Cousins for Sisters

My mom's cat, Basil.

My cat Abe, for my aunt.

Done for Christmas presents. For comparison purposes:




I love how surly my cat looks.

Norman!

I draw things for people now. That's what I do. That's my thing.

This is Norman!

For the gays!

As a youngin', my mother had two gay friends that practically helped raise me. They got married this weekend after 31 years of being together. A couple of days before the wedding, my mother texted me and told me she couldn't find any cards for gay marriages.



...So I made one.

Pride. Geddit?

Okay, actually I didn't think of that joke until after it was done, but I'm still clever, I promise.

Done in watercolor with gouache for the linework while watching a particularly saucy episode of Rome. There are actually some really subtle blues in the mane that the scanner just didn't want to pick up, so that's a little disappointing. They really liked the card though.

Honestly, I checked around and there isn't really a surplus of good gay wedding cards out there. Okay, granted not every state is on the gay marriage bandwagon, but it's not going to stay that way forever. Bwahahaha.

I'm Making a Mask! (Final Sequence)

And thus, after starting this like 2 months ago, the journey comes to an end. Let's check it out.




So, I picked up where I left off and added in the rest of the main. Basically I just cut more cardboard and twisted/tore it till it looked roughly similar to the original mask. Then I used more paperclay to sculpt the crescent for the top of the head.



After letting it dry I hot glued it to the top, using some folded cardboard to make it sit on the head straight.



Then it was time to spray paint!



I first coated it with a base white spray paint, priding myself over being able to avoid doing it all by hand. I used two more colors after this; one a satin finish blue, the other was one of those special-type spray paints that leaves you with a stoney- texture as you paint it. I don't know how it works, but it's magic. Mine was a grey color, and originally I started to apply that to the mask first with the intention of covering it with the blue. Then I got the brilliant idea to put the blue down first and then spatter the grey stone on. THIS WAS A GREAT MOVE.



After a healthy dose of self-congratulation, I gathered a piece of bristol paper and applied the same paint job so I could later cut it out into eye shapes.



I glued the painted eye shapes to the back of the mask like so. Then glued a piece of black fabric over the mouth and nose so you could no longer see through them. Then I flipped the mask over and painted the eyes.

I used more black fabric to cover the back of the mask to give it a more uniform look, then cut a small hole in the fabric so you can hang it on a nail.



Bam! Finished product! I unveil it tonight, though admittedly I'll be a little sad to let it go.

All in all, I estimate the cost of it to be in about the $40-50, only because the stoney spray paint was a bit pricey and it took like 2 things of paperclay to get the base down. In terms of total time to complete, er... things got a little convoluted when I decided to take a crazy long break from it. At a rough guess I would say about 5-6 hours, NOT including all the time I waited for the clay/paint to dry.



Seriously though, I was a genius with that spray paint.

Front Desk Doodles

So I told my manager that I wished I could breath fire and she told me that I'd have to be a dragon in order to do that.

...



Yes, I do solve all my own problems. Talk of dragons led to talk of gryphons and then these guys happened.




And then I promised my manager I'd give her the drawings after I scanned them.

One of the nice things about being in the real world as opposed to art college is that suddenly your skills are valued again. My other manager as well as one of our bellman have requested art from me. Plus Boyfriend bought me an AMAZING Intuos tablet for my birthday and I need to try it out. ...As usual, I do not boast consistent updates, so no promises but I reckon it may help. ...It'll at least help me want to finish things.

I'm Making A Mask (Part 1)

In an unexpected jolt of creativity, suddenly I feel motivated to actually do things.

...Like attempt to make this:


This is actually a thank you gift for Boyfriend for donating a big chunk of money for the Walk for the Animal fundraiser. Also cuz I like him and stuff. We went to see a DJ set of Shpongle last month, and the experience was lucid enough to sell me a bit more on the electronic scene. I've been fairly lost on the music front (on the artistic front in general) lately, so anything that works to motivate me clearly needs to be clung to. Pictures are going to be small for now, but larger ones will come once it's finished.



So, for making masks, I always use a base-form. And because this mask has three sets of eyes, I used two slightly modified half-masks to both give me extra height on the head as well as give me a basic guide for where those extra oculars should go. Then there was hot glue. And hot glue always means burns. Always.

After lubing up the base nice and proper with petroleum jelly (you know, like you use for all your lube - needs), I began applying the Paperclay.



I love Paperclay for many reasons. It air dries, it's extremely lightweight, and it's a very easy material to manipulate. I covered the base, adding depth to the cheek-bones and sculpting the nose out a bit more. For now, all the eye cavities are empty, because I have some sort of crazy idea to put the eyes in later that I'm just sort of hoping will work out. One six ounce package of Paperclay later, once I was satisfied with the shape (I went back and made the brow-lines a bit sadder, and made the mouth less curved so it wasn't being so damn happy), I started working on the lower part of the 'mane'.



Cardboard! No one can say I am not environmentally conscious, what with all of my 'upcycling' and all. Fun fact: this cardboard came from a box that was used to ship a copy of Lost Moon to me. This book (signed by Jim Lovell!) was later given to Boyfriend as a gift.

Moving on. More hot glue was involved in this process, this time with a 30% decrease in burn rate. Pieces were individually cut, with size and shape being determined by a very convoluted process that probably could have been done more effectively if I knew things like math. Then I painted it white, which I would post a picture of except it really isn't all that interesting.

Then it had to sit overnight.

I actually hate this sort of waiting process, especially because the longer it takes to dry, the higher the chance that something awful is going to happen to it in the mean-time. Taking precaution, I placed it on a towel rack in the bathroom to ensure my monster of a savannah cat, Mojito wouldn't eat it. Nigh 24 hours later, I checked up on it.

Still wasn't all the way dry, then I had this brilliant idea of digging through the bathroom cupboard to see if my housemate had a hairdryer. She did, and a few short minutes worth of bending the base mask and being gentle and some minor cussing, the mask was free. Albeit the underside of it was inherently a tad unstable, and the drying process cracked the mask in several places.



This gets remedied by busting out more Paperclay and patching over all the cracks. I use a bit of water on my fingers to help smooth things out. Once that was done, and with the help of the hairdryer, I set out to attach the lower mane to the face.

To preserve the structural integrity of the mask, I put it back on the base - as until it's 100% dry, laying it down without the base could cause the edges to widen. I used Paperclay as my means of fastening the pieces together. It took a lot of adjustments, as doing stuff on one side would cause the clay on the other side to crack/separate. Overall, NOT an efficient way of doing things. After I did the front, I quick-dried it and worked on reinforcing in in the back. Once all of this was done, it looked like this:



(If you look real close, you can spot my Silent Hill monster, Abe in the background)

And that's where it's at for the night. I don't feel comfortable doing anything else to it until it's dry and not liable to fall apart. All of my masks are actually pretty stable, you just don't want to go flinging them around. I've broken a couple, but that's what I get for moving so damn much.

Well, because it's not done yet, I'm feeling a lack of closure. So I'm going to settle all of this by showing you a picture of Mojito laying in a pair of pants I had to abandon after using the bathroom because she wouldn't get out.

Gaga and Forgotten Monsters

I realized after my last post that I didn't include some monster doodles I did. Then I got lazy and never posted them. Then I drew Lady Gaga. Guess who's going to her show at the Xcel Center in August? ...Me.

Work Doodles Part Two

Apparently I've become a bit notorious for doodling on my stuff during meetings. My boss announced out loud that she always looks forward to getting forms back from me because she looks forward to seeing what I've manifested on the paper. So here are some doodles.


Boyfriend


Me in work uniform. I hate pantyhose. With a passion.


A drawing I did of my hairless rat, Goat.


Chimps.


An old character of mine. The feet are atypical of what he'd usually have, but I was just trying it out for fun. Also he looks super homosexual here for some reason.


Habitual makes another appearance. Again his ears have been modified.


A raccoon and a hedgehog - For various reasons.

I can't believe it's been a year since I last made a post in this blog. I'd love to come back with a promise that I'm going to try to update more, but I don't like lying. I HAVE felt a lot more motivated to draw as of late, however. Mostly because my boyfriend bought me a scanner. So hey, even if I'm just uploading scribbles, at least I'll be updating.

And there you go.

Work Doodles Part One

These were all done during the summer. I was bored at work and took some requests from people to draw their characters. This was back in the good ol' days before DeviantArt and Livejournal were blocked.






I really wanted to perfect the craft of being able to draw with pen and not needing to rely on a pencil/eraser. I've gotten better, but it's still hard for me to get my mind off the pressure to not screw up.

Characters are copyright to their corresponding human beings.