Marf Challenge July 2015: Lines and Textures

Another month, another challenge. This time around we've been mostly inspired by Nokkasilis work with ink drawings combined with (watercolour) textures.
The contrast between clean lines and textures, whether used sparsely as highlights or covering larger spaces is super interesting and has of course lots of potential for variation, also thanks to the possibilities of digital textures. There's no need to stick to ink and watercolour, here. Create lines with pencil or brush or pen or your tongue and use whatever textures you find suitable!

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Maybe it has to do with having re-read His dark Materials by Philip Pullman some time ago, but lately my mind has been kind of obsessed with stripping away reality or opening up the sky or whatever (also sewing together sky and earth and playing the harp on invisible sky strings. I have no idea. Brain does, what brain does.)
I also spent June practicing drawing hands, so it seemed fitting to combine those two things.
Most of my creative process might have involved wildly gesturing and positioning my hands.

Pencilling

Inking

So far, so good. I originally planned on creating the textures on a seperate piece of paper and combining everything digitally. Why, though, when the bristol paper can take a bit of watercolour?

So purple. again. what is it with me and purple?

It's a great time to go digital now. As you can see I completely ignored tonal values and colours when I used the watercolours, so that has to be done now. A time of great fun and creating masks follows. (Basically I use different layers of Hue/Saturation with masks to play around until I find a colour combination I like. Oh, and colour balance and selective colour and whatever Photoshop can offer me.)

There you go, it is done:

Marf Challenge April 2015: Pastels

That will be 'chalk pastels' for me, but oil pastels or whatevers pastels you might fancy are just fine.

Alright, the last time I actually used chalk pastels for drawing was about two years ago for my life drawing class. It wasn't 'my thing' to say the least.

Then I stumbled upon Ashly Lovett's amazing children's book illustrations some time last year and thought that maybe I should give that old and dusty box of pastel chalks rotting on my shelf another try. That never happened, though 'pastels' made it on the list for future Marf Challenges and now it turns out the future is here and you'll have to stick with me for another round of 'I don't really know what I'm doing here, but I'll figure something out'.

First things first, I need a concept. Since I don't feel especially proficient with chalk pastels, I decide to go for something relatively simple. My ancient pastels are also chalk sticks as opposed to pastel pencils, so I don't want to go for too many details either (I'm not working on a large format).
Taking all self set limitations into consideration some of my older pictures come to my mind.

As you can see my initial thought was to go for a face peeking out of the surface of an overgrown lake (maybe a bit predatory?), which struck me as too boring, though. Alright, I wanted nothing complicated, but I was letting myself off the hook too easily here.

A change in perspective, then. I actually do a lot of planning while scribbling. At first I placed the figure in the centre of the composition because it seemed only natural to me before deciding to shove her into the left hand corner because 'Why not?'. (No, actually to work against my preprogrammed composition patterns. I really like going for very central compositions and decided consciously against it, which brought an ACEO card I had created for Maren's and mine advent calendar project 2 (?) years ago to mind.)

To me atmosphere is an essential part of planning an image. I need to know how it is supposed to feel. For this one I wanted an underwater image that felt 'safe'. No terror of drowning or anything, more tranquility, peace, and … safety. That was basically my leitmotif.

The next step was asking Google for reference images and creating a rough composing to use as some kind of guiding map.

It's amazing, I know.

My layout drawing is pretty amazing, too.

So, as I said before, I hadn't touched chalk pastels for some time (Uhm, years.) and that was before I new anything about anything and even less about painting or drawing or chalk pastels. I mostly remember smudging a lot. Some years later I decided against that and went for toned paper and, well, drawing. What really irritated me at first was that the colours at hand were all very saturated. If you know my work, you'll know I'm a friend of the monochromatic ('I'll learn that thing with the colours eventually' is right up there with 'Some day I will learn how to actually paint'), so being faced with … colors turned out a bit intimidating. But, what the heck, what's the worst that can happen?

Especially when it's about midnight, which is in my experience a great time for questionable decision. such as using purple for an underpainting. Or something.

Especially, when you come to the point when you seriously wonder why your picture is all purple. Wasn't it supposed to be green? What happened? Oh right, you used purple for the shadows. 

Adding more layers and more layers. Maybe you notice a decided to add a lot of light blue in placed that were  purple before. I actually didn't think pastel chalks were this forgiving, but they are. Nice surprises are the best surprises.

At this point I really liked the textures a markings that had developed and the light blue had turned out to be a great decision (my opinion). At this point I was even thinking of using pastel chalks more in the future. Maybe they go well with my acrylics/charcoal drawings? Something else to try out? 

So I was over the 'ugly stage' of the drawing and started to get excited again.

Until I scanned the whole thing. Nothing more frustrating than scanning something only to wonder what you actually wasted those last few hours of your life on? (Like mirroring your image and realizing  everything is just wrong. And then you can't unsee it. At least on screen. The original still looks fine. Or not. Depends.)

My good old pal Photoshop comes to rescue! Remember I sad atmosphere was important to me? Well, yeah, it's actually more important to me than colour schemes. I generally decide on one beforehand (at least when I plan on using colours otherwise tonal values are enough for me), but the great thing about personal artworks is that I don't have to stick to them when a different colour palette feels more appropriate. (Uhm, nice surprises …)

This one looks a lot warmer now, less like an underwater scene actually, more dreaming that drowning in a way. I also really like the purple shadows now. 

Okay, I really have to clean my scanner of chalk dust now.

Marf Challenge March 2015

Our official challenge title ended up being 'Experiments with scratching and printing' because Maren and me couldn't settle on a precise technique we wanted to try out. Originally we stumbled upon Santiago Caruso's ink&scratch work, then came across Jim Kay's amazing work for Patrick Ness' book A Monster Calls and finally, we never really used classic scratchboards.
Also, have you seen these cardboard etchings?

Basically this challenge is about getting mad with everything you can print and scratch upon. Whether you want to mess around with mono prints on cardboard just to scratch some crude marks in the thing or you'd rather go for that old scratchboard you once bought and never got around to use and then decide to cut it into a thousand pieces and make a creative mess of it in Photoshop, doesn't matter. Just try out something new and see what happens.
(Bonus points if you can get your cat to contribute some scratches …)

I'll keep you updated on the process, which will probably be more interesting than the final artwork.


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So first off, I didn't own scratchboards or any tools especially meant for that purpose and I was pretty reluctant to go on a shopping spree for  'this one challenge', so I had to take a look at what I already had and how to make due with it.
So my first thought was, that if  I put a thick layer of gesso on cardboard and added either a layer of acrylics or ink, I should be able to work with that, right? Also, I could make scratching marks with anything sharp?

Look at that pro tool!

Right. Since this was supposed to be nothing more than a small test, I decided to scratch some fossil vignettes (kind of suits the technique), which worked rather well, although I had to take several breaks to keep my hand from complaining.
(For this use I preferred working with the acrylics layer, although ink works, too. Just maybe not that well … with a needle taped to an especially ugly pencil.)

With eight or so small drawing finished I decided to create some patterns in Photoshop. As you can see they're not actually seamlessly tileable. When I have minute or two I might take a look at how you actually do that …
Otherwise I'm super happy how they turned out, although it would have been faster and easier to achieve the same look by scratching acrylics of a plastic surface. (Like this)

So far so good. Next up would be a 'proper' illustration, or so I thought. The question wa ssimply, what I should do. Not too detailed because that would take ages and leaving enough room for textures and improvisation so I can experiment a bit without worrying too much about messing everything up.

My first idea was to go for an illustration loosely based on the image of having an albatross hanging from your neck. Yeah. It would have a part that involved monotype and a part that involved scratiching and it would all work out very neatly. I'm not quite sure anymore why it didn't, but you can see some very rough thumbnail sketches:

Also some sketches for the concept I ended up going with instead and something completely unrelated.

So the albatross idea stalled and somehow I remembered the W.B. Yeats poem 'The Cat and the Moon'. Or better, I didn't  really remember the poem as a whole, but the fact that it was somehow about how a cat's eyes change the same way as the moon changes form. Based on that I began my first scribbles.

Somehow I was mostly focused on the cats silhouette while being pretty sure about the general concept of making her eyes a crescent and a full moon. I toyed with including lunar phases, but it seemed silly, since it felt like stating the obvious (As in 'but it's already in the poem'.).

Instead I started to think more about tonal values an realized I could use them to make the cat silhouette either pop out or vanish by changing the values of the background. (I often make a whole lot of thumbnail sketches and end up using the first one anyway, so it was nice to see some real process!)

My sketch in format and with values added. I was really excited at this point with high hopes for the finished illustration. 

Unfortunately I didn't really know what I was doing during the process, so it was more a guessing and struggling and I might just do the picture again, just in a way I'm more comfortable with.  (why did I even do these test fossil vignettes? They're nice, but didn't really help my with this one.)

OKAY, we're not quite there yet, though, are we?

gessoing cardboard. still in a good mood.

The plan: applying a layer of dark acrylics I would take of again with a wire brush (I new that worked because I had done that before with another illustration), so I'd get a neutral grey texture for the cloud area. Then I'd monotype the sky and cat silhouette on the whole thing because there's the word 'printing' in the challenge name.

Well, my first mistake was adding graphite dust to the acrylics because I thought it might add some metallic shine to the colour. Well, I wasn't really wrong with that …

Incidentally I also didn't have my steel wire brush at home and the brass one was of course too soft, so look at this shiny polished graphite surface.

Right, not as planned, but nevermind. New Plan: add gesso with a spatula and make sure you get texture and the tonal value you need. Actually, I thought, having the graphite shine through at some places will probably look really neat!

The next step was adding the dark flats, so I looked for a glass slide I had lying around somewhere and sketched the rough form of the cat on one side so I could apply acrylics on the other. 

I then placed it on my textured cardboard thingy and stepped on it to apply pressure. I don't know what you're thinking of when you read 'mono type', but that's my version. (It's not super effective, but I get some nice textures, okay?)

Tell me that's not one top notch cat

Tools of choice

More of a cat. At this point I felt like I couldn't really do anything anymore and decided to go digital.  My former excitment was gone and I started praying to the almighty Photoshop.

Not saying the textures aren't nice, though.

And the final piece. Lots of layers, lots of colour corrections and colour schemes and I'm not completely unhappy, yet I can't stop thinking it might have turned out much better if I had chosen a differnt way of working ('wasted potential') comes to mind. WELL. I might really just do this all over because I seriously like the idea. And I did learn quite a bit about the material I'm working with. Which is the important bit for our challenges. 

Some more textures I really like!

EDIT:

Strictly speaking not part of the challenge anymore, but I really decided to do this illustration again from scratch. Which was totally worth it.

Marf Challenge Januar 2015

Hey there, it's time for the first challenge of the new year!
Sometime last year we realized how difficult it is to draw a little girl that doesn't look creepy. Maybe that's just us and you're all wondering what the heck this is even about, but then you might have trouble drawing creepy little girls (I can't quite imagine, though)?

Anyways we thought this was a fun idea for a challenge:

a) Create an illustration/character design of a little girl that is NOT creepy.

b) Create an illustration/character design of a creepy little girl

Alternatively an illustration including both characters is fine, too.

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First things first: rough sketches of the characters. I'm not sure whether or not there will be backgrounds or what the setting might be, I just want to lay down a general direction (when creating dolls, a lot happens during the creative process, especially when I don't really have any restrictions (such as planned compositions, illustrations. Then I'll have to work with more precise layouts.)
and can rely on intuition and react to the material.) and then see how it goes.

A reason why I believe little girls often end up creepy is, that they are not shown as what they are (human beings), but as dressed up little dolls, which are the stuff of nightmares.
So for my 'not very creepy' girl I imagine her as the outgoing, carefree little sister of Colin (an older doll of mine. His part-time occupation is snail hunting.), who will climb on roofs and trees and terrorize the whole neighbourhood. (If you believe you know how she lost that tooth, think twice.)

For the creepy girl on the other hand I decide to go for a ghostly, impish creature that is, admittedly, not so much a human being.

Next step. I'm going to focus on the decisions I made concerning the 'look' of the characters instead of explaining the technique in detail (I've written about that before and experimenting with materials is half the fun, so I'm not going to take that away from you :)).

The first thing I work on, are their faces and hands because they need longest to dry and do already tell us a lot about the girls' personalities.

For my faerie girl I'm going for a small pointy nose (delicate features matching her hair and dress), which turnes slightly upwards in a mischievous way. She'll get a broad grin so I have to keep that in mind.

Notice that I decided to show her hands after all. Come on, those wirey fingers (also very thin, spidery) are a lot more creepy than not knowing what she's holding behind her back.

At the same time I realize that she doesn't really need any legs. Being a spirit and all, where's the need?

Looking through some leftovers from previous projects (sometimes things don't work out, but that doesn't mean you have to throw everything away. I had this street lantern lying around since the beginning of last year. Why not have her flying like a moth to the light? Why not use a real light for the lantern? Sometimes things just fall in place.)  I start planning the final illustration now.

Gwendoline (which is her name now), being not creepy at all, gets a round, friedly, open face (She might be the really devillish one here, but you wouldn't know). Her mouth will be open and take up more space than I'm used to (Mouths are the facial parts I tend to just leave out with my dolls), so I'll have to make sure that will work.

Her hands are large and clumsy looking, nothing compared to the faerie's metal claws and I decide to go for rubber boots, not so useful for climbing, but giving her the 'will jump through puddles' look.

Her clothes are roughly hand sewn, I deliberately aim for imperfection here and want the yarn to be  very much visible. 

To add detail and character I give her a necklace with dangling, er, charms. Since I have clockwork parts at hand, they fit nicely. The wooden bead is also helping with the family resemblance. (That's siblings for you … matching clothes and wooden beads, okay.). 

So, Gwendoline's all nicely painted, but I have seriously no idea how to best take her picture. I don't have my lighting equipment (not as professional as it sounds) at hand and have to make do with what I have. I end up shooting with daylight, a desk lamp and a steady hand.

You may or may not recognize the location, which is my 'default' environment, serving me we'll, whenever I don't have a background prepared and want to see how photogenic my creations are.

In this case I'm also foreced to tackle one big problem I like to forget: My dolls can't stand. They originally weren't meant to be able to, but since I'm planning to to use them for stop motion animation, I have to find away to solve that problem.

As you can see I attached strings to Gwendoline, which were being held up by, er, whatever was around (The whole construction was quite unstable. On the bright side I have a good idea no, how to build the 'real thing' that will hopefully help to to make my dolls walk and not so much talk.). 

So after hours of trying and failing and trying and failing and eventually not so much failing anymore I ended up with this very neat picture: Gwendoline running through shrubbery.

At the same time, the faerie is still waiting for her background. Some madness possessed me to not only make the whole thing rather colourful, but to include a bit of LED trickery (Which led to more nervewrecking constructions. Unfortunately I have to photos to document the happening.)

Here's a picture of the background in progress, though. I probably spent more time observing the textures the coloures created than actually doing anything, so well ... 

No LED yet, although everything else is in place … The moment of truth is near …

It's glowing!

Look at the edge light! This definitly makes me want to experiment some more with lighting! I'm not sure small LED diodes are the right way, though. I guess there are some nights of heavy googling ahead of me.

(My conclusion is that they are both creepy and adorable in their own ways, though.)