Drawings: Random Sketches

May 6, 2009 at 6:47 pm | In Drawings | 5 Comments
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One of my Summer goals is to try and make a serious effort to start drawing on a daily or weekly basis again (I haven’t been that dedicated to drawing since College). Basically I want to keep drawing, no matter how lame the drawing looks or how uninspired I feel. I figure if I keep it up, I just might get something good out of it, and maybe I can put the good drawings into a sketchbook someday. This is what came out of my drawing session today (I haven’t drawn in a while, so please bear with me…):

Dorothy & Toto -- When I get some time, I'd like to clean her up & add colour to her in Photoshop. (It's not a bad crop -- I didn't have enough page to finish her toe... lol. >_>)

Rose Lady -- She's just a random sketch of some lady. (The composition was completely unintentional, but I like how it turned out.)

Kittehs -- Lucky (my kitty) is the tuxedo cat on the top left, Crookshanks (my parent's kitty) is on the top right (I apologize, I have no idea WTF happened -- her feet are drawn SO BADDDDD!!), and some foxy kitteh striking a pose is on the bottom.

Drawings: Superhero Chicks Part II

July 2, 2008 at 3:03 pm | In Drawings | 3 Comments
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As promised, I have more girly superhero drawings! (I used the same colouring technique for these ones that I used in Part I.)

First I drew Harley Quinn, one of my favourite characters from Batman: The Animated Series. HQ was once the Joker’s psychiatrist while he was an inmate at Arkham Asylum. Instead of curing him, she falls madly in love with him and becomes a villain herself. HQ was only supposed be in one episode, but her character was so greatly received that she was written into the rest of the series (and has her own comics and toys) and she has gained a big fan following. (I think that HQ’s character was inspired by Cyndi Lauper, because her voice and bubbly personality are so similar.)

My friend Anna wanted me to draw her favourite superhero, Black Canary, so here she is! I have to admit that I didn’t know anything about BC, so I had to look up her backstory and costume reference. BC fights crime in Gotham City with martial arts, and her deafening Canary Cry. I think she rocks because she fights crime in fishnet stockings!

The third drawing I did isn’t a superhero, but she’s still awesome. I drew Emilie Autumn, violindustrial singer-songwriter. EA is one of my favourite musicans, and I think she wears the most fabulous outfits ever! (Some of you might remember the EA doll I made for myself a few months ago — I luff her!). I have tickets for her show in November, so I’m super excited! ^_^

I still have Poison Ivy, Batgirl and Sailor Moon in the works, so stay tuned! ^_^

Drawings: Superhero chicks!

June 23, 2008 at 9:32 am | In Drawings | Leave a Comment
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This week I drew two of my favourite girl superheros for fun. My plan is to take the time to draw more (like Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn, etc…) I tried a new colouring technique this time. Instead of doing the flat layer of colour thing, I decided to colour them in properly. It took me much more time, but I think they look pretty good this way, especially Wonder Woman, since she’s so colourful and vibrant. I tried to make my line really clean this time around, because I wasn’t too happy with my messy lines in my previous drawings. (I was once a clean-up artist, so I really should try to keep my skill up.) Now that I look at them, I think they look like animation cels with that white background! Anyways, without further ado, here’s:

Wonder Woman…

…and Catwoman!

Drawings: Alice and the Geisha

June 13, 2008 at 2:36 pm | In Drawings | 5 Comments
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Sketchclub didn’t have a theme this week (not that I’m good at keeping up with it anyways…), but I decided to draw my own stuff this week anyways. I always start off with a Col-Erase pencil (in this case I used the colour pink), and when I have sketched everything out, I clean-up my sketch with a blue ball-point pen. Then I did the usual thing of adding a layer of colour over top of my drawing in Photoshop. This is what I came up with:

Alice’s Shock

In this scene, Alice has just fallen down the rabbit hole in pursuit of the white rabbit. She tries to go through a small door to chase after him, but she’s too big. Alice drinks a shrinking potion (to get through the door), but when she’s shrunk, she realizes that she’s forgotten the key on the table, so she finds a piece of cake (in my case a chocolate chip cookie), takes a bite and gets bigger again. She grows way too big to get through the door and begins to cry. Her teardrops create The Pool of Tears, which whisks her through the door and off to Wonderland. (For the Alice fans, you might notice that this drawing is in homage to John Tenniel’s version. ^_~) When I added the layer of blue to the drawing, I decided to add a bit of white to Alice’s eyes and pink to her cheeks to really enhance her look of shock.

Sad Geisha

Okay, I have to admit it: I *love* Geisha’s. I love them for their aesthetic value, and I love their dedication to their artistic lifestyle. One of my Flickr contacts (mboogiedown) is always posting absolutely gorgeous photos of authentic Geisha’s (Geiko’s) and Maiko’s, and it’s such a delight to peer into this secret world. It’s really hard *not* to appreciate the beauty of these women. Geisha’s wear a kimono (which can consist of over 10 layers of fabric), all held together with an obi (the large “belt” that is tied around their waist). They also wear geta (wooden sandals) which can be almost a foot high off the ground, so their body movement becomes quite limited and restrictive. However, when they do have to move around to dance, they can get quite expressive poses with simple shapes like the tilt of a head or a bent arm (like this photo or this one). I love playing around with these shapes while I’m drawing Geisha’s. This drawing is also a commentary on the life of a Geisha. I will never know what it is like to dedicate my entire life to mastering the arts 24/7, but I can just imagine that you’d have to sacrifice a lot. I think there is such a beauty to Geisha’s, yet I think there is an incredible sadness about them too. So, my Geisha is feeling sad as she lets beauty fall away.

I guess I have Geisha’s on the mind more than usual because of the Hannari: Geisha Modern documentary premieres in the next couple of weeks. It’s playing at a theatre near me, and I plan on dragging my husband to it. ^_^

If you would like to read more information about Geisha’s, the Immortal Geisha site is great for information (for instance, did you know that the first Geisha were men?) and they have a great forum, too. If you’re looking for a great read, pick up Geisha: A Life by Mineko Iwasaki, a true biography written by a real Geisha who lived in Kyoto. Her story is fascinating, and she hopes to squash the common stereotype that all Geisha are prostitutes… a stereotype that is held up as fact in the well-known Memoirs of a Geisha book by Arthur Golden. Even though the life of Sayuri is practically stolen from Golden’s interview with Iwasaki, I still think it’s a good book, and the movie is gorgeous.

Paintings: Zombuki sisters ♥

June 2, 2008 at 3:48 pm | In Drawings, In progress, Paintings | Leave a Comment
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I recently completed these two acrylic paintings of Hanami and Ume, the Zombuki Sisters. I kept the Hanami painting for myself (because I own Hanami), and I sent the Ume painting to Brigitte (because she owns Ume. Brigitte is also the mastermind behind the Zombuki customs). A few weeks ago Hanami sauntered off to spend some time at the “Zombuki Spa”, getting minor changes to her face-up. When she came back, she was even more gorgeous than I thought she could be! I was so pleased with Hanami’s new changes, that I decided to make something as a thank-you for Brigitte. That’s when I thought of making two paintings of the sisters. I thought it would be fun to make a set of paintings that match when they are side by side (they mirror each other, and the blue/turquoise gradation (that is hard to tell in pics) matches in the background), but they will forever be apart, just like Hanami & her sister Ume. Awww. ♥

[Hanami is on the left, Ume is on the right.]


[Strange Sisters #5, by pbrigitte]

Here are some close-up shots. It’s hard to tell in these pics, but their eyes have a silvery/shiny layer of paint over them.

Here are a few in progress shots:


[First concept sketch]


[First I draw out the preliminary sketch, then I draw directly on the canvas exactly what I'll be painting. ^_^;]


[Next I just fill it in! I start painting their faces, and then their hair, and after Hanami & Ume are all painted in, I decide on the colour of the background.]


[They're almost 1/2 done in this pic. There's my reference pic of Ume, and Hanami thinks this work is very tiring, so she takes a nap. ^_^]


[And after all that painting, they're finally done!]

More pics here!

Sketchclub: The Gashlycrumb Tinies

April 29, 2008 at 10:24 am | In Drawings | Leave a Comment
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I seriously don’t know how I found time to work on plushies and draw during the *same week*! I guess when I’m super duper busy, I find a way of packing in a lot of stuff at the same time. I dunno. lol. But I think the main reason why I participated this time is because of the theme. This week was Edward Gorey’s “The Gashlycrumb Tinies“, which is one of my favourite books of all time (as well as one of my favourite artists of all time)! I was so motivated to draw stuff for it, that I topped my record and drew 3 pieces! :O (The Sketchclub is even thinking of putting a book together if we do the whole alphabet, but I don’t think we’ll get that many entries.) It was a lot of fun working on this theme, and I drew while watching some of my favourite movies (Labyrinth, Neverending Story, and Mirrormask). It was weird drawing my own versions of this story because I think Gorey did an amazing job on the book, and it would be near impossible to make any new version even come close to the amazingness that he’s done.

Anyways, here they are:


Z is for ZILLAH who drank too much gin.
This one was my first, and favourite piece, and the one I spent time putting extra detail into. I know that Zillah looks older than a child, but I had so much fun drawing her long legs and little feet, that she just became older. :P I added a Sweet Madness Doll into the pic for fun… it’s like dolly tea time! ^_^


C is for CLARA who wasted away.
Clara was fun to draw. I tried using sharp shapes in this one. I like how her hair looks like it’s shriveling up and dying.


M is for MAUD, who was swept out to sea.
I tried to make Maud look like a little French girl. ^_^ I thought about going for a Hokusai type wave (which is one of my favourite pieces of art of all time), but since it was my last drawing, I got lazy and didn’t bother even putting any detail into it. :P

I drew everything in my sketchbook with a light blue pencil. The colour was altered later, in Photoshop. When I’m drawing, I can already see the colour of certain things before there’s colour there (for instance, Maud has brown hair, she’s wearing a white & navy blue outfit, and she has a bright red ribbon tied around her waist). As I was working on each piece, I already knew the colour theme I wanted to change it to. I decided a on monochromatic scheme because I suck at digital colouring, and I figure that this is the easiest thing to do, and I think it looks nice. (It’s also a style I first tried out with the Leprechaun I drew back in March.)

Drawings: Sketches from the road

April 18, 2008 at 9:19 am | In Drawings | 4 Comments
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Last weekend I took a road trip from LA > San Francisco, then back down to LA again. We drove along the coast on the way up, and took the inland route on the way back. The landscape in California is so diverse! (You can see my pics from the road trip HERE.) Anyways, I was able to do some drawing, which I haven’t had much time to do lately (yes, I’ve been slacking on Sketchclub as usual. >_>). So, here are some of my drawings from this past weekend:

Sketchclub: St. Patrick’s Day

March 16, 2008 at 5:37 pm | In Drawings | 2 Comments
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Boy did I sure fall off the Sketchclub boat! >_> I’ve really been meaning to participate, but I keep forgetting. So this week I tried to make an earnest effort, and I actually came up with something. So, here’s my little leprechaun with his pot of gold:

Etsy: 5 original paintings

February 13, 2008 at 3:54 pm | In Drawings, Etsy | 2 Comments
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I recently found 5 paintings stored away in one of my boxes in the closet (it’s amazing what treasures you find when cleaning up, lol). I painted these back in 2001, and because they were tucked away in a box for so long, I think it’s time to part with them. So, I’ve listed them in my Etsy shop. If they don’t sell, I’m going to paint over them with new images instead. My favourite one is “The Seer”, on the top left, so I may keep that if it remains unsold. They’re all painted with acrylic paint on canvas, and the faerie wings are painted with pink glittery puffy paint. The pink plastic star (on the painting on the top right) is glued to the canvas, and glows in the dark. All the faeries have glitter on them, cause that’s how faeries are. ^_~

1. The Seer – She holds a black raven in her hands, and can see our fate. She quietly exists among the stars.
2. Faerie of Love – She is full of passion and lust, and likes to blow kisses at everyone.
3. Faerie of the Air – She likes to glide along the wind currents until she find the most perfect cloud to have a nap on.
4. Purple Faerie – She is a saucy and confident creature, and likes to push your buttons. ^_^
5. Nimue – She is one of The Lady of The Lake’s many names. In this painting, Nimue is on top of a windy hill, gazing into a ball of light. The zodiac sign “Gemini” floats above her head.

Sekrit plush dolly plans revealed!

December 13, 2007 at 5:05 pm | In Artistic Inspiration, Drawings, In progress | 11 Comments
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Okay, so I’ve been wanting to create my own line of something for a while now. I have ideas for plush tea bags, plush/vinyl mushroom guys, but I also want to make my own dollehs. I am very inspired by Craig McCracken (creator of the Powerpuff Girls, and art director on Dexter’s Labratory), Anna Chambers (amazing illustrator, and she has her own line of plushies), and Mizna Wada (amazing illustrator and plush/vinyl toy maker. She made Lollipop Girl and painted Blood Girl), but I also want to bring my own style too. (I hope I did!) Here are the first set of sketches that I drew:

L>R: Pink Victorian Mistress, Alice in Wonderland, Gothy Sad Girl, Dorothy Gale, Zombie Girl, Shy Heart.

L>R: Gloomy Girl, Victorian Mistress, Alice in Wonderland, Dorothy Gale, Snowflake Girl.

Next up, instead of diving right into making a plushie (which can be very frustrating for the first time around), I decided to make a felt “sketch” of what I wanted, so I could eventually make a pattern off of the sketch. This way I could see what size things needed to be to look good, and it gave me an idea of what worked, and what didn’t. Things can work great as an idea or on paper, but when translated to 3D, it can be a different story altogether… or even from the felt “sketch” to the final product could have things that won’t work (like the coloured streaks in her hair look kinda neat on the felt “sketch”, but they’re too small to sew onto the hair, so I went with the stitched look instead). The felt “sketch” is of my Absinthe Zombie Girl. I need to buy more grey felt to actually make her. :\

So the next thing was, I made a pattern from Absinthe Zombie Girl, and decided to make my first plush doll based off of Emilie Autumn. It was soooooooo much fun making her. I made her all the way back in September (or was it August?), but work had such a *huge* crunch, that I didn’t have time to do make anymore of them. Now that I have the time, I can actually start making these for real. ^_^ I’m going to post her at the EA forum, and see what people think. :P Posted!

[Below is Miss Autumn herself... a big inspiration of mine. :) ]

The next time I would like to use nice material for her dress, instead of felt. I made her striped socks out of strips of felt because I didn’t have any striped material at the time. :P

I really like the way that Anna Chambers’ uses stitches instead of an outline or change of fabric, etc to show lines. So, I used her idea and added stitches in her hair to show swooping and swirling hair.

Then my second attempt was to make brown-haired Mushroom Girl. I’m happy with how her face and hair turned out, but I don’t like how her dress folds and creases weird. Next time I’m going to give her a skirt. I also made her striped socks out of strips of felt, but now that my striped fabric has arrived, I don’t have to do that anymore. ^_^

Then I decided that I really should work out what I wanted for the dress/skirt, and I came up with this (below). The doll body is the same fabric as the skirt. After the skirt is made, I hand sew it onto the body, giving the illusion that it’s all one piece.

I don’t actually have a name set in stone for what I’m going to call these dolls, or what their names will be (still working on all of that), but I have lots of ideas of more types of dollies I want to make. I guess you’ll just have to stay tuned. ^_~

That’s the end of the tour. Thanks for looking! ^_^

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