Angela Porter

Pen and Wash | Entangled Art | WIP

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Link to today’s vlog on YouTube.

A very small penny dropped yesterday. I realised that what I’m doing is pen and wash, or ink and wash, or line and wash. I’m not entirely sure that a label is required, but it seems to fit.

I’m adding watercolour of one kind or another – Inktense, Ecoline, Mijello Mission Gold, Distress Inks, etc – to a pen drawing. Why I haven’t made that connection to the description of the method/process? I have no idea! Still, I have made that connection and a realisation that it gives a sense of artistic legitimacy to my work. That is a function of my insecurities when it comes to my artistic espression.

Yes, that’s right. Insecurities. Lack of confidence. Lack of belief in myself. Self-questioning about what on Earth I’m doing.

It is always nice for me when pieces of a rather abstract, metaphoric jigsaw fall into place, giving me a more coherent view of my method, my artistic voice.

These pieces always fall into place at the right time for me. I’m ready to accept that line and wash is what I do well, when I work within ‘an elegance of limits’ to quote the team at Zentangle. In this case a limited palette of colours harmonious with the background.

As well as working on this particular drawing, I have included some views of recent work in my sketchbook in today’s vlog. This other work shows me trying to work out how to add more contrast to the wash of colour. Fine ballpoint pen, graphite pencil and tortillon or coloured drawing pencils/chalk pastels are what I’m exploring. Eventually, I will settle on a method that I particularly like. I’m not happy with any of these at the moment.

I will continue to explore an figure it out. That’s what I’ve done with adding colour to my drawings, and that’s what I’ll do when it comes to increasing contrast with shadows and highlights.

Of course, I’m talking here about traditional art. When it comes to digital art, I think I have found a way I’m comfortable with in adding colour to pen drawings. I’m not quite there yet with traditional media, as well as finding the traditional media I like to work with.

Tranquility

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Tranquility ©Angela Porter | Artwyrd.com

Not sure I’ve captured the sensation of tranquility all that well. All I can say is that I gained a sense of tranquility whilst drawing the mandala.

I’m tired today. Again, I woke way too early and couldn’t get back to sleep. So, I thought I’d try to do some art to soothe and relax me.

Background texture – Distress Oxide inks on Daler-Rowney mixed media paper.

Mandala – Digital art using Autodesk Sketchbook Pro and Microsoft’s Surface Studio and Surface Slim Pen.

November’s coloring template

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November colouring template ©Angela Porter | Artwyrd.com

A new month means a new colouring template exclusively for members of the Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans facebook group. If you’d like to download, print and colour a template, then pop over to the group, join (it’s free!).

A few, simple terms and conditions apply. All I ask is that you follow them and mention myself and the facebook group when you share the coloured template on social media. Tag me in your posts and I’ll definitely get to see them!

Autumn is well established here in the UK, so I wanted to combine leaves, berries and some acorns in a mandala.

I used an autumnal colour palette to bring the template to life. I think mine looks like a rich, decorative rug. However, I love to see how creative you people are with your colour schemes, particularly those of you who are heading into Spring or who don’t really experience Autumn in your part of the world.

I did draw and colour this mandala digitally, using Autodesk Sketchbook Pro along with my Microsoft Surface pen and the paper that is the screen of my Microsoft Surface Studio.

My interview with nfreads.com

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I recently did an interview with Tony Eames from nfreads.com about my books, my art, and my quirky self.

You can read the interview here.

Work in progress

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Work In Progress ©Angela Porter 2019 - Artwyrd.com
Work In Progress ©Angela Porter 2019 – Artwyrd.com

It’s a new month so that means a new coloring template is available to members of the Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans facebook group, and this is the template! I thought I’d add some colour to it before I head out for the rest of the day.

I drew the template with Fudenosuke pens from Tombow on Bristol Board from Winsor and Newton. The paper is A4 in size (that’s approx. US letter size).

I’ve started coloring it digitally (Autodesk Sketchbook Pro, Microsoft Surface Pen, Microsoft Surface Studio), as that’s what I’m enjoying at the moment.

This month I’ve gone for my signature entangled style of art, but using the Fudenosuke pens, which I’m really enjoying using, gives varying linewidths and heavier lines and a more graphic feel to the art.

It’s free to join the group, there are some terms and conditions attached to the template use. If you’d like to download and colour the image then pop along to the group and you’d be made most welcome!

I’d also love to see how you colour this template. Yes, really, I would!

The difference colour makes …continued

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©Angela Porter 2019 Artwyrd.com
©Angela Porter 2019 Artwyrd.com

I thought I’d show you the progress I’ve made on this drawing. I hope you find it interesting to see how things are progressing with it.

Yesterday, I didn’t get much done as I was whacked out after EMDR therapy in the afternoon. It was very intense with some very powerful physical pains as well as some emotionally upsetting insights. Tears flowed. An hour of discomfort to help to release years and years of emotional/mental pain and suffering isn’t too bad is it?

Today I’ve not done anything. I did an anti-stigma talk to a group of health-care employees for the ABMU Health Board at Singleton Hospital in Swansea. This was on behalf of Time to Change Wales in my role as a champion.

The drive there was horrendous. The rain was absolutely hammering down. Then, it was really difficult to find somewhere to park. I did find somewhere eventually. Then, there was the walk to the hospital and the problem of finding my way to the Chapel/Multi-faith Centre. By that time, the stress of not finding parking easily had caused me to flip into hypervigilance mode and it wasn’t easy to see or decode information.

Eventually I must’ve looked totally lost, a nice man asked me if he could help. When I said the chapel, I noticed another chap had come over and he had a Time to Change Wales badge on and it turns out he was Martin, one of two new champions who had come to observe me.

We had directions to the chapel and the other champion was waiting outside.

I did my talk, became, for me, quite emotional, and left, after chatting with people and Martin and Connor, the other TTCW champion.

I was glad to find my way back to my car, and started to feel a bit spaced out as I drove home. Thankfully the rain had mostly stopped though the spray was horrible.

I’ve eaten and had some tea but I still feel drifty and floaty and I really, really could do with a long nap now. It’s taken nearly 4 hours for me to feel ready to nap. However, I can’t take a nap as I have to drive to Hereford this evening for around 7:15pm. My sat nav said it would be an hour and a half journey there. Perhaps I could have a quick nap …

I know tomorrow I have another anti-stigma talk to do – this time with a group of police officers at Ton Pentre police station – and a medical appointment later in the day. Thursday I’m doing another antistigma-talk to a group of trainee nurses and midwives over in Abergavenny.

I foresee some early nights ahead of me, though most probably not tonight!

Tiny botanical tile 23 September 2018

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Angela Porter 23 September 2018

Yesterday, I had an enjoyable couple of hours drawing fairly cute designs that are 6cm x 6cm (approx. 2½” x 2½”).

I drew my little designs (twelve of them in total, and not all of them I’m all that fussed on at the moment) on Rhodia dot grid paper with a Uniball Unipin 05 pen. Then, I scanned them into the computer and did my usual magic to remove the dot grid and create a transparent background.

Finally, I used Autodesk Sketchbook Pro and a Microsoft Surface Pen, along with my Microsoft Surface Studio to colour the image.

I used various brushes and brush textures to achieve the colouring.

It’s really small, for me. A 6cm x 6cm size would look darling on a small greetings card or note card. I also think they’d make a lovely addition to a BuJo, Planner or Scrapbook page.

Autumn Equinox 2018

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Angela Porter Autumn Equinox 23 September 2018 coloured

I’m a day early as tomorrow is the Autumn Equinox (Spring Equinox in the Southern Hemisphere), but here’s my mandala for this year’s equinox.

I’ve made the uncoloured template an exclusive ‘freebie’ for members of the Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans facebook group. Terms and conditions apply to it’s use, so please make sure you read them if you choose to wander over and join in.

Drawn and coloured in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro using a Microsoft Surface Pen and Microsoft Surface Studio.

Dangle Day Friday 21 September 2018

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Angela Porter Dangle Day 21 September 2018

It’s Friday, so that means it’s #dangleday!

A simple, elegant design with a sweet sentiment for this week’s dangle design. I like the symmetrical nature of the dangles.

I did sketch the design out in pencil on dot grid paper which I scanned in to ink in digitally and make use of the symmetry tool in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro. I also coloured and added texture with various brushes in Sketchbook. Naturally, I made use of a Microsoft Surface Pen and Microsoft Surface Studio to do this.

I kept to a really simple colour scheme, using just one pink, golden, blue and green colour gradient for the design, with the exception of the rainbow beads in the central dangle.

It would be really easy to put a different sentiment or greeting in the box, but I like this one.

A different colour scheme, of course, would result in a very different ‘feel’ to the card, matching all kinds of seasons and occasions.

This would make a lovely greetings card or note card. I think I’d like to use it for the beginning of each month in a BuJo, planner or diary, changing the colour scheme as appropriate for that month. I do like playing with themes for my BuJo, but there’s something in me that likes a cohesiveness in design/style.

What would you do with this design? Let me know by leaving a comment.

Of course, I could print the uncoloured version out and colour with different media. It would be no great chore to re-draw the design on paper more suitable for, say, watercolours, where my printer doesn’t cope with decent quality watercolour paper.

Just a little reminder that my book ‘A Dangle A Day’ is available for pre-order, just click on this link. In the book I give help, guidance and advice on creating your own dangle designs, as well as providing many examples of monogram dangles and dangle designs that you can use for your own projects.

Repeating patterns 20 September 2018

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Angela Porter Seamless Tiles 20 September 2018 small

The other day I had a bit of fun with a program called Repper Pro. It allows you to easily make tiles from any image you have saved on your computer. These tiles can then be turned into tiled patterns which are seamless.

I used just two of my latest abstract botanicals and after less than an hour I had saved over 100 tiles to my hard drive! You can see some of my favourite ones above.

Some of these tiles were made from tiles I’d created rather than the original artwork.

I would love to see some of these as patterns for cushions or framed pictures in canvas work or cross stitch. I also think they’d make beautiful fronts for greetings cards or note cards just as they are. In fact, some of the patterns I prefer as single tiles rather than as repeating tiled patterns.

Here are just four of these as tiled patterns. I think they’re lovely, and I’m amazed how easy it is to use the Repper software and how my artwork can be used in this way too.

I’m not sure if they’d make wonderful fabric, they could be too busy for lots of applications, but then this is all personal preference for sure.

Angela Porter Repeating pattern 20 September 2018 04

Angela Porter Repeating pattern 20 September 2018 03

Angela Porter Repeating pattern 20 September 2018 02

Angela Porter Repeating pattern 20 September 2018 01