stylised drawing

Hearts and flowers mandala

Angela Porter2 Comments

Today’s art is a mandala with hearts and flowers as the main themes. I’ve only used three colours – red, green and gold! That’s surprising to me; usually, I go to town on colour. However, in this case, it gives a coherency to the design I prefer.

One thing I may do is to revisit it and add textures to the spaces between the design elements. And a drop shadow would help to lift it off the paper a bit more.

Mandalas are really soothing and meditative to draw and add colour to. And I certainly need that today.

The last few days have had me intensely inking in colouring pages and adding colour to some of them. Yesterday I was determined to get the last couple done, and I overdid it a bit; my damaged muscles/tendons/ligaments between two ribs are rather stiff and sore. But I got it done! Whimsical Houses is complete, and the cover and back art for the next book is also done. So, now I can take a bit of a breather and spend some time on personal projects.

I’m also so tired today. My mind was working twenty-nine to the dozen last night. I woke before 4 a.m. and couldn’t get back to sleep. So, I see a nap not too far in the future. But before that tea. Lots of tea. Probably some lunch too!

Entangled Drawing Practice

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I’ve been slowly working on this drawing over several days. Little by little, it’s been finished and brought to life with colour.

I’m not quite finished yet; I’m still adding white dots as highlights! That’ll take me a goodly amount of time, no doubt.

Slowly is the correct description of my ability to work, slowly and a little at a time with breaks in between. This muscle healing process is very slow and I’m really learning I can’t push myself too hard. But I really do feel I’m making some kind of progress, which is all that matters.

Drawing Practice! (And a catch up).

Angela Porter2 Comments

It’s been a while, but it’s nice to be back. I’ve had to take a break due to an injury. I damaged some of my intercostal muscles, and drawing, sitting, and typing has been almost impossible for nearly four weeks. But I am slowly getting better.

I have missed being able to create so much, yet I’m so rusty at doing so as well! I may not often post for the next couple of weeks or so as I continue to heal and improve, but … as time goes on, I’ll get back into the swing of things for sure!

Medieval Inspired Botanical Bookmark

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I have no idea why, but tall, thin drawings (bookmarks) just appeal to me. Indeed, they always have.

I enjoyed drawing this one, and I’m fairly pleased with the chosen colours. There’s a soft, muted, vintage palette along with the flowers, seed pods, berries and leaves mainly inspired by Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts and the work of the Arts and Crafts Movement artists.

If you’d like to follow a #comedrawwithme video for this design, just click on this link!

Moon Poppies

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A bookmark decorated with whimsical and stylised ‘moon’ poppies.

I really enjoyed drawing this one and adding shades of blue-grey to bring out the volume in the drawing. Of course, there is a drawing tutorial on YouTube showing how I created this bookmark.

Two Seed Pod Posies

Angela Porter2 Comments

This morning I finished the posy to the right, and I thought it would be interesting to post both versions together.

The version on the right was actually drawn before the one on the left; it was the inspiration for yesterday’s drawing tutorial video on YouTube. I decided to add colour to it yesterday evening, and I added the subtle background pattern this morning.

I like both and would find it hard to pick one as a favourite. There are pros and cons to each for sure.

What do you think? Which do you prefer?

Whimsical, stylised Seed Pods #ComeDrawWithMe #DrawWithMe

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I love seed pods! They are often so architectural in nature. They lend themselves to whimsy and stylised drawings so well too.

I love giving them sturdy stems with tops that look like column capitals. The leaves on these are inspired by medieval illuminated manuscripts, something else I absolutely love!

For the panel behind them, I decided to keep the pattern fairly simple – Tripoli, a Zentangle tangle pattern.

If you’d like to draw your own seedpods, then take a look at the accompanying draw with me tutorial on YouTube.

Whimsical Flowers – Creating Variations

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Please click on the “Watch on YouTube” button to view in Youtube. Cheers!

Flowers are things I really enjoy drawing, particularly whimsical and stylised ones. So, today I drew a few for a drawing tutorial YouTube video.

“Thistle” – An Art Nouveau Inspired Drawing

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I’ve spent some time over the last day or two looking at Art Nouveau flower designs. I was particularly fascinated by a thistle design.

This is my interpretation of the design drawn with Copic Multiliner SP pens (0.1, 0.25 and 0.5) on paper. Then, after scanning the drawing, I added colour digitally using Clip Studio Paint. So, this counts as ‘tradigital’ art!

I chose a simple colour palette; I was inspired by William Morris, the Arts and Crafts Movement and Art Nouveau. And, the colours are more mellow than is, perhaps, characteristic of my work.

The version on the left has just flat colours, no shade or highlight; I let the contour lines suggest volume. This is more true, I think, to the Arts and Crafts Movement and Art Nouveau.

To the version on the right, I added some shadows and highlights, but subtly for me. And even though they are subtle, they have a distinct effect, which surprised me.

These show just two of the many coloured backgrounds I tried out. This is why I love adding colour digitally! It’s so easy to try out different colour combinations, methods of adding colour, and so on.

Which version do you prefer?

I like them both, but I think the one on the right is my favourite; I like the stronger background colour which allows the flower to ‘pop’. I also think the subtle shadows and highlights do add a little something to it too.

William Morris Inspired Botanica

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Click on this link to view the accompanying Draw With Me tutorial video on YouTube.

William Morris, one of the primary founders of the Arts and Crafts Movement, is one of my favourite artists. I love the ornate botanical and nature-inspired designs of quite stylised motifs. I also love the way that colour is used simply in them. That is definitely something I can learn from!

It can take a while for pennies to drop with me, and I don’t know how it has taken so long before I took a look at Morris’s work.

Like myself, Morris was inspired and influenced by Medieval manuscripts. That explains a lot!

I use some motifs from Morris’s designs in this drawing. I applied colour with chalk pastels to the pen drawings, with subtle white highlights from white charcoal. I’m quite happy with the result; I’ve not decided what to do about the background.

Where is this study going to take me? I don’t really know! But I know it’s going to be an interesting one. I’m particularly interested in how Morris used colour, and I hope that will make me comfortable with my own simple way of adding colour to my art.