Over the past few days, I’ve been creating YouTube tutorials on drawing my style of whimsical things – fish, flowers, circles filled with patterns, fungi, and leaves. So, I thought I’d use some of these for this week’s template. And for some reason, I wanted to add a fishy totem pole, or three maybe.
Whimsical things do make me smile. And with whimsical, imaginative kinds of line art, it gives permission to use any colours that seem fun. I add colour digitally, and the colours are often vibrant and cheerful when I add them to such cute drawings.
Of course, the drawing has to be completed, but you can watch me draw this section by clicking on this link. Maybe even draw along or create your own version!
As far as I am concerned, there’s never enough whimsy in life. This kind of art lets me escape into a cute world of my own making and, at the same time, take a break from the sad, bad, heartbreaking news that can flood in from all directions. Art is something I do have some control over and, for a while, I can imagine that I’m journeying in a world that has none of our earthly problems.
Thursday is the day I gift a colouring template to the members of Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans Facebook group. I know that not everyone uses Facebook, so I am working up the oompf to sort out a mailing list, so please bear with me while I do that.
This week, it’s a right feast of funky fungi, with some flowers and foliage thrown in for good measure. As far as I’m concerned, in my inner whimsical universe, all fungi are funkily coloured! And I had a lot of fun working with colour in this one, as well as a new brush or two in Clip Studio Paint.
Today’s Pattern Exploration Video
In today’s drawing tutorial video on YouTube, I take a look at Ansu by Lori Manoogian CZT. It’s a rather versatile tangle pattern that makes lovely flowers and foliage for sure.
I spent some lovely time this morning starting to draw this week’s coloring template. I decided to edit some oopsies and add some colour to the part I drew in today’s video.
It was fun to use a different kind of digital brush than I usually do to add colour. There’s a lot more texture that is a little like watercolour. I definitely need to spend more time with these brushes, and others, to understand them though.
Still, after a late breakfast, actually lunch as it’s now midday, I’ll finish drawing the template.
On the weekend, I like to do an artwork of some kind using some of the pattern or motif variations that I’ve developed in the week. This week, the seed pods and flowers just needed to be used in some way.
I thought of lettering the word ‘peace’ but decided on using the peace symbol as the focal point instead. Being born in the early 1960s, I do remember hippies, flower power and the peace movement, so popping plenty of flowers and foliage around the symbol seemed the right thing to do.
The seed pods fit in well, and the song ‘Sowing the seeds of love’ by Tears for Fears came to my mind too. so doubly fitting the message of peace.
Naturally, there are some hearts hidden in there too! And the plumptious moonberry blueberries too, adding some delicious goodness too.
The green background was a tad serendipitous. Partway through the drawing, I remembered that green is symbolic of peace and harmony, among other things. Rather fitting!
I’ve only got the skeleton of the design done. I’ve yet to decide on how to add colour, shadow and/or texture. So, I’m taking a bit of a break from it for my mind to mull things over subconsciously. I think I’d better scan the page before I do anything more to it though! Things tend to go awry when I start to add colour etc.
I finished drawing this Entangled-Doodleworlds template this morning (and videoed the process too).
It’s full of whimsy and cuteness, patterns and critters, plants and other items. I always enjoy drawing templates like this, ones that have little stories in them (or so I discovered yesterday while videoing!).
The nicest thing, however, is that there are lots of areas, so it’s easy to choose one place, one arch, one motif to colour if you don’t have much time or are just overwhelmed by the overall task. This way, you get the satisfaction of completing one part of the design – whether it be a tiny heart, or one of the little worlds under the arches.
I enjoyed adding colour to just a few sections today. It’s always a good thing for me to work with Clip Studio Paint regularly so I can become familiar with the tools, and to learn new ways of working with it.
I always look forward to seeing how people use colour to bring my templates to life.
Here’s today’s video. It’s over an hour long … just a little warning!
It’s taken me a long time, but I’m starting to appreciate how important open space is in a drawing. I completed a drawing at the weekend. I hadn’t left much in the way of open space and it just felt really cluttered and confusing. So, progress made!
Even though I knew I wanted to leave some open space, I still needed to make sure that the other collections of seed pods and so on felt like they worked together, that there was a flow and connection. So, I tackled that in this video too.
I knew I wanted to put some texture and pattern in the background. So, I used a white Sakura Souffle pen to add some simple, fairly airy patterns.
Now, I just need to decided how much of this drawing to complete. It’s an exploration of patterns and techniques, a sketchbook page. It’s freeing to accept that I can do as much, or as little, as I wish to this page. It’s a chance for me to practice and experiment with different media and techniques with no pressure on creating a polished, finished piece of art.
Today is the third session of work on this drawing. I’ve added some more ornate seed pods, based on the same simple form as the original ones, and some foliage. Here’s the link to today’s video.
I wanted to see how Graphitint pencils worked with the Albrecht Durer water colour pencils. Mainly, I wanted to see how the graphite in the Graphitint would add shadow to the colour. I did this on a couple of the new flowers at the bottom left. I’m not entirely sure what’s going on, but it’s something for me to experiment with more.
I had a ‘ta-da!’ moment as I was talking about where to place the next collection of motifs. I realised that I do think about this, very quickly and not in words. There’s some kind of analysis that goes on that I don’t quite catch, probably because it is in symbols/abstractions rather than words. Having to put words to the thoughts and decisions I was making had two effects. One, my thoughts were slowed down. Two, the words let me realise that I do think!
I’ve mentioned this before, but there seem to be two styles of inner monologue – one is in words, the other rather abstract. Apart from my inner critic, my thoughts tend to be of the abstract kind it seems.
“As in, some people’s thoughts are like sentences they ‘hear’, and some people just have abstract non-verbal thoughts, and have to consciously verbalize them And most people aren’t aware of the other type of person.”
mymodernmet.com/inner-monologue/
I certainly have to consciously verbalise my thoughts, either by writing or by having to speak them out loud. The weird thing is, I’m often not aware of any opinion or idea or thoughts I have until I do verbalise them. That means I constantly surprise myself!
Anyway, by making YouTube videos, I’m having to vocalise my decisions and thought processes as I draw and that means I’m becoming more aware of what is going on in my head, well in terms of putting words to it. So, this ‘ta-da!’ moment is one of many I’ve had whilst being an arty vlogger. That is a very valuable experience for me.
So, this drawing is coming along quite nicely I think. I’m really enjoying these times to experiment and try stuff out without being invested in a finished, polished artwork. I’ve finally found a way to give myself permission to try things out when I think of them, without worrying about whether they work or not, whether I spoil an artwork or not. It’s a very freeing experience for the hyper-perfectionist part of me.
Thursday comes around quite quickly, and with it comes a new coloring page, or coloring template if you prefer, for the members of the Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans facebook group to bring to life with colour.
This week is a fabulous fungi fantasia. I really enjoyed drawing this one, and adding colour really brings it to life. I’ve chosen rather bright, almost psychedelic colours, as is often the case! So, I’m intrigued to see how others will use colour magic to bring the drawing to life.
The design was drawn with a Tombow Fudenosuke pen on marker paper. This version is coloured digitally in Clip Studio Paint.
Here’s the link to a timelapse video showing the drawing of this template.
Some of the colours in my finished artwork weren’t in the palette. I mixed colours from the palette to achieve the oranges and purples.
It was a fun project that I completed rather quickly for me. I used it as an opportunity to find out more about some of the blending options for the brushes in Clip Studio Paint. I’m not sure anyone could tell the difference with how this has finished, but I started to understand how some of these options work.
It’s nearly midday, and I think it’s time for breakfast before I turn my attention to this week’s template for the facebook group. Food first!
Angela Porter 