ink drawing

Inktober 2019 – Day 01 – Chameleon Skull and Amanita

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©Angela Porter 2019

Inktober 2019

After hunting around Instagram for alternative prompt lists, I decided to go with two and combine them. I chose the Animal Skulls prompts from @book_polygamist and Mushrooms list from @nyan_sun.

So, the drawing above shows a chameleon skull combined with Amanita, along with some other design elements. Today’s official prompt from Jake Parker’s Inktober 2019 list is ‘ring’. I can make that fit in too – a ring of fairy toadstools, the ring of the eye-socket in the skull.

The black line work was done with Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pens. I then used an 8B pencil with a blending stump to clumsily add some shading. Then, after scanning the image in, I added colour digitally using Autodesk Sketchbook Pro, Microsoft Surface Pen and Microsoft Surface Studio.

It’s been a very, very long time since I did any drawing like this. My usual style is rather whimsical, cute and simplified to create a stylised form.

While this drawing isn’t realistic, it is more so than I usually do. Having said that, I have added some simplified design elements in the form of leaves and berries and the repeating pattern of arches to give a floor for the skull to rest on.

I found it interesting to add the more realistic skull with the less realistic Amanita and stylised leaves and berries.

It took me over three hours to create this drawing; I’m not sure I can spend that amount of time everyday given the work I need to do in the coming weeks. I shall see though how it goes.

So, Angela, how are you feeling?

I’m OK. I don’t feel as tired as I have lately and there’s also a contented feeling inside me. There’s also a frisson of excitement about turning my attention to work – something that has been a bit lacking over the past month or so.

I did get an early night along with a good night’s sleep last night, which always helps. The sun has just broken through the clouds, albeit briefly, and even a little sunshine helps to boost my mood too. I hope there’ll be more periods of sunshine to help my mood after the past days of heavy rain and even heavier grey skies, although we did have a break from it on Sunday with some bright sunshine in the day.

It’s only in the past couple of weeks that I’ve recognised how much the weather can affect my mood.

EMDR yesterday was puzzling, confusing and upsetting too. However, I came away not as exhausted as I usually do. Indeed, I was able to focus on art in the evening – I did most of the drawing of the chameleon skull with amanita.

My therapist and I did have a conversation about how I found it so hard to go into a cafe for lunch after my Time to Change Wales talk last week. She suggested that in future I take something with me to eat just in case I can’t go into a cafe – that way I can still take care of my physical needs and emotional needs without being hard on myself, calling myself weak and a failure for not doing such a simple thing as going to a familiar cafe for lunch.

Still have progress to make on that goal of mine, but some progress on recognising how I feel about myself not being able to do it at the moment has been made. So it’s not all bad.

Inktober 2018 – Day 7 – “Exhausted”

Angela PorterLeave a comment

Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 7 - Exhausted

Exhausted is how I feel today, so the prompt is very apt!

I woke with a migraine-type headache, and it’s only recently begun to lift, after quite a few Anadin Extras (it’s ok – I kept within the recommended dose!).

Headaches like this leave me exhausted afterwards; it’s only a good sleep that helps to remove the last remaining vestiges of them. Maybe I’ll nap in a while.

What hasn’t helped is yet another day of hammer-drilling next door. I’d’ve gone out if (a) I could see to drive properly and (b) I wasn’t expecting a delivery of a new printer.

My Epson printer died on me on Friday. Terminally died on me. It’s not been used that much. It has been used for scanning more than printing, but it just refused to work, no matter what I did.

I wasn’t very happy with it. The ink jet thingies didn’t work well after a while and I got streaks in the printing – no matter how often I cleaned them. I only ever used genuine Epson ink cartridges.

The scanner was really slow too.

So, I’ve returned to a Brother printer; this time a mono laser printer, and it arrived today and I managed to set it up relatively easily.

So, my Inktober drawing for today is above. I drew it on paper with a black Papermate Ink Joy gel pen. I scanned it in (didn’t check the settings so bits of top and left are cut off).

Then I threw it into Autodesk Sketchbook pro to change the colour to one that looks more washed out and exhausted, just how I feel – blue and grey and pale at the moment.

I wanted to add colour to the hand-lettering, but the headache means I couldn’t be arsed to do so at the moment.

My drawing skills aren’t brilliant on this one. The headache has affected my vision a tad as well as giving me slightly wobbly fingers. As the headache goes, all will be well again – and it’s nowt to be worried about; I get these headaches from time to time and I’ve not had one for more than a month now I think.

So, once I’ve finished this post, I’ll be off to make the great restorative – a good mug of Yorkshire tea! I think I may be able to face a little something to eat too, which could help too to lift some of the exhausted feeling.