Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Roman on horseback.


This is the first decent horse I've ever drawn from imagination. Woohoo! I like it, but I bet I'll look at it sometime in the future and find some fault I can't see right now.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Dec / Jan


I did this gag newspaper page instead of our usual holiday card, since we couldn't get the kids to stand still for a picture. I grew up looking at all the great early Mad Magazine artists' spoofs of print culture, so this was fun. Long live Will Elder!



I'm still copying from my horse drawing books. I got a great cheap brush pen in Chinatown (L.A.). After a bunch of scut work copying horses, I rewarded myself with some inking.



I decided to start cropping in on decent drawings if the rest of the page sucks... Why didn't I do this before?



I keep trying to draw directly, without any guidelines, or underdrawing, and try new tools. This was a 4B or 6B woodless pencil on so so paper.



I make a lot of little doodles and false starts drawing the kids. Here I actually made a good little drawing, then a bad one (cropped out). I had to include the horse head because it looks good to me.



I seem stuck on this idea that I have to learn to draw from life with an accurate but alive line. Sometimes it works like this, but it usually is a very controlled picture. I can dress it up with some watercolor, and I like the results, but I think I need to start working with value more. Plus, drawing with only line is a hard way to go.

Here I'm just copying the mighty Jean Giraud, or GIR, or Moebius.




It's funny that the French outdid us with the Western comics. Vive La France!


My friend Mike Vosburg has helped me a lot with my drawing. He complimented me on this, so I've included it.

Saturday, January 3, 2009

Happy New Year!



Once in a while I can draw directly in pen. Then next time it turns out terrible. I just keep trying. Happy New Year everyone!