Happy Halloween!

'With My Mind She Runs'

Development

Inspired by a photo I saw of someone in costume at Burning Man and another artists work called ‘Light Inside” by Tamberella. I suppose it’s about inspiration; staying inspired and running with it! Oh, and i like drawing feathers!

‘In Bloom’

Following a digital illustration course and learning to paint in Photoshop, it became this…

(Thanks to Lexy and Nick at Turnip Starfish and everyone else on the course!)

Which then turned into this ...

Taking The Next Step

After many months of drawing from reference, learning anatomy, attempting gesture drawing, going out with a sketchbook and looking at lots of artwork, I finally decided to begin putting what I had learned into practice and stop copying and start really drawing!

So, after playing around with a pencil and some inks, I came up with this.

Here's another couple of portraits.

Patti Smith - Gothic Crow

Final cleaned up pencil drawing.

Drawing in progress

 My first piece is of one of my heroes, Patti Smith. She was once described as "a gothic crow" by Salvador Dali and this was the initial inspiration for this piece. My idea was to have her hair turn into feathers and while researching suitable photos of her I found a great one by Annie Leibovitz. The photo showed her strong character and reminded me of the 19th Century photos of Native American chiefs, which fitted in well with the feathers idea.

The Last Twelve Months ...

It's been one year since I started to make a serious effort to work on my drawing skills and experiment with different styles. Over the next week I will be posting some of my favourites for you.