Oona is pushing paint around#catober day 3 yesterday. started again by mapping my notknowing, then followed along with the first cat lesson by Joe Weatherly on NMA. Then I tried to apply that first helping of rough anatomical info to some of my sketches from the day before. Last I made a bunch more sketches from ref, and again made some attempts at very rudimentary anatomical analysis.
Last of yesterday's #catober pages. This one was fun to do, but also I could feel myself being strongly pulled to doing pretty flat shape based drawing reproducing the references without really understanding their forms in space, in other words without really knowing what I was doing.
I could do this all day and enjoy myself a lot, but I would not be learning much from it, and would be no wiser trying to draw cats from imagination afterwards.
#catober day 4. Today I felt like my mind was a bit more awake than before when I did this morning's mapping of notknowing. Still far away from looking good, but at least looking not-good with more of a 3d feel to them.Then a page with studies after Bammes and Wendling, trying to map yesterday's rough anatomy on how these artists have drawn felines. Then put a sheet of marker paper over yesterday's sketches and tried to work out wtf these cats' skeletons are doing.
This means I have done no simple drawing from reference today and that was probably for the best but also I am kinda itchy now and feel like I "haven't really drawn today" and still have the urge to do that. But also all this scanning & post-processing & posting has taken >1.5h already and it is late and I should go to bed so that I can draw better tomorrow. Grmpf.
(always) want to draw more. Draw draw draw. Maybe tomorrow I'll just binge on pages of simple drawing. But also want to get into more detail with the anatomy. So many things!
#catober day 5, and I am trying this thing of scanning & posting in the middle of the day, after only one shift of drawing is done, with another one still coming up. Feels weird to post before I am "done" with the day, but I hate having the scanning & posting as the last thing I do when I am already sleepy. Would much rather sketch my way to sleep.
Like the last few days I started with a page of mapping the gaps in my understanding by doing a page of sketches from memory & imagination. Then I took yesterday's skeleton studies and tried to reconstruct the whole cats over them on a new sheet of marker paper. That was hard and frustrating and afterwards I relaxed by doing 2 pages of just drawing from reference, the thing I had not gotten around to yesterday.
The most instructive thing today so far was really that compression-decompression sequence of first drawing cats, then doing rough skeletal analyses of the drawings, and then trying to reconstruct the whole cats just based on their skeletons, without looking back at the original drawings or reference.
That was hard. I failed plenty lol. But it was also very effective in showing up specific places where my mental maps are off: stuff like that I tend to make the heads too small, the ears way too small, and underestimate the volume of the fur.
On top of still not having a grasp of their overall forms in space. Patience! Ugh.
But I don't hate the one in the bottom right corner. At least the lines have a nice flow to them.
rest of #catober day 5 yesterday was mostly just relaxed drawing sitting cats from reference. fun.
...and just before bed I did a page of sketching the same thing from imagination, and that one actually felt like a step forward. Or rather two steps forward one step back. Learning isn't linear!
(I like how the first two of those turned out, but the third, well...)
#catober day 6 so far. Continued this morning where I left off last night, drawing sitting cats from imagination. Better than the first few days of gap mapping, but still a bit behind the 2 better ones from yesterday.
Took a break from drawing today in favor of doing annoying things like emails and looking at my bank account (need to calculate in both prep time & recovery for that one lol), but! This is the stuff from yesterday's evening #catober session. So technically still day 6. The tiger construction was me following along with Joe Weatherly's animal anatomy class, the other one just drawing from ref.
#catober day 8 (7? not sure how to count now that I skipped a day of drawing but not posting 🙃 ). Again with the sequence of knowledge gap mapping, then study page (in this case after some of the teaser pages of The Weatherly Guide to Drawing Cats which can be found here http://www.joeweatherly.com/book/4284/the-weatherly-guide-to-drawing-cats ), then drawing from ref.
I don't want to move on from the sitting cats before I really got them down, but also I was getting bored, hence the cats washing - they are still sitting on their hind legs! Just in more interesting ways. Funny enough these kinds of poses don't show up much in the animal anatomy classes. Wonder why...
#catober day 9 I did draw, but not post. So here it goes. Started with knowledge gap mapping, then 2 pages of studies after The Weatherly Guide to Drawing Cats (http://www.joeweatherly.com/book/4284/the-weatherly-guide-to-drawing-cats).
#catober day 10 I just got started, but not sure I will get around to doing much more today, so here goes this morning's sole page of knowledge gap mapping.
this was the rest of #catober day 10 :) Ballpoint is fun for doing constructive studies when I don't want to use pencil/graphite, but it scans pretty badly. Alas.
#catober day 11. Had two days that were emotionally exhausting, so no energy for the more demanding pages of knowledge gap mapping or anatomy studies and such. But the simple draw draw draw from ref always works and goes a long way to soothe me.
Halfway through I got annoyed with how small the A4 paper is and how little fits on it and decided to just pack the pages more by using different colored ballpoints. I enjoyed the creepy red pupil-less effect on that one cat 🙃
#catober day 12 I was drawing but away from my scanner, so here it goes: one page of knowledge gap mapping from memory/imagination, and one anatomy study of hind legs after Gottfried Bammes.
#catober day 13, again did the drawing but not the scanning, only direct drawings from photos of cougars this time.
this was #catober day 14, two pages of mapping knowledge gaps from imagination, one page of anatomy studies, one page of drawing from ref. Not done in that order, but I don't remember the actual order anymore.
#catober day 15, one page of knowledge gap mapping, one page of notes on the lesson on spine and ribcage of felines from Joe Weatherly's Animal Anatomy class, a page of studies on the same topic from Gotttfried Bammes, and lastly a page of tigers from ref with ribcages inscribed.
#catober day 16 I started with some knowledge gap mapping from memory/imagination (recognize the sitting tiger from the day before, and how my memory distorted it?)...
... and then did a bunch of pages of memory recall training homework for a class on "drawing from memory and imagination". First page shape analysis from reference (blue), then first attempt at reproducing it from memory (green), made notes on my mistakes, second attempt (red), again some notes, then a third attempt the next day (black).
I am not entirely sure this kind of memory training is the best way to move towards where I want to go, it makes me think in 2d so much, really invites one to simplify into flat graphic shapes. I doubt that doing these teaches me much about the structure of cats in space. It does point out biases in my perception/memory rather mercilessly though, so probably worth it simply for that. And I will stick with them for now just for the sake of the class anyway.
#catober day 17 was another frazzled email writing & preparing for guests kinda day, so just some random sketches of cats from ref
#catober day 18 back to my favorites for some simple sphynx cat fun from reference
...and some memory recall studies also still from #catober day 18 - first an analysis after a page of Weatherly's Guide to Drawing Cats (blue), then first attempt at drawing from memory (green), notes about mistakes I made, second attempt (red), and the last page is trying again the next day (aka catober day 19)(black).
day 20 of #catober I was hanging out with friends, so no time for focused studies - but a bunch of surprisingly colorful cat doodles happened anyway :) (Not in ink though, so not an inktober day after all...)
I keep drawing and falling further and further behind with the scanning and posting. Sketchdump incoming to make up some of the distance.
So, this was day 21 of #catober - wanting to draw a lot without thinking about it I decided to just work my way through this set of "cougar" reference images, sketching every single image. There are 500 photos in the set, we'll see how far I'll get.
#catober day 22, a page of front paw structure studies after Joe Weatherly's 'Guide to Drawing Cats' and an attempt to reproduce them from memory a bit later. *ouch
#catober day 23 was another social day, so I just doodled some cats with the pens I usually use for writing, then used a waterbrush to clarify the shapes and let the ink bloom. I am pleased with the graphic shapes and how the ink washes came out, especially on the red page. Might do a bunch more of these at some point. But also the pretty ink wash effect feels a bit too easy, almost kinda cheap. 😂 Maybe I'll go direct to blob with a large brush next time.
#catober day 24 I binged on working my way through the set of cougar photo references
#catober day 25, again working my way through the cougars, but also a bit of anatomy study and a page of knowledge gap mapping from imagination.
#catober day 26 started with a page of knowledge gap mapping from imagination, then some construction studies after Joe Weatherly. I tried to reproduce each of them from memory immediately after making them (so, first study - memory sketch, second study - second memory sketch) and found it interesting how much better the whole body one worked than the Lynx head. But then I am much more familiar with general cat construction at this point than I am with Lynx heads, so it does make sense.
#catober days 27 to 29 I was bored, OH GOD SO BORED with drawing cats, all mammals really, it felt like they are all the same, all the same skull-spine-thorax-pelvis, all femur and tibia and just tiny variations, and how I miss drawing invertebrates or at least birds or even just random stuff. Even architecture, artifacts, non-organics. Anything other than mammals. Crabs! I wanted to paint crabs so badly. But I also wanted to finish catober, so here a bunch more cats.
...and yesterday I was still bored, so for #catober day 30 I decided to make a bunch of loose ink blobs instead of the serious structural studies. Still cats though, and still in ink.
Ink blobbing is great (in this case: first making the shape of the cat as a clear water puddle on the paper, then dropping ink into it), it has built-in anti-boredom properties, like the time pressure that comes from only being able to work the blob while still wet, as well as the ink always doing a surprising delightful weird whatever it is it wants to do.
Because of the time pressure and no fussing around these go really quickly, I made 20 in the time between dinner and going to bed.
doing these really feels more like playing a game, including the dynamic of "just one more...just...one...more..." and I only stop once it becomes hard to find more horizontal drying spaces within easy reach 😅
...and more. But this is the last batch of them, promise! I haven't done any cat drawing yet today, maybe I will just play around working over some of these a bit, giving them eyes and mouths and such. But working into ink blobs with another medium, or even just more controlled ways of applying ink can be tricky. The blobs have a vibe of their own that doesn't easily mix with other kinds of marks.
Yesterday I was still a bit tired so thought I would just quickly work into one or three of the ink blobs. Which of course ended with me adding some details to all 20 of them...so here are the reworked ink blob cats for the last day of #catober.
...aaaaand a wee little webshop with the first batch of them already uploaded :) https://ko-fi.com/playinprogress/shop
[boosts very welcome!]
I will add more drawings to the shop in the coming days, so if there is anything you're particularly fond of let me know and I will make sure to prioritize it.
[edit: this one has sold :)]
More of the reworked ink blob cats for #catober day 31, all of these now up in my shop https://ko-fi.com/playinprogress/shop
Ok tired now rest will have to wait for tomorrow. And yes I totally got the date wrong when dating the first few things I finished yesterday, but the drawings don't mind :)
Here come the last 10 of my #catober drawings, the ink blobs worked over with mostly colored pencil. All of them are now up in my shop https://ko-fi.com/playinprogress/shop
Kit Jaguar@playinprogress Thank you for sharing these! I've been really enjoying watching your journey this last month ^_^
@drawingdog I've noticed you watching, thank you for these kind words :) I am always curious about people's learning processes, how artists got to where they are, old sketchbooks and all that jazz...
Greg Stolze@playinprogress These are great! Izzat done with wet-on-wet watercolors then?
@GregStolze Thank you! Almost, wet-on-wet ink in this case. I start with a blob of clear water in the shape I am aiming for, and then drop in the ink. Would work with watercolor as well, just the textures would be a bit different.
@playinprogress What ink, if I may ask?
@GregStolze Sure! A bunch of different ones, mostly Rohrer & Klingner "Sketch" ink in grey and black, their general drawing ink in Burnt Sienna and Bistre, and a friend's self made brown iron gall ink
nonsequiturcat@playinprogress these are amazing! Looks at the same time like a blob of ink and also an incredibly detailed cat!
InaThese would be great for a modern edition of "Scary Stories to tell in the Dark" !
@ina <3 Hmmmm, now I am thinking I could do a bunch of these on black paper, would fit the scary dark theme even better...
Jim Postier@playinprogress very nice!
Jeremy Osborn@playinprogress love this series, great way to work.
Btw, if you ever come to Vienna to see the roller wing, stop off at Cafe Néko where customers share the entire place with loads of rescued cats. Imagine the drawing possibilities!
https://www.stadt-wien.at/lifestyle/essen-trinken/lokale/katzen-cafe.html
@jeremyosborn Very tempting! as is that coffee with pastry. I do love me some Wiener Melange 😋
I have only been to Vienna once, 15 years ago, and I wasn't as hip to art museums back then as I am now. I would make very different use of such a visit now, and it is pretty high on my list of places to go to if I get the chance to travel again...
Charles A. Laughlin
posiputt ÖvÖ@playinprogress I like those a lot!
Tyler Cohen@playinprogress these are lovely!
@tylerzonia thank you :)
Rabbit Cohen@playinprogress These are so cool!
SPICY EVIL CAET🍬🍭🎄
lizard appreciator@playinprogress these are all incredible