#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 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 13, again did the drawing but not the scanning, only direct drawings from photos of cougars this time.
#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.
... 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 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 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.
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.
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 😅
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!]
[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