Inktober

Inktober: The Final Push

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I made a minor mistake not bringing my sketchpad with me, but I’ve persevered through and managed to get the last stretch done. Don’t get me wrong, I love the challenge of working to prompts each year, but I’m going to enjoy not having to draw for a few days – especially as we’re in the road and there’s a wedding to attend.

Given the fun and games I’ve had with my back this week, perhaps I should have drawn that, but a couple of plasters seemed to evoke the prompt of Injured more precisely. I’ve never drawn plasters before for some reason, so not bad for a first try.

Day Thirty prompted us with Catch and I enjoyed this simple representation of a fishing line that may or may not have something on the end of it. I particularly had fun with the riverbank and bushes in the background for some reason.

And at last, the final image for the month: Ripe. As we’re visiting my parents and cheeseboards are a regular feature of meals, it seemed entirely appropriate to represent the lovely Cambazola we had yesterday evening. For those unfamiliar with that cheese, it’s a mixture of Camembert and Gorgonzola that combines creaminess with the sharpness of blue cheese. One of my favourites after a good stilton…

Inktober Twenty-Seven and Twenty-Eight

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We were travelling most of yesterday so I was too tired to draw anything yesterday, let alone upload and post it. Today, everything hurts, and the traditional seaside air lassitude has me groggier than the groggy thing of your choice, but I have at least done yesterday’s picture so I can post these two images up

Day 27: coat – I’ll make no apologies for a pretty literalist approach to this one. I could have done something cute with coatings or animals, but cloth and semi-normal clothing is something I still feel I need to practice, so I did this. It’s not perfect, but it is recognisably a coat and is done in a mix of grey fineliner pens.

I forgot to pack my big sketchpad so we’re back to the small notebook that I used for most of last year’s images. The prompt is Ride – so I wanted to do something with a bit of implied motion to it. As winter approaches, what better than a snowman enjoying a ride in a sled? Go on, tell me he’s not enjoying himself!

Inktober Twenty-Five and Twenty-Six

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Day two of being on leave, and I’m just enjoying having a staycation for a couple of days – and it’s just as well as it’s allowing me to get all the sleep out the way that my body is craving. Oh, and do some drawing

Day 25’s prompt is ‘Tasty’ – and while I made Lady M groan by saying I’d draw her but be unable to do her justice, I settled instead on attempting a chocolate-coated strawberry, complete with a pot it’s just been freshly dipped in. It’s fun, but another reminder that I really do need to practice drawing real things. It’s recognisable as a strawberry, but it could be much, much better.

The prompt for day 26 is “Dark” – so inspired by lady s’ love of the TV show Hannibal I went for a representation of the titular character as the Chesapeake Ripper vision used as a recurring motif in the show. I enjoyed this piece, spending my time in layers of greys to produce it.

Inktober Twenty-Three and Twenty-Four

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We’re nearly into the final week of Inktober, and I’m about to have a few days off so finding time to draw as inspiration strikes should be a bit easier. Well, that’s the theory

Day Twenty Three gave us Ancient as a prompt, and while I initially toyed with doing a wider Stonehenge/Avebury landscape I settled instead on focusing on a classic trilithon to practice rendering a set of stone surfaces and a bit of perspective. I’m really happy with how this one turned out, layering successively darker greys and some fine black lines for outlines.

I struggled a bit with “Dizzy” and originally drew a full-length pirouetting figure before making horrible mistakes with feet and leg proportions. So I started again with a head and shoulders shot. I only realised as I took the photo that I’d drawn a blonde to lean into the “dizzy blonde” stereotype.

I’m not as keen on this second image as I am on yesterday’s, but it’s also about of an apples and pears comparison. Onward!

Inktober Twenty-One and Twenty-Two

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These were a couple of fun prompts these last couple days – well, I say fun, but what I really mean is that the inspiration and execution came relatively easily, even if again I was trying different things to make them happen.

Being an avid gamer for many years, the prompt of Treasure immediately suggested a great big chest of it. I wanted to create the impression of a great big mound of it without actually drawing every single element of it, and I think I managed to imply several rises and falls of piles of coins. As with many of this month’s prompts it’s a subject I’ve never tried before.

Today’s prompt was simply Ghost, so I challenged myself to draw the most ethereal sight I could, to let the mind’s eye assemble a picture from the bare suggestions. Many descriptions from people who talk about seeing ghosts talk of vapours or shimmers or movement in the corner of the eye, so it was that kind of representation I was going for rather than a floating sheet, or a clear-lined transparency. This again was a very different style of drawing, and one I think I’ll come back to.

Inktober Nineteen and Twenty

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I’ve got a bit out of sync with my days, so I’ll do another of these tomorrow to get up-to-date. Today has been a day off, so I’ve been relaxing with a box set on TV and sketchpads around me (ok, and a modicum of housework too)

Day Nineteen: Sling – I think calling a catapult a slingshot and therefore a valid use for the word just about scrapes above the bottom of the barrel. I could have shown someone injured or in a playground, but an Angry Birds-style picture allowed me some practice with drawing clothing, some mud squelch, and some humour. I’m particularly proud of the trousers and the mud around the shoes.

Day Twenty One: Tread – I didn’t feel like doing anything particularly dynamic as I was quite tired (pun noted but not intended), so I modelled this on the tread on the bottom of a pair of my trainers (sneakers for those in the US). It’s simple, but it’s practice from a still life, which is an area of weakness for me.

Inktober Seventeen and Eighteen

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I was too tired to post anything yesterday as it ended up being quite a draining day at work – on the other hand I’m now sitting at my desk with a cup of coffee while my neurons wake up properly so it’s all swings and roundabouts

Day Seventeen brought us Ornament as a prompt, and there were so many ways I could take this. In the end I opted to do an earring based on a design I saw on a customer. The longest time was spent trying to do an accurate earlobe – and in the end I used Lady M as a model while she sat on the sofa next to me.

Day Eighteen’s word was Misfit. I considered doing something with jigsaw pieces, or those shapes toys we give toddlers to improve their spatial awareness while they bash them about. In the end I went with the black sheep in the herd that stands out as looking so different, but really isn’t at heart any different from anyone else. A metaphor for family life? Yeah, a bit ham-handed, I’ll give you that, but it’s a simple visual that appeals.

Inktober Thirteen and Fourteen

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I think I’m getting over the bug that flattened me last week, but I’ve definitely enjoyed having an extra day at the beginning of the week where I don’t work where I can feel a bit more human in comfort before diving straight back to work. These next two have been a bit more fun, if only because I haven’t been uncomfortable while making them.

Day Thirteen is Ash – and while I could have gone with cigarettes, or a bonfire, I wanted to do something a bit more dynamic and challenging – hence a phoenix arising from a jar of ashes. I wanted to capture an explosive moment of creation and formation, rekindling life from what seemed dead and gone. The phoenix is an image that I work with quite a lot, and that has a lot of resonance with me in terms of the new leases of life I get when recovering from dips in physical or mental health. As this last week’s bug has had me feeling quite down over how long it has been, a resurgent image felt needed. Its not the most detailed line work – I think I spent more time on the ash and its trails – but it feels like one of those split-second moments of things being in flux with lots of movement. No doubt, like some of the others in this sequence, it’s something I’ll return to as imagery in my doodles.

Im really proud of Day Fourteen – Overgrown – as its another of those concepts that came easily, and I really like how I executed it in the time allotted. The broken statue overgrown in vines and moss feels like something that belongs in a fairytale, or perhaps a gothic romance, as a pointer to tragedy in the past and the passing of time. It was done, like all the others here in 0.1 and 0.5 light and dark grey ink fine liners, and the border with a 0.3 black just to outline. I’m just really happy with how its worked out.

Inktober Eleven and Twelve

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We’re getting close to the halfway mark, which is a nice distraction from how this bug just isn’t quitting. Today’s late posting is brought to you by exhaustion, frequent trips to the loo, and as much lemsip as I can handle.

Day Eleven was a fun and simple one: Snow. The snowman was an obvious choice, and gave me a chance to practice footsteps and disturbed snow, as well as twigs and coal. The carrot was also harder to draw well than expected. Just a fun little picture with no additional meanings inserted.

Perhaps inevitably I had to go with a pun as part of today’s prompt: Dragon. In this case a dragon in drag. Perhaps the biggest challenge was working out the lipstick placement to show the snout shape. I’ll probably do more in this vein as I’m critiquing it hard even as I look at it now – but I’ve kept to my half hour and no prep approach.

Inktober Nine and Ten

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Everything hurts, my sinuses are convinced they’re on fire, and I’m officially fed up with whatever this bug is. But the artwork is a good distraction, so here we go…

Day Nine brings us Swing. I considered a child’s swing but went for something inspired by Poe instead – recalling The Pit and The Pendulum, which enthralled me when I was probably far too young to be raiding relatives’ bookcases while on holiday. Maybe it’s just being ill that makes the thought of ever-approaching death so appealing right now

Day Ten has the prompt of Pattern. My initial thought was something like a leopard or a tiger, but I didn’t have the energy to look for references. As a result you have a creepy alien/robot made up of repeating patterns instead. It looked a lot cooler in my head, but I was trying something different, so yay.