Digital Artwork with a Jack Russell Model

Brandy poses for some digital pieces last year. Yes, I said last year - opps, I realize that I've slacked a bit in showcasing these.  I've created a bunch of different pieces from my own photos, and if you're interested in having a look at them, please stay tuned to this blog as I will be posting more in the future. Nothing for sale at this time though, I've still got the task of testing out the print quality on my Epson Stylus R1900.

To see more of my traditional artwork, visit my website:

www.juliesillustration.com

Biggest Painting to Date!

A friend that I met through agility trials has given me the opportunity to created the largest piece that I've ever done to date. It will be a 3 foot by 3 foot acrylic painting of her beautiful Vizsla, Milo, and what a sweetie he is.

I will be documenting the progress of this painting (Hopefully. I'm so bad at the documentation process - I get carried away and forget to take pictures, which I suppose isn't a bad thing, but it hampers my record of progress on certain pieces) on this blog. 

I thought I'd share two initial images, one showing the size of the canvas, the other showing the initial under-drawing.

Yes, that is me and Brandy attempting to show you just how big this piece will be. Three by three, well sure, I could use a ruler and figure out approximately what I was going to be delving into, but when you're a short person, with a short dog, you really get some perspective when you can handle the canvas in person, and take a picture of yourself (or your little dog) beside it. She's a big one!

This sketch may not be overly visible (you've got to look really hard to see it, and I mean really hard), but I wanted to add it in for progress purposes. Not being able to scan a 3 foot document really hindered the image quality as the camera just can't capture the lighter lines of pencil like the scanner can.

I've had to now designate my laundry room as the "painting room" for this piece since the spare bedroom, where I normally work, just isn't accommodating the overly large canvas (the bed and dresser seem to be in the way).

So stay tuned to this blog for more progress updates on the painting of Milo. This should be a great experience, and will hopefully encourage me not to be afraid to "go larger" in the future.

Digital Drawing

Yes, you'll notice that sometimes some of my images are poor attempts at digital drawing. I have yet to get the hang of the Wacom tablet. It causes me stress trying to draw on something that's not really something, but is attached to something, that transfers something to where the image shows up on screen. My bass-ackwards usage of the mouse (thanks dad), adds to the frustration level of trying to draw with the tablet pen when I think right is left, and left is right ... the tablet is a parallel universe where things are as they seem - oh my gawd, right is actually right! I've resigned myself to sketching by hand, scanning, opening the scan in Illustrator,  (cheating) live paint/tracing, and them importing to Photoshop and painting in layers with the handy dandy good ole' mouse. Not quite the romantic, dignified or simplified way that I envisioned world of digital drawing, but it's got to work for the time being.

Perhaps I'm old fashioned, but I like the feel of a pencil or paint brush in my hand, moving and flowing against a piece paper or a canvas, it's comfortable ... is that weird? I suppose, maybe a little, but artists are allowed to be eccentric, right? At least I'm trying, and digital work is at the very least, more convenient than lugging around an acrylic paint set and canvas or a giant tackle box of markers, and it is much less obvious to others, that I'm actually drawing, ahem, for obvious reasons. Makes life easier. I suppose I should keep practicing - they say practice makes perfect you know, and maybe one day I'll get the hang of it.