Kind of Cartoony Kid Portraits

Head Full of Curls

December 2013

Watercolor and Pencil on Watercolor Paper

This picture was fun to paint! It's of my son and his head full of curls! After many failed attempts at sketching a picture of a child, I decided I needed some help. I began reading! The best suggestions that I have found so far are to keep it simple, look at real children (or real pictures of them) while you are drawing/painting them, and that the type of clothing is really important in creating a child's image. I like detail so keeping it simple was kind of hard for me... but I think it worked! I used my own children that I could reference easily. I kept the clothes simple and casual. This was really fun to have this and my other portrait below turn out looking like a happy children that weren't strangely proportioned!

The thing that I didn't really care for was the uneven paint for the skin. I was trying to create highlights and shadows by layoring the paint, but I didn't blend it well enough. I did a yellow wash where the hair would go, and a slightly orange yellow to create the curls. I really like the shirt texture. There was a lot of water and pigment on the paper to move around and put it just where I wanted it. I feel like I'm getting a better feel for how to use the water to paint ratio to create different looks.  

Pretty Pink Princess

December 2013

Watercolor and Pencil on Watercolor Paper

This pretty girl is my second attempt at painting a child. It's of my little girl who is very attentive to what my pictures look like and says exactly what she thinks of them. So needless to say I was a little nervous what she would think of her painted picture. (I learn a lot from her comments because they are completely honest opinions and thoughts! If I want to learn to illustrate for children then the honest thoughts and opinions of a child are probably quite valuable!) Happily I report that she liked it and thought the hair was cute! Phew! 

Everywhere her hair was going to be, I put a wash of the same color I had used for her skin. Then I took a brown and went over the wash, leaving some strokes darker than others to create the hair texture. I also used a brush with just water to to lift pigment off the paper to make other areas lighter. I think the combination of techniques worked well. The darker color under her bangs looks like orange-ish hair instead of the intended shadow... I'll have to figure that one out.

Many thanks to my kids!

Pick of the Week: The Mitten

Features are well proportioned on Nikki and his grandmother. Her style is to create the animals realistically while giving them human like thoughts or actions and sometimes clothes too (but not in this one.) Its enchanting effect is very distinct. Another thing that I enjoyed about "The Mitten"  was that on both sides of the main illustration it has "mitten windows". The windows show the background story of what the Nikki is doing while the animals take over his mitten. There is a lot of detail to discover each time you look over her illustrations. 

Bird and the Beanstalk

Bird and the Beanstalk

December 2013

Watercolor on Watercolor Paper

What a surprise for a bird flying, to run into something so high up! This was the first time in a really long time of using actual watercolor paper. I found it in an old bin of my things and decided to give it a shot. Consider it a sold concept, using watercolor paper when I watercolor! I could actually work the paint in different ways after it was down. Some things I tried on this picture were layering the paint to create darker areas and moving the pigment around with water to create light areas. I took tissue and wiped off the paint in the blue background for the clouds. In the scan you can't see it, but it left a slight bluish wash with a few light blue streaks that I really liked because it added texture to the white area. I put a yellow wash over the beanstalk after I had the green where I wanted it. For the streaks behind the bird and the birds feathers I used a lifting technique with water and brush to pull the paint back off the paper in those places. Two things that I would change... or work on: The bird is a little heavy in the tail department. The background isn't a solid, smooth wash. I will need to practice to get the background all one shade and smooth. One funny thing was that when my daughter saw the picture, she knew it was Jack's beanstalk. She saw the bird and couldn't get over the fact that I gave it eyebrows! So funny!   

Pick of the Week: Pancakes, Pancakes!

Cow Jumped Over the Moon

Cow Jumped Over the Moon

November 2013

Water Color, Black Archival Ink Pen on Sketch Paper

In this picture I wanted to try some shading by layering the paint. It kind of worked on the moon but not how I had hoped. I had to paint layers with a slightly darker color to get anywhere near the look I wanted. The shading on the cow I thought wans't too bad. The paint for the shading was the same as the dark spots on the cow, just with more water added. Later I realized a slight problem. The shaded part of the cow is facing the moon, or the light sorce (woops!). I practiced making some animals using basic shapes and then adding the detail. I looked through and practiced with drawing books for ideas. I think it really adds alot to the picture, and will make it easier to create characters by getting the baisic shapes down! The color of the sky is much better than in the Cat and the Fiddle picture, I added a little blue in. 

Pick of the Week: Children's Book Review

As I was browsing the internet for ideas about how to become an illustrator one of the websites I looked at suggested keeping track of the publishers that publish the books you like. Because I am always into children's books with my kids, and getting new selections all the time from the library I get to view a lot of children's books. Also, I noticed that I have been picking out details and ways that other illustrators have created a certain looks or feel that I don't want to forget. I am going to start posting my pick of the week for children's books. Things I want to include in my review (subject to change later): Title, Author, Illustrator, Publisher, Web Links, Summary, Story Likes, Story Dislikes, Lessons Taught Through the Story, Illustration Likes, Illustration Dislikes. So here goes...

Pick of the Week

Title: A Balloon for Isabel
Author: Deborah Underwood
Illustrator: Laura Rankin
Publisher: Harper Collins
Web Links: A Balloon for Isabel, Harper Collins Children's

Summary:Isabel wants a balloon but she and the other porcupines are not allowed to have them at class graduation due to porcupine quills popping balloons. Isabel and her friend Walter go to great lengths to find a solution so they will be allowed to have balloons at there class graduation. They don't want to be stuck with boring bookmarks again!  

Story Likes: Almost every kid can relate to wanting a balloon! The details hit on what kids LOVE about balloons, and what Isabel and Walter felt they were missing out on most. Characters had to "try, try again" to find a solution. Loved that the teacher wants to be "pop-proofed" in the end too!

Story Dislikes: Walter's dad owning a candy shop wasn't as clear in the beginning as I thought it should be. Also, when Walter and Isabel are eating at the cook out, the transition from talking about all of the candy at Walter's house to talking about the color of balloons they wanted could have transitioned a little smoother. It does show a random switch of topic so typical of children's conversations though.

Lessons Taught Through the Story: Problem Solving, Perseverance

Illustration Likes: The bright colors are very cheerful and full of energy. Characters have great emotion, not only in the great facial expressions but also the characters whole body. I also like how the pages all varied from one picture across two pages to several pictures on one page, keeps visual interest higher. I also thought it was clever how the conversation between Isabel and her teacher was portrayed. There is one little picture next to each idea spoken. The picture shows the emotion of the speaker as they are speaking, which was fun to see.

Illustration Dislikes: The eyes on the raccoons looked a little strange to me on some of the pages. I don't know how to describe it exactly, almost expressionless in the eyes when the mouth was trying to convey happy... all the other characters seemed pretty good though.

Kids Art Projects

Art Projects



In my daughter's class today they did a fun art project with water colors and oil pastels. They first drew with the oil pastels a sun and rays that all went to the edge of the paper. Then they water colored over the top, different colors in the different rays. The oil pastels repelled the water color which had a fun effect.

The class also did fabric mosaics earlier in the day, as part of their fabrics unit. They have been using fabrics to learn about textures and observing details. One activity they did with this was shoe boxes with holes cut in them, with lots of fabrics with different textures. The kids got to feel the different textures without seeing them. For this activity each child was given a black square of paper (probably about a 6"x6"). They were then given fabric squares about 1"x1" up to 3"x3" in size, of all different textures and colors. They used Elmer's glue and covered the papers with fabric until no paper showed. The kids  

Cat and the Fiddle

Cat and the Fiddle

November 2013

 

 

Water Color, Black Archival Ink Pen on Sketch Paper

 

This painting was exploring how to do shading by layering the water color. I think the character was kind of fun. The stripe on the pants added a lot visually to the cat's appearance, it surprised me the difference it made when I put it on.  The shading on the pants and shirt I thought turned out well. I didn't care for how the background or stars turned out.  



On the Farm

On the Farm

November 2013

 

Water Color (Transparent), Black Archival Ink Pen,

Colored Pencil (Prismacolor) on Sketch Paper

 

 

This piece is my first water color piece in a really, really long time. I used a regular pencil to sketch it out first, then inked it with pen, painted, then inked and used color pencil to redo some outlines and put in some extra shading. I didn't like how the colored pencil looked on top of the paint creating the shading, maybe I needed to match colors better. I like my ducks, they are very simple in design. I love him looking up expectantly at the cow, just for fun. I like the texture and coloring created by mixing the green and yellow watercolor for the grass. I don't like the cows proportions. They are not right at all in its front legs... but that's learning for you. I'm going to start looking more into drawing books to help me learn proportions and perspectives better.  

Teddy Bear

Teddy Bear

November 2013

 

Colored Pencil (Prismacolor) on Sketch Paper

 

On this drawing I was trying out the concept of using colors opposite each other in the color wheel to neutralize each other and create shading. Over all I like what it did. I'm proud of my bear... It's probably my best colored pencil piece that I've done. I used multiple shades of brown, over a green in the darkest areas. I think I might have used a little too much green because the bear looks shaded a slight green, but over all I think the effect was pretty cool.