Pastel Pencil Birdy

Sketchbook Pastel Pencil Photo Study

As mentioned in my last post, I feel a recharged after taking some time off over the last couple of months from drawing / painting every day.

And since the governor of my state has relaxed his Covid-19 'stay at home order' - I've FINALLY been able to get out to do some drawing as well.

Today, I put the finishing touches on the pastel pencil attached below at a local coffee house — and it's felt good after several weeks to be looking at something besides my same ol' walls.

Not to say that I haven't been getting out at all.

In fact, since the first of the year I've been walking almost every day — and thankfully our governor declared that exercise was an 'essential' activity.

So I've been able to continue walking around my neighborhood and having a few 'social-distancing' appropriate conversations with other walkers — which as been really nice.

Still, it's been great to be able to go to a coffee houses or restaurants in just the last week or so — and sit and do some work outside mi casa for a change.

Anywho — I was looking for something to draw — and came across an old pastel pencil of the little birdy that I had started LONG ago — and decided to finally get around to finishing it today.

I used an awesome photo as a reference — so a big thank you to that photographer!

Pastel Pencil Birdy Photo Study - Copyright 2020 - Jephyr! - All Rights Reserved

Thanks for stopping by.

Look for more artwork soon......

Happy Mother's Day And Pastel Pencil Froggy

Hi,

Here in the US we're celebrating mothers today.

As I just wrote to my niece (who has 3 kids and is always kept busy looking after them):

"I know mommas work their fingers to the bone and don’t always get acknowledgement for all their hard work — so I hope you are feeling a special warmth and Blessing from your family and the Lord today!"

So if you're a mother too — whether your kids are grown and out on their own — or you're still wiping noses and bandaging scraped knees — I hope you feel loved and appreciated today!

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I've been feeling a little recharged in the art department myself after taking some time off from drawing and painting all the time.

Recently and somewhat naturally I began making art again — and I feel refreshed by taking that time off.

In my last post I shared a pastel pencil portrait I did for a nephew — that kinda got me started again.

https://artmusicpoliticsfaithhopeandlove.blogspot.com/2020/04/birthday-pastel-pencil-portrait-sketch.html

(Also, I've been working with 3D animation software and hope I can share some of those efforts soon too)

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Today I'll share a pastel pencil photo study I just finished.

In the past, I've always really labored over my artwork and recently I've been feeling more relaxed and am working way more quickly than before.

Years ago I heard an expression, "Perfectionism is the enemy of art" — and the more I work at this thing the more I understand that.

Anywho — here's my draw'ring.

Have a Happy Mother's Day!

Frog - Pastel Pencil Photo Study — Copyright 2020 — Jephyr — All Rights Reserved

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Thanks for looking in on my little corner of the world.

See you again soon......

Great Niece And Nephews Coloring My Sketches

Hi!

Not long ago I was sketching in a local coffee house and a young woman seated near me and I started chatting. Our conversation turned to what I was working on—and when I showed her that day's drawing and a few others she commented that they looked like they would be great for a coloring book—something that had occurred to me as well.

A bit later, I spoke with my niece who has three young kids—and asked if it would be OK to print-out some of my sketches and send them to her for her kids to color.

She agreed—so I printed out 3 copies each of a bunch of my recent drawings and sent them off to her (along with a box of crayons and colored-pencils).  A few days later, she let me know through an email she had received my package and included some sweet photos of her kids.

It made me very happy to hear that my great niece and nephews are enjoying what I sent—and with their momma's permission—I'll share a pic of her kids coloring three different drawings from the group I sent.

The Three B's Making Artistic Magic On Their Great Uncle's Sketches

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Thanks as always for stopping by!

See you again soon.......

God Bless!

4-10-19 New Sketch And Tales

Sketch Posted Below Commentary

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Hi,

Yesterday, I went out to a coffeehouse to sketch for a few hours and on the way there asked God to open the door to some good interactions with folks there.

A large table that I like to work at was open but two women took it right as I entered—and there was only one unoccupied table right at an entrance—so I grabbed it, got settled in, and began sketching.

The coffeehouse is near a large hospital complex and is usually pretty busy, so there were a lot of people there and most of them seemed to be in good spirits, and I nodded "hellos" and exchanged smiles with several people.

After a bit, a woman stopped on her way out the door and we visited about her grandson who is also an artist.  Later an older gent stopped by and we talked a bit about my drawing process and his background as an author.

"Enrique 'Hammertoes' Johnson" - Copyright 2019 - Jephyr! - All Rights Reserved

^ ^ ^  I had a lot of fun drawing this po' creature who dropped his treat—began as a scribble (of course : ).

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Bonus Video

Kim Jung Gi, is a South Korean artist who has an amazing ability to sketch his ideas directly from his mind, using his amazing memory and recall, and is able to literally fill a large complex drawing with characters, backgrounds and props, etc—without any preliminary sketching.

The video below a live drawing demonstration Gi gave in 2013—and shows his incredible abilities.

Please be advised, however, that his drawings are not always so tame and often contain nudity and sexuality—so if you do further research about his work you will likely encounter those kinds of images.





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That'll do it for today.

Thanks as always for stopping by.

See you again soon........

New Pastel Pencil Drawing Of A Vulture

Hi!

As I've said many times before I love sketching birds—and for some reason am "drawn" to the odd, (perhaps) uglier ones—although I think this actually makes them beautiful in their own way.

I found an awesome looking BLUE vulture photo on Pixabay — a site that posts images under a creative commons license which allow the free use of them.

It's a good place to find images for artistic reference and I've collected a couple of folders on my computer of images from Pixabay and Pexels—another "cc" image site.

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In my last couple of posts—I mentioned that I bought some pastels pencils and a couple of different sketchbooks with grey paper and have been having a good time learning how best to use those new tools.

Faber-Castel FC112136 PITT Pastel Pencils In A Metal Tin (36 Pack), Assorted

I've found it rejuvenating at a time when I was feeling a little stagnate—just using white paper and graphite pencils for sketching—as I've been doing for many, many years now.

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Even though it's a bit expensive these days—I frequently go out to various restaurants and coffee houses and work there.

The upside is that it attracts some attention from those around me and I get to talk with a lot of interesting people.

I get so many encouraging comments as well—especially lately for the pastel color-work I'm doing—and that's a big plus too.

: )

Anywho—I thought I'd share another pastel I finished yesterday—and a related pencil sketch from a while back.

"Polly" - Copyright 2017 - Jephyr - All Rights Reserved

^ ^ ^ ^  I'm not sure what kind of vulture this guy is—but he was blue in the photo reference I used too.

I love how it looks like he's wearing some kind of feather coat or something (and looks completely focused on finding his next meal).

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Funny story about the pastel above:  Today I was working on another new pastel at a Chinese restaurant—and apparently my waitress told the other staff there that I was an artist—and soon I had a steady stream of people who worked there coming over to see what I was up to.

I was showing one young server—who spoke very broken English—some of my other pastels—and when I got to the one above—she reached out her hand a rubbed her fingers across it before I could stop her.

I was a bit horrified—until I saw she didn't damage it—but I'll need to tell people in the future—up front—not to touch the pastels!  

: )

Pencil Sketch: Wack-A-Doodle-Do — Copyright 2017 — Jephyr — All Rights Reserved

^ ^ ^ ^   One night last December I was sketching with Valen and came up with this wacky guy—began as a scribble sketch.

I showed it to Valen and he and I both agreed it was a little more over the top than most of what I do.

When I finished the vulture pastel above—I remembered this sketch—and since he's "vulture-like"—I decided to post them together.

Looking at him today I think I might want to do a color version with the pastel pencils—but time will tell if I get to that.

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Well—that's it for today.

As always—I appreciate you stopping by.

Hope to see you again soon.

Sketchbook - Eagle Pastel By Jephyr

Hi!

Recently I picked up two sketchbooks with Grey Paper—rather than the plain white paper sketchbooks I normally use for sketching.

I also bought a Faber-Castel pastel pencil set and have been working with both the new sketchbooks and those pencils.

Faber-Castel FC112136 PITT Pastel Pencils In A Metal Tin (36 Pack), Assorted

Thought I'd share one of those recent images—a photo study of an Eagle that I started yesterday and finished today.

Although I've used pastel sticks before—the pastel pencils have proved to be a bit more challenging to use.  In fact, I used some of my regular pastel sticks to finish this piece off—in part because I was finding it very difficult to get the whites "bright" enough.

Eagle - Sketchbook Pastel - Copyright 2017 - Jephyr!

Thanks as always for stopping by!

God Bless!

Early June 2013: Jephyr's Most Recent Sketchbook Drawings

Hello,

Hope your summer is off to a good start!  We've already been having 105 to 111 degree days here in Phoenix.

I'd promised myself that I would tame the jungle in my yard as soon as the spring semester ended so I've been working both early in the morning and late in the evening...avoiding some of the heat...to accomplish that. 

I'm nearing the half way point...at least on the initial go-round...but these temperatures are ridiculous.  Whew!

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Fortunately, as I wrote in my last post on 5-22-13 I've still been finding a lot more time to work on my own art since school ended too.

I have several digital "paintings" I'm working on...and have been enjoying drawing a LOT in my sketchbook.

It's pretty interesting to discover how quickly I get rusty if I don't draw all the time...and then how rapidly it seems to comes back once I start up again.

Today, I thought I'd share some more of my latest sketches:

^ ^ ^ ^  Not to sound like a broken record...but this guy started out by using the "scribble technique".

I just begin putting down some random scribbles on the page and then look for patterns in them.

Once I start to "see" something in the scribble I begin to work that into a final sketch.

Since the human eye is fine tuned to see faces many of these wind up as my cartoony/caricature people like the guy above

In this case I kinda saw Keith Richards at first and worked toward that. 

Later I began to see more of F. Murray Abraham's, "Salieri" (from the movie Amadeus), and finished it with more of that in mind.

- BTW...as I sat in a coffee house finishing this drawing two separate guys came up to me to talk about it.

When I mentioned Keith Richards and the movie Amadeus, neither of these two 20 somethings really knew who/what I was talking about.

That made me feel ancient...like some old codger when I was a kid going on about a silent movie star I'd never heard of.

OUCH! 

LOL    ;)

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I wish every drawing I did was as easy as this guy!  ^ ^ ^ ^

 

I started with another scribble and immediately saw that magnificent profile.  As I worked on it...it was like it was almost drawing itself!

 

I'd just watched all three Pirates of the Caribbean movies and clearly had pirates on the brain.

 

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^ ^ ^ ^   Not a whole lot to say about this guy...just another chance for me to play with exaggeration and "caricature" of the face. 

If this was going in a portfolio...there'd be a lot I'd tighten up.  But I called him "done" so I could move on.

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^ ^ ^ ^  I tend to like drawing craggy old male faces because they can be a lot of fun to exaggerate...shading and rendering all those nooks and crannies.

But for this one, I decided to draw the face of a young woman I'd seen in an old movie on TV.  She had amazing eyes...and so I set out to capture her from memory.

The final drawing above ain't even close representing her...but I was enjoying just letting this drawing "happen"!

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Man did I sweat over this one!   ^ ^ ^ ^

I call it Prisoner Jx-25.

I met with my friend Elkanah to have some grub and draw...and was scribbling on the page to get started.  At first I "saw" an astronaut type guy in a space chariot and kinda sketched some of the details in.

I kept saying that I wasn't happy with it at all but Elkanah said he was confident I'd figure something out.

I found that to be very encouraging...and so over the next few days kept working on this page.

Finally a weird head with horns all over it began to emerge.  I still wasn't very happy with it...but as I eliminated some of the horns...I began to see a wart-hog type head...and at last I felt like I had something going on.

Then I began to add the body...and later even used some reference photos and anatomy books...trying to make the musculature, though exagerated, a little more legit (although I still took a lota liberties in the end).

The last piece of the puzzle fell into place when I was looking at this drawing across the room and realized I had it's eyes too high on the head.   Once I moved them down to where you see them now...this sketch/character design finally felt right to me.

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Well...that's it for now.

Thanks as always for stopping by!