Doodle Practice

Into the void…. wheeeeeee!

Just wanted to try out squiggly shading.

ballpoint, doodle, ink, practice, squiggles, squirls, void,

I just can’t seem to get there

Looking at the drawing I did yesterday, I realise that I think I’m struggling to achieve the results that I want to achieve because I’m trying too hard to achieve a style or outcome that I don’t want anyway.

What I want to do is draw strong vibrant lines and use bold hatching - I’ve tried the amazing blended techniques used by some of the ballpoint artists that I admire but that just isn’t me. It bores me laying delicate hatch over delicate hatch. For me drawing has to feel spontaneous and energetic to be fun. Meticulous details work makes me feel trapped and restricted. Maybe this means I’ll never be a good artist but I think I’d rather enjoy drawing pictures that look good in my own style than “being a good artist” that is able to render amazing photo-quality productions.

Trouble is I just don’t know where to start. Every time I try to be me I just get carried away with the shading and end up with a muddy mess of hatching. I really overdue the hatching - it’s almost as if I’m scared of leaving white space!

So, I’m going to keep drawing and keep trying different styles until I get there. I’d buy a sketchbook but I’m just worried that the money I spend on it will be wasted by the crap I put in it. ^^

Posted 5 days ago

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Continuing my attempt to keep improving, tonight’s doodle was loosely based on some random guy I found a photo of on the interwebs. I was trying to capture the feeling of age rather than an accurate rendition of the original photograph.

My feelings? Epic fail. I’ve given the guy eyes like saucers and apparently gone for a Picasso-style placing with one eye higher than the other. I am kind of pleased with his turkey neck though.

Time - about 2.5 hours (I should never have shaded the background)
Materials - bog standard A4 ruled notepad, Bic ballpoint pen

Posted 6 days ago

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portrait, doodle, practice, ballpoint, pen, ink, biro, Bic, drawing, old, age, man,

Some inspiring ballpoint artists

As I love drawing with the ballpoint so much, it’s only natural that I should take an interest in others that use the same medium - especially when they can actually draw something worth looking at. Here’s some of the most inspiring artists I’ve encountered:

James Mylne (Fantastic style. He makes the ballpoint look cool for art)
Allan Barbeau (Inspiring hatching technique and a favourite artist)
Chris R Wright (Highly stylised cartoons with strong use of white space)
Mark Powell (Amazing portraits on the back of envelopes)
Philip Blackman (Huge gallery of cartoons. Absolutely love his style)
Andrea Joseph (Manages to make the most mundane subjects look awesome)

Posted 6 days ago

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ballpoint, artists, favourite,

As a fellow pen "artist" (i put the " " because i really dont consider myself an artist per say but whatever) I really enjoy your work! keep at it! also is there a specific pen you use?

Anonymous

Thanks for your question. :)

I don’t consider myself an artist either but I’m glad/surprised someone actually likes my random doodles. I keep hoping that if I do keep at it I’ll get better.

As for the specific pen, I prefer the common or garden Bic ballpoint. I have to admit I’ve tried most pens by most manufacturers (I hated Zebras) but I’ve always come back to a Bic. They’re always smooth, their black is black and they seem to blob less when I’m using them.

If you’re a pen artist I’d love to see your work - I think I learn something new from every ballpoint artist I see.

Posted 6 days ago

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Is it me or is it getting dark in here?

I should probably stop messing around and try drawing something properly. But I do love to doodle. :)

Posted 1 week ago

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I’m sorry, I have no idea where this one came from. I was on the phone to a friend who’s going through some hard times at the moment and I think he channeled his dark chi into my pen.

The ‘why’ was added to reflect my confusion over my pen’s chosen path.

Anyway, I’m still counting this as practice drawing hair! ^^

Posted 1 week ago

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random, doodle, ballpoint, pen, hair, portrait, why,

I had to fix my GRUB bootloader a couple of days ago after a borked upgrade to Ubuntu 12. As I was trying to fix it, I made some notes on an A4 pad that was lying next to the desk.

Tonight, to wind down after a trying day I started to randomly doodle until eventually this pic emerged. I’ve missed doodling. :)

I decided to leave some of the notes visible in the crop as it had meaning to me (anyone that’s ever had to fix a broken boot loader will know what I mean). In case you’re wondering, they’re a note to remind me of what version of the Linux kernel boot files I’m using. *Cough*geek*cough*

Posted 1 week ago

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doodle, pen, ballpoint, sketch, biro, ink, random, portrait, person, Ubuntu,

While I was waiting for Ubuntu to update tonight (I can’t believe how long it took to update the OS from 11.04 to 12.04) I thought I’d have a crack at my personal challenge, in this case hands.

Some of them were okay and some were awful. It’s pretty clear that I’m a long way from reproducing Leonardo’s anatomical sketches. :)

Posted 1 week ago

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doodle, practice, ballpoint, pen, biro, ink, hands, drawing, challenge,

ArtRage challenge: Hair and hands

There are two things that are my particular artistic nemesis : hair and hands.

This week I’m going to make it my goal to try both (not necessarily at the same time - hairy hands? That would just be weird. Well, not really weird - I’ve seen people with really hairy hands but it’s not the sort of hair I’m really talking about).

Anyone want to join me? Bear in mind if you’re already an awesome artist, it’s not really a challenge. Participants will be reblogged. :)