Random Pick

The next lab was the 'Random Pick'.  Making a list of 20 things that I like to draw was an interesting exercise in itself, I know I repeat themes a lot, but I found it almost challenging to think of 20 things I like to draw, because I often draw the same stuff over and over.  (Once I was done with the lab I continued my list and got it up to 47, so that was comforting)

Anyway, this drawing came from the following picks in this order: River, Fence, Cells, Leaf, Squirrel, Map.

Until I got to squirrel I was feeling kind of frustrated with my picks, because they were all kind of background stuff, I wanted a character animal thing for my main focus.  After I finished this and made my 47 things list I went to the random number generator and tried again.  This time I got: Fox, Spider, Grasshopper, River, Fence and Wolf.  Which was way way too many character animal things - so then I felt thankful for my original picks.  And also weirded out that fence and river came up twice.  I did a couple of quick composition sketches for the new picks, but nothing amazing came from it.  I might try this again though.  And maybe soon.  I'm kinda stuck for inspiration for my next painting...

Machines

Completed the Machines Lab.  Since the instructions wanted you to draw from life, I chose an assortment of objects around my studio to draw.  When I went to turn them into machines, I realized that most of them could be considered machines already.  Oh well.  They are extra machiney now.  :)

I was vaugely annoyed to realize how similar my one with the scissors is to one of the examples in the book.  oops.  darn examples.  Messin' with my creativity.

I'm sure someone somewhere has invented the swiss army phone already - but I personally would really like to own one.

Persimmons and Peppercorns

IMG_0036, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

The next drawing lab was collage. I chopped up a Vegetarian Times and made this. So I've recently switched from oils to acrylics for my "real" paintings - and looking at the examples in the book for this lab - I realized that this means I can *paint* in my sketchbook now - which was a very exciting discovery.
This was fun to do - I secretly love doing huge messy fast painting - but I don't love the way it looks, so I don't do it often - now that I can paint on paper I'll probably let myself play this way more often. So the bottom layer is acrylic, then I glued in the collage elements and then added the bird and some texture using oil pastels. (also something that I love playing with, but hardly ever use - again because I feel the results don't look good enough, even though I love doing it. Have I mentioned that this drawing lab thing has been great in that way - I get an excuse to play with all the fun stuff and not worry too much about the result being "show able" It's really nice. :)

Doodling on Steroids

Doodling on Steroids, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I listened to the Emergence RadioLab Podcast and doodled this drawing. This was a fun lab, as I enjoy doodling and I enjoy podcasts :) It was also nice to combine so many different drawing materials. I was pleased to discover how well pencils and chalk pastels and charcoal pencils work together. There is colored pencil and sharpie in there too.

Numbers game

Numbers game, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I picked two numbers and the related words were Rabbit and Sunglasses. So then I got to think of a way to make that into a drawing. Sunglasses just wasn't doing it for me, so I made the sun come through the glass and my rabbit is jumping out of the way. I don't love it, but it was fun to play with watercolors.

I skipped the "drawing on steroids" lab because I'm really excited about that one, and I want to do it, but I just haven't found the right time yet. Today was not that day, but I needed a warm-up before I got down to real painting today, so I skipped ahead. :)

Paint Blob Drawings

Paint Blob Drawings, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

Similar to the random squiggly line drawings - make a paint blob, find the picture. This snowboarder was my favorite. Click to see the others on flickr.

Random Line Drawings

IMG_0529, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

Scribble a line and find the pictures. As I was working through this exercise I was anticipating working on redoing my website, which stresses me out a lot - I hate making websites. So these images came out rather stressful - it was rather cathartic really :) click the photo to see the other's on flickr

Paper Dolls

Paper Dolls, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

The final project for the Inspired by childhood chapter was making paperdolls - this project had a lot of steps, and I was tempted to just draw something in markers and cut it out - but I decided to go ahead and follow the instructions - and I'm glad I did - the marker to gesso to smudging watercolor pencil with a papertowel process actually turned out to be pretty neat - and while these are certainly not masterpieces - they were fun to make.

 Not having an iconic illustrating style like the author, I had a very hard time figuring out how I was going to draw these dolls. In the end I fell back to the stiff "my head doesn't really attach right to my body" style that I developed in college for costume design classes. So then they also ended up in funny costumes. I made a dad, a grandma/nanny, a boy, a baby and a pet fox and octopus. Jonas worked on this project with me, and, as usual, I think his paper dolls came out much better.  He chose to disregard the last set of instructions and finished his dolls off with watercolor. :)  According to Jonas the one on the far right is a helicopter.

Illustrating Toby's words

Illustrating Toby's words, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

It sometimes bugs me how perfectly I fit into the expected readership of this book. Yes - I do happen to have a young child in my house, which is required for almost a whole chapter of the book. oh well :)
Toby goes to a French immersion school - so most of the writing I could find from him was in French - this was a caption for an illustration he did in Kindergarten. (His drawing was much cooler frankly) It's misspelled, but his teacher translated this as "the monster is in the water"
I've been looking at book illustrations that do a lot of pencil lines overtop of watercolor - and I've been wanting to try that - but I was nervous about messing up my watercolor. Then I realized that since the only way this will ever be seen is through it's photo - I could just take multiple photos and pick my favorite. Which is good - because I feel like I did end up messing up the original picture. The watercolor with no pencil was my favorite ;) But the other tries are here and here.

Collaboration with Toby

Collaboration with Toby, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

So Toby drew me, and then I drew Toby - and this is the result :) Toby says this is the angry-bird version of me :) He actually looked at me a lot while he was drawing it - which I was impressed by. I cheated and took a photo of him to draw from - I didn't think I could get him to hold that facial expression for long enough ;)

Clay Creations

Clay Creations, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

Drew some of Toby's clay creations. This one was made years ago - he might have been 3 or so - it's an ocarina. I helped him a bit ;) The other is a pumpkin he just made at school for fall.  I tried using a watercolor pencil for that one.  I really don't get those things.

One-Eyed Monsters

One-Eyed Monsters, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

This was a fun one. I drew 3 monsters the first without using the prompt words - the second (this one) by selecting prompt words at random and the third by picking and choosing my favorite prompts. Fun one.

Toys

Toys, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

Drew some of the kiddo's' toys. I was surprised to find that it was a lot easier to draw the soft toys than the hard plastic one. This is Jonas' favorite hippo that he sleeps with at night. I love this guy.

Scribble Drawings

Scribble Drawings, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I have my very own once a week art morning now! Which is amazing. To warm up before I did some painting this week I did the scribble drawing exercise. It was fun, but certainly not something I've never done before. I drew a shell and a pile of bowls and my old film camera in it's case. (whatever happened to be on the shelf in my studio)

Dr. Suess-y

IMG_9390, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I wanted to be inspired by the Dr. Suess project - but after weeks and weeks of putting it off- I realized that I wasn't. So the other day I was on the porch with Jo and decided to just bang it out in sidewalk chalk on the top of the porch wall. There you go - it is done - onward and upward :)

Inspired by Amedeo Modigliani

Inspired by Amedeo Modigliani, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I'm very "meh" on this one. I like Modigliani's stuff - but I don't think his style is particularly suited to expressing older people - so the assignment to draw our parents seems a little strange to me. My mom would be better depicted with no neck at all - so drawing her with a super long neck didn't work out - this really doesn't look anything like my mom. But - eh' - I did it. Onward to the next one.

Klee Transfers

Klee Transfers, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

This project was a ton of fun. I was unsure about the process at first - rolling paint onto tracing paper? What? But after a few screw-ups it turned out to be really neat.

The first time I tried it it came out way too light - so I attempted to re-roll paint onto the same tracing paper - and it came out WAY too dark. I considered it a failure and kept trying, but when it came time to add color I remembered that I'd just purchased some cheap oil pastels from the school supply clearance at Target so I pulled those out and tried it and it worked great! Usually oil pastels and I don't have much to say to eachother - but this was fun :)

I'm a little dismayed by how much my pictures ended up looking like christmas cards - but I guess it's just the subject matter. And the lines I drew in the sky that look like a christmas star.  I was just trying to break up the space like Klee - but oh well.

This one was inspired by a photo of the interior of a cathedral.  A little less festive. :)

I also got a few more of my 100 faces done - click through to flickr to see those.

Jonas Jumping on the Sofa in the Morning

Jonas Jumping on the Bed in the Morning, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

I liked Miro's titles "Lark singing in the moonlight with the morning stars" or something like that - so I titled my drawing too. I liked making the drawing. I found the coloring boring. :) And yes - that is me he is jumping on.

Picasso Dogs

Picasso Dogs, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

Another fun week - these were easy and amusing. Toby did it with me - click to see my other dog and Toby's dog too.

One liners

One liners, a photo by Steph Toth Kates on Flickr.

These were really fun. Toby and I sat together on the couch and did them together. I will say - I never drew so much with sharpie markers before this book - I've learned to like them a lot - just not the smell :) Click the photo to see the rest of my one-liners and Toby's too.