I Forgot To Title This Post

Well I've had some week how about you? My hernia surgery went off without a hitch. They gave me some oxycodone for the pain and then sent me home the next day. The pills had no effect until about 3 days later when the pain calmed more. By Saturday I was able to go to my friend's BBQ, Sunday I bought a bunch of Prismacolor markers on sale, and last night I went out to get some wings. Overall, I would call that a good week and I'm back to posting. Here's the usual 2 pieces.

Groovy

Elephant

The first drawing is of one of my favorite characters of all time, Earthworm Jim. Earthworm Jim, while a strangely difficult video game, was also a cartoon I watched as a kid. Just some pencil in a Canson sketch pad. The second drawing is obviously of an elephant. I still draw all types of animals in order to up my creature design skills. Lizards, fish, and winged animals are great references for dragons but hopefully I'll be drawing more creatures than just the standard dragon. This I used my very favorite pencil for sketching, an HB Derwent Graphic. The sketching pencil is a little too soft for my taste but reviews on pencils will be touched upon in one of my little reviews eventually. Hope you enjoyed my two pieces. Thanks for reading about my brainsplosion.

Woodless

I want to put all of my readers at ease and say that my surgery Monday was a complete success. Woohoo! I got a hernia repaired but I want to share with you all some of the weirder risks they told me about. Death, perforation of the bowel and/or organs, infection, and other such things are all negligible and routine in my book. Almost all surgical procedures carry those risks and these surgeons do this all day every day so they know what they're doing. However, my surgeon told me about 2 risks that I've never heard before. The first was nerve damage and just required pain medication for an extended period of time as it would not be permanent. The second was more exotic though, the loss of the use of a testicle. I didn't think that would be too bad but then the surgeon went on to say things like, "I'm obsessed with testicles." It's not everyday you hear a respected surgeon who is consummately straight say something like that so stifling my chuckle wasn't possible. Anyway, I've got the usual two treats here.

Loathing and Fear

Crocodile

The first is my attempt at recreating the poster I had in my room for the movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. As I type that I realize how typical that is, to have a fear and loathing poster. Let me assure you, my love for Hunter goes deeper. I remember doing this one very quickly with a woodless 8B pencil. Use an 8B or 9B sometime, it's like drawing with butter and is usually a new experience for pencil artists when compared to there 2Bs or HBs. I used a little bit of crayon on some of the lines to give a hint of color to it. The entire piece only took a few minutes and I think that's why it looks so chaotic and the lines so confident. The second piece is a sketch of a Crocodile. I felt like labeling it and simply writing "crocodile" didn't seem right. This was just pencil of varying hardnesses on my Strathmore 400 Series pad and is part of my attempt to draw lots of animals. I'll be posting again soon so keep your eyes peeled. I'm thinking about including a new type of post but we'll see. Thanks for reading about my brainsplosion.

Who Would Pay That Much For Markers? I Would.

I thought I'd post a little review again just to keep things fresh. I had an great night last night and this weekend should prove to be pretty damn awesome as well. As I've informed you all I will be going in for some routine surgery this Monday and have to spend at least two days in the hospital but it could be more. So this is me continuing my burst of posts before a possible week of silence. Anyway, here is another one of those posts in which I review a product I use or have used. I previously reviewed Strathmore 400 Series Drawing Pads and Moleskine Notebooks. This time around I'm gonna tell you about my little collection of Prismacolor Double Ended Art Markers and how awesome they are to work with.

Prismacolor markers come in a huge array of colors of which I currently only own seven. I know, I know, not really a collection worthy bragging about but I don't have tons of money and so I tend to buy them one at a time. The lack of local art supply stores in my vicinity forces me to shop at Michael's but you can print out a 40% off coupon pretty consistently. Their regular price is $4.49 per marker. It's not much worse than Amazon's price and with the 40% off it becomes even cheaper than Amazon. Expensive? I think so. Worth it? I know so.

These markers come in a huge variety of colors but I think the best thing about them is the ability to mix colors on a palette. That's right, rub the marker on a plastic palette, I use a plastic plate, and use the colorless blender marker to lift the colors like you would with a paint brush. Mix them elsewhere on the plate and then simply draw. Cleaning the colorless blender is as simple as wiping it off on a paper towel. So even with only seven colors, I feel like I have more. But wait! There's more! These markers have fantastically vibrant ink. It'll bleed through drawing paper or sketch paper so I've been using them in a small watercolor pad where the paper is thicker. Oh, and did I mention they're double ended? One end is a fine point and is great for detail work while the other end is a chisel tip suitable for multiple tasks.

In short, these markers are the best I've used so far. If you use cheap markers, like I still do sometimes, that can be fine for practice but if you want to make something truly beautiful, use Prismacolor Double Ended Art Markers. They're pretty awesome. Now on to the bonus drawing.

Steampunk Flying Tugboat

BONUS SKETCH
I included this drawing for two reasons. First off, I think its pretty good. Secondly, I copied this picture from the same magazine I got the dragon from in my last review so it's not my concept. Copying from pictures in magazines and from photos is good practice. Drawing from life is much better but where am I ever going to see a flying tugboat or a dragon. Use the internet, magazines, pictures, TV, movies, comics, books, cards, anything. Just don't copy something and claim it's your own idea. It may be your hand that drew it but it's not your mind that came up with it. Thanks for reading about my brainsplosion.

Links

Prismacolor Double Ended Art Markers