This is a vectorized lizard drawing based on a photo I took in the Bahamas. The only thing special about this is that I quickly painted a background using the layers app on my iphone, and added it to the sketch. I like the way it roughens up the finished product.
I’ve been working on some mini sketches at lunch time. Previously I would sit my 2 year old twins down for lunch and then settle into my own feeding frenzy of news and blog posts. I convinced myself it was a necessary thing to spend some time out of “mommy” mode and read actual blog posts and news written for adults. But I’ve been reading “The Shallows” by Nicholas Carr and it’s convincing me that my time could be much better spent. I love this book because it’s helping me realize that there’s a scientific reason why I often feel like a rat reaching for his pellet each time I go check twitter or pinterest or instagram. So hopefully I will remember to make these little drawings each day in an attempt to remember how to draw.
EDIT from the future, 10/25/24: 12 years later I am STILL struggling with scrolling scrolling scrolling instead of sketching. Maybe I need to reread The Shallows or maybe I need hypnotism or something. The addiction started as soon as social media was invented and it continues to this day.
This is an exercise I did to learn to use the gradient mesh tool in illustrator. It was kind of self indulgent really, as it doesn’t do a thing to advance my drawing skills. It’s just a matter of tracing some shapes from a photo and then mapping them out with gradient meshes. The end result is kind of fun but not really my style – too air-brush-y for me. But there’s something really fun about doing it. Here’s a screen shot of what the “mesh” looks like:
It takes a bit of practice to get the gradients down the way you want them but I think it’s worth it to learn. This is a powerful tool in illustrator and some use it to make super photo-realistic art.
Here is my original photo. It’s one of my favorites, taken in 2010 at home using a lightbox:
Just a simple illustration of some candy corn, done more for practice than anything else. I’m trying to concentrate on 2 things these days: Getting better at illustrator, and finishing projects. I’m starting to understand that the quality of line is the single most important thing in vector graphics and the only way to acheive that is by practice. Also the overall palette is something that requires a lot of planning and strategy. Just using the eyedropper tools to randomly pick colors from the reference photo is not going to cut it.
I think this would look cute as a note card or a tee-shirt eventually, when the season is right.
This illustration is a vectorized kimono, taken from a photo of a kimono from Japan I’ve had since childhood. Basically I was just trying to work on my illustrator skills, trying to get better with the pen tool. I also used the posterize feature in photoshop until I got the shading I wanted. A simple drawing and yet it seems kind of ghostly the way it hangs there, empty.