Here is the latest batcat drawing. This piece is 9×12 inches on Strathmore watercolor paper. I’ve been doing these batcats for a few years now, and have shown and sold them at Science Fiction conventions. Those were created in color pencil on small pieces of scrap black mat board, and use the black for most of the image. This is the first one that is done in a different medium. I had posted this on my social media pages, when it was just the batcat, with no background. It now has one, which is based on the front porch of my house. I like it, but I’m not sure if it fits with this image.

I chose this paper because I was planning on coloring the final image with watercolor. It would be penciled, then inked and finally painted. I may leave it as it is now. I haven’t decided. I’ve done a rough digital color study, just to get an idea of what colors to use. Another option I’m considering is to create a new background and print it up using that, or have multiple backgrounds to choose from. There is also a version of this with the background removed, for use as more of a design.

It’s been a long time since I posted anything on this blog. I’ve been involved with a lot of things since the last post, but just never got around to getting it online. Blogging is not one of my strong points. I intend to post a bit more. I’ve read that artists should blog more. People like to hear what we have to say, as well as what we create.

I have been making art using myself as a model for the last decade or so. I’ve created pieces in acrylic, oil, pastel and color pencil, on various substrates in various sizes. Here is the latest that I made. It’s a small piece, about 5 by 7 inches. I have a lot of this paper that I got some decades ago, when still in art school. Someone contacted our art teacher and said we could have all he had. I don’t know where he got it, but thought donating it to an art class was a good idea. I’m glad he did. I use it periodically to create drawings of various sizes.

This is a fairly quick study that made sometime last summer, I believe. I had taken a few selfies while I was sitting at my desk/work area. There’s window on the north wall, which is behind me as I work on my computer, or to the left of my drawing table. I like the way the light was hitting the side of my face in the original images. I chose this one because it’s a sort of three quarter facial view, and I liked the skeptical look I had. I used minimal marks to indicate facial features, as they are mostly in shadow.

I’ve been playing around with creating art digitally on a computer. I created some digital art years ago, and felt the urge to do some more. I liked the immediacy of the mark making, and the worry-free and unlimited ‘erasures that working on a computer provides’. I use the computer as another tool when I create art in traditional media, for layout or experimenting with color. One of my most grueling hinderances is that I don’t like to waste materials. I don’t want to ruin a surface by not making “just the right mark”. With a computer, I don’t have to waste pencil or paper, or paint and canvas. I can just erase any mark I don’t like and am free to experiment.

This is a piece I’m working on that I’m in the process of developing in digital format using Adobe Photoshop and a Wacom tablet and pen. It is inspired by an image of actor in fantasy tv series that I saw online. I created a pencil drawing based on that image, then scanned it to upload it to a computer. I flipped the image horizontally, because I felt it looked better in that position.

I’ve suggested form by adding values of gray. I like it at this stage, and can be considered a finished piece, but will continue to work on it and finalize it in color. One of the benefits of doing this digitally, is that I can output the art at any stage if I choose to, and changes can be saved to be used later. I can also change the layout, size or position of the figure, or anything on the canvas. I’ll post later on when I get to a more finished phase.