May 21, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge Day 21

My last and final day of the creative challenge. My topic is "Performing":



I think I'll do a circus background for this one, and use it for my Illustration Friday entry. Thanks again to everyone who stopped by and commented. I'm going to continue drawing verbs, and posting several times a week. Maybe not every day though. I need a break!

May 19, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge Day 20

Hey everyone! My verb topic today was "Learning":


These two characters are seperate illustrations, and have nothing to do with each other, aside from sharing the theme. So, she's not floating above his bed in her desk, and he's not reading about her. They just happend to be on the same page in my sketchbook.

I can't believe I only have one more day to go. It's been a quick three weeks, I've been so busy, but I've gotten a TON of good drawings out of it. Thanks again for everyone who commented, and gave suggestions.

May 18, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge Day 19

My verb topic of the day is "Flying" again. I like this topic.



Thier tongues are sticking out, because in order to fly you HAVE to make propeller sounds. I tip my cap to Kathleen Rietz, I decided to do a father and son after seeing her terrific father and child drawings. For those of you who haven't seen her work, be sure to check Kate out, I really like her work.

Has anyone in the challenge used blurb.com? I need to have a few copies of a children's book printed. I used Lulu.com before, and didn't like the results. Blurb offers hard bound, and a better variety of sizes and formats. Any info you could offer would be appreciated.

May 17, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge: Day 18

My verb of the day is "Flying":


I'll have more flying people tomorrow, this is all I have time to post today. The weather here turned hot and bEEEEEautiful! So I'm going to get outside and enjoy it!!

May 15, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge Day 17

With a lot of help from a lot of creative people here is a revised swimming man. I turned up the saturation of the color in the water, and on the man. I added bubbles. I added a rough white border. And I added a tenticle, which I prefer over a shark. Giant tenticled beasts are a lot more fun than sharks I always say. A special thanks to everyone who helped. I'm still not happy with it, I rushed the color work on the tenticle, so it looks sloppy to me, but otherwise I like it.


Also, has anyone in the challenge used a self publishing website called blurb.com? I was thinking of using them to create my next children's book mockkup, and wondered if anyone else had any info to share. I've used Lulu.com, and wasn't happy with the choices they give in regards to size, and binding.

May 14, 2008 21 Day Creative Challenge Days 14-16

I was away for a few days taking care of some family business, maybe I can post a picture of what I was working on, if I can scare up a digital camera somewhere... anywho... Here are the sketches I did the last few days, not as many as I've previously posted for the challenge, but I've been busy. My topic the last few days was "Singing".

Day 14
This guy is pretty good, I like him. Sorry these are so rough, I haven't had time to really clean them up as much as I'd like.


Day 15
This guy looks more like he's laughing than singing. I was going for singing and dancing here. Maybe if there was some frame of reference, like he was on stage, or holding a microphone. But that expression still looks like laughing to me.


Day 16
These are the roughest of the sketches I'm posting here. Look at their hands... I really need to sit down again and just draw hands for a week straight. They look like they're wearing oven mits. So maybe they're singing about baking cookies. "We're making CHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWC-OH-LATE CHIPS! Peanut-BUUUUHTAHR and MAC-AH-ROOOOOONS! You'll eat plate after plate until you go LOONY TUNES!"

May 10, 2008 21 Day Creative Exercise Day 13

Here is last night's swimmer sketch colorized. The verb topic is "Swimming". I'm not happy with it. It seems very boring to me. Blah.

May 9, 2008 21 Day Creative Exercise Day 12

My verb topic for the 12th day of the creative challenge is Swimming:



Thanks to my good friend Dan for the suggestion. I'll post a color version of this tomorrow. So... Sleepy...

May 8, 2008 Creative Challenge Day 11

Well, today my topic verb was "Crawling"


The drunk at the bottom was suggested by a coworker of mine. We've been hearing about impending layoffs at my day job. I'm not much of a drinker so I won't get drunk to cope with a bleak future. I'll just sketch a drunken stupor instead.

May 7, 2008 Creative Challenge Days 8, 9, 10

Well, my apologies for missing the last two days. I just didn't have time to post. I did sketch however. My verb the first two days was "Stretching":


My verb topic today was "Throwing":

May 3, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 7

So I spent all day working on illustrations, and working on a new character when I realized I'd just drawn him standing there. D'OH! Had I forgotten what I'd labored at all week long? So I immediately sketched out an action pose, and voila!! My entry for today is animated(click on the image above to see the two frame animated gif). *bling*! My illustrated verb of the day is "Fighting". As in, "And everybody was Kung Fu Fight-eeeeeng!"

May 2, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 6

The topic I chose for today is Jumping. Man, am I tired. It's been a long week. I still love participating in this challenge though. It's kept me motivated all week.

May 1, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 5

Well, I didn't have nearly as much time today, so these are rough sketches at best. Three goofy kids dancing at the top, the middle one is doing the Robot, which is a nod to Alicia, and her robots the other day. Unfortunately the robot dance looks a lot like standing still, which is what I was trying to avoid, so I drew cartoony swishy lines in there. Then the three ballet dancing little girls, they kind of got blown out, thanks to my scanner. And the couple, that's what I was picturing when I picked dancing as my next verb to draw. The others just kept cramming themselves in, begging to be drawn first.

Beep-beep! This is a fun exercise!

April 30, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 4

"Carl liked his women tall, and Eleanor loved a man who could dance. The two happily danced the night away, at the Hilltown High Society Ball and Sock Hop."


For background on this exercise, click here.

My topic for the challenge today was Dancing. And I liked it so much I think I'll use it again tomorrow. I really liked the first two characters I sketched today and didn't have time to do anymore. Man, this is fun!

April 29, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 3

For background on this exercise, click here. The topic I chose for today is "Skating". These were done quickly as I didn't have as much time today. I would like to go back and refine the poses on some of them, as they look a little klunky to me. But, I think they're a good start. A lot of times I'll burn through a couple pages trying to get a good natural pose.

Be sure to check out my list of Creative Exercise Buddies over to the right. They have some terrific work posted on their blogs. If your new to the challenge let me know and I'll post your link there too.

April 28th, 2008 Creative Exercise Day 2

Here is my entry for the I thought eating was such a good verb I'd use it as a topic one more day. I sketched during two of my breaks at work today. I didn't have time to color them, hopefully I will have time later this week. These sketches are looser than my usual work, but I figured that was okay, given the spirit of the exercise.

And here is the second image, I don't care for the guy eating potato chips. His arms got all freaked out. But I liked the idea, so I posted him too. I'm really enjoying this exercise, and the sense of community I get from everyone involved. I tip my cap to everyone who's been participating.

April 27, 2008 21 Day Creative Exercise Day 1

This is my first entry for a creative exercise I read about over at Alicia Padrón's blog, but it was started by Gina Perry. The premise is it takes twenty one days of doing something each day for at least fifteen minutes, to form a habit. I already sketch every day, but I need more variety in what I draw. I draw tons of characters and for the most part they are just standing there. So... my challenge is to spend at least 15 minutes each morning drawing only verbs. Whatever characters I draw, animals objects or people, they have to be engaged in some sort of activity.

Today's verb was eating. I may use that one again, as I had several ideas. I only managed to get two characters drawn in the fifteen minutes though. I cheated and did the cereal boy in color, taking a lot longer than fifteen minutes, but with those striped pajamas he looked too much like a convict eating cereal, so I just had to.