A Doodle A Day

Dreamers - Finished

This must be the first piece in a long time that I have actually gone on from the first doodle to form it more into what was in my mind.

This is in fact now the third incarnation of this doodle. I wasn't happy with a number of things in the original doodle, the male being the main thing he had a distinct lack of shoulders and an arm which emanated from his neck. The more I looked at it the more I wanted to improve. The second was more or less there but I had drawn the female with the minutest of change of angle of head and flow of robes and it lost something, a big something. The pain of course of pen and ink is no corrections and as it was straight from the pen without a pencil under sketch, well it was a case of start again from scratch. This time I think I am pretty happy with the result.

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper.

Illustration Friday - Dreams

Illustration Friday's topic of the week is dreams. UPDATED - CLICK HERE TO SEE FINAL PIECE.

I don't quite know how this image came about. I was just listening to the radio and had a pad in my hand and started doodling. I never doodle images of this type, or should I say 'had' never doodled an image of this type. I was intending to just create something organic and that looked like an old block print illustration but I found myself thinking of this image when thinking of interwoven vines and trees. It does however fit in well as an illustration for a short storey I have been writing of late and also works for this weeks Illustration Friday topic.

There is obviously a lack of facial features, partly intentional, partly I don't know how if I do include faces how I am going to do them. Also things like the leaves aren't shaded as I may introduce some muted coloured inking. Anyway, a bizarre image for me to create, but that's the thing about a blank sheet of paper, there is no knowing where it is going to take you.

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper.

Charlie and The Bean Stalk

Oh dear you say, he reads that many stories that he now thinks he has a magic bean stalk. Well, no, not exactly but the plant on my doodle desk is exhibiting signs of wanting to take over the world or if not the world then at least the doodle desk.

My doodle desk is for me a little goldmine of interesting things that I like to have around when I am sat doodling or writing. I like natural materials and interesting objects so amongst the little wooden draws and cases containing the pencils and pastels,ink bottles, tubes of paint, brushes and pallet knives you will find a small Chinese style soapstone tea light candle holder, a spiral glass candle lantern, some stones collected over the years from the coast, a small Brazilian Crystal ball the interior planes of which sparkle and change with the light, some tumble stones; Jade, Lapis Lazuli, Malachite, Quartz, Moonstone, Aquamarine, Bloodstone, a small pewter dip pen rest and ink well, a strange silvery gold metal sphere that looks like the surface of some distant planet which the Clangers might live on, a rock crystal lamp and candle holder, a blue glass candle holder, a wooden carved Chinese dragon on a stand made from a cross section of tree trunk, a small wooden case containing a selction of dip pen nibs and one dark wood and one pewter dip pen, a small wooden ink blotter, a number of leather bound sketch books, a selection of China wells, a pair of green shaded brass bankers lamps and a couple of plants. OK, so where does the Bean Stalk come into all this weirdness?

Well, the one plant which when I bought it a few years ago looked like a miniature tree with numerous intertwined slender trunks has over the last few months been going under a bit of a transformation. The green tendrils, and that is the only way that I can describe them, firstly started to reach out and grow towards the window to the side of the desk. Over the last few weeks however they seem to have also taken on the challenge of wrapping themselves around everything so far in reach. They have already wrapped themselves around the neck and shade of the nearest lamp and I am certain that if left to their own devices one day I will awake to find the whole desk and everything on it wrapped in the embrace of this plant.

Maybe if your read too much of mythical creatures and get lost in too many fairy tales your world starts to imitate them? I'm not too sure, but if I find green leggings, jerkin and a green velvet pointed hat with a jaunty feather in it in the cupboard then I may have to change my reading habits or else go and live in a tree trunk!

And finally, A Doodle A Day has managed to crawl past the 15,000 mark in its visitor stats after some nine months. It is nowhere near as popular as the original site ‘Tree of Life’, but it is quite different in its content, being more pictorial and of limited subject matter. As I am neither an artist or an illustrator or affiliated with any blog rings or the like or indeed a regular commenter elsewhere it is in a way still a surprising figure for a site with very quick sketches of nothing in particular or of any standard and also for a site that has experienced some fairly long periods of inactivity from myself. Actually thinking about it, why do you come here?! It’s OK; you don’t have to answer that!

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper.

The Blue Fairy Book

Well not a doodle post for once but a book one instead.

I was browsing today at lunch in a bookshop and specifically at their selection of first editions in some glass display cases when a book caught my eye, it had a gorgeous deep blue cloth cover with gold, red and white designs. On having the assistant open the case and having had a look inside it I knew I was going to purchase it even though I was only browsing. I'm not sure what it was doing inside a case with so many really fine old first edition books with price tags to match as it is only two years old and although nicely bound and printed on good paper it isn't an expensive book.

The book in question is The Blue Fairy Book edited by Andrew Lang with paintings and decorations by Charles van Sandwyk. It is a 2003 reprint of the original Longmans The Blue Fairy Book of 1889 and is a collection of children's Fairy stories and contains along with incidental illustrations, fifteen full page full colour plates by Charles van Sandwyk.

It really is a lovely book and I am certainly looking forward to reading the likes of: The Bronze Ring, The Yellow Dwarf, Little Red Riding Hood, Rumpelstiltzkin, The Master Cat (Puss In Boots), The Terrible Head, A Voyage to Lilliput, The Red Etin, Snow-White and Rose-Red, The Forty Thieves and more in this chance find.

Weeds

A rapid little pencil sketch today. After the recent couple of quick ink doodles of trees I thought it was time to go smaller and also to sketch something that I wouldn't normally consider as a subject.

Not a terribly successful exercise really and even although seemingly a simple subject to tackle I think to create anything worth noting you would have to spend rather more than the few moments I allow for sketching and in better light as well as it is a dull day and the subject certainly lacked any contrast. I now know why I don't sketch flora and fauna!

The Technical Bit.

0.9 Propelling Pencil on Cartridge Paper.

The Old Ways

I have always had an attraction to fine writing implements. Over the years I have bought what probably amounts to an obscene number of propelling pencils and fountain pens. Mostly I have to say from Cross as to me they have a simple elegance.

The pencil I mainly sketch with is a simple, slim, almost art deco style solid silver Cross pencil that takes a 0.9 led, ideal for sketching and a pleasure to use. It has been mislaid a few times and left in offices only to have me frantically searching for it and it has endured a few dents along the way as well somehow. I would feel lost without it as I have had it now for some sixteen years or so. Previous to that I had an antique solid silver pencil that was my fathers and that I sadly sold to an antique dealer when I was an art student to get some money in. The folly of youth. Around the same time I also let go a rather delicate ring that my grandfather had made for my father. My grandfather was a master goldsmith in London and died before I was born.

For my ink sketching on the other hand I am becoming more and more enamored with the simple wooden dipping pen and nib. There is just something so satisfying about a bottle of silky black ink, the way the light falls on the glass bottle, the shape of the bottle, the smell of the ink and the process of moving the pen backwards and forwards between paper and bottle and of course the quality and variety of line created with it. I even use the dipping pen now when sketching outdoors and although impractical to use to write in meetings and in the office I do find that when writing at home I use the dipping pen. It just feels right and makes the act of writing more enjoyable and important an occasion in a way.

Somethings just cant be improved upon with technology. You can't beat the warm homely feel of an open fire, you can't replicate the feel and quality of light from a candle lantern and you can't recreate the same writing experience with a ball point pen that you get with silky liquid ink and a well crafted nib. Pressing keys on a computer keyboard will never have the same satisfaction of writing by hand on good quality paper and an electronic book will never hold the same magic as holding a well loved book.

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper.

Another Tree

Another little ink tree doodle I am afraid, I guess these little doodles are about the size of a packet of 20 cigarettes.

I noticed while I was doing this little doodle that there were already leaves on the ground although not dead ones that had dropped but it was a reminder that things before long will be turning to reds, golds and browns and even now the evenings are drawing in quite rapidly and the lamps going on earlier and earlier. It only seems like 5 minutes ago it was getting lighter and spring was on the way.

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper.

Teensy Trees

Well since I am back I guess I had better post! After a couple of weeks off from doodling and posting it is actually proving to be quite hard to get around to doing either. However with one of the tiny tiny little soft leather bound sketch books bought in the lake district on me today I did manage to grab a couple of minutes to idly make two teensy weensy quick little pen and ink doodles. Is that how you spell teensy weensy? Well, it is in my world!

Actually these two little doodles are the first to grace a page in one of these little sketch books, so now the pristine sketchbook taboo is broken and I can get on with scribbling any old rubbish in them! I had reservations about the pages proving to be large enough for one sketch on a page let alone two, but what do I know.

The Technical Bit.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper. (Yes I keep a little bottle of ink in the back pack!)

Where the Dragons Live

Well, it's been a while! Cin, Paula nope not vacationing or anything more ominous just somehow one day drifted into another without me doodling or even turning the laptop on outside of work to even browse let alone post. Dawn I'm glad you like the site and yes, I think I'm back...

I always read at least two books a week, but every so often I have a real reading marathon, and that's what I have been doing for the last couple of weeks. Nothing too adult though, which is more or less illustrated by the little pencil doodle for this post. I have been lost in a couple of new reads and a fair few re-reads of books already on my bookshelves. The last couple of weeks have seen me actually get around to starting again and finishing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix so I could then read Harry Potter and the Half Blood prince for the first time. Then it saw me re-read Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funk; Wolf Brother by Michelle Paver and Eragon by Christopher Paolini and then add some first reads: Inkheart by Cornelia Funk; The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funk; The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud; The Wish List by Eoin Colfer and presently Eldest by Christopher Paolini. Seeing a common theme here? It would be a nightmare for anyone who has outgrown their inner child and thirst for good old good verses evil journeys involving elves, dwarfs, mythical creatures and magic and of course dragons. I however have not outgrown such things!

The Technical Bit.

0.9 2B Propelling Pencil on Cartridge Paper