Browns with Blue Green and Blue Violet

This may be a gourd bowl with water. But on the back, I wrote "music," so it may be an instrument, a horn of some kind. Whatever it is, I like the shapes and the colors, and especially the dark blue-violet ribbon tied in a bow.

Copic colors used: BV08, V09, BG72,75, E09,33,37, YR14

Pink and Green

Sea life, maybe.

Copic colors used: R000,00,02,32, YG63,97, Y000, G000,07,14,21, Drips of 0, Red and olive multiliners

Heart Drawing

The drawing was based on this silver necklace, a gift from my husband.

Copic colors used: BV20, RV91,95, silver Sanford Uni-ball Gel Impact pen.
Paper: ecru Crane's card approx. 4x6"

To try this, click here.

Star Circle

The shapes and colors make me smile.

Copic colors used: Y000,13, R000,02, V000,12, RV000,11, G000,12, BV20,23
Paper: white Crane's card approx. 4x6"

To try this, click here.

Flower or ...?

Flower? Art glass vase or paperweight? Dancing dreidel? Mask? All suggested by viewers.

January 23, 2010: This drawing, from January 2009, is my entry for the current weekly theme "clumsy" on Illustration Friday. It's awkward, but I like it anyway.

Copic colors used: Y15, YR04,09, G14, B24, C1
Paper: ecru Crane's card approx. 4x6"

Mary 12 of 12 - Holy Family

The last Mary in the 12 Marys of Christmas series. I like the interaction with the baby. I got the arms better-proportioned. I was glad I tried this series. Vacation over, back to my day job.

Copic colors used: Cool gray multiliner; Bench and blankets E41,44, V000, RV91, Y000,13; Halos Y13; Baby E00+R000, R00; Mary & Joseph hair & skin E21,29,37,R02; Joseph robe BV20+W1, BV23; Mary robe & veil BG000,32, B24,29,32

Mary 11 of 12 - Dancing with the Baby

I wanted to show Mary's joy, in contrast to yesterday's post. I made her arm too long (again!) but I like the sense of movement.

Copic colors used: Ground W3 with streaks of 0; Baby E000+R000, R00, RV91,95; Halos Y26; Mary E04,21,29,37, R02, B06,41,45, B41+BV31

Mary 10 of 12

Love her expressive posture. Not sure where that headdress came from, but I enjoyed the flow of the fabric and all the "embroidery" details.

Later I noticed I drew her hands wrong. No wonder she looks so serious. She's thinking, "How will I ever take care of a baby, with my hands on backwards?"

Copic colors used: E21,37, B24,32, BG05,45, BV20,23, Y19, shadow W1, horizontal lines W3

Mary 9 of 12 - Abstract - Mary with Elizabeth

My childhood and adult church life has not had much of a focus on Mary. As I worked on this series, of course, I reflected on her story and what her experience might have been like. Before the birth of Jesus, as told in Luke 1:39-56, she visited her cousin Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist. I drew them together in one of yesterday's Five Oval Marys. For today's drawing, I used some of their words, and words about them.

I needed an abstract drawing as a change from drawing people. For the shapes, I did some tracing of my French Curve templates, and added some echoes of those lines. I drew and colored with greens and grays for Elizabeth, blues and browns for Mary.

Copic colors used: Mary BG45,72,75, E37, YR14, cobalt multiliner; Elizabeth W1,3, G28, YG63, BG93, olive multiliner; Dots of 0

Mary 4-8 of 12 - Five Oval Marys

I made the five oval frames in PowerPoint, then printed the page. Along with drawing the five pictures, I added the flowering vine.

The captions are: Center "Mary with baby Jesus," Top left "Mary with Gabriel," Top right "Mary with Elizabeth," Bottom left "Mary with star and angels," and Bottom right "Mary with shepherds."

Mary 3 of 12 - Joseph Holds the Baby

I like their expressions and the feeling of connection among them. But some of the arms are too long! More practice needed. I used an ellipse template (plastic with many ovals cut out of it) to make the halos.

Copic colors used: Halos Y26; Baby BG000,32, E00,25,37; Mary E21, B41,45, R02; Joseph E04,29,37,41, YG91,95,97

Mary 2 of 12 - Mary and Baby

She looks uncomfortable. Maybe she's thinking, "now what?"

Generally, I don't draw people. So when I decided to attempt a Mary series (see yesterday's post), I went to my local art supplies store and bought 2 manikins. Fortunately, I was on vacation with time for drawing.

This was my first drawing with the gray plastic manikins. It helped a lot with proportion and angles. But ouch, that left hand! A lot more to learn and practice.

Copic colors used: Bench YG91, W3; Baby R00, RV11, Y000,15; Mary B01,05, E29,41, Y15, R02, C3

Mary 1 of 12

The verse reads: "But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. Luke 2:19"

For a whole month, I was doing small images, including the Thanksgiving prayer drawing. So for this drawing, I thought I would do a large abstract something, lines & shapes, just get myself back into the larger scale & wider hand-arm movements. My only plan was to use some orange, which I didn't use in my Advent calendar.

I started with a few swirly lines and patterns. Then I turned the paper a different way & saw the beginnings of a face with scarf or hair or maybe both. Along with other shapes that didn't seem to fit. I kept on drawing and coloring, and in a little while, I saw that it wanted to be Mary, pondering. Not what I expected. Definitely not anything that I planned to draw! I don't draw people usually, and if I had set out to draw "Mary pondering," it would have been shadowy and mysterious. Not like this.

This is Mary 1 of 12 because, when my friend Sybil saw it, she said, why not draw the "Twelve Marys of Christmas." (Like the Twelve Days of Christmas, December 25-January 5.) So that's what I did.

Copic colors used: YR04,09,14, E04,21,37, BG000,72,75, Y38, R32

Advent Calendar 2008

During Advent, I drew something every day in my calendar, a Word table that I created and printed. Each day's space is 1-3/8 x 1-5/8".

It was a wonderful experience for me. If you're interested, click here for what I learned from it. Colors, words, and sources of quoted words are listed here.

Added November 27, 2010:
Click here for my 2010 Advent calendar drawings. Click here for 2009.

The "animals and people" labels are for 12/25. The "from life" label is for 12/7, where I drew a pressed-glass candlestick that is on my dining room table. The "still life" label is for the Sunday candle drawings.

In addition to Copic markers and multiliners, I used Copic Opaque White (12/7 & 12/15), colored pencil (a touch of white on the candles 12/7), gold Sanford Uniball Gel Impact pen (12/16, 12/23 & 12/24), and white gel pen (lace 12/14). Click here for details about the Copic colors used. The pine branch for 12/15 is drawn from Marianne Walker's tutorial on coloring palm and pine branches (her I Like Markers blog) - used with her permission.

Embroidered Ribbons

When I started with Copic markers, I knew I would want some colored multiliners, because I had enjoyed drawing with colored Pilot Razor Point pens. (Which do not work with the alcohol-based Copic markers.)

So, along with a set of black multiliners, I started out with four colors of Copic 0.3 Multiliners - wine, sepia, cobalt blue, and cool gray.

Then I decided to get the other eight Multiliner colors- yellow, orange, pink, purple, sky blue, olive green, turquoise, and red. When they arrived, I did this drawing. I was thinking of embroidered lace.

I did a similar pattern for the 12/16 drawing of my 2008 Advent calendar.

Copic colors used: Background C1; Colored multiliners- cobalt, yellow, red, purple, sky blue, and turquoise
Paper: white Crane's card approx. 4x6"

Three Drawings from Sybil

In December, my friend Sybil sent me an e-mail with three of her recent drawings. (Used with her permission.) Here's some of what I liked about them (from my reply to her):

• The patterns instead of solid colors - I should try more of that
• The shapes that pull away from the main shape, like puzzle pieces that could fit back together
• The curvy lines with dots or circles out at their far ends
• The graceful lines that make emphatic shapes
• The colors and patterns that almost repeat, but don't
• The lines parallel to each other that make new shapes
• The color combinations, bright but harmonic
  
• I feel myself pulled into them - it is very meditative

I Am Thankful For... (Thanksgiving 2008)

Little by little, over a long Thanksgiving weekend, I made this prayer drawing. Very satisfying to do, and a great way to pay attention to what I'm thankful for.

I especially like the slice of pie (drawn, then eaten), the family quilt, and the dog. I used Copic Spica glitter pens in a few places, like the top surface of the pie and the book's edges.

Flowing Blue and Purple

This drawing started as a doodle, just flowing lines. It made me think of flowers - maybe morning glories. So I added leaves. This is one of my favorite drawings.

Copic colors used: B41,45, YG63, G21,V15, Cobalt multiliner
Paper: white Crane's card approx. 4x6"

Grape Ivy 2008

My grape ivy plant #3, a cutting of a cutting of my plant #1 from 1970. I love its leaves and its knobby stems and its survival skills. I drew plant #2 in 1983.

I drew this in pencil, then scanned and printed it before coloring. (In other words, I didn't color my original pencil drawing.) On the copy that I was coloring, I also added some lines in cool gray Copic multiliner. The pot is a very dark brown in real life, but for this drawing, I made it blue and gray.

My original background (YR21 and BG000) looked too intense to me, so I faded it out by coloring over & over with colorless blender, pushing the excess color out the back. And the paper didn't even pill. About this drawing I wrote, "It's such a pleasure to have markers that make nice colors, don't blob all over the paper, and what's more, can do interesting effects that I never knew could be done with markers."

Copic colors used: The clay pot is base color R02 with E09 rim & E09 applied on the R02 marker to give it the streaks & splotches. The leaves are base colors of G12, G21, YG03, YG23 with various layers of darker greens applied on the lighter markers. When it was all done, I added some white colored pencil on the potting soil to make it less of a solid dark color.

Flowers in Shallow Bowl

It was a lot of fun to layer the colors in this drawing. The flowers started with very light base colors. Then I added many different bits of darker with the blender brush tip. The table and bowl were also done that way. See below for details on the technique.

To try this, perhaps with simpler coloring, click here.

Copic colors used: Bowl C5 base, C9, Black 100 on 0 brush tip; Leaves YG03 base, YG63, G9; Wall G40, between flowers G21; Flower base colors W1, R0, BG000, then for the petals, added many colors on 0 brush tip (B06,29,39,45, E04, BG05,45, R24,29,32,59, BV08, RV14,29) and for the flower centers, added Y26,38, YR09; Table base color E33, streaks of E29,44 on 0 brush tip.
Technique: I used the palette technique: picking up the color from a clear plastic CD case cover, as follows: Color with a dark marker onto the plastic, then pick up the color with the blender & gently dab onto the paper. The color dries on the plastic, but you can still easily pick it up with the blender. When done, clean up the plastic with alcohol (hand sanitizer works great) and kleenex. (See Marianne Walker's palette blending explanation on her blog I Like Markers for more info.)
Paper: white Crane's card approx. 4x6"