Mack Doodles

I've been under the weather this whole week. Been sick with a cold/sinus something or other. I think I must have picked it up from the art classes I taught last week, because I never get sick, but last week I was around first, second and third graders and isn't that what happens when you start hanging with the youngins? At least I didn't contract head lice that hit the camp on day three...

Anywho, I was thinking since I felt bad, I needed a little Amazon pick-me-up and I ordered a book called "Drawing Lab for Mixed-Media Artists" by Carla Sonheim. It's a simple book in theory, can be used by students and pros alike. In fact Carla teaches workshops to help adults recover a more childlike, playful approach to creating. It's full of exercises to help make drawing fun...not that it isn't always fun, but sometimes it helps to work outside the box, play around like a kid and just create for the joy of it instead of for some looming deadline.

©Deborah Melmon 2010

So today I did one of the more simple exercises in the book, drawing with black ink and an eyedropper. I did line drawings of my dog Mack from a photo on my sister's blog. She took the most adorable pictures of my new Airedale Terrier which I got as a rescue about six weeks ago. If you want to take a look you can see him here. (Go ahead, he's really cute!) After drawing a simple image and while the ink is still wet, you lay toilet paper over the ink and let it spread out a bit. Makes some fun blobs and fuzzy lines. I then scanned in the line drawing and added a bit of color and some textures which I love to play with in photoshop. My end result is looser than my normal style, but still doesn't have that child like quality I was looking for. Too much illustrator, not enough kid. Looks like I've got some work to do.......fun!

©Deborah Melmon 2010