Sketch Diary: Brush pen inking of a poofy haired portrait (plus video)

Mmm brushpens! My favorite kind of pen to struggle with when I'm tired. So I do most of my drawing late at night, that's just when I'm able to make time right now. And the later it gets, the shakier my hands (and resolve) tend to get. But I was determined! By thunder, I was gonna brush ink the hell out of this drawing. I think it's... ok. Maybe I'll like it more after I color it.

Wanna watch me battle with sleep before your very eyes?! Help yourself:

5x speed

1x speed

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inked Kaiju inspired by Pacific Rim

Isn't he cuh-uuute! This just started as a weird doodle and ended up being a ton of fun to draw and eventually ink.

Watch me ink this bad boy -

5x speed

1x speed

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inktober Day 26 - Freehand ink of Aragon

I love watching movies with great scores in the background while I draw and The Lord of the Rings always fits the bill for me. This was a freehand (no pre sketch in pencil or anything) drawing in ink using a brush pen of Aragon. It's a bit wonky lol and I didn't feel like inking in all of his hair... still fun though.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inktober Day 25 - Death fanart

Freehand ink brush pen of Death from Sandman by Neil Gaiman. I was looking at images of both death and the woman that Gaiman says Death was based on - Cinnamon. I changed the gaze and orientation of the face a bit from the references. Being done freehand, I was just running with the mistakes hah. I love how it turned out though. One of my favorite characters. A great comic - check it out if you haven't.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inktober Day 24 - Ergo Proxy fanart

A freehand brush pen drawing of a character from an anime I love - Ergo Proxy. Yeah I know, the face is wonky. Whatever. I still like it. Freehand is hard.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inktober Day 22 - Whispy hair and purple lips

So I've been watching a lot of Artwork by Christopher Cayco videos lately so I've been all about the freehand brush pen drawings. Be sure to check out his live drawings at least. It's like watching a wizard do magic on paper, to me anyway hah.

How it works is you need some kind of ink and brush - brush pens are definitely easier than using raw ink and brushes. Or at least cleaner and takes up less space. Cuz for raw ink you need the ink well, some kind of palette, some kind of towel, glass of water, brushes, and heavy duty paper. Anyway, you have your brush and ink and then you just draw! No pre-sketching in pencil. Just brush to paper and go. I haven't drawn in straight ink like that in ages and it was so freeing and fun and I felt like my wrist was opening up more. Super nice. Highly recommended.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inktober Day 9 - purple portrait

Note to self: don't play with brush pens when you're tired and don't feel like sitting upright to draw lol. What's funny is that I blamed the brush pen when I first inked this... like it was responsible for my shaky lines.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Inked - Portrait of a girl in my mind

Little bit of a hiatus there - vacation and then heavy workload (doing my team manager's job while she was out unexpectedly). Anyway, back on the tracks here.

Feel free to download this pic to color it in... under one condition: I wanna see it! For realz. Also, please give me credit for the original drawing if you decide to post your colored version somewhere. Thanks a bunch!

with love - M

Sketch Diary: Colored Calm Grace

Here's the original sketch. I zoned out and didn't scan it after inking it, oops. I used a brush pen for some of the lines but ultimately went back to my microns. I just need more control sometimes. The problem is me, not the brush pen haha. Also, was having a really hard time with the skin blending. Yeesh. What NOT to do.

with love - M

Sketch Diary: An almost covered beauty

I sketched this right after watching a special video about how everyone can draw. I just kept the pen in my hand after the practice doodles and did another quick sketch while the feeling of it was still in my mind. I'm not particularly in love with this sketch but I do admire the fact that it's in pen only, no pencil so no erasing. All the 'happy little accidents', as Bob Ross says, are there for all to see.

Over that last couple years I've definitely gotten in to the habit of erasing less but when it's in pen there's a whole other level of permanence happening that can be very freeing. What's there is there and all I can do is keep moving forward with the drawing or stop. There's no going back. Much like life, eh?

With love - M