Mat's Illustrations

I've got some new digital art to share, courtesy of my friend Mat.

Mat asked me if I would draw some pictures for him to use on a website project that he is doing for his university course. Now, of course I said yes, Mat's an old and very good friend of mine. So, for some reason that I still don't know yet, I had to draw a disgruntled wizard, a reverent monk and the same monk doing a sideways jumping kick. All I know is that it's for a story. And a glorious story by the sound of it. Well, I thought I'd share the drawings I did for Mat here.

Here we have the disgruntled wizard. I asked Mat for some specifics, and he basically just said "Make it look a little like me, pinching the bridge of my nose in frustration. And holding a staff with an orb. And put stuff on the robe." To which I replied, "Like cakes?" Mat liked that idea. When I think of Mat, I think first of someone strangling me. But then I think of cakes. So I put cakes on the robe, and on his hat, and there is a cake in the orb. That's a magical cake that has super powers and makes the orb glow with a healthy cakey light. Drawing a hand pinching the bridge of the nose is difficult.

Here is the monk, in all his reverent glory. When Mat requested the monks, I asked him what kind of monk he meant. He told me to go with what my artistic vision told me. I wanted to go for a Shaolin monk because they actually practise the Shaolin kung-fu martial art. But I also feel that an Eastern monk is the epitome of reverence, with meditation etc. So I thought the contrast would be bigger and funnier haha.

Here we have the monk sideways jump kicking. I kind of made this a lot more difficult for myself than it should have been really. I wanted to make the contrast between the two pictures really big, so I chose a more dramatic angle. Also being the most difficult angle. Ever. I think I did a moderately okay job on it, there are one or two issues but they're not that big thankfully. So here is my monk kickin' some ass.

Well, I hope I find out what they're for. If I do, I'll put it on my blog. Actually, if the website goes online I will link it in my blog so you can see how cool Mat is and be able to say "WOW I know who did those drawings" too.

See you soon!

Bird Pencil Drawings

Argh, didn't manage to maintain this very much after my first entry! Last two weeks of term were hectic, apparently essays don't write themselves. But now I'm on holidays until mid January, so I have plenty of time to draw again! Unfortunately I haven't had much time to draw recently, so I'm mostly going to offer old drawings. I'm going for something different than the last post, I'm including some pencil drawings. They are fairly old, but I still like them somewhat. I'll go in chronological order.

I did this for GCSE Art, so I was about 15/16 years old (God that was a while ago now!). I remember it taking me a fair while to do, possibly a few hours a day for a week. It was those blasted feathers! I can't remember why, but my art teacher basically handed out some lithographs and lino prints for us to trascribe, and I picked this one. It was a beautiful lithograph, I hardly think I did it justice. But I did the whole thing with just an HB pencil, which I was proud of.


This is a pencil drawing I did of a willow warbler in Year 12, I think I had just turned 17. I took Art up to AS-level and then dropped it. Can't remember the reasoning behind drawing this now, I just remember that the details took FOREVER. For some reason I didn't scan it in at a very high resolution, might try and find it and rescan it. Anyways, I would like to do some more pencil drawings, but I don't have my scanner with me. I'm going to get to drawing some new things this week, and maybe I'll put up a few more new entries!

The Amazing First Entry

Hello everyone, it's time for the grand opening of my blog, or whatever you do with these things. This is really more of an art journal/diary, rather than some kind of witty and informative web log, but I'll try to somehow make it entertaining. Well, I won't, but it sounds good if I say I will. Maybe I should put a little introduction. I'm a marine biology student who also happens to enjoy drawing stuff. A lot of it is aquatic themed (for reasons that I hope are obvious), some of it is inspired by my day's events. All of it is doodles, sketches and quick paintings that I do when I need a break from writing up my dissertation.

So for this, my first entry, I have four things to show. They are all messy speed paintings that I did on the computer, and only one of them was done today. You would have thought that for my first post I would have done something amazing. Well, I've been busy.

Remember to click on the picture to see it in its full size!!


First is the painting I did today. Would you have guessed it, it's a painting of a fish. A member of Pomacentridae, the Emperor Angelfish. I saw a few big ones when I was diving in Indonesia this March/April, and they're fairly impressive looking. Gorgeous fishies. I was writing an essay and decided I needed a break, and I felt like painting something pretty.

This one was quite a large painting, if I'm bored I just open up a really large blank canvas and see what happens. I like to occasionally paint things in one colour, and for this I guess I chose purple. I was listening to a song that made me want to draw this called Alchemy Alice. I have no idea why she's so god damn miserable. Cheer up woman.

Drew this one several months ago, fancied something in black and white. I just wanted some practise at drawing profiles if I recall, I don't really like it anymore though. I don't know that I ever did to be fair, but I guess it's something. God he's miserable too. Although I was listening to Damien Rice when drawing this so that's my excuse.

This one is more of a sketch than anything else. I can't remember why I drew it now, I'm sure there was a reason behind it. Oh well, it can't have been that important. Either way, I still kinda like the design and the colour scheme, I might try and make something of it over the Christmas holidays when I have the time.

And there you have it, my first entry as a blogger. I feel so accomplished! I'll try to post things every week. It will be good for me because it will keep me drawing and practising. In the meantime, enjoy and see you later!