Two New Drawings of Very Different Things

It took a while, but I finally got what I think is a decent drawing of Zachary Quinto. The man turned out to be rather difficult to capture - oddly, I don't think he's in character in this one (certainly not Spock, and he doesn't quite look like Sylar either). It's one of the most detailed drawings I've ever done, and it was good practice for patience and for keeping an eye on the big picture without getting too concerned about every hair of those lovely eyebrows.

And here's another very different one. I wasn't interested in horses when I was eight, or whatever the usual age is. But this summer, I started taking riding lessons, and had the pleasure of learning from an amazing teacher and her very special horse, the 17 year old mare Valentina. This is the first real horse drawing I've ever done, and now I think I might have to branch off into portraits of animals as well as people.

Mohinder Suresh

I don't watch television, instead watching movies and occasionally a TV series online, which means that when I finally discover a good show, I'm late enough to get all of the episodes on Netflix (or YouTube), and watch three or four in a row. It's a different experience, watching a show that was written to be viewed once a week (I hate episode recaps at the beginnings!). Currently I'm watching Heroes, and I just finished blasting through season 1 on Netflix. Here's a drawing of Sendhil Ramamurthy as Dr. Mohinder Suresh, one of my favorite characters (not least because of his accent, which try as I might, I could not draw).

Severus Snape

I'm re-reading the last two Harry Potter books, and tried a slightly different style of drawing in this portrait of the Half Blood Prince - Severus Snape. I've always liked bad guys (as my parents will attest after I announced at a very young age that my favorite character in The Lion King was Scar). Snape is a particularly tragic (and heroic) character, and despite his general nastiness, I couldn't help being intrigued, even in the early books. This drawing is mostly ebony pencil (with a little H pencil to smooth things out) on bristol board, and it's large - slighly larger than life, which was different for me, and fun. I took the graphite right up to the edges of the paper, so there was no cropping done in this photo. It made for an interesting and, I hope, powerful composition.

One more of Wolverine...

Couldn't resist doing one more drawing of Wolverine. It's another pencil on bristol board - I spent way too many hours on this one.

Wolverine

I really enjoyed the new X-Men movie - I've been looking forward to an X-Men Origins film, and Wolverine has always been my favorite. I'd never drawn Hugh Jackman before, except for a couple of quick sketches after The Prestige came out a few years ago.

Both of these drawings are pencil on Bristol board. I did the entire portrait (on the left) in one day yesterday, and I'm pleased that I'm getting faster. I used mechanical pencil more extensively, which requires me to work more slowly but results in a smoother, more finished texture. The full-body drawing on the right was an experiment with my new Ebony pencil.

Another drawing sent off into the World

I've been following the BBC America television series Robin Hood, which sadly has been canceled after season 3 was completed a few weeks ago. I posted a drawing of my favorite character, Sir Guy of Gisbourne (played by the gorgeous Richard Armitage), on this blog a while back. The drawing sat in my sketchbook for several months, but earlier this summer I decided to send it to Mr. Armitage, just for fun. I had a great time addressing the envelope (bright red with an ornate design on it, for better visibility amongst other items of fan-mail).

Only three weeks after I'd sent it, I received an autographed photo in the mail. I was thrilled enough with that, and it took me several hours before I turned the photo over and saw the thank-you note on the back! It's always fun to send drawings off into the world.

Spock

Hello World - yes, I'm still alive, just pretty silent in cyberspace for the past few months. Both drawing and blogging dwindled considerably over the school year, but I'm home in Alaska for the summer and drawing quite a bit. As a way to ease back in to the habit of blogging, here's a recently completed sketch of Spock (Leonard Nimoy) after I was inspired by the awesome new Star Trek movie.