Error! Plantie's Is Shut Down!

I am sorry to say Painting with Planties has to be cancelled this week!

My computer was loveling taken apart by Richard today, and got a bunch of new parts...so now of course the monitor doesnt work. And still doesnt I am afraid!
I am on my work laptop reporting to you my delay in friendly service :P

I can show you my recent sketch however in the meantime.

Ophelia Sketch - Yes I own this image. 

This is my new painting, a tribute to Ophelia. For those who follow me on Facebook, I posted this a few days ago over the weekend. I wanted to show you the startings of this on masonite board - but perhaps sometime later I will go over what I have done!

I also have photos from my Easter artshow which I will be posting on Facebook once I get my computer back :P

Hope youre all having a delightful week and fingers crossed to see you soon! :D

Painting with Plantie Tuesday! #1

Welcome to the First Edition of Painting with Plantie Tuesdays!
Every Tuesday I hope to show you what I have been working on and walk you through it step by step ^^
For this first edition I had a last minute project I HAD to work on as well...I thought it was due the day after. So I rushed quickly through everything and documented the beginnings of the crazy "beginnings of a painting" here for you!

waste not, want not! my scary fairy gets remade :P

The painting had to be small, it is for a lottery that my local art group is holding for a show upcoming. The only spare small canvas I have left in the house had a barely started painting on it I made last spring :P But I am a firm believer in reusing canvases that have no hope of being finished!

shamefully promoting winsor newton gesso hehe

One coat of white gesso and its already pretty much a clean slate again. There was slight damage due to me being careless over the months on the corner but we will ignore that.
The gesso I use is: Winsor & Newton Artists' Acrylic White Gesso. I remember thinking it was pretty expensive for such a small bottle, but its actually lasted me a LONG time with plenty more go in it!

an amazing digital painting by 0Effe0 found on deviantart

Next! Is the concept, idea, etc. I usually had tons of images for paintings go through my head just before I go to sleep and I knew I wanted to paint a naked deer girl in the woods showing her booty with a little tail :P Originally the idea was quite chibi-ish but I thought it would be better growing her up a bit. This painting instantly came to mind. Its part of my stash of "Inspiration Pictures" I have on my computer and the shape of her body and her face as a sort style I wanted to bring out in this painting.

paint tool sai is the program i prefer best for sketching. the tools are alot easier to use.

I am a digital sketcher for paintings. That is for several reasons, the main one is that in the end I can readjust the size of the sketch to fit the canvas itll be going on. I am lucky enough to have a Wacom Intuos4, and used paint tool sai to first create the face like the reference picture, then I altered it, and added a body in the style I had invisioned.

credit to the original artist is due here! but...it was a quick google search...sorry artist.

final deer girl sketch! minus the whack-a-doodle hand

After one quick google search for antlers because even though I absolutely LOVE girls with antlers...I can never draw them correctly from pure memory :P You can see here in my sketching fury I put her hand on backwards LOL sorry. I do that alot actually - hence all my practice lately with bird girl hands ;)

my poor computer. i abuse it so much. but its love, i swear.

 So then I flip my monitor down after painfully finding the correct image size and put the sketch onto transfer paper.

you gotta love that deer booty

And the numpty that I am I still wound up putting on the sketch backwards, but nevermind! Nothing is ever exactly "perfect" in Plantie world, we just roll with the punches over here ^^

because this is what trees look like in the back of my mind :D

Since I was under considerable time rush I started throwing on the background. The colors you see here are: - Lamp Black - Titanium White - Burnt Umber - Cadmium Yellow - Hooker's Green.
I mixed them on different levels and slowly worked my way into the figure.
I tried keeping the trees especially grey so in the end they wouldnt get too neon bright (something i do alot and too often!)

fast and furious leaf making!

Here I am using a medium small brush with my hooker's green, black, white and a tad of cadmium yellow making fast leaves to add and fill in the background.

i love the color combo light red and green ^^

Colors used for the deer girl - skin: Titanium White - Burnt Umber - Cadmium Yellow - Crimson Red (tiny tiny bit of red)
hair: Crimson Red - Cadmium Yellow - Titanium White - Burnt Umber
And there you have it! Thats as far as I got last night before I passed out and was happy to hear this morning they got the date of submissions wrong and its in a month. Not today :P Thank goodness for that. You can see here finally I added all the basic colors straight up, and from here on out I will start to slowly add in details, starting with her skin and perhaps the trees, giving the painting more definition until I am satisfyed :D

Thanks everyone for tuning in to this weeks Painting with Planties! See you next week ;)

There is no rest for the wicked! New sketch and concepts...

Swan Girl Sketch!

As the title suggest, there is no rest for me, the wicked artist :P Since the Dragon painting had begun I acquired 4 new Bird Girls, and that has meant alot of brain energy of mine has gone into concept drawing.

The one above for Swan I had been thinking of since December when I asked my boyfriends sister, Jenny, to pose for my Swan girl!
The pose itself I was so determined on, and I knew how bold she would have to be to go along with it lol, but she is a gorgeous lady and followed my instructions beautifully!
I am really excited about my sketch - it carries on with my hopes for fuller backgrounds, more details and more thoughts included.

As it was one of my New Years Resolutions I am also going to be painting on something new!

see the strong man at work!! :D

Richard dug out an old piece of laminated plywood which was super thick and heavy :P it had gotten a bit dinged up so he filled the holes in for me and even gessoed it sweet thing!
Its pretty massive, and should make for a wonderful painting surface.

The other 3 bird girls are nearly done with their basic rough sketches. I am still awaiting on reference pics for 2 and brain space for the third.
I really wish I could be a full time artist so I could do all of this in a much more timely manner lol!! Someday right ;)

Sketchfest #22, a Ciwi, and an Interview!

Hello Blogger world :)
Okay, so I have been bad with posting. Ever since I started my Dragon Lore painting a week ago I have never gotten to a point where taking a photo seemed like a good idea as the dragon is the last thing to paint lol.
So Ive been quiet and hamstering things to talk about..

First off! The grand and brilliant Cat, from Catswire Jewelry, was awesome enough to include me in her Monday Interviews!! She has featured me today on her blog with a few questions and pictures and gosh well I am so over the moon :P Heres a link to the full interview: http://catswire.blogspot.com/2012/01/interview-with-artist-christina-of.html
It is the best way my year couldve started, Thank you so so much Cat! *huge hugs*

Second - and perhaps third, my friend Johanna (a.k.a Ciwi) came down from Stockholm for a bit of a visit! You may remember Ciwi from such episodes as Pheasant Girl, of which she modelled for, and other art trades and craziness we get up to.

She came just in time for Sketchfest this weekend and brought her markers and pens along with her! Which translated directly into hours of us sitting at my coffee table gabbing away watching fat people work out, twilight, and gold diggers and generally enjoying ourselves :P
Heres the results:

sketch one started with me drawing an eye...then her drawing an eye...then a face off between how bad we were at profiles and then...theres alex. the unicorn alligator hybrid. 

sketch page 2 was oh okay ill do some line art, and you color it! can you tell whos done what? :P

then sketchfest began at 10 pm our time in sweden! starting with for me  - "Rainbow Hair"

then i did one of my own prompts "Bamboo Mistress" which is one of my creepy favorites of the event

the next day after some sleep :P i did a just woken up sketch of "Clover Mermaid" trying out some color pencils for a change 

then Ciwi picked the prompt "My Gothic Valentine" for me and  yes I spent most of the hour working on her hair. Just addictive!

That concluded Sketchfest for me as my last sketch was horrible and I ran out of time to finish it :P
But before she left on Saturday night we manage our last collaboration:

the bat wing girl. I started off drawing half a face, then ciwi drew some hair, then i made a non nondescript body LOL and some roses and she finished off by drawing some wings and leaves! 

We both took turns coloring it in but let it be known that that skin is all her skill with promarkers!
It was a super fun weekend of art over here - It was great seeing everyones sketches, I cant believe the skill some people have its mind blowing.
See you at the next Sketchfest! If youre interested in joining please check it out here! - http://www.ellenmilliongraphics.com/sketchfest/

And Ill get back to everyone about that Dragon Lore painting sometime this week I am sure :P *must make deadline!!*

And the New Bird Girl is...

Blue Bird!!

My new model is my sweet friend Susie, who made me think of these cute, bright little birds. Its nice going back into a more light painting again after doing a few blackish ones :P

Blue Bird Girl Sketch

From the reference pic I wanted to make her hair quite elaborate as in real life Susie has really long wavy hair - I had to make it more of a center piece! And add lots of little birds and flowers around ^^

WIP of Blue Bird Girl...need a proper name for the painting :P

Its going to be a very blue and pink painting in the end :P
Ive been hashing out issues with her face shape, eye shape, lip shape, every shape! But I think I got alot done yesterday ...
And I am on VACATION! Woot! So plenty of free time to spend painting and having a good time ^^

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas this year and will have an equally awesome time ringing in the New Year :D!

Sketchfest #20!

Okay so I only did 2 small sketches this month as I got really inspired to do my canvas painting but i thought id share them with you here ^^

 prompt was "The Roaring Twenties", and lol shes no going crazy doing the charleston , but this simple sketch was a great precursor to the painting i started after it.

 the prompt for this one was "Elf Hunter", and it looks too much like a blood elf from wow but oh well:P it was good fun just doing some pen work and feeling like it helped inspired me into art again

thanks sketchfest! i really do look forward to decembers and all the christmas prompts that will surely be going on ! :D hehe

Shes doing what? Painting?!

Wow well, its been awhile since ive started a real acrylic project.
I got so hooked and intent on trying to learn digital i put off going back to my roots, but today, with a mix of inspiration here and there i finally got down to business.

I thought of the concept some time ago - sometime around the falling out girl and such. But i havent been the best at getting my concepts onto paper. However! Today was sketchfest, and after doing a few sketches, and talking about painting in the car on the way home from lunch i decided to bite the bullet and do it!!
First thing was...to take a reference picture. Once again i was the only female of appropriate age so i had to use my face. I didnt feel like searching for hours for just the right face, and I knew mine wasnt really correct for my vision but. I modified it quite a bit :P

Okay, so my face is all wrong. My nose is crooked so it appears much shorter when you shoot it from the left, and alot longer from the right, my lips are way too thin, and my face itself is very thin/boney.
So, when making a digital sketch i altered myself into something I thought would suit so much more:

Fatter face, much bigger lips, nicer eyebrows. Yay for art and making a simple day photo of yourself into something much better :P So the concept was a bird girl, with a nest of hair, and a yellow canary.
Next step! The canvas!

action shot!

i put it all onto transfer paper so i could easily put my sketch on the canvas, while moving the hand a bit to make it more at an angle

very very basic, but it gives you someting to work around

my work space! a bit of wine, alot of paint, and some basic colors put onto the picture. always an ugly time :P

the skin was pretty hard, still is might i add!

This is around abouts where it is now - looks a bit odd as the shoulders look too small, when really its because one is bent *see reference pics!*
but so far so good! the skin will without a doubt take me ages to sort out, but i know the hair will be lots of fun ^^
who knows if it goes well, id love to make a serious of bird girl pictures! :D

Oh and Ill be posting all of my sketchfest pictures tomorrow :) see you then!

Sketches of a Looney Lady

the other i spent most of my evening doing something i dont do enough: free sketching. however long i want, about whatever i want, without much thought of anyone else but me and my emotions involved.
okay so they arent really pretty or stylish
but i thought i would post all the nonsense on here to inspire! a burst of odd ball sketching out of everyone else, because you know what? it feels good :P

 This was my last sketch, done on paper with pen. It holds some ugly, some unseen and one cool tree :P I as always wanted to put more into it but it was time for me to crash at this point :P

This was my first sketch of the night, fall out girl, because swedish words were meant to be tumbling out of her hair but i forgot i didnt have photoshop on my computer anymore and my own handwriting is a bit...messy especially digitally :P which you can see below. But yes, the point of the picture is about how ive been feelng since ive stopped swedish school and words just instantly start falling out of your head...

The most sparse and slightly wonky of them all. Cross hatching is not my thing digitally! But as you can tell I write down lyrics I am listening to, or just pieces of thought that need to be scribbled somewhere. This sketch, has alot of frustration in it actually. If you read behind the smiles, youll know what I mean.

Its been quite a short weekend that just flew by without much thought. I hope to do more sketch projects like these over the next week in the evening to help me get back into artwork again and get inspired through it :)
Hope you all had a nice weekend!

Falls Rolling In

I know I have been just about awful with posting. Let me tell you its been a crazy few weeks!
I am attending Swedish school now at the local college, making friends with some very chatty Thai woman who feed me delicious food lol! Its alot of walking everyday, its alot of everything,
But I feel like I am trying really hard every class to learn more than what the teacher is saying to me. So we'll se.

Because of that my artwork has had to the take a small break. My free time always seemed to get eaten up by something else - but now that things have mellowed out a bit and my time management will be getting better (hopefully). When I've had 10 or so minutes of awake willing time Ive been working on a long standing digital painting, which I hope to enter into EMG magazine for their Steampunk issue next year ^^
Its ofc my steampunk lady Bella - but in a more realistic way.
Ill show you some current work in progress shots here:

working on general shading and sessing out a background

working on her face and continuously on her hair, also..her hand -_-

So thats that! Otherwise I'd love to make more basic prints for my Zazzle shop! Such as a Halloween themed category... and maybe other animals like Puku the Owl!
Now wheres some more time in a day - plus extra energy! :P
Hope everyones been well and are as excited about monday as me hehe ^^

another life dump, art and all

Hello hello,
its another life dump sortve day, lots of pictures and happenings here in our little corner of Sweden. First off, I am sick so excuse any poor typing or lack of sense :P comes with the territory.
Secondly, some of you may or may not know my birthday is coming up on September 11th (yes i know an awful day to have a birthday no need to remind me :P) and whilst in town we went to SF Bookshop - and found a wonderful early birthday present for me!! :D

oh yes very nice.

Its the Imagine FX's Fantasy Workshop book! Complete with guides to all sorts of fun things like character creation, backgrounds and more

even a whole manga section yay!!

and some great hints to help me with more realistic painting which i need.

My dream is to someday have a bookshelf full of art books - from digital to acrylic, to sketching, and anatomy... Every book I collect is special to me, as is this. Ive already spent alot of time this weekend reading through and then just without looking at it making crazy sketches on my computer

this is what happens when i start with a blob of paint and nothing else O_o

Despite the oncoming of a cold most of the morning, in the afternoon I got out the paints with liam and did a bit of "portrait" painting with him. We've been watching some Sailor Moon episodes together and he absolutely LOVES her, thinks shes so funny :P So he took it upon himself to paint her:

shes the one named sailor moon!

Obviously hes got the artist talent lol! He even remembered her tiara and "when shes fighting" she has red things in her hair ;) And just for kicks I gave him a moon on his forehead:

moon prince ^^

And beyond all of that!! Ive managed to also find time to work on my Aedhen projects:

Aedhen the chibi - lineart

full form Aedhen sketch - for the element Fire

You know Ive previously done Aedhen in a winter theme, this time shell come about in a burning city, covered in flame. Its another huge challenge, like the forest was, so well see how that all goes.

And thats it for me! A weekend photo dump of all the things going on and about. Now hopefully I can get some rest, and feel much healthier tomorrow as I start the process of my eCourse, new paintings, and more.
Hope everyones had a great weekend ^^

Food Festival, Chibi RemakesI and More

Its been a great wonderful week this week, winning the Discover Y.O.U ecourse, opening and promoting my Zazzle shop and all sorts of other sites like tumblr, and squidoo to get my art out there
Yesterday was a wonderful icing on the cake as it was sunny and warm for once and we went to the last day of the Malmö Food Festival and met up with Richards friends Thomas and Toby :)

Me and Liam eating Greek Food

Liam and I ate some Greek food from one of the stands, and Richard and the rest of the boys had a Boar wrap of some kind :P hehe very manly.

Richard, Thomas and Toby

Afterwards we had Churros (omg, so good) and watched the weirdest band...or sound check...on stage while having a drink overlooking the stage

the band left to go shopping about half an hour in

Another great thing about going into Malmö is the American shop they have there which I always love to go into and grab some of my favorite junk food from my homeland: The States :D

reeses pieces, blue skittles, kraft mac n  cheese and Captain Crunch!!! OMG!

There was also a watermelon airhead but that didnt survive the journey home :P
Today is supposed to be really warm and sunny again so Ill try to make the most of it ^^
In terms of my little art world I have around me - I have completed my art trade with Reem-Alfalfa of her character Lucy :) Which ill show you now:

my version of Lucy

the original Lucy on the left by Reem

And if you can handle anymore Ive been working on some Chibis for my Zazzle Shop!

My Bella Noir Chibi! Now available on Stationary, Stickers, and Buttons!

rough sketch of Aedhen, who will be on the same sortve products ^^

Well thanks for sticking aruond for this GIANT post! Hehe, hope everyones having a great weekend so far :)