Why You Always Look Both Ways

This is the lady who wasn't watching carefully while she crossed the road.

You don't want to be like her, do you? Look both ways before you cross.

End of your friendly public service announcement.

Prince of Persia: Sands of Time

One of my favourite games ever. Here's something I finally put together for old time's sake.


And here it is in glorious colour!

Waiting for the Bus.. and Trees!

On the way to work, when I stop at the bus stop, I still get weird looks as I sketch away. I think it's more because I'm in a t-shirt while I do it rather than the sketching. After all, they don't know what I'm doing.


Capturing a person's motion in an image is hard, especially when, you know, they don't stop moving while you sketch (and if they did, it'd kind of defeat the purpose). That lady needs to not wave while crossing the street. Buses have a lot of mass to stop when they hit the breaks. Also, cute doggy (drawn from imagination, since there was no real cute dog :( ).

Oh, and there was a really nice tree on the way to work. Yeah, I know, I walk the same route to work every day, how am I not noticing these trees and stuff the first time? I don't know. I just don't know.

People Walking By

Sketched some more people on the way to work. This is difficult when they don't stop, it's about getting the key impression down.

Everyone seemed to have a scarf on. Maybe that's a clue that I should get one... I'm still running around in a t-shirt. To be fair, I'm walking further than these people, I need a nice cold breeze to cool me down.

Saw some kookaburras in the park on the way. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera, so I couldn't take any photos. Oh well, maybe they'll be there tomorrow.

Wonder Gal

Ok, finished the Wonder Woman sketch (my version). Colours and everything. Enjoy :)

This makes me feel like doing a whole slew of comic-hero sketches... Stay tuned.

Another Robot Sketch

Here's another one. This took a bit longer, since I was having fun with the shadows and reflections.

Golden Oldies Sketch

Just messing around with some golden oldies. My version of wonder woman.

Do Robots Dream of Flight?

Do robots dream? And if so, what of?

This was a 15 minute quick sketch. Just for fun.

Gypsy Dancer WIP Colour

Every so often I need a break from pencilling/inking and want to check that my vision of how the finished picture will look is on track. It's time to break out the colours and have some fun painting.

I'll have to redo it all properly later, but it helps to see what's what.

Gypsy Dancer WIP

Why does IBM hate the arts so? Was drawing away when I was interrupted by a page-out, since I'm on call this week.

Here's the picture so far.

Hopefully I'll get a chance to finish it soon...

Nyu's Art Meme

Have had this lying around for a while, from DeviantArt.

Only just now found it again and given it a go.

Walking to Work

While I was waiting for the bus, I decided to whip out my notebook and use it as an impromptu sketchbook to quickly sketch some of the unsuspecting people walking by. There being no benches, this meant standing up and trying to hold the book as steady as possible while also keeping an eye out for the bus. An exercise in multi-tasking.

Ok, granted the guy in the top left corner wasn't actually in martial arts garb, but I'm allowed to have my fun. The guy in the top right also wasn't smoking or holding a lighter, but there you go.

While I was walking the last leg to work, I saw a gigantic raven, but wasn't fast enough with my camera to get a picture. I need an iPhone or something. Still, I got nice photos of some flowering bushes that I hadn't seen for 3 weeks.


Beautiful, aren't they?

Trivia at the Pub (3)

Trivia at the pub again.

Once more, I was early. An hour early. It seems to be my lot in life.

Oh well.

I get to sit there, next to the roaring fire, iPod playing while I sketch away.

First up was some birds. I'd seen a group of pigeons and one out of place looking seagull on the way to work in the morning, which for some reason, I found hilarious. Once you draw one bird, you can't stop, so the rest of the page kind of filled up with them.

When everyone got there and we had eaten, the trivia mistress started the night off. We were a big group, so I was far enough away from the side of the table that was making decisions about answers that I couldn't hear what was going on all the time. This meant, you guessed it, to doodling, by which I mean sketching.

I can't account for some of the weirdness. Well, the octopus because I always seem to draw them from time to time. The werewolf because one of the trivia questions was about what phase of the moon do they transform and what kills them. The unicorn was because Jasmine was there (and she likes unicorns). The french alien, I have no idea, except it's hilarious (to me).

Next page (I was on a roll). The mandatory Jesus. A troll under a bridge, initially I just drew the bridge, but what's a bridge without a troll under it? There was a geography question, which means we get the planet earth. The theme of the night was the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, so we get some moon sketches (including bonus cow).

Then there was a Harry Potter question (Who killed Harry's parents. I mean, come on! Really?! Who doesn't know the answer?) Then Jasmine saw NCIS on the TV above us and professed her undying love of Abby, who wasn't on camera, so I sketched who I thought she was talking about to confirm that it was indeed the goth chick to whom she was referring.

Dave requested porn, he got the stick figure Hentai.

At this point, jet lag from my recent trip to the US finally hit me and I almost fell asleep at the table.

I have no idea what place we came in. :)

Trivia at the Pub (2)

This week, I got to trivia a little early. When I say a little, I mean maybe an hour or so. Sigh. That's what you get when you have to go straight from work (and work is so far away).

Anyway, it gives me a chance to do some sketching.


Was in a medieval mood that night. So knights it was.

This guy is a little more um.. evil. But not too much. Don't want to overdose on the whole blood and slaughter thing.

Then everyone else arrived and I turned, quite frankly, into a drawing monkey. As in "Draw! Monkey, Draw!!".



So, starting in the top left-hand corner, rather than in chronological order, we have a playboy bunny I was asked to draw, then a gryphon, a UFO, which turned into an entire barnhouse scene. And a horse.


After a successful first round, the requests became more complicated.

We had, hieroglyphs, a transformer, a gorilla holding a kitten, a monkey eating a banana, an octopus, Atlas, a male hand holding a baby and then Lucifer (Or Lucy to his buddies. He doesn't have any buddies).


Then the game became as follows. Someone would draw some sort of shape or a few lines and I would have to turn that into a picture. Starting from the top left. The pattern I turned into the hem of a dress. I drew a bird just for fun. A swirl I turned into a snail. A box I turned into a flower-box. Dianne then drew a woman. I drew my version of the woman. A heart squiggle I turned into a t-shirt design. Two squiggles I turned into snakes and then a box I turned into a kite.

Because all the above clearly wasn't challenging enough, I was then asked to draw a complete, anatomically correct human skeleton. Well hey, who'd have thought those times I did exactly that for practice would pay off. Easy and done.

Finally, some shapes that Dianne drew of which I drew 3-D versions (with shading). Lastly, some bottles of wine and rum. Not that alcohol was on my mind or anything, I swear.

That was it for the night. We came third, but because the first two teams tied for first place, we got the 2nd prize. Hooray!

Trivia at the Pub (1)

Last night, went to the pub for Trivia night, which is always lots of fun.

Managed to do some sketching there. (Because I take paper and a pen everywhere I go)

This is a doodle of Astronoman, my favourite super-hero. Sadly, he is not immune to water soaking into the paper.

Here he is again.

This is when we were trying to figure out where the hell Sudan was, as well as three neighbouring countries. It’s been too long since we’ve studied African geography (Notice how Italy, Greece, Turkey don’t even figure on my quick scribbling. Well, the question was about Africa, so Europe was put in as an afterthought, but still…). This calls for an Atlas!

Nev’s drawing of a man.

Dianne’s drawing of a man.

Their sketches of elephants.

And here was mine.

At this point, I was asked to draw a lion. Along the lines of: “Fine, so you can draw an elephant, but can you draw a lion?”

Having passed this test, a giraffe was called for.

Then portraits. This one of the lovely Dianne.

This was a sketch to explain a funny picture a child had drawn (shown on a blog on the internet with the words “When I grow up, I want to be like Mommy”).

No, it’s not a stripdancer, she works in a department store, and she’s selling a snowshovel. You dirty people!

I’ve been taught a new drawing game, which consists of starting to draw something that looks very rude (i.e. explicit nudity) but turns out to be a drawing of something else. It works better if you can see the drawing being done (or a recording of said process), but here are some finished ones, see if you can tell.

That owl started life as a woman’s posterior, could you tell?

This one was difficult, I tend to draw the nude part without thinking how I’m going to transform it. But I think I pulled it off.

In case you can’t tell, it’s meant to be an elephant eating watermelons or something.

And that was Trivia. We came second! Free drinks for us. Yay!

Back Into Sketching

Ok, so I haven’t done any sketching for a while. At least, nothing worth putting up here.

I finally got around to doing some sketching while watching Farscape (Season 3, need Season 4… damn it!), hence the sci-fi theme.

When I’m sketching while doing something else, I usually don’t have any idea what I’m drawing when I start, or at least not a clear idea, just a concept, or vibe. What that means, is that the picture isn’t ever as polished as it could be. Fun though

Hopefully I’ll be able to put up stuff more regularly from now on, need to get back into some sort of rythm.

At the Arthouse Hotel

Tonight I went to do some figure drawing at the Arthouse Hotel, at a friend’s insistance. It’s a pretty good setup. You pay $3, and you can stay from 6 till 8:30 to draw the two models who change pose every 15 minutes or so.

The problem was, it was absolutely packed. No seats to be found at 6:00.

So we went downstairs and had something to eat and a drink until about 7:30, at which point we made our way back up to some now available spots.

I think these sketches require some explanation.

The model was partially obscured, so some parts are made up.

As I said, the model held each pose for 15-20 min. So I got bored.

I think that accounts for everything…

My friend and I were joking that there should be a button to ask the model to change pose.

This eventually became an apparatus to deliver shocks to tell her when to swap.

We can’t even blame alcohol for any of this…

Last pose. Sleepy after this.

After this, I packed my stuff away while one of my friends finished sketching. While my and my first friend, who had also packed his gear up, were waiting and chatting quietly, one of the waitresses (yes, we could sketch *and* drink, the perfect service) came up to us and asked if we were here to sketch or not. We said we had finished for the night and were waiting for our friend. Satisfied by this (valid) reason for our continued presence, she left us.

Conclusion: it’s ok to pay $3 to come inside and sketch the naked young women posing. It is *not* ok to pay $3 and just sit on the couch watching the naked young women. Somehow it is wrong if it’s not for the sake of (drawn) art. As if an artist doesn’t notice that she’s naked or something . Perverts are advised to at least bring paper and pencil with them, to look the part of the serious artist.

Donating Blood

Me and some friends went to donate blood.

Well, to be more precise, some of us just went to watch others donate, since we cannot, for various reasons.

This event may or may not have happened as portrayed here.

Anyway, I brought my trusty tech pencil and some paper with me (otherwise how will people know I’m an artist?) but sadly lost the paper on the way. It must have hopped out of my pocket and decided to find it’s own way to artistic fame.

So there I was, pencil in hand, but nothing to do with it. Fortunately, I asked the lady behind the counter at the donation center whether she could lend (give) me some printing paper, and she was quite happy to do so, so it all turned out ok.

In the spirit of the occasion, I drew this little fella. He and people just like him need blood, so please, for them, donate.