New Tools

I had bought these a few months ago and am only now getting to play with them, see what they can do.

Koh-I-Noor watercolour pencilcrayons.
They weren't my first [or second or third] choice, but given that everything else was out of stock at the time and I was on a time constraint, I figured I'd trust what the lady was telling me and add them to my bundle of goodies I was ordering.
That was back just before Christmas and now I'm finally breaking them open to see what the deal is.

I tried something different for Harley's gun.. instead of a typical pop-gun, I figured, why not a circus air-cannon, but with a wick?

So, this is a simply Harley Quinn on watercolour postcard paper.
To start, I coloured with the pencilcrayons normally- and it showed the grainy surface of the postcard. Then I dipped the tip into a shotglass of water and "painted" with it - it came off the tip like paint, smooth and rich, but didn't go very far. Then I put some colour down, dipped the eraser-end [it's just rounded, no eraser or exposed end] and blended/smoothed the colour around, which produced a very watercolour-esque style, but with much less control or precision than a brush would give. Most noticeable on the mallet and Harley's arm where the black is a lighter gray.

Speaking of precision - these are soft-lead pencil crayons but they withstand a good deal of pressure. However, "painting" with them, they blunt very quickly. I used a Copic red marker for Harley's lips.
I foresee some fun abstract art with these things.

I bought them from Curry's Art Store [online] and it's the 24-pencil set. So far, I'm pleased with them!

Inktober & Sketch Dailies [2014]

Instead of the usual digital-ink, I decided to bust out my watercolour postcards and copic markers that I've got stashed in a box with other physical art supplies [as opposed to ethereal, digital ones]. If you're wondering, I buy the majority of my stuff from Curry's Art Supplies.  They usually carry whatever I'm looking for, and at a better price than most of the other local shops.

The other local shops are okay and all, don't get me wrong - but there's some weird cool-guy / hipster / artsy-fartsy kinda vibe I get from them... like if you don't have permanent, expensive-brand grease-paint stains under your fingernails or in your horribly-high-schoolish mustache, you're not a "real artist" kinda vibe / impression. And I don't know about you, but I don't care about my `struggling artist / hipster / cool guy` street cred or whatever.. if I've got the choice of the same item at two different prices? I'm going with the cheaper price because hey, life is expensive enough!

I'd started to sketch this out in my sketchbook, and my brain kept telling me it was from some videogame I'd played when I was a kid, but I couldn't remember what game, even though Ogre Battle for the SNES kept coming to mind, but the style is all wrong and the pumpkin-head critters from that game are more scarecrow-jack-o-lanterns than this thing.

Yes, this is actual postcard that I've made, signed & dated on the back.