I’ve talked about my affinity for stock photos on many occasions. In previous posts, I’ve written about royalty free images, photo spamming on social media, and my general love of memes (which tend to lean heavily on stock photos). I just find these images to be very appealing from a portrait study perspective. The facial expressions and/or subject positions are
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This is going to be yet another piece of artwork dedicated to Dallas Mavericks legend Dirk Nowitzki. Considering this is now the fourth drawing I’ve done of Dirk, I guess it’s safe to say I’ve long been a huge fan of his. I grew up watching the Mavs, and especially remember watching those difficult 1990s seasons with guys like Jamal
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One of my New Year’s resolutions for 2022, in addition to the usual “eat better” and “get more exercise” items, has been to enter a drawing into an art show. Several years ago, based on a suggestion from a co-worker, I submitted a sketch for the River Oaks 5 X 5 Art Show. This was very early in my return
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My habits when it comes to artwork typically involve sporadic bursts of motivation. I often tackle one drawing at a time, spending a couple of hours on the project before I move on to something fresh. Sometimes though, I become so inspired about a topic that I work on multiple pieces concurrently or in succession. There are quite a few
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Every once in a while, I find it’s nice to attempt a self-portrait. After all, what face are you more familiar with than your own? My kids and wife are surely very close, and I’ve drawn them all many times. But drawing my own face is kind of a nice pulse check; a way to see if (and how) my
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At the moment, I am quite backlogged in terms of both finished portraits I haven’t yet written about and ideas for future drawings. I’ve written about my tendency to get behind on this sort of thing, to develop a backlog, but this feels like the most extreme it’s been in a long while. I currently have four finished drawings that
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In conversations with acquaintances, colleagues, and other various newly-met people, occasionally my drawing hobby comes up. Although not everyone is particularly interested in art, usually I can expect a follow up question or two; something along the lines of “what do you draw” or “using what?” People are usually somewhat surprised to hear that I consider my comfort zone to
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Way back in April (which feels like it was years ago now somehow), there was a healthcare worker “portraits for heroes” thing going around on social media. The gist of it was, as a small way to show appreciation for people on the front lines as COVID-19 raged, artists were doing free portraits. Although I don’t have a large social
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It’s taken me quite a while to actually get to the writing portion, but I’m finally sharing the portraits from the most recent giveaway. The original giveaway was back in April, which somehow feels like both an eternity ago and just last week. I guess pandemic life warps time in strange ways. Anyhow, according to the giveaway widget dashboard, this
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I still feel that overall I am improving as an artist, which is nice to realize after two years of becoming re-involved in this hobby. As I’ve mentioned before, I took a (mostly) ten year break, so it makes me happy that I’m still at it and still learning. It’s not a rapid improvement and I don’t really experience any
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I came across a really interesting article a few days ago called How to Be an Artist – 33 Rules to Take you from Clueless Amateur to Generational Talent (or at Least Help you Live Life a Little More Creatively). It’s a crazy long title, but basically the article has some detailed practical advice for artists from an art critic
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I’ve been all over the place lately with my sketches, jumping around to varied subjects like Ghostbusters, memes, Pinterest, and Einstein. I always come back to my favorite portrait subject though; my family. I haven’t done a full accounting of people or types of artwork I’ve done (which would be a fun spreadsheet to make), but I’m sure my wife
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Wow, has it really been another entire month since I’ve drawn anything? Sort of a surprising realization, because it feels like I was just writing about how I hadn’t drawn much lately. But that wasn’t last week…it was last month! Once that thought hit me that October was headed towards its Halloween conclusion, it was enough to push me into
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It seems like I haven’t posted much lately, which is confirmed when I look at the monthly archive counts on my sidebar. Over the last year, I think I’ve averaged 9-10 posts per month, with some peaks and valleys. But June and July have been huge valleys, with only six and then three posts! This does make sense though; summer
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This post will be a delayed publication; most likely you’re reading it in July, but everything here is actually from June. Not that it matters, but that is unusual for me since I can’t stand to sit on finished art. It’s by necessity though, because these drawings are actually birthday presents, and I wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise. When
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