Hand Drawing & Digital Coloring: Uta Hime Niko

New image, titled: Uta Hime Niko. Not sure what the name means, but it sounds cool and manga-like. Roughly it could mean Song Princess Erhu. Maybe...

I did this recently in my crazy phase after watching magical princess anime marathon on youtube. I remembered watching Sailor Moon when I was a little girl. Another reason why I did the picture was the competition posted on The Book Depository. Whoever won would get a set of manga books. Who wouldn't want that? The competition called for a drawing of your original manga or anime style superhero (or superheroine, whichever you like).

Seriously, I'm not sure what possessed me to make this design. It just happened. The costume looks a bit like latex. I was actually going for stretchy blue jeans and pink satin, but it kind of failed to look it. The boots weren't supposed to be brown (at first), but this earthy color was milder and more benign for a heroine. If the character was a villainess, I'd make the boots black with metal spikes. The style was a mix between western square dance fiddler and eastern court musician. Do you think it works?

Like most of the pictures in this blog, the first sketch was hand drawn and then it was colored using computer software such as Adobe Photoshop. So, here it is.

Digital Art: Windance

I made a new image of a girl or fairy or angel, take your pick. Similar method like the previous images, hand drawn outline and digital inking with Corel Draw and coloring with Adobe Photoshop. Not much to be said about what inspired me to draw this image, other than I was thinking about the gale a few months ago. I did pick the title based on the Irish Riverdance.

The color green was my own opinion of the suitable color for the wind element. It's more aqua really, than true green. A mix of water and earth, I think. Earth is true green, water is true blue. Fire should be red or orange. I don't have the reference for this, so it might not be accurate at all. It just looks nice, IMHO.

Hand Drawing: Little Girl Lost

What can I say? I love drawing little dollies. The cuter she looks, the better. Not that, I don't draw the males. But males always end up less cute, somehow.

I got the inspiration after listening to Annie's Tomorrow over and over again. And in the play, Little Annie's supposed to have red hair. The story had a happy ending. But the scene above was before the happy ending. And actually, there wasn't a teddy bear in the story. There was a dog. Dogs weren't exactly my strong point, so I opted for the bear.

I drew the character manga style, as my preference. First, was a simple rough outline with a soft pencil, added the ink using black ballpoint pen, erased the unnecessary chicken scratches. Lastly, the hues were applied using colored pencils and cotton swab.

Hand Drawing: Victorian Girls

I like drawing long dresses. I can't design a beautiful dress, though. So here's just two girls wearing generic long dresses. With different colors, of course. The lack of background is not deliberate. It's just that I suck at drawing background, so it's left empty and barren. I'm not sure about the parchment and quill. Victorians no longer use parchments, methinks. Oh well, at least it's not a slab of stone and a chisel.

The image is fairly simple, just generic manga style girls with generic manga style hair. At first, it was just rough pencil sketch, then I added ink using black ballpoint pen. Other pens are not as cheap and easy to use. I erased the rough lines and added some colors using colored pencils. As I was too lazy to fill the background, I only colored the grass.

Not much to be said. That's the problem about hand drawing. Nothing to brag about.

Hand Drawing: Violet Dress

I drew the picture a while ago. Since learning digital imaging is a little difficult, I thought I could take a break and stretched my itchy fingers. So I picked up my old sketchbook, pencil, ballpoint and some coloring pencils, and started doodling.

To say that I like Jessica Alba is a major understatement. I love her style. I saw a picture of her wearing a beautiful dress in some event and I thought she looked gorgeous. So I sketched one based on that picture. The result isn't realistic like, doesn't even look like her. But the thought is there. I don't really remember if the dress is in similar hue. The hair is too bright and the skin is too pale.

Oh, well. I guess I still need a lot of work improving my hand drawing skill. And since I only used a simple ballpoint to trace the pencil sketch (I don't have RAPIDO tracing pen), the outline looked a little rough. The coloring pencils didn't produce vibrant tones. Those cheap counterfeit merchandise. Something's off, maybe the anatomical proportion. Where is my atlas of anatomy? I still need it as reference.

At least this time my scanner didn't throw a tantrum like last time.

Digital Image: Simple Flower

I really don't like drawing flowers. But it is a must-draw object. So at least I have to give it a try.
Just like back in third year art lesson. I used color pencils back then.
This image does not look like color pencil sketch. I wanted to make it like hand drawing. Apparently I failed.
This is purely photoshop-generated. I only used brush and smudge tool. It's tidier than my nine years old self's scrawl.