Category: Art

Cartoons, webcomics, sketches, 3D art and other artwork.

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ACW Episode 185 – Lean on Me?

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Click on the thumbnail above to see the full-sized webcomic!

Well, having an injured knee has certainly slowed me down in some ways. I am very reluctant to climb the extra set of stairs up to my office, which means I'm working entirely from my iPad and my laptop. It also means I can't scan anything in, since the scanner is in the office with the desktop.

BUT! This week's webcomic was done entirely on my iPad using Sketchclub to draw the individual panels and ComicStrip to assemble them into the final strip. And I gotta say, this one turned out just as good as any comic I've hand drawn and then colored in Adobe.

This week's comic also counts as 4 entries in PerCaDraMo, since each panel had to be individually drawn. (Yes, that is sort of cheating, but since it took me quite a bit of time to figure out how to make these 4 panels look so good, I'm declairing it 4 seperate entries. So there!)

Just to clarify, I injured my right knee while camping with Girl Scout volunteers, but drew it as the left knee since that looked better in the comic. I did get rid of my old crutches back in August during my manic garage cleaning fit, and I knew when I did it that a knee injury wiuld be coming soon thereafter. That's what always happens whenever I get rid of my crutches. In fact, it's happened 4 times now! You'd think I'd learn.

I had an MRI today. Most miserable medical experience I've had in a while. I'll know the results on Friday. It's possible I've torn something this time. If so, I'll be looking at surgery and more time on the couch. But ya know, I'm okay with that. I have recently discovered the joys of watching NCIS marathons on USA. They're fun to sit and draw to.

Tomorrow, something rather different for PerCaDraMo. Good night!

 

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PerCaDraMo for 11 November 2012 – Franken-Kitty

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Lately, I've started blurring the lines between crafting and cartooning. More and more I see crochet and embroidery as ways of taking my weird little sketches and bringing them to a new sort of life. For instance, this sketch…

…became this amigurumi…

Please note, I didn't accomplish either the sketch or the amigurumi all today. The sketch was done two weeks ago when my oldest told me she wanted a Frankenstein kitty. I drew a quick thumbnail and showed it to her, then began working on the actual character in yarn. I finished off the head and legs last night (after many days of experimentation and unraveling) and did the rest of this little guy today. In fact, I just finished sewing on his arms thirty minutes ago.

He still needs more work. I need to figure out what to do for the neck bolts and then make him a little vest and add some more stitches. I'm contemplating stitching on a small felt heart, too. Once all that is done, then Franken-Kitty will be finished and Princess will run off with him and I'll never see him again, I expect. Not much escapes that kid's room once it enters.

I can't honestly say if today's entry qualifies for PerCaDraMo or not. It wasn't started today, and it wasn't completed today, but I put in a lot of work on this little guy today, and it's my personal challenge (thus the per in PerCaDraMo) so I'm adding it to the list.

Besides, he's a cutie. He deserves his fifteen minutes of fame on the internet. And I'm going to bed now. Good night!

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PerCaDraMo – a preview for Monday

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Tonight's PerCaDraMo entry is a preview for Monday's webcomic. I used SketchClub on my iPad to draw this. I'm loving the pen tool in SketchClub. The latest update includes a smoothing function and tapering for pen strokes. This makes the pen tool a lot like drawing with the actual pens I usually use.

Another thing I like is that I can export the SketchClub file as a PDF. So now I have these really nice line drawings that I can use in Photoshop or convert to vectors in Illustrator. So I'm loving this a lot!

Going to bed now. More PerCaDraMo tomorrow!

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PerCaDraMo for 9 November 2012 – Princess Yum-Yum

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Princess Yum-Yum Finds a Snack by Helen E. H. Madden

Here is today's PerCaDraMo cartoon. Honestly, this one, like yesterday, is more a painting than what I typically think of as a cartoon. I had meant to keep things simpler, but I got carries away playing around in SketchClub on my iPad, and now here are the results.

This drawing, in part, is for Princess who loves cats and princesses (obviously). But it's also for NekoMich who says I never use enough yellow in my artwork. Is this yellow enough for ya? 'Cause I'm thinking this is pretty danged yellow.

Anyway, it's late so I'm going to bed. Good night!

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PerCaDraMo for 8 November, 2012 – The Rock God

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The Rock God

The Rock God by Helen E. H. Maddeb

Here is today's PerCaDraMo cartoon. I consider each panel of today's webcomic to be individual entries for PerCaDraMo, since they're each individual paintings and they each took a looooooong time to draw.

So with those four panels and today's cartoon, I'm three cartoons behind. That's what happens when I end up being gone at the very start of the month. I would love to be able to get ahead on my cartooning, especially for webcomics. Doing that would mean drawing comics every day, and drawing them quicker than I currently do. I have gotten quicker in the last year or so, but then when I add in scanning and coloring the comics, that slows the process back down again.

So I'm looking into ways to get faster at this. Today's cartoon, The Rock God, took an hour and a half to do. I'll see if there's a way to get faster at this.

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ACW Episode ?? – Oh, the horror!!

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Personally, I think this is one of the best self portraits I've ever done.

I apologize for the lateness of this week's webcomic, and for the general lack of posts this week. Last weekend, I went camping with several volunteers for outdoor training with Girl Scouts. While participating in some adventure games, I hit an uneven patch of ground and my knee went “POP! POP!” And that was that. Yours truly went down like Moses in the fifth.

So this week, I'm hobbling around the house on crutches. I'm avoiding flights of stairs as much as I can, which means I'm not getting up to the office where my scanner is. So everything on the blog is going to be dne in the iPad for a while.

Anyway, about this week's webcomic. I love candy, especially chocolate. Especially peanut butter cups. In fact the only thing, I love more than peanut butter cups is very fancy dark chocolate. So every year at Halloween, the Hubster buys all this candy. And then he goes off trick-or-treating with the girls while I stay home with this big bowl of candy that I HAVE TO GIVE AWAY TO ANY YARD APE WHO SHOWS UP AT MY DOOR!!

So. Now I have a bum knee and no candy. Except for the stuff I managed to stash away before the trick-or-treaters showed up, and that stuff is all mine. Isn't that right, my precioussssssss…

Hopefully I'll be back to regular posting next week. Until I am, it's Personal Cartoon Drawing Month (better known as PerCaDraMo) again this month, which means I'm drawing cartoons every day, so those should show up here. Enjoy!

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Flashback Friday! Zombie

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Zombie! by Helen E. H. Madden, drawn with ArtRage in the iPad

Unlike other Flashback Friday drawings, this one is from not-so-long ago. In fact, it's the first drawing I ever did on an iPad. It was Christmas, almost 3 years ago, and the iPad was brand-new, right out of the box. I'd been dying to try drawing on an iPad, so I spent most of Christmas Day sketching this.

Three years later, I think it's safe to say getting an iPad changed a lot of things for me. It got me more interested in digital art, let me improve my drawing skills, and helped me realize that more than anything, I wanted to throw myself into my art. These days, I draw on the iPad, sketch cartoons in pen and ink, and create odd little characters out of felt, thread, yarn, and whatever else I can get my hands on. It's a happy way of love, I have to admit. And it all started with this drawing.

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Flashback Friday! Galactic Chicken

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Flashback Friday artwork

Click on the thumbnail above to view the full-sized image!

Back when I used to have a grown-up day job, I would stave off mind-numbing boredom by doodling in a sketch book. Almost all the doodles were done in ball-point pen, because it was what I had on hand at the time. Turns out these days that ball-point pen is quite the artistic medium, which some artists turning out these amazing works of art. I may have to dig through my desk drawer and see what pens I have still. If they haven’t all leaked.

Anyway, these are a few characters I drew during some boring meeting. The cat is Lydia, one of my cats who passed away a few years ago. Lydia was a very loving, quiet cat who was also somewhat crazy.  I adopted her when I was in graduate school. She lived to be 18 years old, and I was very sad to see her go.

The other characters are Elvis the Alien, who I used to draw all the time, and Galactic Chicken, who I only drew the once. I have no idea why I drew Galactic Chicken, but I did, and for some reason, I apparently decided he needed lips. I guess chickens from outer space have lips. I don’t really know.