Art After a Year

I hadn't done any art in a year - a frustrating side effect of depression - and then, around Christmas, I was given a few new sketchbooks.  So, one night, I started sketching again.  It was so much fun.  Between Christmas and New Years (around there anyways) I did the following:

It felt great to finally do some art again!!! <3

Myrtle Beach

These are the watercolors that I painted while I was in Myrtle Beach this last Spring Break.  I think that would put me in February of 2014... or was it March?  I don't know.  Either way, I painted them this year.  I think my faces have improved; at least I like the watercolor portraits much better than the faces I tried to draw.

People. Warning: NOT GOOD

I feel that I need to put a disclaimer on here: This artwork is practice only for drawing people.  They ARE NOT good and are just practice.  However, I hope that with more practice I will become better at drawing them.  Human faces are incredibly difficult to draw - they're so technical with all the proportions having to be just so.

Based off of my friend, Elizabeth

Based off a picture of myself from a long time ago

A really bad representation of my twin

Even worse representations of my twin... she does not look like this.

Really bad self-portrait

Practicing facial proportions

More practic

See here. This is not my video.

See above caption.

My other sister

Attempt at a self-portrait

Again, an attempt at a self-portrait...

Pastel Portraits

This was my first real foray into the world of pastels, and I decided to go with trying some portraits.  Once again, I worked off of photographs for all of these, but in the end, they don't really look like the people they're based off of.  Ha!  I'm just not that good at this point.  These were done in 2012.  

This first portrait was supposed to be of my younger cousin Rosanna.  But to me, it just looks like a generic face.  I mean, let's be honest for a second.  Drawing faces is hard.  It might not seem like it, but go ahead and give it a try.  I bet it'll be harder than you think! I know the nose is too big and long, which makes the face look very long, but you know what?  I like it anyways. :)

My cousin Rosanna

 The next portrait doesn't really look realistic at all.  But, you can definitely tell who it is supposed to be, so I guess that's an improvement over the last portrait!  I made this as a present for my friend Elizabeth.  I think this was in my second semester, sophomore year of college.

My Roommate Elizabeth

 This final picture does not look like my friend Jes at all, except for maybe the eyes.  The hair is too orange for her, because at this point she was mostly still a blonde, and to be quite honest, I've had several people ask me, "Is that a picture of a girl or a guy?"  Haha.  Them having to ask definitely tells you something, and it's not good...

My friend Jes

DeCosta Series

DeCosta Series: 

Done with Prismacolor pencils

Starting in mid July 2011, I started drawing pictures of my brother-in-law, DeCosta.  He had passed away that July 15th, and that is when I really started drawing.  I hadn't done much drawing before that, but I really took off.  I drew all the pictures in 2011, based off of photographs that I had of him or photos I found on Facebook.  

I continued drawing picture after picture of him: 

This picture was drawn with charcoal.  It's the first time I had ever really experimented with it.  

Finally, my pictures started to look a bit more life-like, after I started focusing more on shading, that is:

 Finally, my favorite picture of the bunch, was done with Prismacolor pencils, both graphite and watercolor.

DeCosta was wearing my sister's glasses and making a funny face at me.  I captured this beauty with a cell phone and then drew it from that.