Next Live Caricature Drawing Event Announcement

Attention Naples readers. I will be drawing live caricatures (manga-style cartoon portraits) from 2 pm -5 pm at the Crawfish Boil fundraiser event at the Boys & Girls Club of Collier County on April 2nd.Hope to see you there!

Some sketches drawn at the auto shop waiting room

While waiting for a couple of hours at the auto shop, managed to complete this set of assorted characters with a Sakura Pigma Sensei 0.6 mm pen. Then continued drawing on paper and card stock just to keep busy. Remember grasshoppers always carry your sketching kits with you, so you can make the most of time spent in waiting rooms practicing your drawing skills.
For the most part I used a few leadholders to sketch fantasy subjects and some of the other customers in the waiting room.





Spending a bit more time and practicing some shading on these imaginary objects. Remember doodle and sketch whenever you can: it will help you ward off boredom while improving your sketching skills.

Did Target stop carrying Rhodia pads?

That was the question that popped in my head when i found these notepads: the Rhodia Reverse Book and the No. 11 pad on a clearance end cap at Target. Instead new a display of Moleskine journals pads and other Asian paper products had replaced them in the stationery aisle.
For its first doodle test decided to use a recently acquired vintage Tru-Point automatic leadholder.
The 3B lead glided smoothly leaving rich dark marks on the Rhodia paper. Bit of a shame that the Rhodia pads might get harder to find at retail locally.

Latest donated Prize: Zebra Sarasa Push Clip Gel Ink Pen - 0.4 mm set

George from My Supply Room generously sent me this set of Zebra Sarasa Push Clip Gel 0.4 mm Ink Pens with his last shipment of vintage lead tubes.
The pen tips came protected with these pink plugs that keep them from drying out.
Their push clips allow them to be attached to notebooks and bundles of paper.
These retractable ball point gel pens worked well enough. The pink ink seemed to a be tad more visible than the rest. They should make some fine prize incentives in any one of my ongoing drawing classes. Thanks again George!

Gallery of Manga Cartoon Portraits of the Day

Thank you very much to everybody that stopped by and patiently waited to get their cartoon portraits drawn at the live caricature booth at the Art Festival in Downtown Naples earlier today.
Next time, I will try flipping this arrangement 180 degrees, so that visitors passing by can more easily observe the cartoon drawing process.
The first Dragon Ninja of the day knows how to ride in style.
Cartoon portrait before and after the coloring step.
Our second Dragon Ninja of the day happily casting some blue flame Avatar-style.
Just realized that this was the only mermaid portrait today. Often this particular request is quite popular among the girls. Guess the girl that wanted to be a fairy mermaid (a novel request that has been increasing in popularity in its own right) changed her mind, or did not return to the booth after all.
Surfer Girl cartoon portrait. It had been a while since I got this particular request.

Dragon Ninja #3: our single Kunoichi of the day sporting dual swords, shuriken in hand, and a naginata on her back.
A nice change of pace, a straight cartoon portrait drawn with watersoluble graphite (Caran D'Ache Technalo 3B lead) and a waterbrush.
Crimson Dragon Ninja ready for anything with his 4 swords and handful shuriken ready for a quick-strike.
Straight colored cartoon portrait.
Drawing the hair on this princess portrait was a lot of fun.
And we finished the day with yet another Dragon Ninja. Remember our two Japanese words for the day are kunoichi= "female ninja" and shuriken=""sword hidden in the hand" or "Throwing star". Enjoy your drawings and continue practicing your sketching skills as often as you can. Take your sketchbook and some drawing tools along everywhere you go.

Some of the live caricatures drawn at the Art Festival

My live caricature tent at the Downtown Naples Festival of the Arts.
View from the models' chairs.
Brought my set of 30 Faber Castell Albrecht Durer aquarelle sticks as a convenient source of watercolor.
The base skin tone was laid down with PanPastel Red Iron Oxide Tint. The light facial shading for this sample ninja cartoon was colored with Derwent Graphitint. Before and after blending with a waterbrush.
This Jedi portrait was also colored, but only managed to photograph it in its black and white stage.
At most events with children in attendance, the mermaid portrait is a common favorite of young girl models. We also had an angel and a mermaid-fairy portrait requests, but things were too busy at the time to get a picture of them.
I really enjoyed drawing this particular caricature, for the originality of the request and degree of input provided by this young model that loves parrots.

Upcoming "Live Caricature" Drawing Event and ARTScool Cartoon Sketching Class Registration Reminder

I will be drawing Cartoon Portraits in the Food Court of the Downtown Naples Festival of the Arts on Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th from 10 am to 5 pm.
Going to try some new coloring methods I have been experimenting with. So come out to watch the live caricature drawing event, and maybe even model for your own manga-style cartoon portrait souvenir.REMINDER: Upcoming Cartoon Sketching Week-long classes for ARTScool Summer Art Camp at The von Liebig Art Center June -13-17, July 11-15, & August 1-5, 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm for further info and registration instructions check the ARTScool page.Looking forward to seeing you at the Art Festival this coming weekend or at any of my summer Cartoon Sketching classes.

Practice drawings at Doctor's waiting room

While waiting at the Clinic, I was able to practice my cartoon portrait drawing approach with a variety of subjects of different ages and gender. Started with a couple of quick graphite sketches using a leadholder.
It was a tad difficult to get the arms down since this subject kept fidgeting and changing his posture.
Used my trusty Sakura Pigma Sensei 0.6 mm and 1.0 mm Manga drawing pens to sketch this older gentleman comfortably seated across the room.
Had a good view of the receiving desk and this receptionist from my seat in the waiting room.
Chose to draw this pleasant lady and young girl with the water soluble Caran D'Ache Technalo 3B lead and partially blended the pencil marks with a waterbrush.
Even when aiming for a stylized cartoon style, remember to practice your sketching skills by observing live subjects whenever possible. Always carry your sketching kit and some paper or sketchbook so you can take full advantage of any drawing opportunities that would otherwise get wasted simply waiting or getting bored.