New Crayola Ultra-clean ColorMax Washable Markers and Impromptu Drawing session

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Found these markers on clearance at Target, and they are pretty bold and bright as their label claims. You can never have too many fresh markers when you got lil' artists around eager to explore their creativity.

Just before dinner, this group decided to sketch and paint. Having the art supplies always ready in the playroom and introducing a couple of waterbrushes for painting made set up quick and easy. While we got a glass of water for cleaning the waterbrushes, they can be cleaned by simply wiping them on a paper towel.

Some of them even tried my new Winsor & Newton Watercolor markers.

Happiness = Big Box of Markers

After seeing the batch of custom name plates I drew for my ARTScool Cartoon Sketching class (currently running from July 11 to July 15), my nieces decided to make their own.
Camila drawing her own name plate with a Sakura Pigma Sensei 06 mm pen.
Nicole with her name plate ready for coloring.
Penciling with a Worther Shorty 3.15 mm leadholder. This short and stubby pencil is quite easy to control for little hands, so I often share mine with my nephew and nieces.
Nicole's "Cat Girl" mini comic. A popular subject among my current students as well.
Mateo "drawing" with sparklers on 4th of July.
Look mom, with 2 hands!
I'm a strong believer that markers should be made readily available to toddlers as soon as they show the interest and adequate eye-hand coordination to color and doodle.
With appropriate supervision, the large set of 50 Crayola Super Tip Markers makes for a treasure trove of nice creative possibilities even for budding artists fond of coloring with a single color.
Ok maybe 6 moths old might be too soon to be introduced to markers, but their bright colors already catch his attention. Make the most of the summer and make sure the little ones have a nice big box of markers ready for when inspiration (or a rainy afternoon) strikes.

More Mini Comic Samples for ARTScool

Still got a few open spots in my ARTScool classes (212 & 512 listed on the right side bar), so I am making a few more sample mini comics to display as a preview of the cartooning class projects at The von Liebig Art Center registration office.
While the earlier batch of mini comics was drawn on regular 8.5" X 11" letter size printer paper, I wanted to try other types of paper and bigger sheets to have more drawing room for our class projects. With the exception of the character wearing a green shirt with a smiley face (that was drawn with a Faber Castell Pitt Artist black brush pen), all the mini comic pages and covers were drawn my favorite sketching pens: Sakura Pigma Sensei 0.6 mm and 1.0 mm nibs.
Thus this set was drawn on 11" X 14" Canson 18 lb (68 gsm) Marker paper (which is very smooth and lightweight and folds flat very neatly and effortlessly), and 9" X 12" Canson Biggie Jr 90 lb (185 gsm) Watercolor paper that is sturdier and can easily stand on its own.Given the sizing of the watercolor paper, the water-based marker inks lay down smoothly and without blotching on this support.
This page spread with the "Thou Shall Not Pass" scenario (nod to LOTR fans, for you know who you are) was colored with Faber Castell Pitt Artist pens which also laid down fairly smooth color layers on the Canson marker paper. Thus we have determined that the marker and wartercolor papers would make good choices for mini comics paper stock given how well the Crayola markers and Pitt pens worked on them

Thank You notes from First Grade class

Thank you Mrs. Jordan, for I just received the neat set of thank you notes drawn by your 1st grade students. It is great to see that the students picked up on so many details and drawing tips during their ARTScool presentation class.
Upon closer inspection, I realized that several students had also learned how to write my last name in Chinese. Going to have to learn a few more Kanji for future demos.
Looks like several students grasped the trick of drawing a dragon by starting with a reverse "2" understructure. One even took it a step further by rendering a hydra dragon sporting the expected multiple heads.This Darth Vader note is one of my favorites. I really like the Tie-Fighters in the background and the attention to detail on the helmet, blaster, and lightsaber. Nicely done, you have very talented and well-behaved students. It was a pleasure doing the drawing demonstrations for them. Enjoy your summer break!

Photo Journal of the Card Making Station at the Family Night of the Boys & Girls Club

Along with other artists from the United Arts Council (UAC), I participated in the Family Night of the local Boys & Girls Club about a week ago, and finally got around compiling this photo journal. I set up the greeting cards making station in 3 picnic tables (2 for coloring the 4 available card templates, and one for decorating them with glitter).
Poster display sleeves came in quite handy for covering the tables, providing a evenly smooth work surface, and securely holding the colored reference sample cards and step-by-step instruction sheets.
The coloring tables were stocked with an assortment of fine and broad tip Crayola washable markers that also included a selection of skin tone colors and some bright colors to expand the expressive range of the sets of classic colors.









Several families worked together on their holiday cards.





The finishing table was stocked with plenty of Crayola glitter pens, glitter shakers, and glue sticks to add some sparkle to the colored cards.




Abby with her display of students' art works. Had the pleasure of help jury the entries a couple of days earlier.
The Beads tables were another popular self-service craft activity available on this evening.


Several families enjoyed making their own holiday twig baskets with David and Sarah.


Miss Niki ran a very popular Clay Bowl Making station.


Kim held a Snowflake Ornament Station were Petri dishes were used quite ingeniously as the support for the paper cut out snowflakes.

Towards the end of the evening, I ended up doing several cartoon portraits and speed sketches of dragons and mermaids upon request which proved fairly popular (though did not manage to take any shots of that, for I still have to figure out a way to draw and photograph myself at the same time).