Switching Gears...

I've been working a lot in pencil recently, expanding my horizons a bit more with my "comfort" medium. While I've always enjoyed working in pencil, I am able to work more quickly and decisively with it.

I've completed the anatomy studies now, having done the muscles of the face and neck at work the other night. I think that's all I'm going to do on that subject for the moment. Eventually, I might find a resource that will show the muscles from different angles and in different poses - particularly the arms and legs.

I don't know how artists are content working in a single style or medium. Too much of one thing gets a little dull after a while, and I'm looking forward to branching out. I'm anxious to work with other media and explore different approaches, different looks. Switching to ink, I played around with some quick doodles just for fun today.

I've heard that some illustrators sometimes "discover" a character in their sketchbook - that it starts as a doodle or something random. Then, as the character develops, its story can evolve into a picture book idea. I'm hoping that something like that will happen with something I've drawn, but so far nothing has really struck me in that way.