Bear necessities and IKEA

We went to the Irish opening of IKEA yesterday and met the fanfare outside. I would have been happy to have waited 'til the next day, but we needed our desks ASAP. We got there an hour before the opening and had to endure the entertainment, the worst of it was probably the 98fm trucks blasting out Bewitched. When we got inside the staff were lined up on either side waving flags, I thought this must be what royalty feel like . . . awkward!

We scooted quickly through the store and got lots of help from the staff who were just lovely. But, unfortunately they only had one pair of legs for the desks, so I'm doing without for the moment, Stephen's need is currently more urgent. I did get my chair though, the Kläppe, yep, I got the Kläppe. I gave it some consideration, but decided against getting the Kolon (floor protector) for it.

We also got some Billy shelves and when I pealed opened its cardboard box two of the shelves popped out and fell on my foot. Oh man, that hurt! Anyways, I gotta go back tomorrow to get the legs for my desk and maybe pick up some egg cups.

We went to the Irish opening IKEA yesterday and met the fanfare outside

Maned Wolf

I did this in my new moleskine A4 watercolour sketchbook. There's A3 sketchbooks as well, but at that size they're better for working in at a desk.

We've got a great view from the kitchen window of our apartment, we're on the top floor and there was a short thunderstorm a few hours ago, which we could see approaching from a distance. I glanced up just in time to see a bolt of lightning.

We Have Moved

We moved about a week ago and we've been without the internet until now. Still trying to get a few things in order (mostly my head).

Here's an old rough for a sample illustration for ASBO Fairy Tales, I recently finished illustrating its sequel Robin the Hoodie.

Lil' Medusa and The Aphid Farmers

Here's another picture of a Young Medusa I did a good while ago. I'd forgotten all about her 'til now. She was created in Painter. The internet is so bad here I wasn't sure it would upload. We'd get it fixed but we're planning on moving soon, we've been tempted away by high speed broadband.

Mermaid

Here's another old sketch, made with heavy use of a tortillon. There's a version which had had some colour PhotoShoped over it which I'll dig out.

Noh Mask

This is from a little while ago. Just a simple monochrome wash of a Noh mask. I went through a short lived phase of painting these.

My current illustration project is tipping along quite nicely, I'm on schedule. I have two previous projects which I'm waiting on to be printed, then I'll post some of their highlights. I met Susan, an editor at O'Brien Press, when visiting my parents, she gave me the inside scoop on what stage they're at in production with my latest book for them. Thanks Susan!

Inks and New Portfolio Site

I've been doing a bit of inking and while I still love the dip pens I've had a lot of fun with the brushes. The first bear here was inked with a brush and the second one with a G nib, he's not finished yet, but it was mostly an experiment. The trees are inked with a brush pen and a nib.

I've a new site for my portfolio, which I was working on yesterday. There's still more to do apart from uploading the artwork. Having had problems with uploading websites in the past I was a bit confused about what route I should go, until Stephen suggested just making another blog, and reassured me with a "that's what most editors ask for". So I knocked this up in a day. I salute you Stephen and your clever brain.

Doodling Online

These are just some little sketches done on an online drawing program and then screen captured. The tools were of course very basic, but that can make it all the more fun.

Rainbow Pencils and Harry Clarke

I went to see the Harry Clarke exhibition in the National Gallery on Thursday and while I was waiting to meet my Mum and brother I bought a rainbow pencil in the gift shop. I used to hate rainbow pencils when I was a kid, but I was looking to try them again recently. There were several different colour variations and this was the last one with the CMY primary colours. It's a lot of fun to sketch with, I don't know if I'd use it for a finished picture, but I am thinking about it.

The Harry Clarke illustrations are amazing and so detailed. The lines are so skinny, I've inked lines ten times the size of his and been worried about them dropping out in print. He took seven days to complete one piece, I have to say I wish I had a deadline that would allow me to put that much into an illustration.

Pan's Labyrinth stage 3

I did some more work on Pan's painting, it's still not finished yet. Click here for the previous stages. I closed the sketchbook too soon and the pages got a little stuck together, most notably on the chin.

There's been building works going on next door for the past two days. The house was vibrating with noise, but that's nothing compared with the alarm that went off a few doors up at 4.20 on Saturday morning and lasted until 9ish. After an hour went off again, it was impossible to work or even think (never mind sleep) so we left for town. It's lovely and quiet at the moment, just some birds chirping outside, bliss.

Some Good Support

My bank card got swallowed by an ATM today, fantastic!

Anyway here's a little story about paper. This is the paper I used to paint on:

Daler Rowney have fairly recently changed the smoothness of this paper (and the weight). It's now just cold pressed but it used to be so shmooth. The advantages of the old stuff were several fold: a paper capable of taking ink and watercolour; good for glazing techniques; readily available in big newsagents; affordable enough that you can just muck around on them and not feel like everything you do on it has to be a masterpiece.

Now that it's just cold pressed like every other pad of watercolour paper next to it on the shelves it's lost the first two qualities.

Here's some stuff from 2006 on the old paper:

The paintings in my first post were also painted on this stuff.

I was trying out some Arches Hot pressed and these were the results:

This paper's a lot pricier, but I got this block for free from my wonderful and kind Stephen. It is really, really nice, but it doesn't handle the dip pens as well as the old Daler Rowney Aquarelle.

DR Aquarelle:

Arches hot pressed:

These are the exact same zoom and size. But it is VERY zoomed in. It's more something you notice when your drawing.

Well, I've yet to test out every other hot pressed paper under the sun and that is fairly probable.

Faces

You know you're busy when going to the loo counts as a holiday. I'm just working away as usual, but I will be taking half a day off soon to go see Star Trek (punches air).

The first of the sketches above are cartoonyified self portraits, not very much like me, but that wasn't the aim. The second one was a little acrylic sketch I did on some left over paper from my current illustration work. I had to order the paper in specially for this project. I'll post some of the highlights of these illustrations after they've been published, for now they will remain a tantalising mystery.

G nib etc.

Well, I'm busy at the moment with illustration work and I've been painting solidly for the last 3 days. There's paintings covering every available surface, including taped over my computer (I have my reasons). But in the mean time, here's something unrelated I did a while ago.

This is a sketch I did with a G nib, I'm pretty enamoured with these nibs at the moment. It was done in a Moleskine which always acts funny with wet media and the ink bled a bit on it.

Here's the little blighter, this particular one is made by Deleter and as you can see was purchased in Forbid, not one of the usual places I get my art supplies. You get 3 in a pack, which I reckon is to shift more stock. I found an old one I had ages ago (made by I don't know who), it looked broken with the two bits twisted open, but they just popped back into place, neat!

Here's a bunch of my nibs. The one at the top is a Brause 361 and is an old favourite, I'm using it at the moment on my illustrations with acrylic ink and it's working very well on the rough support.

Nude 2

Here are some sketches from facing pages of my sketchbook.

I went to Cirque du Soleil last Sunday with my family. Needless to say it was spectacular. We were very near the front, so it was pretty intense.

Afterwards we went to Leon, a French bistro, where as well as my own meal I finished off the 3/4 of the large steak sandwiches my parents left on their plates. 'I want to go to there' (again).

Nude

Never let it be said that I don't enjoy drawing nudy ladies.

I like to wear my hair up

This is a quick sketch done in Painter.

Mum's Birthday Card

This is the card I made for my Mum's birthday a few days ago. I used the acrylic ink Stephen got me for my birthday. I really like using these inks like watercolour. The colours are really vibrant and they don't tend to dull on drying like regular watercolour does, that always bugged me.

The Fairy Tale Book

These are some of the illustrations from my most recently published book. I'm really, really happy with how these came out (of my hands, my talented, talented hands!).

I'm currently working on a book in colour for O'Brien Press, which I'm really enjoying.

Here's The Fairy Tale Book on Michael O'Mara's website.

Copyright Michael O'Mara.

Some bloke

I've been posting a lot of pencil sketches of late and I've got some inked sketches I'd really like to post next time. I've been trying out my Deleter nibs, I really like the G nib, the line quality isn't so far removed from my pencil work.