Anyway, this was mostly a place with shadows, seeing how they affected perception of raised areas. I chose an alien’s face so that I wouldn’t be focused on getting it “right” and could instead focus on experimenting and seeing how things turned out. Obviously, better symmetry would improve the drawing, but this helped me to realize how even a hint of shadow or light reflection can really affect the sense of depth that a drawing has. Despite how little the helmet-like part has, it fights with the depth of the eyes. Looking at it in one place gives the sense that the eyes are recessed behind the helmet; in another place the eyes are more bug-ish, making them appear to stick out quite a bit.

I still have a lot to learn, but I had fun with this drawing and feel that it did help me with my understanding of light in drawings.

Anyway… I was sick a couple of weekends ago, so I decided that resting and doing a simple drawing would do me some good. I chose to draw a hydralisk from the StarCraft world. I had one small reference photo on my phone, but I mostly took artistic liberty and modified it as I drew it. Hydralisks are so small in the game that I didn’t feel a need to go for a perfect replica and I instead played around with harsh shadows, giving the hydralisk a more skeletal look.

The biggest problem I had with this drawing was the raised arm/claw. The perspective is definitely off, but I just couldn’t get it to look right. The face also looks a little “funky” because of the angles, but I’m overall happy with the drawing. It’s pretty different from anything else I have drawn and the skeletal look came out well.

I’m relatively pleased with the way this picture turned out. I wanted the focus to be on the mid/upper portion of the drawing, so I neglected detail in the lower third. Some of the shadows turned out a bit harsher than I intended, but they’re pretty good overall. I like the way that the hint of the ribcage turned out, but I don’t think the abs look as natural. The breasts are pretty good with the exception of the shading at the top right of the (viewer’s) left one. The collar bones turned out well, but I’m not satisfied with the way the neck looks. Oh well, there’s always next time!

Apologies for the white balance being a bit off with the photo. I took a quick shot of it and didn’t do any post processing (other than a quick resize), so it’s not as good as it should be.

My proportions are a bit off, but overall I think it looks good. I decided to add a few rough cracks to hint at why this person is no longer living, though I suppose that if everything but your skeleton has decayed, you’ve probably been dead for quite a while. Anyway, the cracks were a good chance to play with irregular shapes and their effect on lighting.

This one clearly turned out well enough that I was willing to take the time to get out my real camera instead of just snapping a quick photo with my cell phone.

As you can see, the focus here was mostly the fist and some of the forearm. I used a 5B pencil with rough, fast movement to create this. There isn’t a whole lot of detail, or really that great of contrast, but it’s a reasonable sketch as far as composition and consistent sizing (something I frequently struggle with when doing detailed drawings where I get lost focusing so much on a single section of a drawing).

Don’t worry, sketch book drawing #50 is a lot more interesting….

I doubt if the coming rainy months are going to help me get out and do some photography, but perhaps I will actually draw something. We’ll see….

Anyway, This one turned out pretty well. I cut it short at the bottom to keep the focus above, though I should have done so in a more artistic way. The hands turned out relatively well, considering how difficult fine detail is with charcoal. Like any drawing, there are plenty of imperfections, but it certainly felt good to be creative again. All things considered, it’s a decent drawing considering how long it has been since the last one!

Like most mornings, I had smacked the snooze button of my alarm clock a few times before forcing myself out of the warm bed. Zombie mode had taken over as I completed the ritualized morning routine. I ate my cereal, skimming through a car magazine, trying to imagine owning the latest supercar. I neglected thinking about the inability to drive the car to my apartment’s designated parking space due to the extra large speed bumps and instead focused on accelerating to three times the speed limit faster than my car could get onto the highway. Being a fantasy, the cops were actually pulling over drivers for cutting people off rather than speeding, and people actually stayed out of the fast lane instead of being three cars wide with only a one-mile-per-hour difference.

I chuckled at the lack of realism and took my now-empty bowl to the sink. Glancing at the oven’s clock, I saw that I was actually a few minutes ahead of schedule.

I brushed my teeth in the bathroom and narrowly missed spitting the used toothpaste on my hand. It was early; I was still mostly asleep.

I lightly sprayed some cheap cologne on myself. The smell was too weak for me to notice, but I had learned the important life lesson “If you can smell your own cologne, it’s too strong” long ago.

Glancing at the mirror, I saw that my hair was still there, so I made my way toward the front door. I threw on my light jacket, ignoring the impending rain predicted by the news channel’s professional weather guesser. My wallet went into one pocket, and my under-used cellphone went into the other. From the counter, I grabbed my keys—no, the keys weren’t there. Why weren’t the keys there?

I checked my pockets and found the phone, the wallet, and a small ball of lint, but no keys. I checked under yesterday’s junk mail that still sat unopened on the counter. Nothing.

My brain, now just awake enough to be a threat to a five-year-old at tac-tac-toe, suggested checking the couch. Unfortunately, I didn’t even find spare change under the cushions. Another glance at the clock, and my semi-awake brain created the image of a cheap hourglass from a board game dropping the last few bits of sand.

The bus would be down the street in five minutes, so I rushed about fast enough to put a headless chicken to shame. Thought: maybe they were in my pants from yesterday. If this were Family Feud, my team would be saying, “Good answer; good answer.” And then the buzzer would sound loudly, flatly denying my guess. The pockets of yesterday were even devoid of lint.

My time was up. I had to rush out and just not lock the apartment door. The quest to find my keys would continue tonight, provided no burglar took the opportunity to relieve me of my worldly possessions, eliminating the need to find the keys. I charged out the door, swinging it shut without looking back.

The door slammed, and then it made a sound like someone had just bombarded it with a half-dozen pennies. Curiosity beat my sense of urgency, and I turned to see the origin of the sound.

Dangling from the deadbolt lock were my keys, still there from last night. They sparked two thoughts: Damn, I’m an idiot, and chicken sounds good for dinner tonight.