It’s been hectic where I am, but things seem to settle down a bit now. The Christmas activities have been fantastic. I am feeling the vibe now, which is great. I am back to loving Christmas!

I hope everyone is enjoying theirs too. Can’t believe it’s nearly the end of the year and I feel as though I have not done much at all this year… well, that is not entirely true, I suppose: I finished my novel, I drew a total of two hundred and fifty two (yes, two fifty two) artwork on Ipad, I made seven animation videos with some, including a book trailer for my novel, and I went to a Writer’s conference with my lovely girls for the first time. Yeah, it’s not been entirely unproductive, I guess. I’m pleased and grateful for all the support and encouragement I’ve received from everyone around me. You all rock!

Now, a few more drawings to share…

Midnight Surf

A gift for my friend Beth, but because I love it and it’s Christmasy, I shared it to all others as well, I hope she doesn’t mind! I will draw her something more personal next time, when I have more skills to draw her characters.

Don’t Leave Me, My Love

Tried to draw a dragon but could not get the wings to look right so he became a Loch Ness monster instead. But I do like how the whole thing turned out anyway This one I drew to test the new filters on Sketch Club. They work like a charm!

Weee!

I drew this one quickly as I was shopping for Christmas presents. I got a bit frustrated by all the crowds so I stopped at a cafe and started drawing. It helped

Anyway, hope you’re enjoying Christmas. Love you all. Happy Holidays, everyone!

Hugs, Lyds

I’m sorry I haven’t updated my blog as regularly, been trying to upskill myself by doing loads of drawing tutorials. These are mainly for eyes but I made one up for hair as well. I hope you find them useful!

Alien eyes

I followed this tutorial and failed to achieve the look I wanted, but decided to go ahead and finish them anyway. I cheated by turning them alien-ish, ha. Long and behold, this one was much loved by the Sketch Club family, so I’m very pleased.

Lady Red

This was from the same tutorial. I’m still unsure I like how they turned out but I think I skipped a few steps because I didn’t know how to achieve the results exactly, so I compensated my flaws with fiery hair. I hope that worked, ha.

Forest Child

This one was from this tutorial I just changed the colour of the iris. I do like how these turned out, quite striking, despite not following the instructions to the detail. I think I need more skills to do that, but that’s why I’m here, still learning Anyway, the rest of the look was inspired by Princess Mononoke and the whipping hair was because I couldn’t be bothered to draw the mouth, hehe.

Exotic Princess

Another attempt at drawing eyes, following this tutorial. I also changed the colour and used my own imagination for the shading. I do like how they turned out. Again, too lazy to draw the other features, so I added the beady veil, ha.

Hair Tutorial

Since a few people have asked about the hair, I did a quick tutorial on how I draw it with Sketch Club. There are many techniques to draw hair, and mine is by no means superior, but I thought I’d share it anyway, since some have asked. And I do like my style, it’s quick and easy. With the eyes, I used the tutorial from a fellow Sketch Clubbers, an amazing artist who has drawn such amazing pieces, each just blows me away. Here is his awesome tutorial for the eyes. Here are some of his works. And here is my meagre hair tutorial hehe.

And the final result.

Hope those help! I hope one day I may be able to create wonderful things without having to check out tutorials. I just continue to practise, practise, practise. It has been fun, and I know I have improved a lot since I first started drawing. Now I feel like revamping all those Stealing A Dream illustrations… or create new stories with more illustrations!

Thanks for stopping by, peeps! Have a wonderful Christmas, all (four more days, wow!)

… yet I don’t know why it doesn’t really feel like Christmas this year. Perhaps it’s because soon I will need to start looking for jobs and it makes me nervous. Perhaps it’s all the stress of fighting the crowd in shopping malls. I don’t know. Glenn did a great job putting up the lights outside our house though, and the Christmas decorations everywhere certainly are lovely but I’m missing the vibe. Perhaps I should move my butt and put up the decorations myself. Too lazy though, so it’s my own fault.

I do look forward to the Xmas family dinner this weekend and our yearly family gathering on Christmas eve. They should be great.

Anyway, I have been busy drawing Christmas gifts for friends (thanks so much for your support and for enjoying my art, even though most of us met through writing ) Now that they are sent out, I can share them with you…

Bird

This is a Christmas gift for my friend Jeanne who loves Celtic art. Despite numerous attempts trying to draw something in that style, nothing pleased me. I saw a beautiful mix of Celtic and Japanese art recently and I tried to capture a similar feel here with the bird. Not sure if I succeeded, but I like how he turned out anyway.

My Service Is Yours

A gift for my friend Selina who is an amazing artist herself. I must be crazy trying to draw anything for her but I love this character from her book ‘Memory’s Wake’, so I could not help myself.

Her artwork can be seen here.

You can get ‘Memory’s Wake’ from here.

This is my rendition of him (Thanks to my Sketch Club buddies for their feedback as I was drawing him–click here to see the progress! He could have turned out a drag queen… not that there’s anything wrong with Drag Queens)

Steampunk Eraser

This was born out of the daily challenge on Sketch Club: to use only the eraser tool to draw something. I used a combination in the end although all of her was done with an eraser. It was a lot of fun and I do like how she turned out.

All right, off to Christmas shopping now to absorb the vibe.

Happy holidays, you all, and thanks for the visit!

Hugs.