The Library

The witch with her pet dragon has returned. I have experimented with mixing ink and two kinds of paint, and I have made a video showing the progress, too. You’re welcome to have a look, everyone.  I’m proud of what I’ve achieved. It was a hard fight with our new camera. The camera is better then old one, but it has more buttons then one, and this makes the whole thing very difficult. Me and advanced technique, we just don’t go well together. I managed to choose a few fragments which are not too dark and not too fuzzy and I have added stills to cover the other steps.

watercolors, acrylics, ink

The Cows

The next poem to illustrate  is wonderfully simple; the first cow is fat, the second is piebald, the third is black, the fourth is purple… and so it goes, the cows get stranger as numbers get higher. (Please note my poor translation covers no rhythm and  rhyme, only the  general sense.) The author had just one request; to make it sunny. I hope it is.

mostly watercolor

 

The Cat, The Dog And Their Friends From Garden

Another illustration to the poem written by Mira’s friend. It’s rather hard to explain what the poem is about; it’s modern poetry. The title is “Waiting”. The cat, the sleeping dog, bats and hedgehogs are mentioned there, so I have simply put them all into the picture and this is it.  I have experimented with mixing a bit of acrylic paint into the watercolor; the texture seems to be slightly different, but this is probably unnoticeable here. Color  got  brighter, too. No wonder, I’ve added bright pink to cobalt blue.

watercolor paints and pencils

Oldfashioned Roses

This time I’ve painted something for private purposes; I need a present. Our friends’ daughter has got married and  we are going to celebrate the fact, one month after official wedding. The wedding was limited to the family members only, and now the rest of the world comes to congratulate.

traditional watercolor drawing

Pine Trees in Color

The author of the story asked for a color sample, so this was my task for today. Together with 12 jars of gooseberry jam. Gooseberry is one of few things which grow very well here.

Pine story

Sketches for a new would-be story to illustrate; it’s  not certain yet, but likely. It’s a story about trees, again. This time they are pines, not oaks, and their dream is to be great Christmas trees.

pencil

Version B

I must have gone lately too far into the sweet-and-angelic side and this is what happened. My creative interpretation of the scene,  on the base of the early sketch.

Faces

Some sketches I’ve made for characters featured in the last illustration; faces need more detail, I’m working on it. I haven’t worked too long, to be honest. Ewelina dropped by after one-year absence, taking her husband along and the new baby, too. The boy is 2 months old. Ewelina is a recent owner of Baden, the big brown gelding who lived here with us for several years; this way she became our family, of a kind. She’s been riding Baden for 5 years by now. What’s most interesting, she managed to ride regularly till the seventh month and she started again four weeks after giving birth. I belive this makes her the world champion in young moms’ horse riding. Her husband, who doesn’t ride at all, shows infinite patience for her sport passion. Being non-rider must be helpful; my husband wasn’t that calm and tolerant 20 years ago. Luckily Baden is a quiet animal and caused no trouble. Both E. and the baby are perfectly well.

Going to Bed

A busy week. Some major repairs have started around the house – it seems that houses of certain age need renovation every year, to survive next winter season. This is now. What a mess around! There was some computer work to do, too. No drawings are finished lately, except one more illustration with the boy playing in his room at the sunset; at the moment he’s going to bed. I think I’m going to do the same. Digital edition is not quite finished yet, hair should be made more shiny, eyes more blue etc. But for today this is enough.

watercolor & digital edition