Category: Sketching Blog
Fantasy People Based on Caramel Corn
This series, started in January 2019, is based on my noticing that individual pieces of caramel corn look like little heads. If I don’t eat all of my current batch, I’ll have enough kernels for at least 20 fantasy people drawings.
These drawings follow my series of Fantasy Animals as Children that assume the characteristics of kids playing. This new series also features kids playing, but this time their faces are based on what I see when looking at a piece of caramel corn.
The featured piece of caramel corn seen above was the inspiration for the first drawing in this series, which is the last illustration on this page. Do you see the connection?
Concept Art
Concept art is based on a cross between one’s imagination and reality. It can get quite detailed when designing for games and picture books. In my case, I just enjoy creating imaginary characters that are a cross between animal and human, or are found in the spirit world of water and cracks.
If you are also interested in creating imaginary characters, whether realistic or cartoons, you might like to follow the advice listed below:
- Sketching for Concept Art with Donald Yatomi, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- The Art of the Picture Book by Shadra Strickland, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- Shadra Strickland’s YouTube Channel
- Drawing and Painting Imaginary Animals: A Mixed-Media Workshop with Carla Sonheim, a book.
- Search phrase of “Developing Concept Art” on Google.
- Search phrase of “Concept Art Tutorials” on YouTube
- How to become a better concept artist by Donglu Yu on CreativeBlog. Note that CreativeBlog has many excellent articles on the subject.
Karen Little – info@littleviews.com
Note: All art and photos on this website are the property of Littleviews.com and Littleviews-Crafts.com and may not be reproduced in a fee-based publication without permission. Do you want to post these images in any article? Request permission from Karen.
Fantasy Animals as Children
This series casts imaginary animals as children, most of them paying energetically. These paintings were originally posted on Facebook under my account as Karen Little.
I just finished creating a series on imaginary animals based on what I saw in cracks and concrete and changing places, where I cast fantasy animals as people. I’ll add to this collection until I produce 15 or so images, then on to the next thing!
The paintings posted here show my most recent one on top. The last one was posted on 12/31/18.
Concept Art
Concept art is based on a cross between one’s imagination and reality. It can get quite detailed when designing for games and picture books. In my case, I just enjoy creating imaginary characters that are a cross between animal and human, or are found in the spirit world of water and cracks.
If you are also interested in creating imaginary characters, whether realistic or cartoons, you might like to follow the advice listed below:
- Sketching for Concept Art with Donald Yatomi, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- The Art of the Picture Book by Shadra Strickland, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- Shadra Strickland’s YouTube Channel
- Drawing and Painting Imaginary Animals: A Mixed-Media Workshop with Carla Sonheim, a book.
- Search phrase of “Developing Concept Art” on Google.
- Search phrase of “Concept Art Tutorials” on YouTube
- How to become a better concept artist by Donglu Yu on CreativeBlog. Note that CreativeBlog has many excellent articles on the subject.
Karen Little – info@littleviews.com
Note: All art and photos on this website are the property of Littleviews.com and Littleviews-Crafts.com and may not be reproduced in a fee-based publication without permission. Do you want to post these images in any article? Request permission from Karen.
Fantasy Water Spirits Based on Japanese Suminagashi
Japanese suminagashi is the art of floating ink on water, then capturing a print of the forms it makes on paper.
The forms it makes often take the shape of what we think of oriental paintings and prints of fantasy animals, mainly dragons. While this series of fantasy water spirits are based on the suminagashi I created at a workshop given by the Japanese Society in New York City, many cultures practiced this form of art that we know today as “marbling.”
I hope you join me in finding water spirits in the suminagashi I post. You’ll notice as you do it that your drawings will start to resemble the images you’ve seen in ancient paintings and needlework. Below are some of the pieces I did at the Japanese Society under the direction of Linh Truong as demonstrated on YouTube.
I’ll be posting updates on this page over the next 30 days.
Marbling
Marbling is created by floating pigments on a wet surface that includes water and even frosting! As the next 20 days go on, I’ll be adding links for you to learn more about it.
- Paper Marbling – Wikipedia
- The Turkish Art of Ebru (Marbeling)
- Royal Icing Paisley, Mandela, and Wet-on-Wet Design – Design in Royal Icing
- Linh Truong demonstrates suminagashi on YouTube
- . . . to be continued
Karen Little – info@littleviews.com
Note: All art and photos on this website are the property of Littleviews.com and Littleviews-Crafts.com and may not be reproduced in a fee-based publication without permission. Do you want to post these images in a commercial article? Request permission from Karen.
Changing Places: Substituting Fantasy Animals for Humans
In this series of paintings, I continue to explore fantasy with the idea that I develop a style that I can replicate.
To come up with ideas, I look at pictures at random of people doing things, then I identify an animal that seemed like a good substitute. At first, I used common animals (cats and dogs) but I’ve started using more unusual animals, like the kangaroo drilling a hole with a power drill.
The pictures below of fantasy animals were first posted on Facebook and are presented here in the order completed, with the most recent on top.
Concept Art
Concept art, when integrated into a serious project, takes a great deal of planning and skill. At the level you see in my article, creating imaginary creatures is fun and a good way to expand your imagination.
If, however, you wanted to elevate your illustrations into children’s books, games, or other types of professional reproduction, follow the advice provided here:
- Sketching for Concept Art with Donald Yatomi, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- The Art of the Picture Book by Shadra Strickland, a video tutorial published by Craftsy.
- Shadra Strickland’s YouTube Channel
- Drawing and Painting Imaginary Animals: A Mixed-Media Workshop with Carla Sonheim, a book.
- Search phrase of “Developing Concept Art” on Google.
- Search phrase of “Concept Art Tutorials” on YouTube
- How to become a better concept artist by Donglu Yu on CreativeBlog. Note that CreativeBlog has many excellent articles on the subject.
Karen Little – info@littleviews.com
Note: All art and photos on this website are the property of Littleviews.com and Littleviews-Crafts.com and may not be reproduced in a fee-based publication without permission. Do you want to post these images in a commercial article? Request permission from Karen.
