Feeling Crabby
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Our little guy has been having lots of teething days. On those days, he moans and groans and drools. He is so sad and gloomy. I suffer with him. Teething sucks. That inspired me to illustrate this one...
I knew I didn't want to go this route. I have had a kind of artist's block when it comes to drawing babies. Every time I attempted to draw my son, it came out so weird! I wasn't happy with any of the results, so I just focused on expressions he makes when he's in a funk...
I learned tons about combining Illustrator's vector shapes with textures in Photoshop in this Skillshare class by Matt Kaufenberg. I started out with a pencil and marker sketch.
Then, I found something that has been so freeing to me... sketching in Photoshop. I know it's a weird hang-up for a traditional illustrator, but I hate wasting paper. And, when you sketch a lot, you inevitably end up using loads and loads of paper. And, no matter how cheap it is, you kind of feel the weight of how many trees you've decimated on your creative journey. Okay, maybe it's just me. In any case, it doesn't pain me to do sketches on layers in Photoshop. Not. one. bit. So, off I went!
I started off using traditional shapes for figure drawing (can't help my training!)...
I had a breakthrough with that big head up top. I then pushed the exaggeration of the size of the head even further.
After drawing the top one, I said out loud, "aww." And that's when I knew I was onto something! So, off I went using the techniques from the Skillshare class, and the end result is the first photo from this post.