Category: Art

Illustration

The Ornithology of the American Lesbian

If you follow me elsewhere on the Internet you’ve probably already seen that I illustrated this feature for BuzzFeed on The Ornithology of the American Lesbian. The writers gave me a ton of freedom when it came to matching birds and humans, so I got to run wild picking my favorite avian friends. Challenges included accurately translating Bette Porter into an ostrich and Lea DeLaria into an owl.

My only enduring sorrow is the fact that the authors were originally thinking of human illustrations, so the classification text never got updated from Mammalia to Aves. Apologies in advance to my scientist pals—I promise I’m only responsible for the artwork. Check out the whole list here!

Comics

New Comic: Dance Yourself Clean

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I’m so delighted to share this comic today as part of Whatever We Please, The Nib’s collection of comics honoring International Women’s Day. Dance Yourself Clean is a brief meditation on what being a part of the social dance scene here in Portland has done for my sexuality and my sense of self. Read the whole thing here.

(This comic was made possible by the generous support of my patrons on Patreon! If you’d like to see me making more comics, won’t you consider joining them?)

Art

31 Days, 31 Outfits – 2015

Those of you following me elsewhere on the Internet have probably already seen this year’s 31 Days, 31 Outfits challenge, but I finally got ’em all scanned and uploaded into a tiny army, so I figured it was time for an official post. If you’d like to compare notes with 2014’s 31 Outfits, you can take a peek at those right here.

(The Goblin Interlude was brought to you by Evan Dahm and Goblin Week.)

Outfits2015-Vertical

I hadn’t intended to make this an annual thing, but it’s been really fun both times and I dig getting to see my progress year-to-year, so I guess I’ll be seeing you with another batch of these in 2016!

Comics

Hourly Comic Day 2015

It’s that time of year again, folks. 2015 Hourly Comics are here! Be warned there are mild boobs and sorta-I-guess spoilers if you’re committed to never knowing how Moby Dick ends? That’s all the warning you’re getting though.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the premise of this exercise, on February 1st cartoonists around the world attempt to draw a panel (or series of panels) for every hour they’re awake. The result is a tiny snapshot of everyone’s lives, which is generally a ton of fun. Google around and you should be able to find comics from many great creators. I’d recommend Eleanor Davis and Boum to start.

If you’d like to see previous HCD efforts, here’s 2014, 2013, 2012, and (gulp) 2011. It’s amazing to see how much my art’s changed year to year. My skills are improving but I’m also getting…tighter? More static somehow? Next year I’d like to draw straight to ink and loosen up a little—maybe work in something larger than my sketchbook to keep things flowing. Also it’s physically painful to me that these are uncolored pages. Nrgh, perfectionist tendencies.

ANYWAY. Comics. Have at ’em!

Art, News

Emerald City Comicon Pre-Show Commissions

Hey gang! I’m trying out something new for Emerald City Comicon this year: pre-show commission slots! This hopefully means I’ll be able to deliver a higher calibre of work to those of you looking for original art, while prioritizing my time talking to everyone on the show floor rather than hunching over my sketchbook desperately trying to complete larger art pieces. Everyone wins!

There’s a couple different options for con commissions. Read on to find out which is best for you:

1. Little Paintings (Full Color / $20 – $40)

These cuties are done on high quality cold press watercolor paper and measure either 3″ x 4″ or 4″ x 6″. Featuring a bird or animal of your choice with an optional word balloon, they’re ideal gifts or tiny talismans of your favorite beasts.

2. Pin-Ups (Ink Only, Grayscale, or Full Color / $40 – $70)

These are larger pieces (generally 6″ x 9″ or 8″ x 10″, but I’m flexible) with minimal background elements and one or two figures. More figures or full-color generally equal higher costs, but let me know what you’re after and we’ll work together to achieve it!

3. Ships (Grayscale or Full Color / $75 – $100)

A handsome portrait of a tall ship of your choosing on a calm (or tempestuous) sea! 8″ x 10″, full-color, lotsa rigging guaranteed.

Sign-ups are limited since there’s only a couple months before the show, so shoot me an email at lucypcbellwood [at] gmail [dot] com and let’s get rolling! Payment for commissions is due up front via PayPal or your online money transference service of choice. All pieces will be ready for pickup at Emerald City Comicon in Seattle March 27th-29th.

Art

100 Hands – December 2014 Edition

Long-haul readers of the blog will recall that I have a habit of drawing 100 Hands every now and then, thanks to an exercise set by my mentor Eben Matthews ages ago . Last week I finished my annual pilgrimage, which I now present here for your viewing pleasure. References include: Pixelovely Reference Tool, Animopus Hand Reference Post, and the inimitable Jordi Lafebre.

I like mixing photo reference with work by artists I admire (especially animators) since it keeps me thinking in terms of what can be simplified and exaggerated. There are so many masters to learn from, and the mechanical act of replication plus an awareness of form can work wonders on your technique.

To everyone who looks at this exercise and says “Wow, I could never do that!”, remember that a) all you have to do is draw one hand at a time, and b) even though this batch was drawn in a handful of days, this practice is a process that was set in motion over a decade ago. I really wish I had scans of the very first set of these I ever did in 2003, ’cause lemme tell you they didn’t look so good back then. Heck, they still don’t look so good to me right now, but they’re better. And better is what matters. Here’s some from a little over two years ago, here’s some more from two and a half years ago. Now: a little less stiff, a little more expressive.

Next year? Let’s find out.

HandsStripWeb

Illustration

Process Post: Black Hand

A couple months ago I was delighted to receive an email from Glenn Fleishman, who some of you might remember as the fella who interviewed me for The New Disruptors earlier this year, asking if I wanted to work on an article about an imaginary friend for his publication The Magazine.

I love the idea of imaginary friends, even if I never had one of my own as a child, and as soon as I received the list of this friend’s characteristics from writer Lisa Schmeiser I knew this was going to be a lot of fun. You should really just go ahead and read her essay, which does a far better job of explaining Black Hand than I ever could.

But since this is a blog about my creative stuff I thought you guys might like to see a little step-by-step process of the creation of this piece. The graphic below was created for one of my weekly Patreon Process Posts, which I put up every Friday with updates on my current projects and behind-the-scenes info on how I get stuff done. If you dig it, why not subscribe? It only costs $2 a month, and helps ensure the creation of bigger, better comics just for you!

Patreon12.8I created this piece start-to-finish in Manga Studio 5EX. You can see my initial sketch with the pencil tool, which actually went through three versions. First I’d given Black Hand these loopy bellbottoms, but Glenn asked for something a little more like Morpheus from Sandman, so I added bulky Goth boots and snugged up the pants—tight jeans or flowy sweats. We ended up going for the latter.

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After the sketch was approved I went in with the Hairpin Sable inker and laid down some lines. Glenn wanted a psychedelic, dream-like color scheme, so after blocking in some bright colors with the fill tool I added shadows (on a separate layer set to Multiply) and highlights (on a separate layer set to Screen) before going in with a watercolor brush and adding splotches and clouds on the background.

Screen Shot 2014-12-18 at 1.15.30 PM

And there you have it! Again, you can read the whole finished article here, and tune in for more weekly process posts like this one over on Patreon.