Flora & Fauna: Time to Get to Work

 I have found my sketch book. I have my supplies together. And the Llama of Judgment is glaring at me. So, I'm going to be doing some sketching today and attempting to come up with some pretty drawings for you. I'm still working out how to get nice depth of color out of these pencils. If they are problematic, I may be using the water color pencils. Those have really rich colors because they're designed to put down pigment for painting.

I'll confess, I'd attempt painting some of these images but this paper is for dry mediums. Some of my next floral images are going to be of 'ordinary' plants, stuff that you would find on Earth in the sort of biome that the Seven Kingdoms of Evandar is located in. I am not going to say that my work is going to be remotely close to anything John Audubon did, but it will at least be recognizable. Because these 'ordinary' plants are part of what you will find in this world.

I must make an additional confession, I am awful at drawing animals. Except for birds. I can draw a pretty decent little Robin or Sparrow. But the fantastical things like dragons may as well be stick figures. Eventually, I will make the attempt. I just need to get better at things like drawing feet, claws, and hands. Also, head proportions are difficult. I promise, I will try to do that, but it is going to be later in the year after I have gotten back into the swing of drawing again. I may post occasional pictures of the meditation coloring pages I have begun doing to help manage my stress. But I will note that it's just my coloring in something someone else created.

Speaking of coloring in books, if you're looking for a really cool adult coloring book, check out the one based off of J.R.R. Tolkein's works. A friend of mine gifted it do me for Yule a few years back. It is beautifully illustrated and includes stuff like dot-to-dot pages. (Yes, there is a Smaug dot-to-dot page.) I'd give you the exact title and ISBN but the book is buried. At least I have enough of a path through my project room that I was able to get to some of my colored pencils. I'm amazed it hasn't collapsed into a black hole with the amount of stuff in there.