Impromptu Trip to Yorkshire

This week I decided to take a trip to Yorkshire. We booked a night in York and on the way decided to drive through the Yorkshire Dales area. We stopped by a small village and had a wander round, there was a craft fair and lot's of little quaint shops.

The British Summer

Wet is an understatement

A huge train

Owl outside the Yorkshire Museum

Driving through the countryside in torrential rain, in my 1l Yaris was not much fun.
The scenery was beautiful though, so much green. We set the sat-nav to take us to the Yorkshire Dales National Park Centre and took a stroll around the area. We went up to the river which a scene from Robin Hood was filmed (the one with Kevin Kostner). We took a walk to some waterfalls and got soaked because the rain was bucketing down.

Peace

Have you ever spent an entire day lost in a book? I know I have. I love it when I find a good book and I can't put it down. I just finished this illustration for this weeks Illustration Friday topic which is peace. I used pencil, fine liner pens and watercolour paints.

Sea Maiden

A sneak peek of a drawing I am working  just now. Lately I have been enjoying drawing with fine liner pens. When they start to run out I find you can get a nice effect with them. I plan to scan these drawings and colour them digitally or perhaps using watercolour since the pens are water soluble. I haven't decided yet.

These are the pens I used and I did it on watercolour paper.

Nicola

Beard

I did this illustration this evening for this weeks Illustration Friday topic, which is 'beard'.

I did a pencil drawing of what I think is a typical bearded guy you see nowadays with the quiff-ed hair and bushy beard, plus I added a few tattoos.

I used graphite and Photoshop.

Purple Roses

A pretty, basic illustration. A sketch done in pencil, coloured in Photoshop.

This reminds me of the headbands most girls will be wearing this year at all of the festivals.

The Messy Princess

I will be done with education in under three weeks and I'm not sure how I feel about it. The search for a full-time job begins... Not to fear though, I shall be keeping up this blog with my illustration work among other exciting things I get up to.

I've been busy right now with a project for a client that I was sent on by the college, plus working on getting all my work sorted and presented for the end of the year show, which is on the 10th to the 13th of June.

I did this sketch a while ago and only recently coloured it on Photoshop. I like the way it has turned out and I feel like doing something childrens book related again.

I call it -  The Messy Princess

Everyone likes owls.

Nicola

End of Year Show

End of Year Show | Student Exhibitions | City of Glasgow College

A Walk in the Park

 

Sometimes there is nothing better than going for a nice stroll through a park or countryside to clear your mind or get a bit of peace and quiet with a friend or alone.

Lately my mind has been buzzing with the end of my course and end of the year show coming up, it's all getting pretty stressful.

 

 

 

 

A sketch I started the other day, inspired by Brian Froud's trolls and fairy tales in general.

 

Scuse my jammies.

 

Nicola

Bear Hug

I love simple illustrations that are childlike. I took a quick pencil sketch I did and coloured it on Photoshop.

 Sketch

Recent Work

I think it's about time I updated this blog. I recently finished my Graded unit (thank god). I did Dracula by Bram Stoker. I did enjoy it at first, the book was good to start but got quite boring. I had to design a book cover and graphic novel spread, plus a small editorial illustration. Here are my finals.

Fineliner pens, Ink, pencils, watercolours and Photoshop.

I'm relieved the Graded Unit is over but sad that I only have a month left of being an illustration student. So the next month will be spent researching and learning how to become a freelance illustrator.

Bye for now

Nicola x

Illustrating a Children's Book

Here is the finished product of my illustrated version of 'Daga and the Flying Troll of Sky Mountain'

An old Swedish tale, originally illustrated by John Beaur. 

If it was to be published, this is basically how it would look.

 I drew each illustration in pen, used watercolours and finished digitally using Photoshop and Illustrator.

This one did not originally have a starry sky with a moon, I took that out and added one I did using inks, watercolour and acrylics, among other things.

This is the cover I decided on.

Hope you like!

Check out my Facebook page - www.facebook.com/strawberryskullsillustration 

Illustrating a Fairytale Part Two

My progress on this project;

I have been experimenting with media and playing around with thumbnail ideas. For this I used watercolours and white ink. I adjusted the tones slightly after I took a photo of it.

I watched a tutorial on Youtube on how to paint a galaxy. I tried it out using watercolours, bleach and acrylics. I like the way it turned out, I might do a few more of these.

 Experimenting - Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Thanks for stopping by.

Nicola

Fairy Tale in the Making

Sketchbook so far:

My self initiated project for college officially started on Thursday. Read my project brief here. 

Most of what I have done so far in my sketchbook so far is character development. I am focusing most on Daga and the trolls, since they are the main features of the story. (and I love anything to do with trolls/faeries/princesses)

Thumbnail ideas for scenes to illustrate.

That's all for now. A lot of work still to do!