2017 Monster Month: Day 17 – Hipster Frankies

Last year my Hipster Frankenstein debuted on the ol’ blog. (CLICK HERE if you need a reminder.) When a drawing like that is born, it comes from reflective study. One does not often just spit out a sketch and there it is. Several sketches are explored to find the perfect look for what the artist is trying to achieve. Thus was the case with ol’ Frankie.

So, here is a page from the sketchbook where Frankenstein’s monster was sketched in a variety of ways looking for that perfect hipster persona to apply to the creature. A whole page of Frankies, each unique in their own way, and none exactly like the final one from last year. These were necessary to inspire the final look.

 

Look, they really are drawn in my sketchbook!
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Art: Inking Character Designs Frankenstein Monsters Random Doodles Sketchbook

2017 Monster Month: Day 16 – Doilies and Dragons

Dragons are often misunderstood. They rant and roar, and breathe fire all over the place, but this is really because they are lonely. If only more people like Adelade here would take them in and give them some love, the world would truly be a safer place.

 

The tricky part is finding enough villagers to feed the dragon.
Categories
Art: Colored Pencil Art: Drawings Character Designs Illustrations Monsters Random Doodles Sketchbook

2017 Monster Month: Day 15 – eHarm.com

Everybody deserves a little love, right? How would a zombie really find his match online? No human is going to trust him, of course. They’d go out for dinner and one would come back without any brains. So, zombies really need their own online dating service.

Introducing E-Harm.com, where monsters can safely find a mate compatible to their lifestyle.

 

Click on image to enlarge.

 

After the effort of making a dating website page for good ol’ Don here, it seemed a shame to not let you see him a little closer. He’s good looking, has a decent job, and is into small pets – or are they into him as it were? So here he is…

 

Now who wouldn’t fall in love with a face like that?
Categories
Art: Inking Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Cartoons Character Designs Illustrations Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 14 – Blue

How does that saying go again? “Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.”

Well, today’s monsters have something old that we are borrowing for this year. Do you recognize that monster on the bottom with the little tyke pulling his hair? That was a monster I featured in full color last year (which you can see by CLICKING HERE). It was an inked drawing from my sketchbook.

I never did show you the whole page from that sketchbook last year, so it seemed like a good idea to bring it back complete with the two menacing monsters leering above the family duo. Just some blue was added in Photoshop to give the ink drawings a little extra pizzazz.

 

Really, drawings like this don’t haunt my dreams. Maybe because I get them out while awake.
Categories
Art: Inking Art: Photoshop Character Designs Monsters Random Doodles Sketchbook

2017 Monster Month: Day 13 – Fluffy

So, did you make a guess as to which of yesterday’s sketches would be turned into a painting today? If you guessed the little girl and the big horned beast at the top of the page, you would have been correct.

It just seemed like a fun idea to take that little girl and make the big guy her pet. Clearly, he could totally be the one to take her for a walk, but he willingly allows her to be his master.

So, a little watercolor paint and some colored pencils applied to a textured paper can turn a few rough pencil sketches into something special…

 

Who walks whom?
Categories
Art: Colored Pencil Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Character Designs Illustrations Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 12 – Monstrous Inspiration

Here is another full page from my sketchbook of some random drawings that have nothing to do with each other, or do they? Hmmm. They were originally drawn without any real plan, but sometimes random doodles such as these can inspire a whole other image when put together.

This is often the point of drawing in a sketchbook. It is a place to get the bad drawings out of you so the good ones can see the light of day, but it is also a place where your mind can run free and slap out innocuous little drawings that can actually inspire real creativity later on.

Which of these drawings do you think were turned into a painting? Come back tomorrow to see a watercolor creation inspired by these sketches.

 

Look, an image not cropped so you can see it really is from a sketchbook!
Categories
Character Designs Monsters Random Doodles Sketchbook

2017 Monster Month: Day 11 – Frankentori

Okay, today’s monster has a little bit of a personal angle to it. My sister Tori married a man by the name of Frank a while back. When my family refers to them, it usually comes out as “Frank and Tori.” However, we have become so used to saying it, that it ends up sounding like one word, “Frankentori.”

If you put THAT word into the mind of a cartoonist, particularly if that cartoonist is the mischievous brother of the bride, then something like THIS two-headed monster comes from it…

 

Yes folks, this reproduced. I have three nephews from them.
Categories
Art: Drawings Art: Inking Caricature Character Designs Frankenstein Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 10 – The Bird Lady

Okay, I realize that TECHNICALLY, this lady does not look like a monster. However, the whole scene gives me a bit of the creeps, so it is being included in this creepfest I call Monster Month.

This started as a sketch of a gnarled old tree in my sketchbook drawn lightly with a blue pencil. As it started to take shape, the birds seemed like a natural addition. Then, of course, an old woman needed to be added, who is likely the birds’ mistress, or perhaps she is not. That is the beauty and mystery that a single drawing can do to the viewer. It makes one ask questions. Who is this woman? Why are those birds there? What do the birds and the woman have to do with each other? Why doesn’t this artist seem to know the answers to these questions?

Well, maybe I do have these answers, or maybe I don’t. That is the beauty and the mystery that an artist can wield with his ink brush pen…

 

Tuppence a bag?
Categories
Animals Art: Drawings Art: Inking Character Designs Illustrations Monsters Random Doodles Sketchbook