First comes painting, Then comes sketching

While enjoying my new acrylics hobby, I started a painting and decided I wanted to include a dragon statue in one of them. There was, though, a hurdle I had to overcome. I don't know how to paint a dragon. I pondered a bit and realized I didn't know how to draw a dragon either.

So, I picked up Michael Dobrzycki's The Art of Drawing Dragons, Mythological Beasts, and Fantasy Creatures at Michael's. I opened its pages, grabbed a sketchbook, and took a very deep breath. I vowed to not cower before the intimidating task at hand.

Much to my astonishment, they turned out better than I expected. I've still not painted a dragon yet, but I have now drawn a few. And I will draw more. I can use the practice.

And for your amusement, here are the ones I've done, shown in the order I did them. (I've captioned each drawing with the title used by the book.)

Fire Dragon

Storm Dragon

Hatchling

Drake

Hydra

Amphitere

Lindworm

Wyvern

(Just a bare naked tree -- not from the book)

So, I guess I've acquired two new hobbies this year.

A New Hobby - Painting

Wow, ten months have simply vanished since I last blogged and this place here is dusty! (And I'm sneezing--for real!) Alas, I've not been idle all this while. Overtime and I have been inseparable, but I've managed to do a wee bit of writing and plotting. However, my writing desk is no longer dedicated exclusively to writing.

I desperately needed a creative outlet that I could actually do after draining my brain at work, so my writing desk now doubles as a painting desk! Yup, I decided to try my hand at another form of art. It's a fantastic diversion and I'm really enjoying it. And I might actually be improving.

I chose acrylics as my medium and am using canvas panels for the most part. (I see little sense in wasting good money on mediocre canvases to hold beginner art.) I did, however, finally acquire some "quality" paints after much persuasion. I started using them just recently (beginning with the black and white "depth & contrast study" painting below).

There are some wonderful beginner-level tutorials on YouTube produced by folks who really try to teach. I must tip my hat to Ryan O'Rourke at Ten Minute Painting Tutorials. The first four paintings below were derived from his videos. There are, of course, many others out there who do a fantastic job as well.

Who knows? Maybe one day I'll improve enough to do my own book covers! (I'm allowed to dream; I do, after all, write fantasy.)

The paintings below are listed in chronological order based on date completed, but they were all completed this month. (Just finished Road Runner today!)

8"x10"

8"x10"

5"x7"

11"x14"

5"x7" Black & White paint only (Depth/Contrast study)

16"x20" ("Team Mascot" at Work)