Sketchbook Update 100 (Patreon)

100th update since I started in 2018, I can't believe it! I was actually doing it all digitally back then, before coming back to sketchbooks in 2020 or so. Honestly I still feel like I'm better at digital drawing, but I am absolutely improving with my traditional, and it's a skill I don't want to lose! (Better because I can undo, and therefore keep my lines loose, basically.)

It's been a quiet month or so! It's been very rainy and muddy so I haven't got many of my usual plein air drawings and paintings. I've been spending a lot of my free time in the living room with the fire lit playing KCD on the switch :P. Hibernation season...
With that said, here's some of my goings on!

Snow!!!

I went on a walk to take full advantage, and it was foggy at the same time, which is a combo of my favourite weather. It was AMAZING, the fog was travelling in big banks, so a view that was previously clear would suddenly be completely obscured. Or it would be around me like in the first photo, and I couldn't see anything around me, it was like being in a strange void, I loved it!

Once I was above the fog I got some beautiful clear skied views to paint, and the cows looked great in contrast :p. Our farmers cows are inside at this time of year, but these ones are almost wild apparently! (They're a scottish breed adapted to the cold)

Here the snow was falling from the trees in such fine particles it was like glitter, it really reminded me of Legend 1985, in which every actor and the whole set is coated in glitter. (exaggerating. but not much)

It's a wild movie, super nostalgic for me, I am very passionate about the original tangerine dream soundtrack.

I got a planner that actually fits my huge handwriting and mega to-do lists! It's a Papierniczeni Classic. I've enjoyed going back to physical planners again, I like having more space for working out my plans and writing notes, vs my previous more restrictive digital format. If you can read the picture at all you'll see I utterly failed with my fun tasks and did all my work tasks. oops.

ALSO I felt very smart using an elastic band to attach my planner to my diary. I was agonising over a cover to fit them both in, but this works...dare I say...better. they're both completely usable this way, if a little heavy! I also made my own monthly tabs, and placeholder tabs, using paper and washi tape! I think I am still feeling guilt for buying a hobonichi weeks that was too small (I sent it to a friend) so I'm like...no more money on this for a bit please.
I also wasn't sure if it would work with them together, so it's a good trial if I ever did get or make a cover. I also thought I'd mention if if anyone else was thinking about combining books, I used a fairly thick and small elastic band and put it through a center page of each book. (I did it in the middle of a signature (page cluster) to avoid direct pressure on the glue keeping the signatures together. It doesn't wiggle at all, which I was surprised by!

Speaking of the hobonichi I gave to a friend, they work in waterstones and bought me a book in exchange with their discount >:) so I got daydream hour by Ryoko Kui! I'm glad to have a physical copy of this, there is SO much art in it, I cannot understand how the artist has the time.

New years day we made lego, and watched a scream movie :3. It was so nice to have a chunk of time off, though I didn't make much of the fun art I had hoped to haha.

I took part in goblin week! I remembered that references are king, so I got an absolute shed load of refs and picked bits here and there to give my goblins some more interesting clothes than the basic rags I was defaulting too. I especially loved giving them little coifs, as I said, I've been playing KCD, and the clothing is pretty in depth so I was kinda pulling inspiration from there too with the coifs and gambesons!

I also have a brian froud book (the art above), who is the master of goblins and trolls and such, that I've had open while I work.
Here are some sketches! I did some warmup goblins straight into ink, and then decided I wanted to pin things down a bit more for these.

(I actually got the week wrong and most people are doing it This week) I highly recommend drawing goblins, if they look ugly or weird- that's GOOD. It's a low pressure character design, and I find it very freeing!

Haha, I'll not lie this was very eagerly anticipated and...very disappointing. They were all much paler than I thought! I'm using a dip pen here so this is about as dark as the colours get-and in a fountain pen they're paler. I am still sad tbh and a little embarrassed, I paid £12 shipping for these £2 samples LOL. We don't have anywhere that sells a range of samples in the UK and I didn't want to buy a bottle without testing first. I was Most excited for the Kobe inks, and I adore strawberry but it's just slightly too light! And you can see....I previously tried to make my own milk chocolate colour from diamine primary colours, and it's a very close match ;).

I actually have some water reservoir brushes that I'll put the samples into, they'll make pretty washes at least!

I made my 33rd sketchbook! I am ONE page from finishing the last one, so this one doesn't have a start date on it yet, but the last one was started on the 19th September, I feel like I've barely had it before I finished! (80 pages...yikes)
This time because I've still got plenty of spare sketchbook paper...I couldn't justify buying a new sketchbook to pilfer the covers, so I bought some bookboard and made my own covers! Cutting the holes was the worst part, and my bookbinding from uni came in handy wrapping the colourful paper around the cover neatly! I'm using some sugar paper and some folder dividers haha. I like the little holes, it's kinda fun lookin!

Stickers are from Shazleen Khan, potoh, yumiko_tezuka, lily vie, iyo okumi and sadly I can't find the tiger/daffodil/flower in bed creator, or the curled cat, if anyone knows lmk!

I've actually lost the will to live as patreon deleted my captions and I had to rewrite, forgive me for any mistakes lol. I'm gonna go play Loop Hero now and not move from the sofa.

Thank you for reading, and for your support!