[Art] NBB illustrations for "A Tale of Two Sisters"

[edenfalling]

When I was a kid, I was fairly good (for a kid) at a number of things: music, sports, art, math, writing, etc. But there are only so many hours in the day, and some activities are always going to strike any given person as more interesting and desirable than others. As I got older, I focused mostly on writing and music. Those were not necessarily the things I was best at -- if you look at my art and my stories from when I was ten or eleven, I am pretty sure the art was better. (My early writing was dire. Trust me on this.) But because I put work into them, I got better. And I did not get better at, say, sports and art.

I still draw like a twelve-year-old, in other words... though admittedly, a twelve-year-old who took a figure drawing course in high school, for what little good that did me.

Which is by way of leading up to: My NBB art is now up. I drew two pictures for pamymex3girl's story, A Tale of Two Sisters. They are done in pencil and colored pencil and then scanned into my computer via a photo editing program, because have I mentioned that I am not an artist? And therefore do have have art or art editing programs? (That is not a thing that ever stopped being true.)

You can also see them on deviantART: Into the Dark Woods and Susan and Lucy.

The reason the sisters have no faces in the first picture is a stylistic thing I fell into doing when I had to write and draw a comic book in 8th grade English, because I cannot draw faces in profile to save my life. I like the coloring job there, though, and the picture went pretty quickly -- I did most of the background directly in colored pencil without a regular pencil outline. Pine trees are dead easy to sketch.

The picture of Lucy brushing Susan's hair was extremely annoying to draw. Hands, how do they work? Also noses. And lips. Argh. (You will notice I completely finked out on any attempt at ears.) I spent a lot of time in front of a mirror using myself as a model, so if the fabric and fingers bear any relation to reality, that's why. The hair is pretty obviously stylized, though. And the frame with the leaf design is there because... well, the frame is both meant to be a mirror and also a device so I didn't have to worry about the background of the room they're in. And then I made a leaf design because I like geometric patterns. I may not be good at most aspects of art, but I can draw some pretty nifty geometric patterns.

Comments

[rthstewart]

I know you are frustrated but I enjoyed them very much and I thought the captured the feel of the story very nicely. I especially liked the first one where they are in profile in the woods.

[edenfalling]

They are not the worst art in the world, but it's annoying not to be able to get the image in my successfully onto paper. I mean, I never manage to get the stories in my head onto the page intact either, but at least with words I can get closer!

...But it's not quite annoying enough to make me practice art and get better. *wry*

[rurounitriv.livejournal.com]

Cute! It looks kind of like the stuff I was doing at that age.

[edenfalling]

Like I said: I draw like a twelve-year-old. Even though I am thirty. *sigh*

[rurounitriv.livejournal.com]

Most 30 year olds - even ones who used to be pretty good for their age - have forgotten everything they knew about drawing if they haven't used it.