Whimsical Friends

Especially since the home isolation, I’ve been following tutorials of various artists and most recently, Juliette Crane from the U.S. She offers one free one, and I thought I’d check it out! In the beginning of it, she guides us into drawing owls and other whimsical animals in line with her theoretical “circle and rectangle” template. I had my first attempt using my black charcoal and soft pastels the other day as written in Whimsical Jungle, and that went so well that I thought I would do another sketch to practice more!

Sumie Ink Sketch

Besides just for practicing, it’s so much fun doodling cute things anyway. So out came my Strathmore Visual Journal for Watercolors. This time, the whimsical creatures were doodled with Japanese sumie charcoal ink (Kuretake ZIG Cartoonist black ink) and bamboo stick pen. I really enjoyed it and kept going and going. Look at all the kawaii characters… owls, cats, bears, mice and bunnies! A clearly therapeutic exercise this was.

Fill in with Watercolours

I was juggling with whether to leave the sketch as is or colour it in. Finally I decided to take the plunge and go for it. It’s been some time, after all, since I’ve used my Japanese watercolors, Kuretake Gansai Tanbi. I thought they’d be a perfect match together and hence a good opportunity to dig them out for this purpose. And what fun that was! Also great practice for painting with watercolor. I also used the fluorescent set of this brand in some areas. And here it is. How much cuter can that get! I’m certainly glad I decided to go for it.

I love making my animals not only whimsical but also kawaii. Actually the main practice was with the owls but I added their friends too for fun, along with flowers and hearts. I must say that just sitting down and, for a change, doodling away to practice drawing was quite relaxing. It’s a good idea to do this from time to time! I’ll definitely be doing one soon, especially in between working on my paintings…