PD Drawings

 Last week I was privileged to attend a Professional Development by Andrew Fuller. Certainly worth listening to. I drew these during the PD to help me remember some of his main points.

Chinese Brush Painting

My wife gave me a Chinese brush painting set for Christmas. I've finally been able to set aside time to begin having a go. Today's lessons was learning the different brush strokes and developing darker and lighter areas. This was followed with having a go at painting pictures of bamboo. Not too bad for a first attempt. I finally worked out how to form the leaves by the time I had finished. A bottle of strong ink given to me as another Christmas present from my younger sister a few years ago came in handy, too.

From concept to reality - Kevin Koala in Shanghai

Last year, I was privileged to travel to China. While I was there I was very inspired by the city-scape of Shanghai.

From a photo of the Shanghai CBD, I made this sketch.

From that sketch, I then utilised the idea to become the first panel in this Kevin Koala comic strip.

The next step will be to add dialogue. Stay tuned...

Shanghai fascinates me because of how development has gone on there in the last 30 years. This photo dates back to 1990;

Which is pretty much what my grandfather saw when he visited Shanghai in 1980.

Simon the Nexian - Experiments with font and format

A couple of experiments with how I can print/type text on top of the comic format for Simon the Nexian.

I'd also like to be able to use this format to create translations in Chinese, Japanese and Indonesian.

Lecture note sketches while in Lombok, Indonesia.

This is some work from a few years ago. In January of 2014, I was at the University of Mataram, Lombok, Indonesia on a three week intensive Indonesian Language course. I began drawing some sketches while writing notes from my "dosen" (lecturer). Although I was three weeks away from family and home, I still thoroughly enjoyed the experience and occasionally dream of going back.
The boy featured is a practice sketch for Penci (Penchi), one of my characters for Simon The Nexian.

Koala Committe ideas drafts

This was drawn during a meeting. The idea is having a group of koalas sorting out (or not) various problems. It would be a good tangent for Gone Bush to travel in from time to time.

Koala Commttee Notice Board

I've been working on a few ideas for a second series of Gone Bush.  This is one idea I explored on the classroom white board before school started.  The children (who are becoming used to my humour) all liked the joke.

Choosing Good Paper!

This is a good lesson in choosing good quality paper. Unfortunately the paper is too waxy and won't absorb the ink from the pens and colour shaders. So the dog and pig don't appear bright and colourful, just dirty and a little smudged.  Not to worry. Back to the drawing board (so to speak).

Monok and Zeppelin

This drawing is some of my preliminary ideas for designing a male Monok and his environment. It is also an experiment with shape and design. The Monok's eye and the oval shape of the zeppelin together make two eyes facing the reader.

A study in ears

A study in ears. How do you draw a reverse view of ears? To answer questions like this you need to go to the masters and see what they do.