Dogs

A recent commission of some adorable pups!

-Anna

Sledding

Better hold on tight!

-Anna

Weekend Stuff

Some doodles from the weekend.

-Anna

Some Designs

So I really want to get some visual development stuff in my portfolio... not sure these will make it, but the more I do the better I will get.

-Anna

Summer Day

OH WOW I did a drawing that doesn't have snow in it.

Based on this doodle from my sketchbook:

-Anna

Jack Frost

A Rise of the Guardians doodle before bed. I'm starting to realize that I'm happiest with my work when I draw it on paper then scan and color it... I just can't get the look I can get with pencil on my Cintiq, even with the best pencil brushes I have. This way takes longer, but it just looks better.

-Anna

2012

This was going around tumblr and I thought I would do it... It's always cool to see how much my art has changed. This year I really pushed myself and experimented, trying to find how I like working digitally. I've drawn more since I graduated than I probably did in school, at least in terms of like 'hours per day', and I think it's helped me. But still so far to go...

-Anna

Winter

Yeah... still waiting for that snow...

My new goal is to develop a more focused animation portfolio. Right now mine is much more children's book (which is fine!) but considering I want to get into animation, that might be nice.

-Anna

Stargazing

Sketch from last night that I colored as a warm-up this morning.

(Oh, and as a general rule, don't let your hair out in your space suit helmet...)

-Anna

Rise of the Guardians

I saw Dreamworks' Rise of the Guardians last night, and I really liked it. My friends and I all came out of the theater feeling super happy. Apparently it's not doing great at the box office and has yet to make back it's budget, so yeah... go see it!

 -Anna

Snowman

Hey snow, I know it's only December 1st, but really any time would be nice. Anyway, it's Saturday, which means I can draw whatever I want. And I wanted to draw a snowman.

-Anna

Lincoln

Saw Lincoln the other day.... so good.

-Anna

Old and New Things

So I recently rediscovered a couple of old stop-motion clay animations from high school that I hadn't seen in years. I wasn't expecting them to look great, but I was actually kind of impressed! I thought I'd post them here. I've also added them to the Animation section up above.

Hunting Rabbits (2007) 

The sound effects make me cringe, haha... we edited these in iMovie and were pretty much limited to stuff from the program's library. That being said... seriously, 17-year old me?

An Apple a Day (2006)

Also, here are my next two pieces for Young Adult Mag. The first is from a new series, which will follow a different family each month sharing a meal. The second is the fifth in the "Girl" series.

I also colored a sketch from last night... I wanted it to snow, and it did!

-Anna

Nazgûl sketch

So out of excitement for The Hobbit I've decided to rewatch the Lord of the Rings movies. I just watched Fellowship. This particular scene is really awesome, and I wanted to draw it. Right now I have a bunch of design jobs (designing floor tarps for indoor percussion ensembles, winterguards, etc.), along with the two YA Lit Magazine pieces for next month... needless to say, I'm quite busy and don't have time to work on this. I'd love to finish it before The Hobbit comes out next month, but I'm not sure that will be possible... only time will tell!

-Anna

Going on an adventure.

"This is the story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected."

(Because this photo. Just... this photo.)

(Martin Freeman is made of jam and kittens and rage. Don't ask me to explain it, I don't understand it. I just know it's true.)

-Anna

Do you like our owl?

One of my favorite websites, The Mary Sue, is having a Blade Runner fan art contest. I thought why not, I like Blade Runner. So I doodled this up quick for that. Check it out on the contest page here, and Like it (if you like it, of course.. hehe)

-Anna

Wall-E

Last night I watched Wall-E... I hadn't seen it in forever. I think it's the best Pixar movie. While watching I ended up doodling what I thought a human Eve and Wall-E might look like... derp!

-Anna

Riddles in the Dark

Quickly colored a drawing from my sketchbook... I just read the chapter "Riddles in the Dark" in The Hobbit. It's where Bilbo finds the Ring and meets Gollum.

And here's some more sketchbook stuff from last night:

Also saw Wreck-It Ralph the other day... it was super cute!

-Anna 

Sketches - 11/8

Quick sketch I did this morning.

And here's an adorable small child I drew the other day in an ACTUAL sketchbook.

The Hobbit is coming out soon, and I'm really excited. I decided to reread the book, since it's been years since I first read it and I barely remember it. I thought it might be fun to do a hobbit-inspired piece, which is what the black and white comp below is for. I've been busy lately, but hopefully I can find some time to work on it!

And here's my most recent illustration for Young Adult Lit Magazine... you can see it on their site here. I'm starting a new series for the site that will hopefully begin running next month. Looking forward to that!

-Anna

Supergirl

I felt like drawing a superhero.

And here's something fun! This is a drawing I did of Supergirl back in 2009... hah. A few years can make a big difference!

-Anna

Pines of Rome

Thing I made while listening to Respighi's 'Pines of Rome'... You may know it from Fantasia 2000 (it's the one with the flying whales). Earlier this month I watched the NY Phil play it on PBS, and it was mind-blowing. Then, my college marching band played it at the NYSFBC Championships last weekend, and it was also mind-blowing. This is just a quick thing I whipped up, experimenting with some new brushes.

You can watch the SUMB play here. 6:50 is when I start to freak out... some sweet gate turns rotate into a field-length company front. Classic SUMB at NYSFBC... hehe. This was always my favorite performance of the year. We would prepare one show especially for it, and it would be the only time we performed it. The high school band kids would lose their minds... we seriously felt like rock stars. I miss band a lot, but I've never been more proud of the SUMB! Go Orange :)

-Anna

Treasure - Color Study

Final color comp for a little piece I'm whipping up for fun.

-Anna

Rainy Day

Hurricane Sandy is coming!

-Anna

Mononoke

All the news about how Hurricane Sandy is going to decimate the East Coast (and therefore me), and how man-made climate change is a very probable cause for all of this ridiculous weather we've been experiencing lately...it's the essence of what Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke is saying (among many things). The film is all about the conflict between human civilization and the natural world, and how even though we can manage to find balance between the two, the conflict between man and nature can ultimately only end one way. The environment is something that I care about deeply. It makes me so angry to see how we abuse our planet, and rather than face the consequences of our own actions, we deny it, because sometimes it's just easier to be ignorant. ARGH, I say!

Anyway, here's San and one of her wolves. If you haven't seen this film, watch it immediately. It is my favorite movie. I've seen it more times than I can count (but actually though... I watch it a lot).

-Anna

Katniss doodle

A quick sketch before bed... it turned into Katniss from The Hunger Games. Experimenting with chiaroscuro shadows.

-Anna

Little Robot

I have a dream that one day every little girl will have her own robot.

-Anna

Trick-or-Treat

From the sketchbook.

And colored...

-Anna

DS9

Characters from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine... yeaah.

Sisko, Dax, Odo, Kira, Bashir, O'Brien, Worf, Quark, Garak, Dukat

And if you want to flip back and forth between this and the sketch, which is always amusing, here's that:

So... that was fun. What show should I do next??

-Anna

ds9 cast - rough sketch

It's been a while since I've drawn the cast of a TV show. It's one of my favorite things to do, so I thought I might start a new one. I've been watching Star Trek: Deep Space 9 (a show almost as old as I am... what) and it's really good (just started season 6!). My brother's been wanting me to draw these characters for years, and now I understand why! I thought this might be a good opportunity to talk about my caricature process.

This is how I start - with a rough sketch. I find that the longer I work on a caricature, the harder it gets to capture a likeness. The moment I start to overthink it or overdo it, it doesn't work anymore. This rough sketch stage helps me really capture the essence of the character without much detail. I'm mostly concerned with getting the main features of the character down... things like head/face shape, eye, nose and mouth shape, etc with as few lines as possible. I try not to spend more than a few minutes on each face. And of course, I make sure to have reference photos of the character up on my screen to look at (though I find it easier if I focus on just one photo).

From here, the next step is to lower the opacity and go over this foundation layer with a tighter drawing. I'll fix wonky things that happen in the rough stage like symmetry (which you can check easily by flipping the drawing horizontally... the weirdness will be super obvious, if there is any). The next step is fun because the hard part (the caricature) is already done.

UPDATE: Here is a link to the finished drawing!

-Anna

10/13 Stuff

So you may remember a while back I posted a drawing I did of a girl riding a reindeer. I'd like to finish the piece, especially once it gets closer to winter, and this is a rough color comp I did for that.

Random Captain America.

And this is a puppy I drew as part of a sketch for another series I'm starting with YA Lit Magazine. I thought it was cute. It ended up looking sorta like my friend Morgan's dog, who she draws all the time... haha

Oh and I almost forgot, earlier this summer I entered a contest on the site WeLoveFine. The contest was to design a t-shirt with any Marvel villain on it. I figured why not, and on a whim did a quick illustration of Lady Loki (which I never posted on here, it was that 'on a whim'). The image ended up being selected as a Staff Pick in the contest-- you can check it out on their site here. If it sells well, there's a possibility that WeLoveFine could come back to me for more work, so... yeah. That'd be cool!

-Anna

10/12 Sketches

 Some sketches from this morning. Catwoman, Anne Hathaway version.

The past couple weeks I've been taking care of my aunt's miniature horses. There's this cat that stays with one of the stallions at all times... it's like a bromance.

-Anna

Weekly Updateeee

Haven't posted in a little while, so here are some doodles I did this week.

And here is the illustration I did for the October issue of Young Adult Literary Magazine. You can check it out on the website here.

-Anna