Category Archives: Unusual Animals

Another January’s End

On the off chance you’re here to find out about the third January painting I teased in the last post, “Phoebe in the Aisle of Eyes”, I am sorry to report that painting was a dud. However, I finished my favorite painting to date over a number of days. This one:

Patience, 16″ x 20″ acrylics. He was told they would sleep the whole time. They did not.

Here are the rest of my results from Paint Every Day, January 1-30, 2023.

11″ x 14″ (and one 12″ x 12″) acrylic on canvas paintings, January 2023
Top Left: Louise, After the Recital

Results: The first painting (blue critter, above), and the last painting (at the top of this post), were the only ones I managed to finish. I had hoped to finish a painting a day but it turns out that goal might not work for me.

I have some paintings to finish for February. We’ll see how that goes.

Thanks for visiting!

It’s January Again. And Paint Every Day!

Today is January 7, 2023. I finished a painting on January 1. The painting is titled Louise, After the Recital, and here she is:

11 x 14 acrylics on wrapped canvas. Louise, After the Recital, by Cindy Dauer.

I hoped to do a painting every day, but the next one took three days, including many false starts. I didn’t give this one a name. Someone who saw it pointed out that the main character looks a bit like the Grinch, which is true.

11×14 acrylics on wrapped canvas, by Cindy Dauer

I am on day three of the next painting, which got a name early on: Phoebe in the Aisle of Eyes. You’ll just have to come back and see. :-)

Thanks for dropping in! Happy 2023!

Completed Drawing Challenge, 1-25

Composition/Drawing Challenge 1-25, March to April, 2022
Opus (plush), pencil
Kyle the piranha-dog from Despicable Me (plush), pencil

Originally it was a 30-day drawing challenge, but I finished it out at 25, which is still pretty great! It was particularly motivating seeing drawings from all the other class participants. (I can’t link it because it was on a closed teaching platform.) It’s always good to surround yourself with an art community if you are trying to do art, which is so often a solitary pursuit.

Next up is a continuation of the composition instruction, this time with paints, and I will be using oil paints for the first time, after 11-ish years of halting progress with acrylics. I am actually putting together a slideshow of my first 11 years of paintings, which I’ve been meaning to do for ages. I want to see it for myself, and I thought it might be interesting for others.

Thanks for dropping by!

30 Days Challenge Day 2

Sherman Shoebill
2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners, white gel pen

Day two of Thirty Paintings in 30 Days and I am still snowed in (Chicago area). I prefer not to complain because I get to stay home from work. But I am not looking forward to moving my car to the other side of the street this evening.

But the other thing about being snowed in – still no paints! I know that this challenge doesn’t require painting specifically, but it still has paint in the title and I intend to do it.

In the meantime, I did extra scans during the coloring process for this one and the dog below, both finished today. I use a lot of layers with the alcohol-based markers, and often it does give a nice painterly effect. I’m hoping this will give me a head start when I actually start painting.

Stewart Lodwick
2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners, white gel pen

Thanks so much to all the 30 Day Challenge visitors! It is always my intention to visit any commenters back, but some of you do not have a comment system I am able to use. Or no comment system at all!

And one more note! Subscribers, I will be doing a new post daily for the 30-Day challenge, but I will not be emailing every day. Probably every third day or so, so as not to inundate your inbox. Thank you!

(Final final note, these are both going in my shop.)

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Holy Cow with the Hats Already

Franny the Fairy Jester, and Leah at the Abbey
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners, white gel pen

Two new wild hats and more fancy clothes. I really tried with Franny to make a different kind of face for a change. Mission accomplished! These are maidens number 133 and 134 (which is totally crazy). Leah at the Abbey, and the two hatted fellows below, were made while out of town with a limited palette. (I did bring quite a lot of colors, but it’s never as many as you think.)

Yaro the Elder, and Streetwise the Pooka
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners, white gel pen

As I mentioned in the email (the new-post-announcement, if you are a subscriber), I have not figured out how best to relay new post information without spamming email subscribers who are also Facebook subscribers. If you are accomplished at navigating these waters, please share your wisdom! No progress pics for the last three drawings because I was without scanner, but a bunch for Franny. Thanks for stopping in!

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Chimeric Rabbit for Illustration Friday

Chimeric Rabbit
8″ x 7″ Copics, fine liners, white gel pen

Well, it started as a cat stretching for Illustration Friday‘s topic “Stretch”. Then she got a sort of foxy prehensile tale, rabbity ears and some lizard scales. It’s a rather half-hearted stretch (or her eyes would be closed or her neck would be stretched). She doesn’t get much in the way of stiff muscles, being magical and stuff.

I did a bit of messing around with the color sliders, and got this purple and olive version, which I prefer to the original:

Chimeric Rabbit, original Copic illustration with colors changed digitally

Thanks for visiting! Lots of progress pics below.

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Chameleon, Wombat, and Kettle in Copics

Strange Chameleon Two, 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics

Edgar Wombat 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics

 

 

Perhaps you are shocked to see more ATCs. For those of us joining for the first time, I started doing Artist Trading Cards about three weeks ago, and I’ve done about 20 now. Which is crazy. And I must mention illustratedatcs.com again because they are to blame. I mean, to thank. :) (They also have a bigger site, atcsforall.com.)

The thing about tiny cards is: instant gratification, nearly instant satisfaction and practically instant feedback. Ah, internet, you have reduced our attention spans to approximately 45 seconds. But I will try to work with you.

Edgar the wombat is a huge fan of the movie My Neighbor Totoro. Wombats rock.

Gnome Portal Kettle 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics

Slideshows for all three! If anyone wants to see. Thank you so much for visiting. :)

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Chameleon photo reference, wombat photo reference.

Copic ATCs, Anteater Chameleon Stork Hornbill

Oops, forgot to change the order of creatures in the title. Too late now since the memos have been distributed!

Purple Rhinoceros Hornbill, 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copic markers and fine liners

Blue Stork 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copic markers and fine liners

 

More tiny Artist Trading Cards. I don’t know how long the enthusiasm will last but that’s ten in two weeks.  It is certainly much less daunting staring at a blank 2.5″ x 3.5″ than an 8″ x 10″.  For one thing, much easier to fill in a background, and I like to do backgrounds.

I have a lot fewer smudging problems since I’ve been using colors other than black for the initial ink. Copic has a fairly limited number of colored fine liners so I use Micron and Prismacolor fine liners, too.

 

Strange Chameleon 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copic markers and fine liners

Blue Anteater 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copic markers and fine liners

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Thanks for visiting!

Anteater reference photo, Stork reference photo, Rhinoceros Hornbill reference photo

 

 

Kookaburra Holding Court, Copic Markers

Holy cow, 100 posts!

Kookaburra Holding Court, 8×10 Copic Markers with digital corrections & digital sky

The topic is “Suspend” at Illustration Friday, and Thadeus the Kingly Kingfisher is holding court in an abandoned tire swing. He looks a tad cramped in there, if you ask me. His attendant today is a juvenile Boobook Owl, a smallish species. The elder Boobooks find Thadeus rather tiresome, if you must know. But he can usually get one of the kids to stand in. This one is called Lorna. She is very impressed by Thadeus, particularly the jeweled necklace.

The Kookaburra is the largest species of Kingfisher. Thadeus is a Laughing Kookaburra, though he tries not to laugh. He thinks it unkingly. This is my second kingly kingfisher! The first one with his mouse deer steed can be found here.

About 3 scans before the end I considered scrapping the whole thing! But I will be unable to do another this weekend, and I did spent quite a few hours on it. So here it is! I did some fixing up in paint.NET. The main issues were not enough refinement in the sketch and then trying to fix mistakes as I went. But each new drawing is a learning experience, whether it be post number 1 or 100.  Thanks for looking!

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Kookaburra reference photo from TrekNature, Boobook Owl reference photo on Flickr

Hornbill and Kingfisher, an Unlikely Pair

Yellow-Billed Hornbill and Stork-Billed Kingfisher, Copic Markers, digital sky

A somewhat smaller than expected Southern Yellow-Billed Hornbill and his best friend, a somewhat larger than expected Stork-Billed Kingfisher. Ari the Hornbill was born in South Africa. Shey the Kingfisher is from Sri Lanka. That they met at all is unprecedented!

Ari was flying northeasterly over the Indian Ocean, and Shey was flying southwesterly over the Indian Ocean, and they both landed in the Seychelles the same week in 2009. Crazy, right? Both natural comedians, they became instant friends and for a short time they performed a Strange Bird comedy show that was a huge hit with the local Red-footed Boobies.

As you may know I have been exploring all manner of exotic creatures at this blog. Most recently it’s the birds in particular that have caught my fancy, and thus today’s drawing. Started with a lot of refinement in pencil then several scans showing the blue .05 multiliner. After that, Copics and .1 and .2 black multiliners. Finally I attempted some highlights with a white Prismacolor pencil, to mixed results. (Still trying to find a white gel pen that works. Not sure about attempting some white acrylic. Hmm!)

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No Masquepen or swirls this week. Crazy! Thank you for stopping by!

Southern Yellow-Billed Hornbill photo reference; Stork-Billed Kingfisher reference.