I Am A Hypocrite

by on 14 Dec 2010 in Art

Awesome thing! Waking up to snowfall. (A pittance, but I’ll take it.) Not-so-awesome thing! Waking up to single digit temperatures. (Well, it “feels like” 8 degrees according to Weather.com. I don’t care if it’s actually 19. It feels fucking cold!) Friday I fly home to warm and sunny southern California for an extended Christmas break. Hallelujah! The East Coast can keep its frigid weather, thanks.

Bishoujo Manga

A doodle from my sophomore year religion class. In my defense, the class was boring!

Anyway, welcome to Day 2 of Teen JJ week. Yesterday I showed you the literary contents of Teen JJ’s head. Today I will show you the artistic contents of Teen JJ’s head and reveal to all of you that I’m actually a horrible, horrible hypocrite.

I’m infamous around my office (and probably on Twitter) for my abhorrence of both paranormals and books with FEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELINGS. But this was not always the case, as you will soon discover.

From age 12 to, well…now, I was obsessed (and I mean obsessed) with Sailor Moon, which I affectionately refer to as my “gateway anime”. I loved every possible thing about this girliest of girly animes: the sparkly magical powers, the friendships, and of course, the most epic of love-across-times-and-past-lives romance between Usagi and Mamoru.

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The Inimitable Bex

by on 18 Oct 2010 in Art

The Inimitable Bex

A few days ago, I doodled this sketch of The Kitchen Girls, mostly experimenting with underlying shapes. Wicked Cool Riley is an oval, The Inimitable Bex is a diamond, and yours truly is a rectangle.

Then I decided to go ahead and quickly paint Bex. I shifted her pose to make it less stiff, changed her hands, and added her ever-present cup of coffee. I’m starting to like this mostly-digital thing, and I’m getting a little bit more comfortable with Photoshop painting. But I don’t deny that I rather miss natural media–I love the organic look of it–but it’s kind of nice not to have to carry around several brushes and paints; I just need my tablet and I’m good to go!

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Dance Doodle

by on 15 Oct 2010 in Art

Dance Love

At some point, I will return to posting about books and writing and publishing. I will. But until the art bunny moves out of my brain, you will be subjected to stuff like this. (I ought to name the art bunny something.)

My very first (beer! Sorry, skydiving tic) entirely digital doodle. Usually my sketches are drawn by hand in my sketchbook, but I decided to try and expand my drawbling into the digital realm so as to stop relying on the annoying scan-and-ink-in-Photoshop method (which is essentially like drawing the same thing twice). Still getting the hang of the Photoshop brushes, but in general, I kind of like it.

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Playtime is Over

by on 14 Oct 2010 in Art

Playtime Is Over

The art bunny continues its stranglehold on me. Sketched this on the train ride home and then quickly coloured it in Painter.

Poor Bear. During the winter I always want to play Lyra Crosses Svalbard, but Bear is usually not up to playing Iorek and White-Harp doesn’t want to play a male daemon.

I’m not sure where this came from. It’s not even winter.

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The Many Expressions of JJ and White-Harp

by on 13 Oct 2010 in Art

50 Expressions

I have recently been struck by the art bunny and have been spending most of my free time sketching. The art bunny is nasty and vicious and a close relative of the dreaded Rabbit of Caerbannog. Once it sinks your teeth into you, it doesn’t let go until it’s satisfied.

This is a 25 expressions drawing exercise, except in my case I had to do 50 because of White-Harp. It was actually pretty fun to do.

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Adventures in Publishing

by on 12 Oct 2010 in Art

Adventures in Publishing: The Evolution of An Editorial Assistant

I am by nature a verbose and loquacious creature, but sometimes, words fail me and pictures are necessary. I’ve been trying to restart my blog in fits and starts, but I think this cartoon pretty much sums up my state of existence for the past few weeks.

Apologies for the low quality of the drawing. I took pictures of my sketchbook with my Argos the D60 and then magically stitched them together with Pixlr.com, adjusting the levels and so forth. I briefly entertained the notion of starting a comic strip called Adventures in Publishing, but I don’t have enough time as it is…

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Stealing My Harps

by on 16 Aug 2010 in Art

Stealing Harps

Bear brought to my attention the other day that it had been over a year since I last changed my desktop/laptop background. So I came up with a new one.

I was a little stumped a first about what to draw since I usually draw from life, but this illustration came to me. After all, I am constantly the butt of Bear and White-Harp’s jokes. Le sigh.

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May The Odds Ever Be In Your Favour!

by on 2 Nov 2009 in Art

This is the best costume for the day.

This is the best costume for the day.

Halloween was a blast this year, but then again, Halloween is a blast every year. I need no excuses to dress up as whatever character I please, but it’s nice when the rest of the world has license to be five years old again. In New York it’s especially great because you get to ride the subway with adults dressed in costume on their way to various parties. On our way to a med school party in New Jersey, The Inimitable Bex and I spotted Dwight Schrute on the N train into Manhattan.

I loathe store bought costumes but I love the creativity of thrifted ones. Bex was Joan Holloway, having borrowed my retro dress and shoes (as well as a coworker’s DD bra) and our friends Alex and Jay were Big and Little Edie, but my roommate Rachel takes the cake as she was Effie Trinket from THE HUNGER GAMES. She had a pink wig, a spring green trench coat, my mockingjay pin, and a glass bowl filled with names for the Reaping. How awesome are my friends?

As the weather has grown cooler, it is now time for me to be busting out the knitting needles. Last year I made a few scarves, a hat, and a pair of mittens before retiring for the spring. This year I am determined to make these mittens (yes, they’re named for the TWILIGHT books, but I don’t care—they’re pretty!), as well as these arm warmers to wear in freezing cold New York offices. More knitting follows beneath the cut.

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April Showers Bring May Flowers

by on 20 Apr 2009 in Art

If April showers bring May flowers, what do Mayflowers bring?

Pilgrims.

Anyway, spring continues to be a magnificent and infuriating tease. This past weekend it got up to nearly 80 degrees and was sunny and clear and absolutely beautiful. Today it was freezing cold and pouring rain. Again.

Have been doing bits of revision but I’ve mostly been in an artistic mood lately. See what I’ve been working on!

Click for larger

Click for larger

I sketched this thinking I might use this in some sort of website/blog redesign. I like how the image turned out, but I couldn’t figure out how to use it. It was just 2H pencil that I painted in Corel Painter Essentials, but I didn’t like how indistinct it looked so I went back and “inked” it in Photoshop.

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Knitting Question?

by on 28 Feb 2009 in Art

For my friends (and non-friends) who knit:

What is the difference between a place marker and a slip marker in a pattern? I’m working on a pair of mittens that I’ve had to unravel twice because I keep getting screwed up at that point in the pattern. :( Halp?

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