It’s not often that I draw a whole person and even rarer that I do a portrait of a child, but who can resist a child in a dinosaur jacket? Not me. This is from a photo posted by Meredith on the Museum by Sktchy app.
Meredith’s child
Tag: portrait
Danny
Today’s portrait is not a Sktchy face. This is Danny Gregory, founder of Sketchbook Skool and all round art guru who is celebrating his birthday today. I owe Danny a lot. He is the person who got me drawing for the first time since childhood when I was in the depths of major depressive illness after a serious breakdown some years ago. It’s no exaggeration to say that drawing, and by extension Danny, was one of the things that helped to save my life.
Since that time chronic mental and physical illness has become a part of my life and daily drawing is part of my toolkit for maintaining my wellbeing. Sketchbook Skool and Sktchy, and the online communities that surround these, have become an integral part of my life and crucial to my mental and physical health. I’m hugely grateful to the people who make up these communities for their ongoing friendship and support and to Danny, Koosje Koene and Jordan Melnick for their foresight and hard work in creating and sustaining them.
Those of you who follow this blog regularly will know that a few months ago I became a teacher for Sketchbook Skool. I can’t tell you how exciting it is for me to go from student to teacher. The very least I can do is draw Danny on his birthday and wish him a very happy birthday!
Jon
Saturday morning drawing.
Inspiration from a photo posted by Jon on the Museum by Sktchy app.
Mahoo
I had a lot of fun with this portrait of Mahoo from Museum by Sktchy winking. I drew him with my Bic 4-colour ballpoint pens in a Life Noble Note Plain notebook.
Wendy
This is one of those portraits where I lost the likeness completely but I nevertheless had fun with the process. I’ve drawn Wendy from Museum by Sktchy several times before too, and have never struggled to capture her likeness before – maybe it was the slightly upward looking angle that confounded me?
Vincent
Every week Sketchbook Skool founder Danny Gregory House Draw With Me session on YouTube. Anyone can attend and draw along with Danny. Each session has a different theme and after the session people post their drawings on social media (although this isn’t obligatory).
During this week’s s Draw With Me session we drew a 19-year-old Vincent van Gogh. I did a simple sketch in ballpoint pen. But many other people did wonderfully colourful drawings in true Van Gogh style and when I saw them posted online I decided I had to have a go. So I uploaded my sketch to my iPad and started playing around in Procreate with a TrueGrit TextureTown brush and the Liquefy function. This is what I ended up with. I love it.
You can see my process on YouTube here. If you’d like to watch a previous or attend a future Draw With Me session ( they’re absolutely free and open to anyone worldwide) you’ll find them here – make sure you subscribe if you want to receive a reminder of future sessions.
Letitia
A little bit of ballpoint pen action for this drawing of Letitia from Museum by Sktchy.
Faeze
This was so much fun to draw! I want to focus on drawing hands in a future Spark class so I was looking at inspiration photos with hands. This one caught my eye – too hard for a first class on drawing hands but fun for me to draw. The muse is Faeze from the Museum by Sktchy app.
Devon
I drew this portrait of Devon while teaching Spark classes for Sketchbook Skool. It ended up very wonky but that’s OK – it was a valuable lesson in how to keep going even when you really aren’t happy with your line drawing. And the final portrait turned out fine.
Irina
This is Irina from Museum by Sktchy drawn on an iPad Pro using the Procreate app.
drawing faces 