Megan’s Christmas Present

As a Christmas Gift this year, I finally drew my niece Megan a drawing of herself in my “Artzee Fartzee” style. I’ve meant to for some time, but never really found the time to do so..until now. Since she had been salivating for what in her mind must have felt like eons for me to Doodle her, Sketch her, and Draw her on up, I knew I had to do her justice. So with pad in hand and my trusty mechanical pencil, I began to work out the drawing. While sitting in front of the TV watching one of many 007 flicks over the Holiday break with my Father-In-Law…I etched out a concept sketch for the piece. I usually start off by first trying to capture the individual’s likeness as best I can…my cartoon style can have it’s limitations but in Megan’s case, I think I succeeded…especially with her personality. And the drawing oozes with her personality. So with her likeness captured, I move directly into thumbnails. I don’t tend to do as many thumbnail sketches as I use to, now I tend to do a couple at most and pretty much leave it at that. With Megan, I only did two and really only explored the one Posted below. My thumbnails are usually quite small and tight, I like to work out the flow of things that way and then translate that almost verbatim into the final drawing…which is what I did in this case.  There are slight variations, but what was mapped out in the concept sketch is for the most part represented in the completed drawing.

I had planned to add color to the drawing, a few accent reds and grays in her clothing and skulls and such, but in the end I felt like the pencil stood on it’s own. I may go back and color it in the computer later for my own personal use. I also threw in a word bubble with a completely random phrase, ’cause my niece…if anything, is completely random.

Just thought I’d toss up here a couple of pics I took of her opening the gift. By the way, I know she dug it, ’cause immediately after opening it, she magically produced her cell out of thin air like she was Criss Angel and began pounding away at the key pad texting her friends about it. I guess I could call the gift a success.

I hope you enjoy it Megan.