Another Bruce Lee sketch

I'm thinking about what to paint on the huge canvas that's been sitting in my room for months. Here's a sketch I did today of Bruce Lee, that I'd like to have a go at painting. I'm trying to make the most of the bank holiday weekend and get a lot of sketching done. Most of the ones I did today were terrible, but I quite like this one. Needs a bit of work on the likeness, and a bit more exaggeration, but it's not bad.

Peter Petrelli

Got my scanner hooked up finally, so here's that Peter Petrelli (Milo Ventimiglia) sketch I mentioned earlier. I'm not sure about the mouth, I was trying to capture that drooping lip thing he has sometimes, maybe I'll work on it later. Just started watching season 2 of Heroes, and despite starting off a bit slow, it's got me hooked again!


Peter Petrelli - Save the cheerleader, save the world!

Tags: Peter Petrelli, Milo Ventimiglia, Heroes, Caricature

Faye Wong android sketch

Here's a quick study of Faye Wong (or Wang Fei) as the android stewardess wjw1967 in Wong Kar Wai's modern classic 2046. I was teaching English in China when this came out, and a lot of my students said they hated it because the story was hard to follow and didn't make much sense. But I think 2046 is more like a piece of art than a film. You watch it for its beauty rather than its story. If you haven't seen it, give it a try and you'll see what I mean. And if you like it, try In The Mood For Love too, it's kind of a prequel . . .

Norwegian Wood cover sketch

Here's a quick sketch I did a few months ago from the cover of Haruki Murakami's Norwegian Wood. It's not great but I just thought I'd post it, as I haven't posted any pencil sketches for a while. Apparently the photo is by Markus Klinko & Indrani. I'm not sure which of the characters from the book the photo is meant to portray. I guess it's too young for Reiko, so I suppose it's either Naoko or Midori. Any ideas?

Elisha Cuthbert caricature

People often say I don't draw enough women (it's because they're harder!), so here's one. Probably best known as Kim Bauer (Jack's daughter) in 24, it's Elisha Cuthbert. Someone asked me recently to draw some of the older 24 characters. Kim is first, expect more soon(ish).


Elisha Cuthbert

Bruce Lee Caricature - First Attempt

Here's a 5 minute sketch I did last night of Bruce Lee. I definitely intend to do a full-sized acrylic painting of the little dragon, but I'm going to try a few different sketch versions first to make sure I get something I'm happy with. It will probably involve his upper body, since it's so distinctive, but I first need to learn how to caricature bodies!!

Bruce Lee - the Legend

I quite like this sketch, considering it took literally five minutes, and I usually spend a lot longer. That's the beauty of digital - no pencils to sharpen, no scanning required, and no problem if you make a mistake! The only problem is I think he looks too young, and maybe his eyebrows are slightly too high. I'll work on that next time.

Tags: bruce lee, caricature

Nathan Petrelli returns

After some advice from various people on the NCN forums, I've made another attempt at Mr. Petrelli. I made his face longer, thinner and not so much emphasis on the jaw. Apart from the wonky eyes (which I just noticed) I much prefer this version.

Sketch of Nathan Petrelli from Heroes

Fly man!! His brother Peter may have the lion's share when it comes to super powers, but will Nathan Petrelli (played by Adrian Pasdar) have the power to go against the plans of his mother and Linderman, to stop the explosion that will destroy New York? Apparently the story will come to a conclusion at the end of season 1. Can't wait to find out what happens!


Wide-jawed Nathan Petrelli - Fly man!

NCN Firing Squad

Here's a sketch of Tony 'Parsnips' Parsons, a fellow member of the National Caricaturist Network. You can see his caricature of me here.


Parsnips

Sketch of Hiro Nakamura from Heroes

Yata! Here's my favourite character from my new favourite TV show, Heroes - Hiro Nakamura, played by Masi Oka. As well as playing a loveable, time-and-space-bending superhero, Oka is also a digital effects artist, having worked on the Star Wars prequels and Hulk, among others. Oh and he also played the intern Franklin in Scrubs (I knew I'd seen him somewhere before). Hiro always keeps me laughing with his childlike optimism, and I cracked up when he phoned his company in Japan, and inadvertantly spoke to his past self. Fearing causing a rift in the space-time continuum, he slammed the phone down and came out with a very Japanese-sounding "Great Scott!" It's classic comedy moments like that, and a gripping storyline, which makes Heroes my favourite, over both Lost, which I still watch, but only because it's there, and 24, which has lost the suspense that made the second and third seasons so great. I can only hope Heroes doesn't go the same way. There are some great faces in the show too, I'll draw more when I can.

Hiro Nakamura- "Save the cheerleader, save the world."

Caricature of Court Jones

Another one from the NCN firing squad, the great Court Jones, master of all things anatomical, and all-round nice guy, he's been a source of much inspiration for me, so I thought it only fair to caricature him. I chose a tricky angle, but I think I pulled it off quite well, and I'm happy with the greater level of exaggeration than usual. Check out Court's website for some of his amazing work.


Caricature of Court Jones

Tags: Court Jones, Caricature, Illustration

Sketch of Faye Wong

I tried Faye a while back, but wasn't quite satisfied with the results. Here's another attempt, and I think it's a bit better. She's got such a unique face, it's pretty hard to capture a likeness. If I decide to colour this one I may have to play around with the features some more.


Caricature of Faye Wong

Gandhi's Fight Club

Here's a sketch I did of Mahatma Gandhi for a recent competition on the NCN forum. The competition was to draw an illustration for a made up magazine article entitled 'Secret History', which depicted a historical figure revealing a secret side of themselves. My idea was to show Gandhi participating in an underground fight club (much like the movie), in order to release some of the aggression he built up through a lifetime of non-violence. This sketch was just a facial likeness study. I intended to draw Gandhi in the ring, surrounded by spectators, with blood on his robes and an evil grin on his face, but unfortunately I don't have time to keep up with the competition deadlines, and to be honest, after watching the movie Gandhi, I'm going off the idea of drawing him in this way, it just seems wrong! Anyway, I may revisit it at a later date.

More caricatures of me!

Here are some more caricatures of me by some more of the lovely NCN members. It's recently come to my attention that I have a huge nose!

Oh well, it never gets boring seeing how other people see you, it's just hard finding the time to return the favour.


Dan by Parsnips


Dan by Jan Ibelings


Dan by Moyse

And here's one I did in return for Paul Moyse:

Sketch of the day

Another NCN member, Kathryn Bailey:
I'm happy with the overall likeness and composition, but I thinnk I need to work on my shading, it can look a bit scribbly. Maybe I need to keep my pencil sharpened!

Tags: caricature

Caricature of Tom Welling from Smallville

**Warning** -- Smallville Spoilers below --

I was watching Smallville last night. Lana Lang had just married Lex Luthor to save Clark Kent's life after being blackmailed by Lionel Luthor. They had just got into the wedding car, and Lana turned her head to see Clark standing behind the crowd, looking on in disbelief.

In that shot, I saw the curve of Tom Welling's prominent jaw, and I had to freeze the video and grab my sketchpad. The caricature jumped out at me, and I know that when inspiration hits you like that, you have to stop what you're doing and capture the moment.

So I started with the jawline, which is something I rarely, if ever do (I usually start with the eyes as they tend to hold the key to a good likeness). Then I completed the outline of the head, before filling in the features. I liked where it was going, so I spent some time on shading. Overall, I'm happy with the likeness, but I think I could have made the top part of his face
a bit narrower to accentuate his huge jaw. Also I'm not entirely pleased with the hair, but I just need practice with that. Any feedback is always welcome.

I'm planning to do one of Kristin Kreuk who plays Lana too. She has a beautiful face which may prove quite a challenge to caricature.


Tom Welling as Clark Kent in "Smallville: Superman - the Early Years"

Tags: Tom Welling, Smallville, Clark Kent, Superman, Caricature, Kristin Kreuk

Caricature of Dr. Cox from Scrubs

Here's a quick caricature of John C. McGinley, who has starred in several big movies (Platoon, Any Given Sunday . . . ) but is probably best-known as Dr. Perry Cox in the American hospital sit-com Scrubs. I'm definitely not 100% satisfied with this one, and I almost abandoned it halfway through, but finally stuck it out. It's not terrible, and I think the likeness is there, but there are several flaws:

1. The eyes look funny, giving him a crazed look. I'm having trouble recently drawing matching eyes.

2. The teeth aren't right. He has funny teeth, but I've not quite captured their essence here, it just looks like he's chewing a toffee or something.

3. The cheeks don't match.

I'll definitely revisit this one soon and see if I can iron out these glitches.

Caricature of Jeff Goldblum

Well, I was inspired yesterday by Roberto Freire of Robolus.com, who is still going strong with his New Year's resolution to draw a caricature a day, and his work is of outstanding quality too! So I thought, maybe I should try and do the same. Then I thought, that's never going to happen, how about a caricature a week. I think I can stick to that, so here's the first Sketch of the Week - a young Jeff Goldblum:


Jeff Goldblum

Tags: Jeff Goldblum, caricature