For assignment two for the visual journal, we should think about characters who will play a role in the story. Later on we have to integrate this in the (collage-) work we've done so far.
I came up with the idea for a 7 year old girl, not quite sure about her name yet (suggestions are wellcome!), thinking about Lily, who lives with her parents at an old house at a Canal in Amsterdam in 1971. She lives with her parents above a bookstore they own.  Her parents spend a lot of time working in the store and don't have a lot of time for her....She has a Siamese cat named Peppermint (because he loooves the smell of peppermint) who spends his days sunbathing between the books in the window display.
At night times, when her parents are asleep Peppermint and Lily (?) sneek down to the bookstore and toghether they read books about foreign places and cities. One night when she opens a book about New York something magical happens....
Here's a few sketches of how the girl and her cat might look like! :-D
I had so much fun imagining about Lily, who she is, what she likes, hates, where she lives etc.
It is all happening in 1971, as you can see by the clothing etc....:-)
(Gave the glasses glass after taking the picture...forgot that:-))

A few sketches for the second week of visual journaling. Character development! More to follow!

Coco Chanel

Result of the last few drawing lessons for now. I learned a lot! I took a picture from a magazine of Coco Chanel as an example. Not an exact copy, but just an example to work by. I like how the shading on the sofa worked out and I'm satisfied with the overall result.
By the way, there is an error in the text of the magazine, it should be :" leS secrets de Coco" or "le secret (without S) de Coco"......

All the pages for assignment 1 for my visual journal....(hard work :-))

I like this one by Keri Smith. Permission to make mistakes. It should all be fun! :-D
http://www.kerismith.com/

A couple of pages for first weeks assignment for visual journaling. I added a few things since I took the pictures, but more pictures coming soon! :-D This first week we have to glue material such as magazine or newspaper clippings of our own choice into the moleskine sketchbook, really fill the pages with this material, and leaving some space open for expansion in the next weeks assignments. We"ll be working with different media such as paint, text and photo's to fill it up in the next weeks.

Got some extra help with the first assignment for the Visual Journaling course I'm following! :-D

(Visual Journaling is an online course I'm following at Camp Pikaland, a virtual school for artists by artists. In this five week course we’ll use a Moleskine sketchbook as a medium and place to gather images and ideas. Incorporating collage, drawn imagery, words, and photos to create your own narrative we’ll explore different ways of self-expression. With emphasis on specific character development and examples from across the web of exciting, inventive visual journaling to inspire and learn from.)

I finished this one today. I am experimenting with 'ecoline' (is this the english word for it too?). Love the way illustrators use it in their work, but I am not very used to this technique yet. You have to work with layers, letting one layer dry (most of the time starting with the lightest colours first). In this one I started to draw and paint the shoes first (which are actually shoes of mine :-)) and then came up with the idea to look up he word "green" at wikipedia. I like to put words in a drawing so I used some common connotations wikipedia helped me with ;-),: emarald, nature, grass, growth etc. Words that come in mind when you think of 'green' perhaps.
I like the result, especially the shoes, although I'm not quite happy with the area at the right side (and just beneath that), of the ladybug: a little to much going on there, with the leaves and stuff :-D. But a good practice in working with ecoline after all.

Work in progress.....:-D

Two results of my drawing lessons.

I recently made this for a friend who moved to another place.

To-Do List.

These boots are made for walking.....Favourite boots! I love the colour.

This is so cool: An attempt to draw all the buildings in New York by James Gulliver Hancock, an illustrator originally from Australia currently based in Brooklyn, New York.

ALL THE BUILDINGS IN NEW YORK: 16th Street

Loooove this old (Ford?) seventies car. Thought its orange colour to be appropiate because the whole country is looking orange these days. Because of the European Soccer Championship and orange is the national colour. Today the first match! (Took this picture last winter).

 I drew the eye first and came up with the idea for the text after that.
Discovered a stupid mistake in the spelling, should be:"tHrough" ! Will change this in the drawing!

“Life is not the way it’s supposed to be. It’s the way it is. The way you deal with it is what makes the difference.” (Virginia Satir)

 
Saw these on:
http://galadarling.com/