The Sixty Sixth Doodle

Someone said to me that this illustration looks like a dark Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. Must be the pigtails!

Outlines are, at times, over rated. It's nice to see what happens when you take them away. How do you keep the concept of shape, depth, form? Do you lose anything? I find that, if anything, you gain more. Sometimes defining pencil and pen lines can hold back the mystery and ease of a piece of art work. Can you be too defined?

Oh dear, I am clearly feeling a wee bit philosophical. 

Take this pigtailed lady above. She began as a sketch, and after a while of staring at her wondering what to do, an idea started to form. I began painting out parts her face, splashes of hair, dark pools for the eyes. And here she emerged, no outlines and all the better for it. 

Odd ey. Take away boundaries of any sort and groovy things can happen.

The Sixty Fourth Doodle

I hate technology. But I love it. I rely on it. Isn't it so annoying. 

It always there, interfering with us, well, you know, actually living. Yet we can't tear ourselves away, and I don't really think we ever will. Oh dear.

I came up with this illustration after watching a friend messing around on a new phone. The pose is typical; sat in a cafe with a big group of people, but bent over the phone, totally engrossed. Sucked in. It's not necessarily that this is bad, but it has changed how we interact and live our lives. It's interesting.

Anyway, I doodled this chap, and after looking at the sketch I though 'This has to be mad. Surreal. A bit bonkers. A little eerie. And almost scary.' So after a few experiments and many cups of tea I decided on having a black background, white outlines and a whole heap of confusing surrealness. Which I liked. The bizarre curls under the phone and between the phone and the figure were done with coloured pens (Stabilo fineliners are my fave, they are fab) and signify that almost unbreakable bond and reliance we now have on such tech. Again, it may not be that bad, but it's definitely not natural. Does it add to our minds and characters, or does it simply suck the life out of us? Is this guy crying or learning great things? Hmm, that's a tough one innit.