Similar but not the same

So I spent some 15 minutes today to play around with two techniques and a same style and it ended in two sketches that are similar but not the same.

For the first one, I first painted the whole thing and then sketched the outline once everything was semi-dry. 

 And the second one was done the other way round, first I doodled with my sketchpen and then filled it all with colour.

I decided to stick to the same colour pallette so that I will know how it will look like in the end.
When one is a self taught artist, one has to try out stuff to learn stuff. Not bad, eh?

Which one do you guys prefer? I cannot decide myself, I like them both. I dont even know if the technique differences count in the end product. I personally like the process of painting first and then sketching more because it gives me a freedom to improvise as I doodle. But the other way round is fun too. 

Write to me, let me know your thoughts in comments!

Tschuss! (That means bye in German! I know, I am showing off. )

Pages from the life of a journal junkie

I love everything about a sketchbook journal. I relax and workout inside the pages of my sketchbook. My sketchbook has my random thoughts, ideas that needs to be worked on, designs and patterns I want to try and just about anything and everything I might want to try putting ink on.

I sketch at all times. I sketch when I am happy or gloomy. I sketch when I am in doubt. I sketch when I want to celebrate. I sketch because I know no other way to reach pure unadulterated exhiliarating bliss. I love me the most when I play with colours. Take a peek into the pages of my new sketchbook...

I am that person who doesn't start a sketchbook on the first white sheet inside, but will start working literally from cover to cover. The idea is to not waste any kind of workable surface. Cover everything with art is kind of my style :)

New sketchbook cover makeover.

Forgot to take a before picture, it was just a plain cover with some paper quality and size written on it.

 This little kitty was for daniel and was copied from elsewhere.  the flower is mine :) 

Playing with pattern is lots of fun!

Mixing poetry and paint is clearly one of my favorite techniques...

I will soon come out with a post with my interpretation of fifty shades of De. But since this grim portrait of de was part of the sketchbook, here goes :) Ria De, the bestest friend one can ever have. 

The original photograph of this birdie was much more stunning and stark!

More random doodling and sketching...

I wish I had flowers instead of hair! :)

To the new wall, new city, new country and new life!

I dont know if many people were wondering where this blog disappeared. If you have been, here is a quick note. We have shifted from New Delhi to Gottingen, a sleepy little University town in West Germany. The husband is doing his PhD and the son is doing his Kinderkrippe (pre-school). I am hoping to join for my PhD soon. It has been a long time consuming process, of packing our entire lives up and uprooting and planting it elsewhere, the elsewhere being a place where the language and the culture and the people are so different and so new from what you have seen so far. We were wading through a sea of changes and uncertainities. I have been working on tiny little art projects all the while, but didn't get the time or energy to come to this space and blog. When you have too much to handle, it is always better to shut yourself up and concentrate on things, one after the other, don't you think? Anyhow, not that we have finally completely settled down here or anything, but I have finished a wall mural in our new home and I couldn't resist sharing it with the world. May be I will take this as a starting point to start posting my little sketchy sketching adventures.

Ta da!
That is mr husband working on his desk in the background.

A little closer view.

 Not bad, huh? I have oodles of patience, I know! Also I love working on a wall. The way a wall mural transforms a space, it is beyond me. Love it. Love visualizing it, love painting it, love everything about a mural.

When you look closely, it is not so neat a work. It is messy and it is completely random.
Random is what keeps me going!

It took me about a month to finish it because I was doing it in between a lot of other odd things in life. If I had the time, I think this would have taken two-three days to finish. But sadly, I dont have that kind of time now.

The son wanted to click pictures, but he was not handed over the camera at his whim, so he gives a fussface on camera! Drama!

You and your freak wall Amma, I am not posing for it.
Bah!

Then the artist tried to be all demure and all that blah!

A broom seems to be his favorite plaything everywhere.

Wizard boy riding his broom :)

See you soon again in this space :)

'Our' Sketchbook

Soon we will reach that two year mark of being together. We are not associates. We work side by side, be it art or be it doing potty. He does his thing, I mine. There are these times when I let it go.  I have let someone else occupy my sketchbook and have total control over it. This has never happened.

Glimpses. These are not great art pieces. This is how we keep ourselves occupied and entertained.

This was something I was doodling and then he was doodling over.

He wanted a pig. Then he graced the pig with some green stuff.

I don't know what this is. This is completely his work.

This is when I drew a spider for him. Then he wanted spider inside circles, so he drew them circles.

Completely his work.

I doodled and he doodled and this monster was born.

 He wanted a fish. The water colour finger paint is his own.

Moth, unfinished, or finished. Depends on the way you look at it.

People.

and more people and animals and things. I have to speed draw on demand and it is not an easy job.

He doodled and then he wanted a key and then he doodled again.

interrupted crow

Car caught in a web

and crows.