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fragilewing7 — Absinthe Makes the Heart ...
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Published: 2007-01-03 14:51:33 +0000 UTC; Views: 1637; Favourites: 16; Downloads: 0
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...grow fonder. Why can't we have longer titles?This is for a story entitled 'Relative Misery' by Douglas Wright for Black Ink Horror issue #2. This illustration is for the beginning of the story. It's a wonderful, spooky little tale, I hope I do it justice.
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Comments: 39
This is trulyu amazing. Love the little details
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It's hard for me to pick which one I like the best from the two for the story. Nah, I can't. Love them both.
Doug
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thanks for taking the time to check them out. i appreciate it. sorry it took me a bit to get back to you!
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Wow. This is absolutely amazing Meghan. I absolutely love how you did the glasses and their relationship to the background. Is that liquid coming from the subject, blood or the green fairy, by which I mean absinthe?
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thanks! i'm glad you like it.
the liquid coming from the body is blood. but the liquid in the glasses is the green fairy, but it was difficult to show green when you're working in pen and ink. a lot of people think it is blood in the glasses. oh well.
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Um, I'd say you did it justice. My God, Meghan--this may be my favorite of all of the work I've seen of yours so far (and keep in mind, I love all your stuff). Great subject, perspective, realism, details (those glasses--damn!), and technique. This one has it all, girl! One of the best illustrations I've seen. Beautiful work.
Tom
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Amazing work Meghan. The detail in everything is very impressive. I especially love the the hair. Excellent, excellent work
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thanks so much! i love the hair too, but it was hard to do justice to jacob's hair! thanks for taking a look.
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Nice piece. Is that really all inkwork?? Almost looks like pencil?
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thanks. yup, it's all ink. i like to use drafting pens that give me a lot of varience in thickness, and when they are almost out of ink, i can get really light value tones. that's how i got the light cross hatching on the walls and such.
thanks for checking it out!
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Believe it or not, I get the effect when I use cheap Bic pens because the ink doesn't always flow so good and I can drag the ink for that effect. Downside is that the Bic's ink is so pastey that you can't touch the page or else,...*splotch*...Ugh!!
I'm trying for the same effect with my Pilots, but I assume I will have to use a high res image on big sheet so that the lines will look smaller when it gets scaled down. Any tricks to not waiting till you run dry or using the Bics would be appreciated...
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really, its the pens i use. i just stumbled across them in the drafting section of an art supply store. the brand name is 'zig', they come in sets or singly in various sizes. the shaft of the pens are silver and it says 'zig memory system' down the side. i really like them because they don't blotch like with other pens. you know, you're drawing and then a big chunk of ink just plops out. i've had that problem with prisma color pens and some other brands. i hardly have that trouble with these pens.
then when they are almost out of ink i use them to get very light values, i tilt the pen at a pretty severe angle and barely touch the page when i'm cross hatching. they don't bleed either, even when i lay a lot of color down, it doesn't bleed to the back of the page or come off on my hands. they also use archival pigment ink, which means they won't lose their color over time, you know how some other inks look red after they've been hanging on the wall for a while? they aren't very expenssive either, which is nice. i think a whole set is somewhere around 9 or 10 bucks. i highly reccommend them, they are super easy to use.
wow, i sound like a commercial.
my best advice is to just expirement with how you hold the pen, try holding it at different angles to slow or speed up how fast the ink comes out of the pen. use different sizes and really get to know what each size does. one thing i did when i first started using pens was to draw the same subject with one pen and then do it all over again with another size. it was a great learning tool to see how the thickness of the ink can really change the mood of the piece.
it might also be good to expirement with different weights of paper. for most of my pieces i used 70 lb paper, it's heavy and thick, but still smooth so i'm not fighting the texture of the paper. ink behaves differently on different paper, there's a big difference, for instance, between computer paper (and other thin papers which are great for graphite drawings) and heavier paper like watercolor paper with more texture. so just experiment and see what works for you.
hope that helps. i bet when you asked for advice you didn't think you'd get a novel! sorry, sometimes i can be a it long winded.
just experiment! i'm not a genius at this or anything, i think i have just honed what works for me in a medium i enjoy. play until you find that too!
thanks for the interest, and if you ever have questions feel free to ask. if i don't know the answer, i can get you in touch with someone who does, ok?
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Wonderful response and attitude. Its good to know that there are still people who believe that good conversation about art isn't a fight to win approval of skills and esteem. I find some people who don't bother giving thanks for their comments nor even bother to respond when asked a simple question regarding their work. Possible egoists looking to get praise and not bother to feel that others don't care to know them when they don't share the time to say thanks. Too many out there believe their work is too good and their heads are so damn high in those clouds that the rest of us are viewed as unworthy. Too bad...they might meet some nice people if they could just stop staring in the mirror...LOL!!!
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i'm so glad you took all of that in the spirit it was intended. right after i hit the send button i thought 'wow, i bet he's going to think i'm full of myself spouting off all that crap'. one of the major reasons i joined DA was to learn from other artists, and if i can teach some too, or at least give someone a new way of looking at a technique, all the better. i'm always interested in talking about art and how people make it their own.
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I know what you mean. I could go on for hours about this and that and yet never feel I'm as serious about it as I should be. I always look at other work and say, "I wish I could do that." Its what inspires me to try to achieve that sense of accomplishment, not for people to sugar-coat their responses by trying to be nice and lie to make me feel good. If people are too afraid to mention subtle flaws or be ones able to take such criticism then I don't see them leading a fulfilling career in the art field. Opinions are like assholes...everyone's got one.
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i'm special, i have an opinion AND an asshole.
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Well, I'm more specialer than you...
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did i respond to the wrong comment with the asshole thing? oops.
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Now people will think you ARE "s-p-e-c-i-a-l"....
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i used to ride the short bus. seriously.
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...and that explains what?? 
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that i'm s-p-e-c-i-a-l!
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Love the play on the title...How you did the wood grain is great, that and the transparency of the glasses and how it distorts the grain ever so slightly. I'm still working on that...he he he...
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thanks, i had a really hard time with the glass, it was a struggle. i really appreciate your comments.
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You`re welcome
I haven`t gotten any letters from you yet
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that's because i haven't sent another one yet! i'm a bad friend, sorry! soon, though.
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No,You`re not a bad friend!
I was just wondering
You are the greatest friend
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