For my Drawing I class, we are required to maintain a daily sketchbook, and every sketch has to maintain a continuous theme.
I've been keeping multiple sketchbooks for years now, right now I have one "do whatever/doodles" sketchbook and one "life-drawing/anatomy practice" sketchbook, plus a tiny moleskin that I tend to do landscape gestures in.
So, for this one, I decided to maintain it digitally via a blog format. I tend to do most of my personal work using photoshop and my wacom tablet, so I figured I'd be more enthusiastic to maintain this sketchbook if I used a medium I really enjoyed and am comfortable with.
SO, I have my medium, now I need my theme. I went back and forth for a while. Since I love musicals so much, I was considering creating my own costume/character designs for characters from my favorite musicals. I scrapped that idea, as I wanted to do something more challenging.
Then I considered doing a four-panel comic based off my daily experiences, but I felt like my life was too boring and repetitive. My routine doesn't vary much from: sleep, eat, go to class, do homework, eat again, sleep again, and maybe mess around online a bit.
Then I considered doing a dream journal by illustrating my dreams into a four panel comic, but since I hardly ever remember my dreams, I scrapped this idea, too (though this is a project I would like to do eventually. I LOVE Emily Carroll's dream journals).
FINALLY, inspired by my interest in feminism and women's rights, I decided to draw fearsome ladies in history! And so far, it's been a wonderful project! There are SO many interesting and inspiring ladies from the past, I'm sure I could continue this project WELLL after its due date.
As you can see, I started out with a fixed composition of "circle thing in center with bust of lady in center of that".
After a few weeks of just doing busts, I decided to change things up a bit and do full-body portraits. I retained the limited color palettes of the busts, but with the added bonus of being able to challenge myself with body proportions.
My main source of research material for this project has been this AMAZING and informative podcast called "The History Chicks." Check them out if you have the time! I love listening to the show while I work on these.
If you want to find out more about the ladies I drew above, or want to see more of my sketchbook, you can see ALL of my sketches and descriptions on my "Fearsome Ladies in History" blog on tumblr.
(I might make a post detailing my process in making these sketches whenever I have the time)
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