With this sketch, I was trying to forget about noodling right off the bat and focus on just getting shapes down. Took me about 15 minutes. I need to do about a hundred more of these. My lighting seems to always kill me. I guess it's practice, practice, practice. 
Tonight I really got the itch to oil paint. I think it was all that staring at amazing art on Ryan Wood, Adam Ford, Mark Behm, Dave McClellan, Dave Malan, and a ton of other's bolgs. They amaze me. Makes me want to paint and draw more and more. Man, I need it. This is oil on paper. I began using oil on paper in college, and fell in love with it. It is somewhat smooth, but keeps a bit of a tooth, shows the brush strokes a bit from the gesso, and is light and easy to store. I remembered something the hard way tonight...don't use Ivory Black as your black when doing a grisaille painting...it turns blue when mixed with white! Mars Black all the way. Doing this tonight was punishing...but worth it. I needed it, and I need to get better, that's for sure.
This is one of the greatest pieces of art I think I have ever created...or helped create - my son, Will on the Oregon Coast last week.
I'm not sure if you can call three images a "dump", but here they are. The last image I saw a drawing of Ariel that Glen Keane did, and I could see so many construction lines, I tried to copy it. I came out with a somewhat similar looking Ariel, but I like the way he constructs his heads. After all, he is the master. I'm trying to get into form and shadow rather than line. I've found a new favorite pencil (that happens on a daily basis) and it is the "Turquoise". It's dark and smooth, and is a joy to draw with. The only drawback is that it smears easily. I still think my alltime favorite is the "Ebony" pencil. Well, the first two were attempts at getting back to knowing my anatomy and construction. I've got a ways to go as you can see. Both were from my head. 
