Skull and Crossbones
Quick post this morning as we’re leaving for Warwick Castle in four minutes (ahem, or we’re meant to be. I’ve been making picnic for an hour and I’m still in my PJs eating my breakfast.)
This skull and cross bones is copied from the front cover of Zac and the Dream Pirates by Ross MacKenzie and was drawn using FS Paint. The slight cut off on the left is because I’ve edited out the header bar…
Dragon eye
I found a new free art app for the iPad, called FS Paint, which I had a lot of fun with today. As an app it’s a little rough around the edges, something that’s put me off paying for the full version, but the benefits outweigh the clunky format.
For a start, this one allows colour choice, which is nice after Fingerpaint and KidsDoodle, where colour selection is random. There are a range of brush types, sketch, shading etc. The shading effect is in a criss-cross cross-hatch style which takes a bit of getting used to, but can get some nice results.
Of course my first attempts had to be dragon-themed. I’ve always wanted to draw dragon eyes, but have never managed to capture the life and sparkle. These are not perfect but, for first attempts, I’m pleased. It’s great to build up layer by layer.
This is a subtle drawing app that I feel has more to give with practice. Expect to see more!
Dragon-tastic
Hubbie and I went out this evening without children, for the first time in years, to a friend’s birthday party. Great, food, great live music, great company. It was nice. It was even nicer to come home and swap spanx for pyjamas!
As a result, I don’t have many words or much in the way of art work. So here are a few more dragons I drew while waiting to see the doctor about my chronic tiredness (come back and see us if you’re still tired when your kids are back at school!) while offering unspoken smiling moral support to the mother of a fractious tired child.
Hopefully I’ll manage something new tomorrow. Have a great bank holiday weekend!
P.S. Class Act is free on Amazon today, just click the link on the right
Fingerpaint App Dragon
At 6.30am this morning I still didn’t have a clue what my Art was going to be for today, as I crawled into bed exhausted at 9.30pm last night and spent some time with Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet.
I thought about using a photo of the kids and photo-shopping it, but I haven’t taken anything special recently. I trawled through my KidsDoodle pictures but I’m a bit bored of that app. And then I spotted a new one in the children’s games folder on the iPad. Fingerpaint.
This app is even more beautiful, annoying and uncontrollable than KidsDoodle. On this one, not only does the colour change randomly mid-stroke, but – depending on the force of your finger stroke – tendrils of colour run off in different directions. I chose ‘pencil’ and so the tendrils were delicate coloured pencil lines that I ache to be able to create in real life.
Oh to be a child of today, with all these amazing ways to create vibrant pictures. Of course, not being a child, I found the lack of control hugely frustrating. It took around thirty attempts to get this dragon. Still, it’s the process, not the end-product, that’s important, right?
Doodle Dragon
I’m still sick. I don’t even know what’s wrong with me. Maybe I’m just plain exhausted, although if that’s true only a quarter of the way through the summer holidays we’re all in trouble.
I stayed in bed for a couple of hours but after the fifth, “both of you get in here right now!” in response to the escalating squabbles that seems to have marked week two of the holidays, I hauled myself into the shower and took us off to the supermarket to buy popcorn and DVDs.
The trip out finished me off, so I lay on the sofa while the kids watched Angry Birds Toons and Elmo goes to Grouchland (their choices, sigh.)
I didn’t even have the energy for reading or loombands, but every time I lay down both kids piled on me for a cuddle (which, if you don’t have 3 and 5 year-old children, is a bit like the judo I watched in the Commonwealth Games).
Doodle Firebird
So I decided to do my August Art on the iPad, using the children’s KidsDoodle app. Oh my, it’s amazing. My fingers are big and clumsy – I really needed a stylus which I don’t have – but I had so much fun. There are a whole range of brush types, but you can’t control the colour – a different colour comes every time you touch the screen. Very difficult to draw eyes!
I couldn’t choose which of my random creations I liked best so – as the children do – I saved them all.
Here’s to feeling better tomorrow!
This post is part of the Art in August challenge on the Laptop on the Ironing Board blog.
writermummy 