It's Britney, bitch.

If you've been following me from the beginning you'll have known that I draw.

I'm a self-taught artist and I'm still learning. Heck - I don't know how to paint, so I stick to pencils, sometimes watercolour pencils (how do you use them? Not a clue, I make it up as I go along...) and sometimes chalk and charcoal.

I've also liked Britney since she released her first single "...Baby One More Time" and I've never actually drawn her, so I figured it was about time I did.

I used the colour and black and white image of this picture to copy:





These are my step by step pictures.









So the eyes were practically done, and I was pretty pleased with them.
Next was the lips, and as you can probably tell I had difficulty with the shape. Once I thought it was correct, I started to use my watercolour pencils (red and black) to try and give that "Dark Hollywood Glamour" feel to it, but it was disasterous. Trying to blend watercolour pencils before applying water is a very difficult thing to do...there were too many lines and just looked plain awful. I tried using the water on top to see if it would improve but it didn't improve at all, just looked messy.
I then used a normal colouring pencil that was of a berry colour to try and go over it a little bit (the black kinda took over a bit) and I thought my picture was completely tarnished.
I used Tippex to give the lips a shine to them, and used a red manga pen to go over it and give the lips some lines on the bottom lip.

And thank God as well, as I believe it saved my picture.
I also used watercolour pencils to colour in the eyes.





And the final piece...



It took me about 3 hours. I know it's not perfect, but hope you like it nonetheless.

Portraits for Pleasure - We Are Golden

I promised myself I would draw a picture inspired by the Mika song "We Are Golden" but struggled to conjure up any imagery. And I'm talking weeks here: figuring out how to interpret this song into a drawing took a mighty long time.

Just a few short days ago my house was filled with boredom, so I decided to stick on Mika's first concert DVD and also brought his second DVD into the living room so I could watch them both in order (Yeah, I really wasn't busy that day). I was flicking through the booklet that came with his second DVD and my eyes stopped at this picture.



I had always wanted to draw this picture but for some reason just never did. Now I had a reason to. "We Are Golden" is about giving yourself value and realising you have worth, and what I love about that picture is that Mika is wearing a golden mask, but on his head and not on his face. To me, it says that he doesn't really need to wear a mask to prove how golden he is, because that's what he really is.

So I started drawing! This is the first draft, and the mouth is completely dodgy lol.



I really like this next picture because of the intense shading. Of course there was still a lot more work to do, but it was also my first time using pencils of different thickness and it was turning out rather well.



It was at this stage where the picture began to look more like Mika! More detail plus the afro-fied hair which um...wasn't entirely meant to happen. Sorry Meeks.



I shouldn't brag, but I love the mouth detail. However, there's something about this picture that doesn't quite seem...Mika like. It just doesn't entirely look like him and I can't understand why. Sort of hated doing the shirt.



Starting to see a pattern yet? Greyscale face with a splash of colour. Looks more like Mika in this picture I think. I used charcoal for the hair. Still afro-fied though.



Okay, so the mask isn't great. What was difficult about the mask was that I had a gold colouring pencil, but it was light and wouldn't stand out well enough against the dark hair, and I had a gold permanent marker pen but was too bold, so I decided to mash them together to create light and shade. It could have gone a lot better if I had the right stuff. Oh well, it's done now. I also put gold glitter eyeliner over the top to add sparkle (No really, I did.)



By the time I got to this part I was really tired (it was late at night and I was doing this for 5-6 hours straight) and I couldn't bring myself to do the mask by his face. So, like a lazy person, I disguised it and wrote the word "Golden" inside it. So far this is the final piece. The shading doesn't look so intense next to all the colours and the charcoal, so I may have to work on that more when I have inspiration/when I can be bothered. But here it is so far and I'm quite proud of it.

Behold MIKA - The Golden Boy!

Portraits For Pleasure - Lady Jane

Okay so basically I'm a big fan of Mika and he released an EP earlier this year. It consisted of 4 songs and the EP was titled "Songs For Sorrow". Mika contacted several artists and asked them to draw interpretations of his lyrics, and on the MFC (Mika Fan Club) we are doing the same thing and giving it to him.

I have been drawing since I could probably hold a pencil, and it is because of MIKA that my artistic skills have progressed greatly. I still can't make a masterpiece, but they're not exactly shabby either, in my opinion. I put a lot of hardwork and dedication into my drawings and you always know you've done a good job on something if you can't stop staring at it, or listening to it, whatever it may be.

I wanted to showcase my drawings because I am really proud of them and hope you like them too!

His song "Lady Jane" provokes a lot of imagery, as it's a tale that could easily be a replica of those tales people used to talk to each other about years ago. That's how Disney got their stories you know, and it wasn't always pleasant!
It's basically a story about a woman who had everything apart from love, and when she finally met the man she wanted he followed her to the sea and, while Lady Jane was able to walk on water, the man drowned. In order to save her lover, Lady Jane cut off her feet and turned into a fish to search for him, but she never found him. Eventually she was caught and eaten, while her lover below was still looking for her.

I imagined Lady Jane to be quite young and have striking features. Like an English Rose, if you will. I visualised her looking over her shoulders with her eyes looking right at you, as if she's enticing you in, with her long wavy locks embracing her face. The more I thought about this picture the more I realised I actually had a picture like it. This is a picture of me in April 2009.



This picture became my blueprint, if you will. I started to copy the hair and the face shape in pencil on an A3 sheet of paper.




Some artists get the picture they want to copy, put a grid over the top, then draw a grid on paper and then draw the picture by using these guidelines.
I don't. My work is completely freehand. That's by choice and also because I don't draw on A4. I like to make my pictures big.

One of the many things that I cannot do is paint. It's pretty much impossible for me. Whenever I do a face I shade with pencils which I do rather like, as it gives a sort of elegance and classic feel to the drawing. However, I believe that colour can give a lot of body and life in a drawing so I tend to colour in the main features. These usually consist of just the eyes, but with Lady Jane I also coloured in the hair and her lips.




I coloured in the eyes to make them more striking and piercing. I coloured in the lips to make them more sensual and enticing, and I also coloured in her hair to give a bit more life and to make it her main feature, something that you would imagine Lady Jane would take pride in. I gave her purple hair because it gave an unrealistic/characterisation effect next to the humanistic face. I quite like how they combine. Plus whenever I hear the song, I always imagine the colours purple or a deep blue. I think purple hair suits her (Or me! O.O) quite nicely. Plus I think the colour goes well with her despair and hopelessness, it represents her emotions.


I used watercolour pencils to colour in and it was my very first time using them. There are various ways you can use them - for this I decided to colour in what needed colouring in, and then wetted a paint brush and brushed water over it (but only a little bit). It made the colours blend a bit more which looks a lot nicer than the rough lines normal colouring pencils can give.

After that, I added charcoal to the background to make her stand out more against the paper.




I then used white chalk to doodle mystical shapes in the background to give a more mysterious effect and blended it in with the charcoal so it didn't look too bold and draw the attention away from Lady Jane.

This is actually the finished picture.




Here it is also in black and white, and a close up.






It's one of my favourite pieces and I won't lie; I adore it. Sure it's not perfect, and people probably could have done better, but this drawing was a turning point for me. It was the first time I used something different and I'm less afraid of trying something new.

Thank you very much for reading and for the comments if anyone chooses to leave any. I will read them all and will try to respond if I can. If you are going to criticise, please do it constructively rather than in an attacking manner. Feel free to write your name in case I actually know you. :-)