How to draw: A Grizzly Bear

We have a lot of fun in today's blog when I show you how to draw this furry grizzly bear. After following the steps to draw the bear, I will use a very special type of pencil, manufactured by Derwent, called the Drawing pencils, to colour the bear with. These pencils have been specially developed to draw animals with and are an absolute treat to work with. However, if you can't lay your hands on these, feel free to use your own colouring pencils instead.

You will need a sheet of paper and pencil to start today's drawing with.

Start with a big oval to represent the bear's body. Place an overlapping smaller circle on top fir the bear's head.

Draw shapes for where the hind legs will go and mark off the width of his face.

Add ears, a snout and eyes and continue developing the width of the head.

Add the front legs.

Develop the face a little more and work on the hind legs. I also added detail to the paws.

Start to establish the outline of the bear in furry scribbles.

Add more defining detail.

Draw a setting for the grizzly.

I used a Faber Castell Artist's Pitt Pen with a brush tip to redraw the lines of the drawing.

Erase the pencil marks.

These are the colouring pencils I will be using to colour the drawing with.

I start on the darkest areas.

I go slightly lighter.

I then use my medium tone.

I again go slightly lighter.

I use a surprising green in the shaded areas. I will use this same colour in the background, and need to add the reflection of this colour into my drawing.

I add the lightest tone.

I now start colouring the foreground.

Darkers shades are added.

I move on to the background.

Warm colours advance while cold colours retreat, adding dimension to the background.

I finalize the background.

Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.

How to draw: An Excavator

Today we continue the series on how to draw things with a drawing of an excavator. I am not a technical artist by any means, and I am sure there will be some of you out there who will be able to spot some obvious errors in my drawing. However, I hide myself behind artistic freedom, and show you how I went about it anyway. The really fun part of today's blog, is that I use acrylic ink to paint the drawing with, when we are done. Ink is one of my all time favourite mediums and I can barely wait to introduce you to it!

We will need paper, a pencil and a ruler for this drawing.

Start your drawing with a triangle, a rectangle, and a shape for the rollers/wheels that the excavator moves on.

Start developing the arm.

Continue the development of the arm and the cabin.

We are now starting to add a third dimension to the drawing.

A whole lot of detail is added in this step, from the top to the bottom.

Even more detail is added.

It is time to redraw the sketch in ink. I used a black marker for this purpose.

Erase all of the pencil lines.

I then used my black marker to draw a setting for the excavator. This was done freehand and very quickly. Do not overthink it - this is simply background.

I used Dala Acrylic Ink to paint the picture with. I also used smaller and larger flat brushes. Once the ink dries it is permanently set. However, as long as it is wet, it can easily be washed out with water.

I started with the lightest shades and coloured these a pale yellow.

This was followed by a more intense yellow.

I then added Sienna.

This was followed by black.

I painted the background in Sienna as well.

Then I added dark areas in Brown.

The final picture.

Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.

Decoupage A Carry Case

My mom's birthday is coming up and she has had her eye on a set of pencils for a while now, always putting off buying it, because something else enjoyed preference. I figured her birthday was the ideal time to surprise her with the longed-for pencils. However, I wanted to give her something nice to keep them in. I had this old wooden carry case lying around the house, which would be ideal for this purpose. The problem was that it had become very ugly through long years of use. A fresh coat of paint and some decoupage would do just the trick. I show you I went about it in today's blog.

This is what the carry case looked like before I started the revamp process.

The inside of the case did not look any better than the outside.

I started by removing all of the hinges, fasteners and handles from the carry case.

These were all neatly put aside in a plastic container with a lid to prevent any of the small parts from getting lost.

I then applied a coat of gesso to the box to prepare the surface.

I then measured the box in order to cut the papers to size.

I carefully recorded the measurements on a piece of paper.

I then cut the papers to the desired sizes.

I applied a coat of pink paint to the lid of the box. Normally I would use craft paint, or chalk paint, but as mine is still in storage, I used acrylic paint instead.

I also covered the inside of the lid in a layer of pink paint.

The outside of the bottom of the case was painted sea green.

The inside was painted the same colour.

Once the paint was dry, I covered the lid with a coat of Dala Acrylic Gel Medium.

I carefully laid the paper in place, making sure to keep any air bubbles from getting caught underneath. I then sealed the paper by painting another layer of Acrylic Gel Medium over the paper.

I did the same thing with the strip of paper on the side.

The bottom of the case received a similar treatment.

I then decoupaged the sides of the bottom half of the case.

Afterwards, I decoupaged the sides of the lid.

I carefully cut the paper away from the openings for the hinges, once the project was dry.

I then screwed the hinges back in place.

I used an awl to help me find the existing holes under the paper. Then I screwed the fasteners and handle back on.

The completed project!

Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.