Sketchy - Moda

I used to draw a lot. When I was a little kid, I thought I'd grow up to be a famous animator or some other type of artist (or a circus performer, or a mermaid - a girl's gotta have options). Eventually I hit eighth grade, started scribbling down story ideas for this now three-book-long fantasy thing called Sixth, and my drawings turned into character designs and illustrations.

This story effectively killed my career as an artist, and I'm not complaining. From the time I started doing character sketches, I couldn't get myself involved drawing any other subject. I tried, but there wasn't the same sense of satisfaction drawing trees or whales or setups in the art room. So in high school, I drew almost exclusively scenes and characters from this story. I learned to use colored pencils and oil paints not so I could be a better artist, but so I could more accurately portray my protagonist and his entourage.

Occasionally my art teacher made me paint wildlife. Those were not happy art days, and I still get angry whenever I see a pintail duck. But most of the time, I just churned out illustrations. In college, where I had to draw concrete things instead of images in my head, I started to lose my interest in art. Grad school has all but snuffed it out due to time constraints. Almost nothing ever gets finished. But I do sketch pretty often - almost always my characters.

I'm going to try to post some kind of sketch here once a week or so, just to keep myself drawing.

That said, here's an unfinished digital painting from late 2008:

Who d'you think you're smirking at, Moda Sams? Oh, shut up, hiking boots are a perfectly valid choice in winter footwear. At least my favorite jacket doesn't have rhinestones on it. Smirky bastard.