Katla

I've wanted to make a portrait of my dog for a while now. (But I've been avoiding it because of how tricky her markings and colours are to portray). You can see a photo comparison of her below.

In the photo she was about 1 year old, this year she'll turn 9 so I decided to draw a more grown up version of her, where I really tried to capture her personality (loyal, playful, intelligent), and play around with the light to make it even more of a challenge (than her fur and markings already were).

Easter

So easter was a few days ago. I don't really celebrate it but we had an easter dinner and I spent the day drawing. Here's A small speedpaint of some chocolate bunnies rushing to deliver an easter egg. 

Warhammer raven

Any Warhammer 40k fans here? 
Here's my own take on the "imperial eagle", or, in this case raven.

The upper one is made as a realistic version, and the lower one made to resemble rusty metal. 

This was a requested  piece for a tattoo! :)

Fenrisulven

Quick practice in drawing landscapes & different environments. 
This one inspired by the beautiful nature of Iceland, featuring Fenrisulven / Fenrir from norse mythology.

Spring

 "And when the spring came, winter died."

Mostly a practice in drawing realistic fur and using light from behind the motive, 

but also in symbolic storytelling (in which I used the passing of a season as a metaphor for how new life can grow from the death of another). I couldn't decide which version I preferred so this one got two final versions, as seen above and below. 

Here's also a rather rough step-by-step tutorial thing on how I created my latest work "Spring". 

I originally planned to make this a "tutorial video", but Photoshop really didn't like my recording program and decided to freeze and crash over and over, so I eventually had to give it up halfway through the painting.. But here's some sort of tutorial thing for you anyways, and I'll give video tutorials another try some other day! (ALSO, If you haven't seen any of my "basic sketches" before -from when I've previously made tutorials etc- then yes, they are hilarious)

Grandfathers of horror

A quick material and lightning practice, inspired by two fameous horror writers. 

The H.P Lovecraft bottle, including a tentacle to symbolise his stories of odd sealiving creatures. Underneath is a paper sheet with R'lyehian symbols, mentioned in many if his stories.
The bottle shape is inspired by a lantern and fish gills, and ment to match the setting of harbor docks.

The Edgar Allan Poe bottle, including a heart to symbolise his stories of love and hate. Underneath is a raven feather from his poem "the raven".
The bottle shape is inspired by the thorns on roses, and ment to match the setting of a castle.

Midnight hunt

A bit late, but here it is, my first finished painting of 2016!

Some late night sketching turned into a whole painting. I wanted to work with contrast and light to create a dramatical setting, as well as practice more in storytelling and portraying movement. 

This painting became very important to me so I spent much time on it, this because I made it to help myself cope with grief. Ravens and snow owls are my favourite birds.. only, this snow owl became an albino rather than a regular one. This, as a small tribute to a loved (albino) pet of mine that died this week. I'm still very sad about it so I couldn't handle drawing a portrait of her.. but this way I still included her in my art.

You can also see some closeups of it HERE.
Below you can see a step-ny-step tutorial thing on how I painted this artwork.

I wouldn't claim my basic sketches are very pleasant to the eye, but after some hours of work even the messiest ones can turn out nicely. It's been long since I spent this long on a painting and I usually stop somewhere at step 4-5, but I hope this can inspire some of you to put effort into your art even when it feels like it takes forever or won't be good. I promise you, in the end it will be, and the time spent on it will be all worth it.

My art-Instagram!

I've now created another Instagram account, this one for my works, especially my digital paintings and illustrations.
Check it out HERE!

Julbocken

Merry Christmas, or Happy Yule!
Have you also been visited by Julbocken, or the "yule goat" today? He at least appeared in my sketchbook while I was waiting to open christmas presents~

Art of 2015!

As the year is coming to it's end, here's my summary of art for 2015! Smiley grin

I used to do a lot of these to see my progress, so if you REALLY want to see how my art has improved and turned into what it is today, you can take a look at THIS awkward thing.
You can also find the blank template HERE.

Mist

Here are some of the photos from a photoshoot I did with my boyfriend Wulfar Smide and my dog Katla in November. The weather here is awful and it doesn't feel much like winter at all, but luckily there are many foggy days and I really like playing around with mist, smoge, fog etc when photographing! I'm thinking of making an entire series of them some time..

Which one is your favourite?

Moon and Sun

"Sun and Moon, brothers of the world.
With horns proud as Kings, they gave all creatures of this world a chance to rise."

I often re-draw or finish up older works, as a way to see how much I've improved my drawing skills. My painting "Moon and Sun" originally showed two plain green unicorns on a green background. Today with more shadows, better colouring, a lot more details and markings it looks like this;

Sketchy Flowers

Sometimes a simple sketch that you didn't plan to use for anything, turns out a whole lot better than expected when printed on things. This goes for my "Sketchy flowers" prints, which I made in ink in my travel sketchbook when on a train this summer. I made my sketch into two patterns, the single flowers as in the pictures above, and the bouquet in the pictures below. Originally I din't even plan to keep the flowery pictures.
Today it's one of my most popular prints!

Bunny studies

I drew theese two a while ago, as a practice in drawing realistic fur digitally. Whenever I'm drawing hair of any sort, things tend to get out of hand and I end up drawing curly swirls everywhere.. but not this time! I imagined them sitting on glass, hence the reflections. I also really tried to give them realistic light and put much effort to their eyes.

They're loosely inspired by two of my own bunnies, Spookie and Tengil.

Dawn of the Deer

Today started with me and my boyfriend taking a short ride in the forest with the horses. Since we came home I've been trying to find matching frames for my drawing "Dawn of the Deer", which I'll be selling prints of. It's actually one of my favourites among my own works.

This piece was originally named "Hunters doubt and debt". It's ment to be a portrait of a hunters perspective, in the final moment where he/she decides whether end the deers life, or not. Unlike many of my latest works, this one is sketched and painted entirely digitally, in Photoshop with a pen tablet.

Horse photography

I took the camera with me to the stable this week, and tried to shoot some cozy autumn pictures. All three horses were great models (even though they were very curious of my camera so most pictures turned out as, well, a little too close-up photos of their mules).

Eldgrimur (the grey) is 7 years old. Eldur (the palomino coloured) is 16 years old, and Smári (the chestnut) is 33 years old. I think Eldgrimur was the hardest one to photograph, as his colours doesn't blend as well with the orange autumn leaves in the background as the others.. but I think I managed to capture the autumn mood in most of them. Here are only some of the MANY photos, and you'll eventually get to see more later! :) 

The Hill

Yesterday I started taking a backup of all my pictures, turns out I had, well, let's just say a lot so it took over 24 hours and when almost done, it crashed my computor. So I'll just have to try again. Yay. On the bright side, since I couldn't work on my computor I instead took the time to plan my upcoming projects. For instance I've been looking up galleries in which I could hold an exhibition/vernissage, and I booked a selling table at a local Christmas fair! 

Since I can't acces my newer works right now, here's an older photograph, taken in a beautiful place I still long back to often.

THE HILL
-Spontanious photo taken in southern Norway. 

Masked creatures

Environments have always been something I've found quite difficult to draw. I think it's hard to capture the depth of nature, the light setting and slight movements in all of it. This makes it an interesting challenge to me. 

In my piece "Masked creatures" I tried to picture a calm glade at the foot of a mountain, in which the curious creatures live.

Picture above: Process, building the layers of rocks and moss
Picture below: The finished drawing.

The creatures themselves are something I used to imagine a lot of as a kid. They're small mammals that move similarly to how mice do, and lives in holes in trees and under rocks and roots. I never gave them a name, but whenever I saw small holes in the ground I used to think "Oh there lives one of those creatures".

Inktober

So October is almost over, and for many that also means Inktober is almost over as well. Artists all over the world participate in the Inktober challenge, in which you're supposed to draw at least one ink sketch/drawing per day of October.

My drawing for today turned out to be a little dragon. 

I'll admit that I'm not really one of the participants -at least not this year- as I haven't been drawing exactly every day of this month. I actually tend to forget such challenges halfway through them, AND I've been busy with other projects I'll show you soon!

Autumn

Fall has never been a favourite season of mine, but I think it's starting to become one as it's almost impossible not to love how colourful and cozy everything becomes in it. A few days ago I tried to portray the feeling in photographs -as seen below-, but it's not quite the same thing. Today I just feel like laying on the sofa under a fluffy blanket with a cup of hot chocolate, and just, enjoy it all..

However, I'm currently busy packing the last things for my event job at Kolmården wildlife park this week. I'll no doubt bring pen and paper for the trip, as all the animals and this beautiful weather most likely will inspire me to create stuff!

Which season do you find most inspiring?