Okay, so the source for this one is a picture where Emmy was just lying down with her face smushed down. I drew it all in one go, but I took pictures along the way so there’s progress! Biggest lesson here, the nose _really_ is the focal point. That was the biggest deal in positioning her eyes, and those three points where what I referenced for how to place every other feature on her face.
Initial box in, some fuzzing of edges & nose.This is at the state of OMG EVERYTHING I DO MAKES IT WORSE. Blank paper is torturous.Okay, nose is getting decent, but at this point I’m _sure_ I’ve messed up the eyes.Still unhappy with eyes, but now I’m also unhappy with that right ear…Okay, eyes are getting better. Her left eye is starting to get the half open look, and I’m happier with how the fur is overlapping her right eye.Move away form the eyes for a little bit, try to outline how the fur contours around eyes leading to ears.Big jump in details – I know the middle needs to be darker, but the eyes are the darkest part, so darken those while making the mid-face fur darker than everything else. Fill in some more ear fur since that’s dark too.Okay, at this point I’m pretty happy with the eyes, and the nose. Not quite as happy with the ears. They feel too disconnected from the rest but I don’t know how to fix that.Clean up around the edges and get a little more layering in her fur to make certain patches stand out a bit more. She looks a little like a teddy bear but that’s good! She did in real life too!
Final version. A little more depth, some layering. And more nose. NOSE!Day 2.2 – Fill in, depth, more lines for fur directionDay 2.1 – Okay I’m a lot happier with this already than I thought I’d be.Day 1. At this point I’m convinced it’ll never look good. But I have to try.
So, this kind of went SuddenlyTheOwl, but I got a good half hour of drawing in this morning, then another 10 minutes or so. Once most of her head was furred, it’s been shading an getting more detail down.
First half hour of drawing todayAfter another 10ish minutes.
Emmy passed away at the beginning of August and getting used to life without her is a process. To help, I’ve started working on drawing her. Here’s day 1.