Fountain Pen Doodles

As any of my regular readers know, I seem to have a bit of an obsession with doodling. Up until now, they have all been created using permanent markers or pigment pens.......but wait!...there is a new kid on the block  (well, new to my studio) it is a fountain pen called the Ahab Flex by Noodlers.

I had always thought of fountain pens as simply writing instruments, never really considered drawing with them.  At the Toronto Creative Festival this fall, a vendor in attendance,Quills, had some inventory out that could be test driven. As soon as I made that first stroke, I knew that pen was coming home with me.

I filled it with ink and began playing with little doodles.....these are the first ones and as you can clearly see in this photo, I really am able to get some very fine, intricate lines with this pen, to give you an idea of scale.....the pen measures 5.25 inches

I LOVE this pen, I can't stop playing with it.   Yesterday, a Spider fell out!

In case you are intrigued......here are links for couple of online resources for the Ahab Flex Fountain pen.....I am totally new to Fountain pen use so am learning about ink properties, cleaning and so on....You Tube has lots of videos on the topic too.

The Goulet Pen Co
Noodlers Ink
Amazon

Coming soon!!!!!

In my last post, I wrote about an opportunity that I had recently turned down because it just did not seem to be the right fit for me, today I want to SHOUT about an amazing opportunity that this time, was absolutely right!

Over the summer I was contacted by an acquisitions editor representing  Quarto Publishing, with the Walter Foster  group, I must admit that the email really caught me by surprise and I had to read it more than once.

As it turned out, while doing artist research, some of my doodles had caught this editor's attention and I was being contacted to see if I might have interest in collaborating with them on a book project.

Whoa!......you gotta know I sure was interested and couldn't wait to hear more!

She proceeded to fill me in on the concept of the book as well as what they had envisioned for my contribution.  It did not take long to determine that this project certainly did seem to be a perfect fit, and, as you might imagine, I was quite excited to accept the proposal and eagerly got to work creating projects for my section.......(although I really should not use the word “work” as I have been thoroughly enjoying the process)

The Art of Fashion Tangling: 40 prompts, patterns & projects for fashion-forward tangling artists &doodlers is to be 144 pages featuring several artists/authors, each one bringing to it, their own unique, fabulous style.........and I am completely thrilled to be counted among them.

You can read details about the book and its scheduled release date here

 

I snagged this image from the web site.....I LOVE the cover art they chose to go with!

Below you will find links to the web sites of each of the book's contributing artists, you may already be familiar with many of them, ..... just click their names to explore their work. 

Jill Buckley........... you are here :-)

Norma Burnell   

Heidi Cogdill

Penny Raile

Monica Moody

Jody Pham

I can hardly wait to see it all come together......so SO excited!!!!

Passing on an Opportunity

Many of my readers have suggested that I should create a "colouring" book with the doodles that I draw......well......back in April, I was contacted by a publishing company with an interest in doing just that............ I was SO incredibly excited! 

After several months of discussions, proposals, and sample drawings, I was indeed offered a contract.

Unfortunately, in the end, I really did not feel that the project was quite right for me and decided to turn it down......believe me when I say, it was a tough, VERY tough decision.

There were many deciding factors, but partly I suppose, it was that my drawings were not really looking like "my" drawings anymore. I can explain it better visually with the example drawings below

This 1st one is okay.....but not all that interesting

The 2nd one is likely how the drawing might look when prepared for use in a colouring book, definitely more detail.....a little more interesting....but... still not quite "me"

This last one definitely feels more my style, I like to add a little drama by playing with positive and negative, but all those filled in areas, all that black, would make it unsuitable for a colouring book.

In order for me to feel comfortable with this project, to move forward, to accept the contract, to dedicate the massive amount of  hours the work would require, I had to LOVE what I was doing and that just wasn't the case.

BUT.....other opportunities can come along....and recently, another one did.....one that absolutely DID feel right....I will tell you more about it in my next post.

Doodle Inspiration

This weekend, our area is enjoying some glorious autumn days.......the weather could not be more perfect. On Saturday, while doing yard work I came across this interesting bug.

Turns out, it is a Helmeted Squash Bug.....and look how wonderfully Mother Nature doodled him.
so I was, of course, inspired to do a little doodling myself.

In progress