Moving on to page 59 before page 58 is finished, and page 54, too

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The title says it all. I’m working ahead a bit, but I’ll backtrack to finish up the unfinished pages.

Sketching a magically shrinking cat

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As a newbie, everything I do I’m doing for the first time, which means I don’t know what I’m doing. The idea for this picture is that the tabby cat is shrinking from the size of a monster to a little kitten. I can imagine this as an animation, but I want to suggest a shrinking cat on a single page.

To improve this sketch, the first thing I think of is removing the outlines and painting blurry, suggestive forms rather than creatures with hard ink lines. I’ll think more about how to shrink a cat tomorrow.

Page 53 finalized -- 20 pages to go!

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Final version of page 53.

I’m done with this page…for now.

I woke up at 4 am this morning and couldn’t fall back asleep. It’s 7:30 pm and I’m falling asleep at the keyboard. ZZZzzzzzzzz!

Adding Another Paw to the Giant Tabby

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I painted the beginning of a very nice left front paw for my volcano demon tabby cat. At the moment the colors are out of whack and the paw is a little distracting, but I’ll fix that tomorrow.

It was a great day. The vertigo that bothered me most of yesterday has disappeared. When I get stressed out my body says, “You’re dizzy. Lie down and sleep.” I did, and it worked.

Page 49 with the Volcano Demon Flatted in Her Swansea City Kit

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I actually got some work done today. I managed to ink and flat the volcano demon. I’ve decided that she’s a Swansea City AFC fan. Her dream has always been to play in the Premier League.

Back to Work...In the Outside World

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August222023_sketching.png

In this picture I’m trying to draw a very large, very irritated cat yawning. I’ll try again tomorrow.

Today was a busy day. It started with a trip to the vet for Nacho’s surgery appointment. Yes, he getting neutered. He went through the surgery perfectly and made lots of friends. He was the friendliest pug anyone had ever seen. He was so popular he even got to hang out behind the reception desk and chill with the staff — a first for a pug. He is exceptionally goodnatured.

My contract work began today. After work I had about one hour to make the awesome sketch above. It is what it is — a start. Every drawing is a new challenge for me. I look at Betty and Tuco and I think, “They’re so boringly static. Make them react! Give them emotion! Make them dance!”

Page 49, Volcano Demon Turn Arounds

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I want to give the volcano demon a little more personality so that the reader will understand why she’s such a nasty person. She has her reasons, as we all do. In this picture she’s rubbing her eyes up after Betty has interrupted her nap.

Page 48 Flatted

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Today I re-drew some funkily-drawn hands and then re-inked the entire page. I did the inking in Clip Studio Paint using a simple opaque round brush, then did the painting in Photoshop. Photoshop is my go-to painting application - PS seems to take advantage of my Cintiq’s pressure sensitivity better than CSP. When I make that kind of statement I always keep in mind that I may be doing something wrong. In this case, I may not have my tablet sensitivity configured correctly for CSP.