For the first time in a little over a year, I hit up the Dr. Sketchy in Portland.  If you've never been to one before, it's basically a more informal life drawing session.  Informal in the sense that it's usually held in a bar (that's right, you can get your drink on), there are no teachers lurking, there's usually awesome music playing, and you get to draw (in my experience) crazy, tattooed guys and girls in various outfits.  Many cities have their own Dr. Sketchy's chapter, so if this at all sounds interesting, you may want to do a quick search for "Dr Sketchy" and the name of the nearest big town.

Like I said, it had been a while since I had gone to one, which is a shame.  I had a great time last night, and I'll have to make a return trip later this summer.  Without further ado, here's the cream of my crop from last night:




The first model had great poses - I wish I'd had much longer to draw her.  She was wearing this white, ruffly. lacey dress, which I could only hint at in the sketches (and drawing in china marker is fun, but it's kind of a blunt instrument - you have to suggest with very broad strokes).  I have another drawing that I did that I think was a good start - I may bust out some vellum and try to do a finished ink drawing from it.




I think overall, I got the best drawings of the second model.  It may just be that he sat for longer poses, so I had more time to work up the drawings, but I like both of these.  Plus, I got a prize for the first one, so I can officially say that a cowboy gave me his magic snake in a bar!  The second drawing here is of him gnawing on a bloody severed hand - I immediately wished I had a red marker to really hammer it home.




Here's the only two good drawings I got of a third model, and they were from early on in the evening.  One fun thing about Dr. Sketchy events is that the models are frequently heavily tattooed.  You wouldn't know it from my drawings, but this woman had a ton of awesome ink.  I find that unless the tattoos are isolated, I pretty much have to ignore them and focus on the figure when I'm drawing.  There's never enough time to do them justice (like her half-sleeves and full back piece), and if I just start blocking them in, they'll just look like random blobs.  And that's no good. 

Unfortunately, I'm a little out of practice at drawing from models, and my hand finally went stupid at about the 90 minute mark (after intermittent bouts of hand-stupidity along the way).  Anyhow, if you get the chance, a Dr. Sketchy session is an excellent way to spend an evening.

c.