Watercolours: St. Peter’s

The other day, I and the Significant Other watched the Pope’s special sermon/prayer/benediction regarding the Current Situation. The text is here (video here); as the program progressed, I was struck by the sight of the bright white marble against the deep blue evening sky, and tried to reproduce it.

The blue is not quite blue enough, and possibly I should have used coloured pencils. (I also simplified the perspective a bit.) The original:

I just downloaded Storyhack #5 to my kindle, as it’s free until the end of Sunday (not sure which time zone, presumably one of the American ones). It’s a small press scifi/fantasy/adventure magazine; I’ve read an issue before but forget which one (’twas a while back), but I wasn’t disappointed. I’ll probably take a look at the similarly-free Corona-chan: Spreading the Love at some point if I have time – I’m working from home and have enough to do to keep me occupied. (I have free time, I’m just not in that class of people who are housebound with way too much time on their hands.)

Dalek

Happy Mothers’ Day to British mothers! And to the rest of you… uh, happy 4th sunday of Lent, if you follow the Gregorian/Latin calender. It’s a day of rejoicing – Laetare Sunday – from the traditional opening chant:

“Rejoice, O Jerusalem: and come together all you that love her: rejoice with joy, you that have been in sorrow: that you may exult and be filled from the breasts of your consolation. Psalm: I rejoiced when they said to me: ‘we shall go into God’s House!'”

Wikipedia entry on Laetare Sunday

Alas, there’s a little irony here in that Corona-chan has visited town here, and going into God’s house is not possible for a while – at least, in any great numbers. But the verse is from the prophet Isaiah giving people hope in an even worse set of calamities, so it does fit in, in a way.

Apropos of absolutely none of that, here is a dalek.

(Photoref: hitting up google images for “dalek.”) I am slowly getting better at using watercolour pencils, but I suspect they’re best regarded as “watercolours on hard mode” and I should first try getting good with normal watercolours.

Anatomy: Facial Muscles

Some attempts at drawing facial muscles. Largely just copying this useful reference – with a brief excursion to wikipedia to double-check I was understanding things right on that one weird-looking muscle (the platysma). Further study required on…. everything, but particularly the neck muscles.

Old stuff: An Austrian Hotel

A picture I drew two years ago, promised to send to the hotel owners, and then… didn’t, due to phone woes and then getting distracted by other things.

This picture’s also up at the Blue Hat Art Blog, as the Artistic Relative tweaked it a bit and added text. (A text, I must note, which is not in any way inspired by the actual occupants of the hotel.)

Sketches around the house

A wine bottle, beer mug, pair of sandals:

Murtal

A light week, just some sketches from the hotel we’re in, up in the heights of Austria.

View from the window:

The bathroom, which is not too far away from the Platonic Form of Hotel Bathrooms: