Sketchbook - September Issue #2

"Calico Koi"  Prismacolor pencil and PITT graphite on Strathmore 400 series 80 lb. grayscale paper.

I often have people ask me, "How do you do that? Where do you get your ideas?" In response, I decided to show some of the initial process that goes into creating a finished work like the one above.

There's a local Chinese buffet that features a beautiful indoor koi pond in the lobby. The koi here are somewhat shy but if you're patient you can watch them slowly, gracefully circle the pond beneath an arched bridge. The lighting here is too poor for good quality photos, but I wanted an image of these majestic animals for my bathroom wall. The trouble was, I had never drawn a koi fish before. To the internet!

My intial designs were made on newsprint with PITT charcoal pencil. The first image here was nice, but a bit too stylized for what I wanted. To me, it looked more like a Chinese kite than a real fish. The pose seemed stiff, like the fish was angry, and lacked that feeling of graceful, flowing motion.

Attempt number two was a little closer in body shape to what I wanted, but it was still to overly stylized, and in this case, too busy. It looked more like a bad tattoo. The feeling of motion was there, but this poor fish seems to be suffering from some kind of seizure. It seems to be thrashing the water about - not typical koi behavior. The head feels flat, like a shovel.

Attempt number three, and now we're even closer to what I wanted. I've perfected a sensible method of putting scales on my fish. The head is still too stylized though, more like a catfish or a sturgeon than an overgrown goldfish. The pose still feels stiff, but the feeling of motion here is less agitated.

Ah, now that's what I wanted. The head doesn't look like a shovel, the fins are more feathery and flowing, the scales are even and run correctly, and there's the illusion of movement without it looking like my fish is trying to escape its pond. I've made my choice and this will be the final image.

I redrew the final image on grayscale paper and finished it with Prismacolor pencils.

#sketching #drawing #coloredpencil #koifish #japanese