H.P. Lovecraft | this northern boy

Creatures

Happy New Year everyone. I hope you all had a good festive break.

I’m starting 2018 with something a little different for me. Most of the time I draw inanimate objects, whether those are buildings or spaceships, and very rarely anything organic or living. So this year, in an effort to improve my drawing skills, I’m going to draw a series of creatures from fiction or myths.

I’ve started with a creature that I’ve started to draw a few times in the past, but which has always turned out terrible. This time, while doodling with no real end purpose in mind, it came out pretty well.

Cthulhu is a God from the books of H.P. Lovecraft. Described by Lovecraft as “A monster of vaguely anthropoid outline, but with an octopus-like head whose face was a mass of feelers, a scaly, rubbery-looking body, prodigious claws on hind and fore feet, and long, narrow wings behind.” I’ve skipped the body completely with my drawing, and just shown the head and wings, this is the approach I’ll take with all (most?) of the creatures I’m going to draw.

Cthulhu-Final

The second creature is the Faun from Guillermo Del Toro‘s film Pan’s Labyrinth. I love this creature design and it was a lot of fun to draw.

Faun-Final

The third is a Wendigo, a cannibalistic monster from the folklore of the Algonquian speaking peoples of North America.

Wendigo-Final

All of these were drawn on A5 Daler Rowney Smooth – Heavyweight cartridge paper, using Copic SP Multiliners and a Rotring Tikky.

Any suggestions for what creatures should be next?

You can also find prints of my work here

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Beneath the Sea

I recently completed a commission for Max in Canada. He’d seen an illustration I did a while ago – The Island – and asked me for a new version.

The picture below show some of the process, from initial inky thumbnail sketch, to the final coloured illustration.

If you’d like to commission an illustration from me, message me here or on social media.

Initial inky shapes.

Tentacle details

Onto the illustration proper – outlines.

Adding flat blacks and thicker lines to create depth.

Detail goes in with a very fine pen initially.

I always get carried away at this point.

Inks complete.

Final image, ready to send to Canada.

This, and most of my illustrations are drawn on heavy, but smooth cartridge paper. I use Copic Multiliners, a Pentel Pocket Brush and Copic Ciao Markers.