I’m not particularly…fashionable. I don’t have the latest coolest outfits, you can ask my friends if I’m an embarrassment to be seen with! I still own —and wear—a tshirt I’ve had since highschool! In the 1970s!! I have to admit I don’t even know what IS fashionable any more. I kinda live under a rock.

In 2013 I bought this cool fashion sketchpad that I saw online, and did I use it? Once, apparently, I don’t even remember drawing Batman, but I guess I did at least crack the book open. So when I found it recently I thought it might be fun to play with for a week. I’m not the best with proportions in the human body; I’m fine in my life drawing group when I’m looking at a real person, but so many other drawings come out with a little something odd. So this book full of templates – or croquis, as the book calls them – that really helps. I get to do just the fun part of adding the clothing!

Tutorial: Trying fashion illustration

I’ve come up with four outfits inspired by my sunflower bouquet in the studio….I wonder how many there might be? Sunflower shorts? Sunflower vests? Shoes? Hats? 🙂

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

My drawings

I chose to make sunflower outfits out of a made-up fabric that would look like my sunflower….a long dress and a skirt…..

…and then for something different, a swimsuit and a princess gown! Don’t forget to accessorize all the ladies….

Update to hex chart!

Before you get excited, it’s NOT that big a deal. I changed….fonts. For the title and paragraph. LOL. It bugged me that the outdated one is still there as well as the link was to my blog not the place where it’s now sold. I also did eliminate some of the extra “sliver” divisions from the previous chart; they’d made sense to me in 2014 but not so much now. But THERE ARE NO NEW COLORS. NO HEXES HAVE MOVED. You don’t need to update unless it’s time to recolor a new chart. And you could still color up the old chart, no biggie!

IF you bought the chart at art-classes.com then you’ve already got access to the new one: just go to your account and the downloads tab and grab the fresh one.

IF you bought the chart when it was here on my blog (until 2017) then I’ll need to move it for you. It would help if you have the receipt to email so I can track it down and check it off…but if not, just email and I’ll dig around for it. Or if you found it $5.99 worth of helpful you can buy another rather than waiting on me, but – remember you don’t need the new one. Really. LOL.

Other options without this sketchpad

You can draw your own ladies, of course. But if you want you can also stamp just the head and arms of a rubber stamp or digital image….Mo Manning has some extraordinarily beautiful ladies in her collection you could try! 

Need your ideas!

All week I’ll be playing in this sketchbook, or variations on it, I don’t even know yet. Probably different themes, not all sunflowers – got ideas?

Supplies

• The PANTONE Fashion Sketchpad
• Copic Markers
• Copic Hex Chart 
• White Uni-ball Gel Pen:  AMZ – BLICK 
• Dr. Ph. Martin’s Bleedproof White: BLICK  – AMZ
• Fluid Writer – Kemper Tools 
• Glass dip pen
• Winsor and Newton Gold Ink