Hello everyone – we’re almost half way into an entire year’s worth of themes – I’m pretty impressed with that and proud that we’ve stuck with the blog so far.
Week 25 was a suggestion from a mutual friend of ours – she suggested movie stars from the Black and White film days! Let’s take a look at what we did..
Materials: fineliner, brush pen.
One of my favourite classic films is Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, so I had to draw the glamorous Marilyn Monroe and the sophisticated Jane Russell. I then added more leading ladies, trying out different drawing techniques and methods for each one.
Marlene is in lines that are envious of her checkbones and Katharine Hepburn looks serious with her shading.
Lauren Bacall had the loveliest eyebrows and I drew her with her trademark intense gaze that she used to stay calm when in scenes with prominent actors. Sophia Loren is dipped in dark hues with India ink pens.
Bette was at angle which didn’t show off her Bette Davies eyes but instead allowed me to draw the lines of the face in this perspective.
Audrey Hepburn had soft shading to bring out her gentle features using brush pens.
Jane Russell had sharp features so I left her with gradiated markmaking while Monroe had the sultry gaze meant for fineliners!
Materials: Pencil, Copic markers
I’m not a huge fan of movies from earlier eras – not that I dislike them in anyway, but I haven’t found myself watching many of them nor seeking them out! That said, the few that I have seen have all been perfectly interesting and well, most of them from the early days of Horror! My all time favourite black and white movie is Romero’s original Night of the Living Dead – however I decided to draw someone completely unrelated to that.
Growing up, Vincent Price was a familiar name to us especially for his Hammer Horror appearances (my aunt is a HUGE Hammer fan!), but of course as a child my exposure to him was through his amazing voice over in Thriller, and as The Inventor in Edward Scissorhands. Even with his horror associations, he had such a warm aura and a gentleness about him which didn’t render him scary- unless he wanted to be!
I decided to draw a simple image, a pencil sketch to capture his likeness. Of course, I’ve kept it monochrome to respect his film roots and the picture I chose was one which reflected my childhood image of him – playfully terrifying.
That’s all for this week! The next theme will mark our half-way point into the project! Check back soon to see what we do.
With Two Sugars, Please 