Skulls, skulls, more skulls......oh and bats !

As Whitby fills up with goths for our biannual weekend of velvet clad silliness, it seems like a good time to sit down and share what's being going on around here. Because I also have a blog over on my own website Drawing In Dark I don't always post here too so we have some catching up to do. Sitting comfy ? Good, then I shall begin :)

Skull t-shirt by Drawing In Dark

Most recently (read - just landed lol) is my new merchandise range based on two of my latest drawings, the human skull and my little hanging bat.

Skull tote by Drawing In Dark

This is the first time I've tried having any of my work screen printed and was frankly delighted with the results - I hadn't expected such a close representation, even down to tiny details.

Skull mirror by Drawing In Dark

I have also added to my range of accessories for the discerning goth by expanding my collections of mirrors and bookmarks. All of the products here are of course available in both skull and bat designs.

Bat bookmark by Drawing In Dark

I'm hoping to be adding cards and notebooks very soon. Asides from being very gorgeous, the merch serves another purpose - most of my time this year is being spent creating full page illustrations for a new horror anthology with author Sean Walter. The new lines keep my shops full while I'm bound to the drawing desk and are also letting me test out new product ideas for when we take the book on tour.

What a tour it will be - we didn't want the usual art show 'glass of fizzy and a nibbly thing' boring goings on so we're creating a fully immersive experience complete with animation, readings, 3d creations and an opening night party that's actually a party :) That's more than enough for a post all on its own so I'll get further into that in my next one. In the meantime, all of the above goodies are available via my website or my Drawing In Dark Etsy shop.

Black box

 I've discovered a new toy :) Or rather, a new technique. If you read my last post you'll remember that I photographed something in a black mirror before drawing it. The results were fantastic so I've pretty much spent all my free time since stuffing things into the felt lined box I created to go with it and snapping away.

 There is a bit of an art to it - to photograph a reflection, you have to adjust your focus to cover the distance from your lens to the mirror - and back again. Then of course there's the issue of lighting the object without shining light on the mirror or towards the camera.

 The results are worth it though - I started with a deer skull and took two photographs of its reflection using different lighting. That completely transformed it as you can see from the resulting drawings here - they don't look like the same object in both at all.

I then drew the images out on Fabriano Artistico paper using charcoal pencil for the details and pure carbon stick to get that gorgeous velvety black background. You can buy the drawings framed and ready to go over in my Etsy shop.