B and B blog

How to know when the job is done March 30, 2020 12:00

One of the most difficult parts of being an artist/illustrator is to know when to stop. When is your job finished, when can you sit back and be satisfied that you have done enough. My answer to this is you don't, I always think I can do a bit more here and a bit more there. I treat my work as a story, there's a beginning, middle and end and that's when I must say goodbye.

I recently started sketching an new illustration, I have an urge to introduce more people into my work that look human and not animalistic. The pencil work was done (all my artwork is handrawn first) and then I went on to using fine tipped black pens. While doing the fineline pen work i did a small film of the process which I shared on social media.

Adding colour

When this was finished the artwork was scanned to Photoshop where I started to work on building up the color. This work is not finished yet but am enjoying adding the colour to this one but am stuck on the many coloured jewels on the girls dress!

 Rain drops coloured

What makes art good?

We had the honour recently of being asked for the second year running to judge the Mothers' Day portrait competition for the Mercury Mall in Romford. Many schools got involved and there were hundreds of entries. There were different age group categories.We had a ball spending half a day going through all the fabulous artworks. The winners and close runners came to a prize winners ceremony at the Mercury Mall, and all the childrens' work was also displayed in their art gallery. 

Overall winner of Mercury Mall Mother's Day competition

Mercury Mall Mother's Day competition prize giving

Display of competition entries and B&B artwork

Lis & Maj in front of children's artwork