When bored at work, I draw

[Goldfinger24K]

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These are a couple of drawings that I played around with the past couple of weekends. The rose I did for my wife. She says she likes it. I'm not totally happy with it but it was my first attempt at a rose so I guess it's ok. The fire is really hard to render with pencil though. I have to work on that some more.

The other one is just something that I doodled out. I really like the way it turned out. If I would have known I was going to like it so much I would have drawn it in my sketch book instead of on a regular piece of paper. This one I may have done as a tattoo someday.

These are mostly exercises for me to learn shading and stuff that I can try to apply to my airbrushing.
Any tips, advice or criticism is always encouraged. Like my lousy background in the rose picture. I know it looks terrible but I only have my pencils at work so I had to use something.

[bigwater]

Off the top of my head, I could only suggest rubbing the taper of the pencil rather than scribbling with the point for the background. Use the broad width of the side of the taper to smooth it in rather than scratch it in with the point. I can't really figure out another way to describe it other than to compare it to using a piece of charcoal. You don't want the background to dominate the drawing. Smooth and easy on the background, and the rose and flames will jump out

[Goldfinger24K]

This is a collage of the trading cards I've done so far in pencil. These are "Artist Trading Cards" by Strathmore that I picked up at Michaels craft store. They're 2.5" x 3.5". The first 3 I did a couple of years ago. The others I've done the last couple of weeks with the woodgrain one done today.

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[Norm]

Ssome decent work Gold... my fave is the wood and nails. Planning on doing any of these with the airbrush?

[Goldfinger24K]

Thanks Norm. I hope to try some sunset scenes with the airbrush. I have to wait for warmer weather first and I also have to build up my paint selection. I have some ideas for some beach scenes.