Recent Blog Posts

Tag Archives: Fun

The Boyler Kat

Summary: Character sketches for a short story that I’m writing and illustrating based on my experiences at Pratt University. While I was in NYC this past November with my Hartford MFA comrades, we got a unique tour of Pratt University. Betsy and Ted Lewin walked us around the campus and showed us the sights. One… Continue Reading

Victor Grey Development Sketches

Victor Grey Development Sketches

Even in the midst of wrapping up some client work, I am finding some time to continue to develop a story for my MFA thesis. This particular story actually has its roots in a project that I was developing back into thousand and 12! It’s amazing to me to think about the arc of the… Continue Reading

A Sly Suitor

Getting ready for Open-Studios here in Santa Cruz, I decided to try a new inking and watercolor combination.… Continue Reading

Victor Returns

Victor Grey returns to the drawing board looking a bit more chipper.… Continue Reading

The Magic of Creation

The Magic of Creation

Working in the studio today, devising some new techniques to add to my watercolors to give them more life… I think I’m onto something here!… Continue Reading

A Cool Sage About To Loose His Head

A Cool Sage About To Loose His Head

My imaginary friend, “So, Brian what’d you do today?” My imaginary answer, “Oh, nothin’ much, drew a sage about to get his head cut off.” These are the things that I am thinking about when I am thinking about these things.

Freaky Farm Fun

Freaky Farm Fun

This painting was started for an illustrator intensive. I can’t wait to get back to it. it is just starting to come together.

10+ Hours of Watercolor Painting in an 8 Minute Video

10+ Hours of Watercolor Painting in an 8 Minute Video

Summary: 10+ hours of painting in an 8 minute video? I share watercolor painting tips and concepts in a time lapse painting of three storybook characters. Check it out, and share it with your friends.… Continue Reading

Hacking The Color Script; A Visual Color Guide For Your Next Painting

Hacking The Color Script; A Visual Color Guide For Your Next Painting

Summary: This post is on the theme of color, and explores ideas about developing your own color story. I’ve put together a simple (and free) recipe to cook up your own home brewed color scripts.… Continue Reading

12 Incendiary Ideas from the SCBWI Spring Spirit Conference

Summary: A brief recap of the the 2012 SCBWI Spring Spirit Conference followed by 12 ideas that ignited my mind.… Continue Reading

The Un-taping of Bo Diddley

studiobowesart

✅ Will be painting this portrait of Jimmy Cliff

✅ Will be painting this portrait of Jimmy Cliff on Saturday at Haymans Hall from 8:30a - 12. Curious? Come on down and watch this come together!

❓Do you have any suggestions for music stars that I should consider for my next image? Leave a comment 🎉 👇

Instagram post 17965082207651919

Instagram post 17965082207651919

Really psyched to receive an original drawing from

Whoop! Art giveaway! congratulations @fuselier.doo

Whoop! Art giveaway! congratulations @fuselier.doodles !!

Day 7: Final Final Finals! How're your final imag

Day 7: Final Final Finals!
How're your final images coming along?

Me? I'm busy putting down watercolor washes and working the painting process. So far so good!

Tonight we'll have our 🌈celebration, and conversation about the whole #studiobowesart_character_challenge

Hope to see you here!

✅ Post Prompt: What was one of your favorite parts of the process?

Day 6: Guest Presenter Lisa Johnston Hancock! ✅

Day 6: Guest Presenter Lisa Johnston Hancock!
✅ Challenge: Continue to create your final character painting!
✅ Post Prompt: Post below, are you going to make it to tomorrow’s livestream? Sunday 5pm EST!
✅ Create an instagram post of your sketches, and post using the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge

🌈They say that sharing is caring, and I’d like to share with you one of my friends, illustrator and author @lisajohnstonhancock 👏👏👏

👋 Hi Illustrator Friends!

I’m Lisa Johnston Hancock, a children’s book illustrator, artist and art educator and I’m taking over Brian Bowes’ account for the day! Hehe.😈

When Brian asked me to come along on this “whirlwind challenge,” I was already taking part in my Art Making Club 30 animals drawing challenge over on my Patreon account. I chose a sloth as inspiration because I thought that it would make a silly imaginary friend and also be a fun way to check that animal off of my list. My Patreon account was created in June to share patron only posts, behind the scenes content, process videos and books that inspire me. I also share one art tutorial monthly and you get a welcome sticker pack for joining!

👉 If you are interested in checking it out, you can find me here:
👉 www.patreon.com/LisaJohnstonHancock 🔥
👉 https://linktr.ee/lisajohnstonhancock

My favorite part of this challenge was slowing down and enjoying the process. I had fun moving shapes around and figuring out how I wanted my friend to look. I work both digitally and traditionally. I’m currently on vacation and I have my trusty iPad as a tool, so I drew my character digitally in Procreate. I’ve included three of my current favorite brushes incase you are curious; Lane’s Master Charcoal Brush, Max Pack Gouache Glaze, Max U Colored Pencil Waxy.

I hope you had fun, I know I did and can’t wait for the next one!

🏆 Participate and get entered into the Drawing for the Drawing! 🏆
Follow these simple rules of engagement to be entered in the drawing! ✍🏾
✅ Follow @studiobowesart
✅ Respond to each Daily Post Prompt. New posts will be posted each day at 11am EST. 🤓
✅ Use the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge in your instagram posts. (So we can see your work!)

Day 5: Final Illustration 🌈 Let’s see what we

Day 5: Final Illustration
🌈 Let’s see what we’re talking about! It’s time to bring this whirlwind challenge in for a landing. We’ll be looking at results on Sunday during the Livestream! 🏆

✅ Challenge: Create your final character painting! Review your notes from the past week and choose from your best ideas to create a fun and energetic final illustration.
✅ Post Prompt: What would you like your Imaginary Friend to help you with right now?
✅ Create an Instagram post of your sketches, and post using the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge

Reminder 👉 Day 6 🔥 Instagram Takeover with Illustrator+Author, Lisa Hancock 🔥
✅ Follow @lisajohnstonhancock

⚡️ Exercise: Rock Steady ⚡️
For today’s post I'm reaching back into the Vault! Today’s images were taken from a blog post I wrote and you’re encouraged to check out the original post here>>

👉 http://brianbowesillustration.com/2013/01/03/think-globally-act-locally/

👉 Use a simple step by step illustration process: Thumbnails, Sketches, Values, Colors, and Final piece. Each step builds upon the positive qualities of the previous step.

💪 Pro Tip: Create multiple sketches to start with; explore your ideas. Often people will try to create a single image, especially when working digitally because you can cmd+z and select and move selections. The work is better served when you create, re-create, and refine your work. This is especially true if you're creating a character that will need to be seen from multiple points of view, such as in a children's book.

🏆 Participate and get entered into the Drawing for the Drawing! 🏆
Follow these simple rules of engagement to be entered in the drawing! ✍🏾
✅ Follow @studiobowesart
✅ Respond to each Daily Post Prompt. New posts will be posted each day at 11am EST. 🤓
✅ Use the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge in your instagram posts. (So we can see your work!)
✅ Help each other! After you’ve posted, please comment on the 3 Most Recent posts under the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge
🏁 Participants Instagram names will be collected at the end of the challenge and put into a random generator.

Day 4: Textures & Colors Today is a two-parter! We

Day 4: Textures & Colors
Today is a two-parter! We're going to be focusing on developing our painting skills today by intentionally practicing our use of color and textures.

✅ Challenge: Create a three different texture spheres with three different color harmonies.
✅ Post Prompt: Post below, what is one area of improvement that you’d like to focus on in your painting?
✅ Create an instagram post of your sketches, and post using the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge

⚡️Exercise: Texture and Color Spheres! ⚡️

Textures:
👉 Thinking back to day one, reflect on what your Imginary Friend feels like. Is it a warm cozy sweater? A fuzzy-wuzzy? Maybe they have fish scales. Maybe their from the land of Faerie and have more natural textures like leaves or flower petals. Maybe you're just fond of that shag-carpet in the other room. Be bold and explore fun textures for your fun character!

✅ Create a list of three textures that you'd like to explore for your Imaginary Friend.

Use color harmony to support your Imaginary Friend's color.
👉 Choose a single color that best represents your Imaginary Friend. Choose only one! We are going to call this our "hero" color.

👉 Hues in relationship with one another are called a Color Harmony. Common color harmonies have names like Analogous, Complimentary, or Triadic. A full exploration of this may be the topic for another challenge!

💪 Pro Tip: Color harmonies should almost always be in major/minor relationship. All the other colors that are used in any color harmony need to support your "hero" color. You'll want to save your "hero" color to use as the minor part of the relationship.

🏆 Participate and get entered into the Drawing for the Drawing! 🏆
Follow these simple rules of engagement to be entered in the drawing! ✍🏾
✅ Follow @studiobowesart
✅ Respond to each Daily Post Prompt. New posts will be posted each day at 11am EST. 🤓
✅ Use the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge in your instagram posts. (So we can see your work!)
✅ Help each other! After you’ve posted, please comment on the 3 Most Recent posts under the #StudioBowesArt_Character_Challenge
🏁 Participants Instagram names will be collected at the end of the c

Load More... Follow Brian on Instagram