ON THE DARK SIDE FOR TAKE A WORD

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WOW, I never expected that to appear!

How does inspiration come into your minds?  If I'm given a topic that interests me, inspiration often just shoots straight into my mind as an image, and excitement makes me want to get it down on paper right away.

When I saw the theme of "Dark" for Take a Word this week this image flashed into my mind straight away, and I had to get the initial sketch drawn before my brain started adding other ideas.

I saw the word Dark as part of the title for an imaginary book, a gory murder novel.  It's the type of book I haven't read for years so I don't know where it came from.  The page above shows what appeared when I picked up my 'rough' sketchbook to quickly scribble down the initial idea.  No neatness in that sketchbook.

The advantage of a quick sketch like this is that it gives a chance to see if something needs changing.  I realised I was wrong to have the girl's eyes closed because she just seems to be asleep.  I also decided that there would be too much bright red if I did red drips.

Fabriano Fat Pad, 300g HP

In a 'proper' A4 300g sketchbook I made a start on the final piece with Pitt Artist's pen for the head and black acrylic ink for the rest of the cover, slopped on with an old half-inch acrylic brush.

I had fun adding the black ink drips, which ran right down the page and onto the newspaper that I'd fortunately had the sense to place underneath.  Gorgeous black ink to play with.

When you're doing drips you have to accept that once dripped they are what they are, unless you want to start the whole thing again, but I was quite happy with the way these turned out.

I used red acrylic paint for the blood and the spatters, and added the text on Photoshop since I will never be able to write well enough for a book cover.

So this is how my final image was created.  When I asked Dev if he thought it was good enough to post for TAW's theme of Dark, he said:

'Well it's good, but I don't know if it represents the novel because I haven't read the book'.

Nor have I.  No-one's written it yet - so if anyone out there wants to write the story, I'll provide the cover picture for you.


Also linking with Paint Party Friday and Manon's Paper Saturdays.