Kat Johnston

Tag: dragon

  • Painting: The first for 2010 – Toni’s Dragon!

    Kat Johnston Painting: This is the dragon painting I did for Toni for her birthday. It is pretty, and green, and has wings and stuff. Cute!

    Phew… my first little painting for 2010! A friend of mine has a 30th birthday coming up on Tuesday, however the party was held yesterday. Although I posted that I was going to draw the card (because she reads this blog – I couldn’t give the surprise away!) I also painted her gift.

    So… why a green dragon, on a green background, looking very green? Not really too much to say – she likes green, and she likes dragons. I’m really deep, aren’t I? I was going to add a splash of another colour, but then I liked it so much the way it was that I just decided not to. The completed work actually contains a grand total of 4 colours – I’ve decided that I love working with a limited palette when painting. While the colours used are limited, I still think it pops rather nicely. I realize that the composition isn’t exactly grand, but I like it that way!

    I would have liked to have taken some better shots of the final product – the problem with using a satin varnish is that it gives the painting a very nice sheen, but for taking photos, it isn’t the greatest. Well… at least not at night with just the room light to illuminate the room. The light in my studio (in photos, at least) makes everything appear very warm, which unfortunately just doesn’t show off green in the greatest light without a flash.

    But anyhow… happy birthday, Toni! I hope that you enjoy the dragon, and that you have a wonderful day when the day actually rolls around.

    On an unrelated note, I’m getting the distinct feeling I should really add a dragon category.

  • Sketch: Little mister dragon.

    Kat Johnston Drawing: A little dragon sketch – isn’t he cute? Ok… so he might be just a scribble-dragon… but I think he is cute!

    I was doing a little scribbling last night in a sketch book (oh my god! I’m sketching in an actual sketch book!), and this little fella popped out. I was sketching dragons… you know… just coz? Ok, I might have had an ulterior motive. I need to make a birthday card later today because I am too lazy to go out and buy one for someone. I mean, it is really kinda rude to show up to a birthday party without even a card, or so I am told! It won’t be overly fancy, but it should do the job.

    So, later on, I think I’ll get to sketching the actual card. I’m not quite sure what I’m going to do for it – it has to have at least a dragon. Possibly a dragon rolling a D20, swilling a good glass of red while being attacked by a ninja reading a fantasy novel. Well, perhaps not… but it would be a good way to combine a heap of things she loves into one awesome image!

    My apologies… my writing may not be fantastic today. I am writing this blog post while listening to the commentary for ‘Dr Horrible’s Sing-along Blog‘, which admittedly is really as good as the movie itself. So I’m a little distracted. But don’t worry – I’m sure that my posting will be up to its usual fantastic (ha!) standard again soon. When I am not listening to musicals and grooving along instead of paying attention as I should.

  • Sketch: Rawr the Dragon.

    Kat Johnston Sketch: Rawr the dragon is full of dragony, rawry goodness! Is rawry even a word? It should be!

    Going to Sydney is a great idea, when you have a party on down there to attend. What isn’t a great idea? Doing a drive down and back (about 12 hours each way) in the space of a weekend! It was well worth the trip, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think I’m going to be wanting to do that trek again so quickly any time soon. I was just the passenger, and I can admit quite freely that I am rather exhausted! I don’t know how the drivers are up and functioning properly today.

    There were some highlights of the drive though… a fox who decided to cross our path (though thankfully not to get run over), a stop in Scone to purchase (can you guess?) a scone… and to top it all off, at the close of what turned out to be around 13 or 14 hours of driving through excessive roadworks, small towns, and other delaying things, a traffic controller who waddled over to our car less than 30km from home to tell us that we had to stop for a while because they were sorting out some line-work on the highway. Believe it or not, that made us quite hysterical with laughter, so close as we were to our goal of bed and much needed sleep.

    Was it worth it to go and see all our Sydney-based friends for a night of fun and frivolity though? You better believe it.

    I very much wish there was a way to smush all of our Brisbane-based friends and Sydney-based friends into one, big, very-easy-to-access (geographically) group. Sadly, the distance is really rather a pain. Don’t you wish that teleporting and making portals to other major cities was as easy as casting a quick spell or pressing a little button? I know I do. The airline companies might not be especially happy about it, but I’m all for it. Viva-la-teleportation!

    Oh, and a note about the actual picture for today. It is made in honor of a friend of mine who is hitting the big three-oh on the weekend. She likes dragons!

  • Body Art: seems I’m drawing a lot of dragons lately…

    Kat Johnston body art: Yay! Another dragon… and this time he’s green. Phew!

    Another day, another dragon, on another person’s arm. It seems that dragons are well requested within my little circle of friends… that said, this dragon wasn’t actually ‘requested’ so much as ‘drawn because I knew that it would tickle this person’s fancy’. The background then came later, once I’d had a bit of a break. By the time it was done, at least she’d started actually sitting (or laying, rather) still.

    Sorry that there was no posting over the weekend – it’s been a bit busy, of late, so doing posts for here wasn’t exactly top top priority. No matter though – I’m back at it today. And that is what matters, when all is said and done!

    So, anyhow, not much actual news to add here. There’s nothing especially interesting or fascinating going on in the world of Kat, just the regular ole day to day stuff that requires doing. Speaking of which… time to get back to work. Talk later, everybody!

  • Body Art: A clockwork orange… dragon?

    Kat Johnston Body Art: A clockwork orange dragon… his name is Clarence!

    I have been having so much fun doing these ‘faux-tattoos’ recently. I’ve decided that coloured sharpie markers are the bomb. This one was done last night on a friend I had over for dinner. We had tasty, hearty stew with mashed potatoes. Isn’t that just the best type of meal for these cool winter nights?

    Anyhow, I asked her what she would like drawn on her, and her answer was a clockwork flower dragon. While I could have gone the way of creating one composed entirely of mechanical parts, I just didn’t feel quite like that… so we met half-way! Oh, and when deciding on a name, I picked Clarence. It’s such a gentlemanly name for a dragon such as this, don’t you think? Given a bit more time, I probably would have added just a tiny touch of colour around the outline to make it ‘pop’ from the skin a touch more, or a little more detail… but since it was already pushing 11, I just had to get done. I am very, very happy with the results.

    I think I’m really starting to get the hang of working with these markers on people – I’m getting decently gradated shading, and becoming more confident with my lines, though some people really should stop moving when I draw on them… yes, I’m looking at you, miss! And now I’ve started formulating another awesome idea, for my next venture into the joys of drawing on people with markers. It contains a lot of blue, something a little abstract, and no dragons this time methinks… any volunteers?

    Oh, and please forgive the somewhat shabby masking around her figure (I can do better, I’m just lazy today) – I just wanted to darken the background, since that particular picture was taken in front of the bed here in our computer room. As cute as the bed may be, it did kinda draw away from the focus!