Elephant seal drawing & photo: First Friday Art

I did this elephant seal drawing as part of the Inktober challenge. On October 9th, the prompt was “heavy.”

elephant seal drawing

I drew this quick sketch with a black Pentel Brush Sign Pen Artist pen and I used a gray Tombow ABT pen for the shading. I especially liked the Pentel pen since you can easily vary the width of each stroke with the brush tip. The Tombow pen has a soft brush on one end and a hard tip on the other end.

elephant seal drawing pens

Since I was going to be traveling during part of the Inktober challenge, I wanted a small pad I could tuck into my backpack. I found this cute little watercolor book. Yes, the paper has a rougher texture than I would prefer, but it worked out well.

drawing book

I taped a copy of the 2025 Inktober prompt list onto the inside cover.

Drawing book

This is the photograph I worked from for the elephant seal drawing. I thought of this pair of seals I saw at Elephant Seal Vista Point north of San Simeon, California. They appeared to be smiling. I’m not sure they really were, but they certainly looked comfortable.

content critters

Do you have artwork you would like to share? Be sure to include the First Friday Art tag.

First Friday Art

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Ponytail drawing & photo: First Friday Art

One of the prompts for the 2022 Inktober event was “ponytail.” My interpretation, shown below, was a quick pen-and-ink drawing of a pony’s tail. 😀

Ponytail drawing

I’m also including a photograph of a ponytail. Okay, it’s not really a pony, but people often mistook him for one.

This is Calypso Blue, a miniature horse I once owned. He measured 32 inches at his withers. Miniature horses are supposed to have proportions similar to full-sized horses, only smaller in size.

Mellow fellow miniature horse 9January2019

Do you have artwork you would like to share? Be sure to include the First Friday Art tag.

First Friday Art

Hibiscus photo & drawings: First Friday Art

For this First Friday Art post, I’m sharing a hibiscus photo and a few drawings. I took this picture of a Spin the Bottle Hibiscus, Hibiscus rosa-sinensis, at the Oregon Garden in Silverton, Oregon. I’m not sure who came up with the common name, but it’s a funny one!

Hibiscus

I’m sharing a quick pen-and-ink drawing I did of Hibiscus flowers. I’m participating in Inktober, a challenge where you make a drawing a day for a month based on prompts.

I tend to fuss over my artwork a lot, so for this challenge, I’m trying to draw fast. You create a different kind of artwork when working quickly. Is it perfect? No, but it’s a freeing experience. The goal is to capture the essence of your subject.

You can interpret the prompts any way you want to. Here was my interpretation of ‘bouquet’ from the October 5 prompt.

Hibiscus bouquet
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