I zoomed in on smaller sections of my ‘world’ in these thumbnails, and I tried to make a different animal the focal point in each one. I exaggerated or changed some of the colours from my original world because I wanted to further experiment with the surrealist theme.

I allocated myself 5-10 minutes for each thumbnail, as I wanted to practice drawing free-hand, and for my brush/pen strokes to be quite gestural. I experimented with a range of media including: biro pens, pencils, chalk, charcoal, posca pens, oil pastel, watercolour, and colour pencil. Oil pastels are one of my favourite media to use when creating quick sketches like these because they don’t allow me to be precise, and the surface texture they create adds a layer of depth that smooth textures can’t capture.

I chose the dragonfly to be central in my composition as it clearly incorporates the fauna and surrealist themes, and I think that it has the most interesting textures and patterns. I added much darker tones to the animals than the background as I wanted them to stand out and be the focal points of the piece.

I really enjoyed working with ink because I can easily create lighter tones as well as build up more intense shadows. I experimented with applying the ink with different tools, including brushes, pens, and nibs; I did this in order to give the line some different textures. I was hesitant to add too much detail and darker tones as I think that ink pieces can become over-worked quite quickly. But to improve I would’ve added more texture and detail to the waves, so as to differentiate between them and the mountains in the background, as I think that the background appears quite flat and two dimensional.