Japanese Silhouette

I enjoyed watching the Japanese series "Subete Wasurete Shimau kara" on Hulu for multiple reasons (not least of which is star Hiroshi Abe, whom I've had a crush on for over a decade when I spied him modeling in the pages of Men's Non-No magazine) but also because it gives me a slice of life of Japan, which I'm somewhat obsessed with, even moreso after my trip there. So when I saw a scene with a delivery guy coming out of the subway, it struck me how even non fashion people have such a fashion silhouette in their clothing, because Japan.

Clint's Dress

Someone on Facebook posted in the Gay League comics thread I follow, about a 70s/80s Hawkeye costume redesign that they claimed was a skirt but in essence was really a dress. I would assume his on-again-off-again wife Janet Van Dyne (the Wasp) would have designed it for him, so I figured she might want to wear it too, lol.

Big Knit Collar

I've been seeing these updated zip or button neck collars for a few years now, and they're cozy as fuck. I just wanted to do an old 80s style pastel drawing of one, in a more playful style, using the Charcoal Pencil brush, which is a fave. I started out using the Vine Charcoal brush in Photoshop but that one doesn't allow for erasing when you hit the tilde key, so I'm less prone to use that for an entire drawing.

Subway Boys 3

A little more detail, a lot more color. He's just evolving into one of my model-y faces versus being teh kid in the train, but that's okay, that's how inspiration works, I'm gonna argue.

Graham

My online friend Graham had asked if he could pose for me, way back in  2020, I think? Anyhow, I got him to pose on videocam, and he got a bit raunchy, but I did manage to extract this pose from the session. And when I started sketching it earlier today, I totally expected to make a rough sketch, show it to him to show progress, and leave it for later to finish...except I ended up finishing it in 12minutes. I kinda liked how minimal it was because it felt like I got Graham's face in a few minutes, so I went with the minimalist look.

Subway Boys 2

I better draw the other guy at some point to justify the plural in my title! Anyhow, this is the more filled in digital watercolors, plus some adjustments to the scale of his head and features. He's feeling real, but looking more like an old model friend, Laurie, than the kid in the subway.

Seated Like Marianne 4

I decided to finalize it for Instagram. Here it is for better or worse. I cleaned up the anatomy, and made him actually smaller in frame, like if he were real he'd be no taller than 5'6" or 5'7". Even his penis is scaled back.

Seated Like Marianne 3

Getting more of the detail in. I think I'm just going to doodle and see how the sketch turns out. I seem to have in mind it should become a finished piece, but I really am not that enthused with it, maybe because the pose is an old one I already did before.

Subway Boys

Last Sunday I was coming home from visiting Rainer, and a whole passel of 20-somethings were all in the train car, dressed up for a night out or traveling with their family. One of them was from the latter group, and I took note of how the lighting delineated his nose. I spent a bit of time being kind of a creep, staring at his face and studying the lighting and shadow, and wondering if I could recreate his face from memory. This is the result.

Gone Circus-y

Keeping in mind the comment I got from a Japanese Illustration agency, I thought, maybe I should try more of my less realistic styles? So the strongman emerged because of the need for a rounded shoulder, and the carnie gal came as an adjunct.

De-pants Yourself

Yet another drawing showing a guy removing (or is that putting on?) his pants. I started out wanting to do just blocks of color, but as I doodled, I couldn't help but put in detail. Now it's transmogrified itself into another drawing detailing anatomy versus a minimalist piece.

Seated Like Marianne 2

I seem to be recycling my own ideas—I just remembered I photographed Ernesto in this pose in  2008-2009 when I took a lot of photos with him as muse. Anyhow, I pulled up the old pics to use as reference for the musculature, but found I didn't really want the pic's version. So this sis still more from imagination.

Seated Like Marianne

I started this out as a doodle but then developed the stance a bit, and realized it reminded me of a Calendar Girl pose by Rootstein (even if the arms are totally different). Maybe it's because of the forward-resting positioning? Anyhow, it might be worth pursuing this seated version more than yesterday's chiaroscuro.

Seated Chiaroscuro

So, in keeping with the minimalist idea, I wanted to construct a play of shadow with a watercolor feel. It's a good start but not sure if it will be worth pursuing.

Naked and Wet 2

This looks even more Mats. Ugh, I need to abandon this, it's not my technique. But still, a nice effort in knowing I can reproduce those effects.

Naked and Wet

I was channeling the wet-on-wet techniques of Mats Gustafson and Sara Singh, whose work I've been seeing a lot on my feed. But I wanted to see if I could get those effects digitally. Here's an initial stab.

Possibly Seth

I know this guy Seth, who used to run a nascent online menswear magazine, but it wasn't edgy enough for me so I didn't feel the time was right to do drawings for him (esp since it was gonna be for free). However, he's been working out since 2017 when I met him, and has started modeling more for artists and photographers. So when he sent me a dick pic (with the rest of him, of course), I wondered, hmm, maybe I can leverage this. This was a sketch idea.

Linocut Guy 4

I don't know if this is done, because I'm revisiting an older version and making improvements, while I still think the newer version can be improved and finalized. Ughh, divergent stylings.

Shinkansen Guy, done

It's funny how uncomfortable I am with the iPad when I can get such clean results like this without thinking on my desktop/Photoshop.

Linocut Guy 3

Hmm, better detail, but he's starting to look like 80s clip art.

Linocut Guy 2

I felt like I wanted more detail in yesterday's sketch, but I wonder if more detail is exactly what I shouldn't do? But I do want the sexiness of the body parts so I'm torn between art and illustration.

Linocut Guy

I was feeling very minimalist after coming back from Tokyo, because the illustration styles there favor the minimalist and reduced (not to mention cutesy—not exactly my market). So I thought to channel it into a male-oriented sketch and this was my first attempt, which I rather like.

Shinkansen Guy 2

Got to tweak him a bit more in Photoshop at home. But still not up todrawing snuff—jet lag!

Trip Back Home

I thought I should do multiple sketches to makeup for the lack of drawing time in Tokyo, so this was another, which I'm using for the next day, the 6th.

Sketch on the Plane

Technically this was done on the 4th, but when you're flying back into teh past as I was from Tokyo, it's the 5th, really, haha.

I was clearly inspired by the Egon Schile show I saw, trying to channel Schiele's contorted poses.

Shinkansen Guy

When I was taking the train to Tokyo the other day, I made note of a really stylish guy (I assume he came in from Tokyo) arriving in a beautifully layered all black outfit. I made note of the details to sketch later, and this is the initial sketch.

Osaka vs Tokyo 2

I needed to add the quilting details on the Osaka /Umeda gal's coat. It was ALL about the quilting this year!

Osaka vs Tokyo

I did do a better sketch of yesterday's subway sketch, and put the Osaka gal next to the Tokyo gal.

Drawing On The Tokyo Subway

I was trying to observe the Tokyo styles and how they differed from Osaka, and one gal and her friend who were waiting on the platform had an interesting look that felt similar but also divergent from Osaka. I wanted to make sure I got all the details so I pulled out my phone and started sketching roughly, and an older Japanese lady next to me was so enthralled, she let out a yelp of glee when I showed her (which was so cute—she squeezed my arm before leaving the train, which I thought wasn't very Japanese to touch a stranger). To be fair, it's a terrible finger-painting sketch, but I can use it as a basis for a better sketch later.