A Batch of Bartimaeus

[tealin]

So last night was Life Drawing, which more often than not ends up being an excuse to draw my own stuff. As I had just finished Ptolemy's Gate the day before*, it was (understandably) the subject of my distraction. I scanned these at work so they're kind of streaky, sorry.

Kitty, Angry - Ooh, she's angry a lot. You can see a rejected drawing underneath her arm.
Kitty, Afraid - She's afraid a little less frequently than angry but it does happen. Her outfit is kind of based on the cursory description of a black tunic and trousers during the summoning scene. Not very imaginative, I'm afraid, but it's good for action stuff. This was drawn over the gutter of the newsprint pad, hence the line and shadow. Hands = uck.
Nathaniel - All (well, mostly**) grown up. Managed to make him look slighty less like Mr Stroud than how I see him in my head ... not easy.
Nathaniel Ushers Kitty to the Car - and eventually the theatre. I like Kitty here; Nathaniel's pretty bad but there's no way to edit him out and still have the vaguest clue what's going on.
Ptolemy - I like everything but the face.
Kittyblob - Uhhh ... I can't really say too much about this without giving away an important part of the book. To be safe: this is Kitty's self-image constructed with awkward coordination. Yeah. That seems vague enough...
Pyramid of Slime - Bartimaeus doesn't have enough energy to maintain a physical form beyond that of a bit of slime, but he still has the dignity to at least pull himself into a pyramid ... of slime. (The big cartoon eyes could not be resis- avoided.)
Quentin Makepeace - Mad, mad mad. This one's just a thumbnail (larger than life size!) but I seem to work best at that scale (or else at life drawing scale...) I don't know where I got the idea of his hair being like that; I think there might be a character in Christmas Orange that's rotund with red hair that waves out sideways. He also looks a but like Tweedledee/Dum though without the 19th-century-caricature-of-an-Irishman face.

*In just over twenty-four hours ... it's one of those books. I took a nap afterwards. It's also one of those books.
**Yes, yes, I know, there are some technicalities here. Hush now.

Comments

[green--desire.livejournal.com]

omg your nathaniel really does look like a younger stroud. thats kind of cool though now that i think about it...damn it don't taint my own image! haha im easily influenced. I love the slime pyramid I totally pictured it with big weird eyes only one of them was on top and the other was like sliding off the end of one side in cartoon form. I pictured the whole thing as a disney movie actually, all the characters where animated drawings in my mind. weird.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Your slime pyramid is funnier than mine... I think I like yours better.

Yeah, while reading it I was convinced the only way it could ever be moviefied (that's a technical term) was in animation – even if the humans were live-action, there would have to be so much CG that they might as well make it animated right off. And it'd be more economical to do 2D because you'd have to employ a horde of modellers for a year just to come up with all the models and rigs for the crazy demon shapes and all their various forms, then there's the problem of morphing, and that's not even considering the effects or the insane amount of rendering time. Whereas in 2D ... you draw it, it's done. Everyone uses the computers in their heads. Fabulous.

[green--desire.livejournal.com]

Seriously! There would be so much cg characters and speical effects it would be just so cheesy, and rediculously over budgeted to fund those effects then theyd also have to deal with stupid crap with the actors aging blah blah, it would actually probably get way more attention if it was a 2d animation, plus a million times cheaper to make. Like whatever non-anime movie decides to give 2d a comeback will get lots of attention just for being in classic disney style 2D. Also the movie could cut out some of the boring parts where I zoned out and skimmed. haha.