Middle-earth Journeys

This is wonderful! I say something I'd like to see in one thread and then it appears done in another! I love Bilbo's face in this, and Balin in profile is quite distinguished.

Thanks!

Iolanthe, your are a master of Tolkien characters!! These new ones are perfect.

Iolanthe wrote:I love the way the end of the Viol is growing out of Bofur's head - that wouldn't happen in a properly planned painting!

No, but it would in real life, Iolanthe! you've brilliantly captured a "real" moment in Tolkien's subcreated world. I think it's one of the best things you've done - I just love the Took-ish-ness of Bilbo's expression! Are you going to submit this sketch to Amon Hen? I think you should - just as it stands! send it off to Andrew now, if you haven't done so already!!!

I'm glad you all like it . I was actually thinking of working it up as an ink drawing for Henry Gee and Mallorn (he likes black and white options as his colour pages are limited), then I could move the end of the viol . It is very real life (I have a photo of me from The Gondoliers with the end of a gondola growing out of my head) but I think it would distract people!

I'm getting more and more into trying to capture characters, it's interesting how they sort of grow once you start them.

Riv and Iolanthe, your drawings are just wonderful!

I'm still doing a lot of sketching - maybe because I can do it in the evening while watching the TV (one eye for each... ).

Here is Turin Turambar at the end when he knows the truth. Such a terrible moment in Tolkien's mythology. He may look a little older than his actual age - I figured that with the rough life he had, with that terrible Curse of Morgoth hanging over him, all that early beauty would have fallen into ruin. And he has, after all, just slain a mighty big dragon...

Wow, that is truly and amazing drawing. I have to say, you are fantastically talented when it comes to faces.

the haunted eyes are wonderful, Iolanthe!

I don't know how you do it Iolanthe, but the expressions are perfect. Another brilliant portrait!

(but I have the most brilliant of all )

I don't know how I do it either - you really are all too kind!

I do love drawing faces and it's just so much fun seeing where they go or, in this case, who they turn out to be. I think the fact I only half concentrate on drawing actually helps. Maybe it's a right brain kind of thing. Left brain - CSI Crime Scene Investigation, Right Brain - Turin .

I agree with the others, Iolanthe: amazing. I think that flaws in technique usually take the viewer out of the art, especially with faces, but there is nothing here that takes me away from discerning what this man feels.

There is something of Boromir in him, don't you think? A little movie Boromir, maybe, but more than that, the haunted face.

Funny you should say that, because he started out as Boromir, but then I realised I was drawing Turin. I've recently finished reading the Lost Tales version of his story and he actually took over. I reached a point early on where I knew I was looking into his eyes, not Boromir's.

It's very wierd how art takes over - it's the same with writing. If any of you have ever tried to write a story you quickly realise that the characters make themselves, not the other way round. It's the 'Tolkien discovering Faramir unexpectedly' scenario.

Spooky.

I haven't had much time for painting because I've been working like crazy on creating prints now I have my new printer up and running. But I'm still sketching like mad in the evenings and I also still seem to be stuck with poor old Turin Turambar. I had a yen to 'do' Glaurung and something a bit complicated. I think there might be a painting in here somewhere :

Whoo hoo! Iolanthe! That is a magnificently nasty-looking beastie you have created there! I agree, that is DEFINITELY a painting in the making! WOW!

Love the sketch. Tolkien's description of the event always takes my breath away. I can smell the sulphur.