Carla Benvenuto

Yes, as a self-conscious person I order a McMuffin when I go to the old golden arches and immediately look down at my belly in shame. Nevertheless, I am undeterred. I make it a point to order combo #3, but ever since I watched one of those damn health documentaries on Netflix I haven’t been able to order it. Not because I’m now on a health bender or because I care about being there for my children when they get older. None of that. What did it was those damn pigs with their damn sad faces and the damn poo poo being sprinkled out into an open field. Grossness to the left of me and grossness to the right. Does that mean that I am cutting off bacon? I wish I could say that I had the fortitude of spirit to do so but I ain’t there yet.

What it means is that I’ve moved on (nay, evolved!) to…combo #1. The picture you see above is the cleaned up, cartoon version of a McMuffin. The real version is, like life, messy and often not what you asked for. Even with all of my best intentions I still end up getting ham wedged in there half the time. You have ask the customer service representative, with strength of conviction: “No ham, please” and make sure there is plenty of eye contact. It’s the only way.

The version above was scanned on my trusty Plustek 1180, drawn on common bond paper with an HB pencil. The cheese was filled in with Crayola golden rod crayon (that’s the name of the colour…fitting, right?) and the heavy black lines were courtesy of my favourite pen ever: Uni-ball “eye” (brought to you by Mitsubishi Pencil Co. Ltd. [really? Mitsubishi? the people that make the cars? Boy, that’s range…see what I did there?]). The brownish parts where the bread gets toasty was done with a generic brown pencil crayon. I was going to MacGyver it and use liquid paper to put in light highlights on the cheese, but the liquid paper dried out. THISCLOSE to being a masterpiece. C’est la vie.

I will leave you with one more insight.

This picture was taken with my cellphone in front of a window. I don’t like altering pictures for the web. I’m willing to crop because I do other things around the edges, but that’s where I draw the line (the crop line). If I’m being totally honest, I would say I like how the cellphone photo turned out but I don’t like the darkness. For my next drawing I’ll use better paper.

Until then, happy penciling!

No one is more surprised by the length of time it took me to get back to this blog, the fact that I got back at all and that the quality of this image is so shit, than me!

It’s an almost brand new scanner, unused for the last [so long ago I’m actually doing the math here], I’m gonna say [I can’t do math] 2 years. 3 years?

It’s been years. Things that have happened since then, let’s do a quick run down, shall we?: Biden became President, Trudeau is STILL our PM (I like him, not gonna lie, but even I’m surprised by that), US pulled out of Afghanistan, I learned to spell Afghanistan, a global pandemic, Ukraine, Gaza, a housing crisis, an immigration inflation, heat waves and Trump was nearly killed.

If Trump can make a come back from that then I think I can put my phone down and doodle. And so, I have made a solid commitment [that’s a lie! I call “Liar!” Carla, don’t lie to the Peoples of the Internet!] to take 30 minutes every 2 weeks [better] and get some lead on paper.

To say that I’m disappointed by the drawing is an understatement. Not the boy! He’s beautiful…and he’s definitely my baby [Freud would have so much to say about that] but the quality of paper. I must remember not to use bond paper for these drawings. Bond paper is for printers. They always end up kind of bluey, and I refuse to do touch ups. Touch ups are for the weak.

If we gonna do this, we gonna go raw!!!

‘Til next time…

This little dude had the brilliant idea to go tree hopping during a windstorm, and the way that it flung itself between branches was heroic. Good for you, little squirrel!

I find the page scan comes out a little blue…or is it that the screen is absurdly white? Either way, not entirely thrilled with the tone.

Shinhan Touch Liner 0.5 and 0.8, Pentel ink brush and Staedtler pencil crayon.

Hmmmm, I initially thought of this scene as a woman at the cash register, but then I thought why put a woman there? Surely someone else might do the trick. So, here you have it: distracted teenager asking distracted question.

This took a few drafts and I opted for no shadow just to see what that would look like.

Shinhan 0.05 and 0.2 Touch Liner on A4 bond paper, traced using a FOME flat “light box”.

So it took a really really long time to come back to this, eh?

My original plan was to return to the blog at the end of February, but obviously that took a turn. While I work out the finer details of my Dr. Sun/Snail extravaganza, I’m dipping my toe back in with single-panel cartoons. I’m using The New Yorker as an influence (but still like comic books best!).

This panel was done with a pencil on bond paper. Then traced with a 0.05 black liner on an A4 light box and scanned with my ol’ Canon LiDE scanner (it’s model not immediately available to me, but looking to upgrade at the end of the year).

I can’t say my week has been very productive (or maybe it’s been more productive than I realize?).  I’m working on a side project and wanted to know what combination of ink or pencil would work well with watercolour paints vs. watercolour pencil crayons.  So far, after consulting with a freelance art critic (my mother), it looks like the combo that came out on top is ink brush with watercolour pencil crayons and watercolour paint highlights (the flower at the very bottom).  The paper is watercolour paper but I’ll be damned if I can remember the brand or weight.

Either way, that finished flower is my first attempt to colour a drawing with anything other than pencil crayons.  The kicker here is the pentel ink brush, which takes a ton of practice to master, is the one that I’ll end up going with. So, again, a longer journey than I thought.