Hey, Bizarro Jazz Pickles, Peyote Cowpokes, and other yet-to-be-identified individuals and groups! People have been enjoying the posts I’ve done showing how I do my art so I thought I’d post another installment. This one is the last shot of the most recent episode as of this date, chapter 7, episode 3.

If you’re not caught up on the story to this point, DON’T WORRY, THIS ILLUSTRATION IS NOT A SPOILER. I did that in all caps because spoilers are one of my pet peeves. Movie trailers these days often tell you everything about a movie except how it ends.

Doesn’t matter. Let’s begin…

Here’s my first draft sketch. It’s about the size of an average comic book page but I do these on computer so size becomes something different. I looked at lots of pictures of old prairie-style churches and designed this one after those. The rest of the scene is just quickly sketched from my head without any particular reference.

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I draw these directly on a computer screen in Photoshop. The pencil layer is actually just light gray lines on a computer screen as no 3-dimensional pencil or paper is involved. Here, I’ve created a new layer to keep the “inking” separate from the pencil layer, and I’m doing final line art over my scribbles. I’ve drawn these characters enough to not need more refinement steps than this. That’s one of the many advantages of working on computer instead of paper, if I charge into the linework and mess something up, I can just step back a few spaces in the history, or erase it and try again.

I admit I got some photo references for the chicken. I could probably come fairly close to this level of realism without it but I wanted her to have a real ring of truth about her.

In this step, I’m more or less making up these characters as I draw them so it is the most time-consuming phase. I’m really happy with the way the running kid turned out, although I think all of them look pretty good. Those paddle cactuses that populate so many of my landscapes are a royal pain in the ass to draw but I love them so I keep doing it.

Architecture, like this church, is always my least favorite thing to draw. Lots of straight lines and angles that have to be pretty accurate but I don’t like the look of razor-sharp, perfectly straight lines so I insist on drawing them by hand. Once again, I’ve designed a way to make it just a bit more difficult than it has to be.

The most obvious addition here is the color but I’ve also finished all the background line work and the rocks on the trail to the church. These elements are all sort of improvisational and freehand, so they’re much easier and quicker to draw. The buildings in the far background are small and rickety, so they don’t require the same slow precision as the church did.

I like this basic palette of just a few colors a lot.

In this step, I’ve added shadows to the ground and background. I do this before coloring the characters because I can just paint right through them and not around them. On the computer, working back to front like this can be a big time saver. With traditional art, that isn’t always the case; it depends on the medium you’re using and several other things.

This was another very time-consuming step as I had to meticulously color each character’s outfit. I could just call it finished at this stage but I’m far too anal for that. I must add more obsessive detail!

Okay, I’m finished. I added some more shadows to the ground and changed the linework on the far background from black to brown, which helps give it more of a sense of distance.

I also added the skeleton guy’s trademark blue glow. By the way, you may have noticed that the glow tends to come and go from scene to scene. My rule is to use it only when he is around others who cannot see him. The glow is to show he is invisible to most people. Thus far in the story, only the cowboy can see him.

That concludes today’s Bob Ross Wannabe Art Lesson. I hope you enjoyed it! If you’d like to join my Peyote Cowboy email list to be notified when a new episode is posted, do that here. Here’s where you can catch up on all of the episodes of Peyote Cowboy. And click here to see my video explaining my writing experience and why I’d get goosebumps if you decided to support my efforts as I finish this monumental project.

Thanks for reading!