My First Collage!

Hai. This week will be a little less depressing than the past two, this week I'm gonna show you my first collage!! For those who don't know what a collage is, it's basically paper crafting cutting out shapes to make a piece of artwork gluing or taping together. Some people go all out and use fabric and other 3D things like beads, buttons, other trinkets, sometimes pressed or live flowers, really anything to make a 3D piece of art. I personally used my drawing and painting tools and craft patterned paper I was given by somebody.

I'll tell you a little about what I used since I think it might be interesting.


First, I used printer quality cardstock, it's pretty thick, perfect for marker because it's super smooth but not spongy, it's not good for watercolor though. I used this to cut out the butterflies and the leaves on the middle flower. To cut out the butterflies I cut a smaller piece off of the cardstock and folded it in half drew the wings on one side and cut it out, when unfolded it was even in size and shape. Then I sketched the basic pattern on it and colored with sharpies and Bic markers along with a white gel-pen. I based the orange butterfly off of a Monarch though it's not really a Monarch, and the yellow butterfly is based off of a Swallow-tail butterfly but it doesn't actually look like one at all. I basically based the colors and type of patterns more than anything else. I did make a blue butterfly but it was too big so I gave it to my mother to play with.


For the flowers, I made the purple check-patterned one first, for that one I cut out each petal resulting in a variety of sizes because I did one at a time. For the other two I cut a horizontal strip of the paper I wanted, then cut a piece vertically off of it and used that as a template to cut and have all paper being the basic same size then. After that I piled and used a paperclip to keep secured, drew the petal shape and cut it. - Gluing I glued the petals on to the center part (all centers were made with cardstock) and I glued a scrap piece of cardstock to keep the flowers secured together.


I didn't plan the layout for anything at the start I used laid it out on the paper as I went along. I added all shading and details myself using colored pencils and markers. The background is watercolor, the grassy area is craft paper too.

All Supplies Used:

• 6 Craft Papers (Patterned paper)
• Cardstock (White)
• Mixed media paper – Base paper (what everything is glued on)
• 14 Colored Pencils (5 Prismacolors, 5 Crayola, 2 EK Memory Pencils, 2 Other/Cheap)
• 20 Markers (11 Sharpies, 4 Bic, 4 IDenti Pens, 1 Prismacolor Black)
• Watercolor (Off brand, Raphael)
• 2 Brushes (one flat and one round)

• Scissors
• Eraser
• Stick Glue
• White Pen
• Prismacolor 03 Pen
• Sakura 0.3 mm Pen
• Mechanical pencil
• Three 3D Paint Pens.

Thank you for reading! I hope this was interesting. If you enjoy all things art, please +1, share on whatever social media you like to use, and follow me here. Thanks!


~ God Bless ~


~ Firefly

Why So Serious? Confessions of an Artist.

In this week's blog post I'm going to talk about being laid back. A thing that's hard for me and I'm sure other artists...I suppose more I'm going to talk about who I am and how to not be like me, haha! If I seem to be rambling I'm kinda high on musical euphoria from the She Is We song "Runaways" so...Yeah. Ha!

K, lets get started!

In the recent weeks, I've been, I guess you can say trying to find myself... And I've noticed that my art mentality with how I approach my art shows who I am deep down. Art shows the soul of a person, if there's anything you cannot hide, it's who you are in visual art. I'm not gonna say the politically correct thing and say I saw beauty and that's what I paint/do. I'm going to say I saw the negatives in my personality. I'm controlling, impatient, want the easy way out, and want to have everything how I want it, where I want it, and I want what I want when I want it, and preferably now. Not the best of traits.

Pen & Cheap Paint

Now I'm not going to say everyone is like me or that's all I am (I'd like to believe I'm nice..at least sometimes! heh..), but doesn't that say a lot about a lot of us? I believe the God given gift of creativity a lot of us use first because it's fun, but then it becomes our slave that we abuse and control, and in our control it starts to control us, we have to have it a certain way and we will not expand. We won't go beyond “how it has to be”. We make our own boxes and refuse to get out of them. I believe this goes in to all of life and we really shouldn't do that to ourselves, we have enough people in this world trying to put us in a box, trying to take who we are away from us, we shouldn't have to worry about our own selves doing it to us as well.



How have I overcome this? I haven't yet really but I have done somethings that I never do just to try and break out of the cage I've put myself in. For one, I didn't worry about what art supplies I'm using I just had fun with it which to be honest, was hard. I hardly ever have fun with anything, I'm rather serious. Or I just doodled with a pen and played with the cheapest watercolors I have, which are from Dollar Tree. I allowed myself to express without being my own drill sergeant. Another way I have broken out a bit was I drew things I never draw and I used photo reference (which for most of my life I have refused to do, I feel it's cheating) and taught myself how to draw something myself. There was a lot of specifics but I allowed myself to fail (something I rarely do). Often times I draw what I know because I know I'll do it well, or I'll be admired for my talent. But I actually broke away from what I know and I have to admit I'm very proud of my results, they came out great in the end (at least for my own personal standards).

It took me failing 14 times trying to draw a deer to finally get this result. Perfect? Maybe not but it's better than how I started

I suppose to close, don't do whatever you do for blood, do it for fun. I know I have judged people and get irritated with them who take things that don't mean anything too seriously and to be honest there are somethings in life that ARE meaningless and I don't see why a person has to blow a gasket over it. I look at that like wow that's just retarded and immature; But if I were honest, I do the same thing, maybe not with the same things that I get irritated over people with, but I do it.

Free-flowing lineart, not controlling watercolor but letting it flow.

So the question I pose to all of you who read this...Are you serious over your artwork? If so, why so serious? There's a time for professionalism and a time to relax. And of course if you are being paid for something or something like that, do a good job, use all of your resources and work hard. But if art is what you love, relax and enjoy it, you only live once so enjoy what you love. And in that sense, enjoy who you love, with their flaws and perfections. Many who read this are not Christians, but even if you're not Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 talks about life poetically. If you want to read it, you can go here, if not that's fine, I don't make people read things they don't want to.


To fully end, have fun, enjoy what you have, your past doesn't define you, and your expression should be done out of love and joy and also your pain inside, expose yourself, you don't have to show anyone those pieces if you don't want to but you will feel better. Don't be stiff. And this applies to whatever you love, not just art.

So, why so serious? Pick up a pen and have fun, have no plan and make something beautiful. The world is waiting to see, and so am I.


Thank you for reading my ramblings.


God bless,


~ Firefly

Some Drawings I've Done Over The Past Few Months

Okay I know the middle or early week would have been better but I'm a lazy jerk and never got the nerve to actually write a decent article so we get these pieces of artwork instead. I'm sorryyyy!!!

Okay here we go, some of these are going to be mentioned in future posts. I'll say a little about some of the artworks. And yeah...it'll explain itself.


Monochrome inked with brown pen and colored with watercolor.

Sunflower with bees, colored with sharpies and colored pencils, on mixed media paper the background is watercolor and the outlines are with inking pens and a sharpie fine tipped marker.

These first two are done on printer cardstock using Prismacolor multi-liners and Sharpies to color. (The light blue from the dress is a Prismacolor marker [I only have 3 of those]).

This next one is I believe the first drawing I've ever colored not in monotone while having the outlines in brown. Colored using watercolor, crayola markers and soft pastels on mixed media paper.

I was watching Jake Parker videos while drawing these from photo reference. I didn't aim for realism just a likeness of the different leaves. The top row left to right: Oak, Ash - Botton Row Left to Right: Maple, Birch.
Colored pencil, pen, soft pastel on sketch paper.

A pen drawing using color inking pens and IDentipens all from Sakura brand.

Opaque watercolor painting on mixed media paper.

Colored pencil drawing on watercolor paper with a watercolor background.

I have drawn more but I think that's enough for now.

I hope you enjoyed these drawings, if you did please +1 on google plus and show other people.
Thank you!


~ God Bless~

~ Firefly