I’m beginning to suspect that painting manly, squinty, scowling men in great detail for hours at a time in bad on my skin. You see, I have this odd habit of getting really emotionally involved in the facial expressions of the drawings I’m working on. Most of the time, they are unreferenced and have to occur naturally within my imagination. I want the guy to look like he’s convincingly sneering at the audience, so I have to feel it as well. This manifests itself on my own face.

That’s right; I squint and sneer while I draw, because I unconsciously feel it helps me draw it better.

This is something I should probably stop given I now do most of my drawing in a crowded office

(Have a bad old drawing of a naked dude riding a giant bunny)

Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah forever!

(Click here for full size)

As you may or may not know, work takes up a lot of my time. It’s a little difficult to set rigid standards for myself when it comes to drawing outside of work (you know, what people do for fun I think) so I’ve become determined to draw one really low-pressure personal illustration per month. It keeps me loose, keeps me happy, and lets me draw manly men any damn I want to. So what better time to kick it off than during my favorite months, Manvember, the Only Month Whose Name Can Be Conveniently Transformed Into A Manly Pun.

I’ve been fascinated by images of men and their dogs for a while, so I came up with this. I made it a calendar so I could have something to look at while I work. Not the most exciting of reasons, but there you are. It’s still somewhat a work in progress, but I haven’t been able to upload the work I’ve done on it since I saved this version.

I’m not sure what I’m doing for next month yet, but I doodled this on my spare time and was fond of his comically tiny legs.

Let’s hope I’m actually able to finish December’s before December starts.