I wish I wasn't so scattered these days. One of the best things I did was to draw Caricatures at a Corporate Party. It was great being there.

Even though the venue was dark, the music was too loud to talk, and the Happy Guests did Not come near to any sort of focus on the activity, aka keep their faces showing while I was drawing them ~ Even though I have been focusing on Personal Events including yesterday's Dentist appointment and and ~ Even though circumstances were not optimal for Drawing ~ Even though all that, I felt so relieved to be at this Event. Drawing at Parties is where I feel 'Home'. Aaaah.

I felt totally Appreciated. Guests and Client were so Happy with my Pictures and my Performance. For the first time all Week, I felt respected as an Artist ~ nobody telling me to draw differently than I draw. That's what Artwork is about. Letting it happen. In the midst of it all

Here's one of the Caricatures that I drew:

I recommend Estimating 10 Faces per Hour. But I try to accommodate my Clients when they ask me to draw Faster. So here I am ~ practicing from photos before my next Really Big Party.

Obviously, I can't do what I can't do. But there are ways to get more people drawn (if they all sit for their Caricatures very quickly ~ I can't very well Rush the Guests). I can approach the Artwork very simply. I can just draw Lines without Shading. I can skip the Color. And I feel that the way to keep them Simple is to just draw what I see ~ with not much in the way of Artist's Interpretation.

Still, the Artwork takes on a Quality of its own. Not the Whole Symphony, but a Simple Beauty in its Simplicity. Kind of Classy.

Corporate Event ~ Happily drawing Caricatures ~ ~ and wouldn't you know it ~ when I was almost done ~ in marker ~ they asked if I could add their friend in.

He's the little face on the bottom of the page. It made them laugh ~ Happy Day

UPDATE: READ TO THE END. BY FIGURING OUT HOW TO HANDLE MY CLIENT'S WORK WITHOUT BOTHERING HER, I ENDED UP DEVELOPING MY DIGITAL CARICATURE SKILLS EVEN MORE. SO EXCITED WITH THE DIRECTION SHE SENT ME ON.

Sometimes it looks simple to do someone else's job. Because the Professional has already navigated around things that could have caused problems. That's what I'm dealing with today. Because my Client emailed me the Logo that she wants me to use on each Caricature ~ instead of just telling me the words and hiring me to design her Papers

I quickly did a ridiculously Simple Caricature to see how it would work ~ and a problem came up that would not have come up if my Client had hired me do the job myself. Perhaps I'll spend a lot of time to figure out how to handle the situation to my satisfaction ~ not reasonable to Require, so I'm only going to do what I can. And if I do figure it out, well, I will just be even that more More skilled than I am already.

You can't see the problem here because I deleted the Layer that had the Company's Logo ~ for their privacy of course. But I did have a problem come up with it.

What happened is that my Client had emailed me a Template to use as a background for each Digital Caricature. I sent the Template over to Procreate so I will be able to use it during the Party. But it came through as Black Letters on an OPAQUE White background.

It would be fine if the Letters were on a Transparent Background ~ That's what I'm trying to do ~ I'm trying to figure out HOW TO MAKE THE WHITE BACKGROUND BE TRANSPARENT while keeping their Text Black.

The way it is now, If I use it as a Top Layer, their Opaque White Background obliterates any Layers underneath it ~ so you wouldn't be able to see anything I draw.

It I use it as a Bottom Layer, even if I make my own subsequent Layers Transparent, anything I draw or color that is on top of their Logo (a big thing that takes up the bottom left quarter of the page) ~ anything that I'm drawing there obliterates their Logo. Unless I lower the Opacity of my Artwork. Which looks rude to their Logo.

It's the same situation if I just draw directly on the Layer of the Logo. Opaque Artwork obliterates the Logo. Transparent Artwork dulls out their Logo.

I can't just put a box around it and let my picture Stop there ~ because they didn't do anything like making it One Line across the Bottom of the page. It's the size of a whole business-card on the bottom of a 4" x 6" print. They do not want me to make it smaller.

......only One Hour later:

I'm on a good path! I changed her Template Layer to 'Multiply' instead of 'Normal'. Voila! I could see what I drew on Layers Underneath the Template Layer.

But And oh ~ the next problem popped up during my Practice time. It's a good thing I do this ~ so I can better handle whatever comes up during the Event.

What happened was that I decided to Yay get back into Exaggerations ~ So I scribbled out a pretty detailed Predraw for this Practice Caricature. But I made a mistake ~ the sort of mistake that could happen when I'm At an the Party. I drew the Predraw on the Template Layer.

So after I did the Linework on the Layer Underneath the Transparent Template (that's what the Multiply did ~ It made it possible to see the Layer underneath the Template), I figured I would just Erase the Predraw that was on the Template Layer.

But it would Not erase. I could erase the Text that the Client had sent on her Template, but I absolutely could Not erase my scribbles.

So..... I'm on a path. I'm sure I will feel compelled to play around with the Multiply Layer as soon as I get another chance.

Good Morning. I'm back again. And I FIGURED IT OUT! I can handle the Logo that the Client sent on Opaque 'paper' with no problems. I found out that I can Change a Layer to be Multiply even After I draw on it. So I will still have the Option to erase on it afterall

And to make things easier/smoother during event anyway, I made TWO Templates ~ so I can figure out which one is working better based on my mood (whether I want to Color Transparently or Opaquely. One Template has the Client's Logo on a Multiply Layer ~ and it has more Layers already set up as Multiply Layers. The Other Template just has the Client's Logo set up at Multiply, and other Layers set up as Normal.