Doodles...

No, not doodles you silly moos. Doodles! (woo for Chocobos!!!)

Yes, in a rather nostalgic phase, I decided to go back to the memorable times we (dan, dave, dave and I) had through our GCSE english course. Ah good times. The memorable ticks of herbert (something I'm still part of :P) as he would berate our lack of attentiveness in lessons with such choice phrases as "(heavy welsh accent) Oh boys, can you please focus 'ere, this stuff is hard I know but I wish you'd just try and engage with it, the exams are a matter of weeks away..."

I suppose you had to be there.

Anyway, back in the day much of our English lessons comprised of Dave furiously writing down all the notes, while I lazed about and did the mathematical equivalent of f*ck all. That is too say, not writing anything in my book, not taking any of the notes and not doing any of the coursework essays (this and this brought back memories :P. What did you get in english in the end dave? An A you say? Kekekekeke). Anyway, with an hour to kill each english lesson I would invariably spend my time doodling random things to amuse myself, such as my rendition of the memorable final scene of the film version of Of Mice And Men starring Gary Sinise and John Malkovich:

However, i eventually got my own little style when it came to drawing sharp pointy instruments of arg and death causing. Or swords, as they are usually referred to. Here, in all their glory, are the cream of the cream of my Yr11 pointy things (I framed me favourite)

Anyway, I thought I should have a go again, and it seems i have lost me touch rather, but I hope to get back into the swing of things. However, I also thought it would make this post longer to include a photo guide to my sword designing techniques. With pictures!!! Oh yes, with pictures. You are not safe!!!

The Slightly 'chard guide to drawing 'knives, and stabbing weapons' (yeh, wrong Terminator, I know...)

So! Let's get the forge heated.

Step 1: Above is the sort of thing we're aiming for. Draw a straight line. Faintly, but so you can see it.

Step 2: Draw in two parallel lines (===) which will become the hilt, and two lines that meet to form the tip (<).

Step 3: Draw parallel lines from (<) until they're close to (===)

Step 4: Add a basic cross guard (+) to join (<) and (===) together.

Step 5: Fine criss crossing lines along (===) create the grip. There are other ways, but this is easier

Step 6: Start adding decoration to the cross guard. You can be as elaborate or as simple as you like (note to self: simple seems to look better), just stay as symmetrical as possible keep going until...

Step 7: ...it looks like that. Then, with the edge of the pen (or pencil I guess) Shade over everything. No idea why, but this makes it look better overall.

And there you go. here are some more examples that stuck to the same basic ideas:


In the words of the scary bloke from Art Attack: "Try it yourself".

Enjoy.
'chard