Two sleeping cats
These are two drawings I did of Max and DeeDee, my two cats. I would have rather drawn them sitting up, or looking at me, or doing something more active than sleeping, but it was almost impossible to draw them when they were doing anything. Even trying to draw them when they were cleaning themselves did not work.
Deedee came out better than Max. Finally, she curled up nicely on the couch and I had enough time to get this drawn:
This is how Max came out. He was sleeping on the floor nearby.
Both of them had one ear turned around toward me. I think they knew I was looking at them. Getting the ear to be the right shape was really hard – it took at least 3-4 tries for each ear! Deedee’s far ear came out best; its actually perfect. At least it happens sometimes.
I drew these with an HB pencil on my new, “nice” sketchbook. The paper is pretty good – good enough that I can draw on both sides if I don’t press down too hard.
I am also using an eraser, lightly, to clean up stray lines. Sometimes this means that I have to erase all the lines I’ve drawn, even the good one/s in a certain part of the drawing, and then go back in and put “good” lines in only. It works, but sometimes when I go back in to draw the correct-looking lines, I screw them up too. That’s when it ends up taking 3-4 tries to get a line right.
By the way… in real life, cats are hard to draw. They don’t stay still, for starters, but they also NEVER sit in a way that does not involve some foreshortening. Their bodies also slope in ways that can be confusing and hard to draw (all that loose furry skin… it is like drawing drapes… or cat’s pajamas).
However, cats are beautiful. When you can get the lines right, they make great drawing subjects. Especially for pencil work.
