It was doodle time tonight and the subject was trolls! I’ve got the roleplaying bug again which means exploring the characters & creatures around the fantasy lands – watching ’24′ was not reason enough to not doodle (although it did come close)!

Tonight’s doodles were mainly about trolls but there’s been many iterations of Orcs as well which I’ll upload as soon as I’m happy with the final result of them. I’m working out the different features and stature for the goblin type variations as well – goblins, hobgoblins, lesser and greater orcs.

In the following image, I’m heading towards the pot bellied, gorilla style stature and playing around with facial expressions, body hair and armour ideas.

Hopefully, I’ll be adding some digital paintings of trolls to the gallery in the near future as well.

Once again the Bic fine biro is the weapon of choice for the doodles – it doesn’t smudge as easily as pencil does – and it gets me concentrating on each line.

Click on the image for a larger view.

Finally, I’ve added an image gallery of some of my work!

Check it out – Craig’s Sketchpad Gallery

…and ironically, this post has no pictures.

I’ll also be adding a gallery at Craig John (the Blog) which will include more of the ‘design’ projects covering both web and print work but I’ll let you know when that happens.

After deciding to leave it as an old school style map, I couldn’t help myself and I had to colour it in and add some textures.

The story so far, the initial colour and textures have been added and now I need to colour in the other elements (the wood has just been started as a sold colour but needs more textures, highlights and shadows)…

And a close up of the textures.

As usual, click on the image for a larger version.

Once again, another ICE competition raises it’s head; This time in the form of a Kobold lair!

I’ve been looking through some of the b/w drawn maps and I like them. So much so that I thought my first entry would be in that style (and it meant I could draw it while watching TV).

I need to stick it in a PDF with separate pages tiling the map, but here it is in it’s full size form.

As usual, click the image for a larger version.

While putting off starting the Crypt Map itself, I’ve created another sketch for the introduction. This is showing the High Priest and his Stone Golem ready to attack intruders!

Yet another biro sketch.

Click to see the larger image.

…and yes, it’s probably time I started the map itself!

The Alien entry is coming to an end – all that’s left is the text! Here’s some of what’s in store here …

As always, click for the larger version.

It seems that scribbling very hard with a biro does actually lessen the Migraine pain marginally; so I present to you a couple more scribbles!

I may be ready to compile the sketchbook for my Alien Creature entry (but as that’ll require a little more time looking at the screen than I really want to right now, these 2 sketches will have to suffice for the moment).

Click on the images for larger ones.

Just a sketch of an Aztec Mummy to use in the intro for the Crypt Map Contest. They used to bury their leaders that way in Jars apparently (but even if they didn’t – they do in THIS fantasy land).

This is another biro sketch – Click the image for the larger view.

ICE seems to be competition central all of a sudden! As well as the 2 I’ve mentioned below, they’re also doing an Alien contest. ICE Alien Contest.

I’m going to be doing an alien sketchbook kind of a thing with coffee stains an notes on the creatures etc for my entry but here are some of the raw images so far. In my favourite medium – biro… Bic to be precise. When there’s no way to rub it out or hit ‘undo’, every line counts!

Click the babies to see larger versions. Enjoy.