Category: Blog post

Hello everyone! And welcome to yet another weekly recap. But look!! The design of the banner changed! How crazy is that? Pretty crazy I’d say.

This week started on the 9th of January 2016… I mean 2017. Aaah I’m never getting used to this. Anyways. This week Mr Owl has been feeling his heart beating faster, and also skipped some. He met the author of the love letter he received on week 7!

MONDAY

Well look who just turned up at the party! Mr Owl can hardly believe it. “Was she really waving at me from the beginning?”, he thinks

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TUESDAY

Mr Owl saw The Lady. Now he’s a bit confused about what his next step should be. “Hello, my name is Mr Owl. Yes, like a night bird”, he rehearses in his head.

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl finally went up to her, and offered a dance. “He doesn’t even know my name”, she thinks

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THURSDAY

These beautiful people are turning round and round the dance floor. “Let’s not tread on each other’s feet”, they think.

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FRIDAY

Our lovely people decided to have a walk in the neighbourhood. “There’s nothing like a starry sky”, they think

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SATURDAY

The Lady just told him a joke, so Mr Owl can’t help but to laugh out loud. He almost ends up rolling on the floor laughing. “Hahahahahaha (…) ha.”, he thinks

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SUNDAY

Apparently the previous joke wasn’t a joke. The Lady really has bear feet. “Hahem”, says Mr Owl.

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And there you have it! I’m rather happy with a few drawings I did this week. Especially the hands on the first drawing, I somehow found a convincing posture. It’s something I like about Mr Owl : he doesn’t have hands, so he’s easier to sketch haha. That’s a reason why I took more time on this week’s drawings, the lady is not as cartoony as Mr Owl, so I have to pay a lot more attention to her proportions, postures etc. But in the end I think it pays off to spend more time on each piece. I think in a few months or years I’ll be happier to look back at something that’s more polished.

Other than this, I used a few textures as background (pavement for the dancefloor, and a picture of tower bridge) and I feel like it makes the image a lot more “convincing”, whatever that means.

That’s it for this week. I won’t draw Mr Owl this week cause I have to work a lot, and have a lot on my plate otherwise. But I hope next week will be better… To be continued!

Take care of yourself.

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Hello everyone!

This recap is going to be a little special, as I realised I didn’t upload any of the drawings I did while I was ill and on holiday. And boy did I draw! Well not so much, I did roughly the equivalent of 1 week in 3 weeks. But there are some special things : a GIF and a speedpainting video at the end. I didn’t keep track of which day I posted what so…

#1

MYSTERIOUS DAY

This week, Mr Owl is looking for a new outfit. Today in the fitting room, he has to laugh. Yes, the salesman told him it was trendy in Tokyo, but he still feels a little ridiculous with whiskers on.

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#1

FOOLED YA. THAT’S ACTUALLY #2

This time the salesman was convinced he found a look that was perfectly edgy and cool. But it only gave Mr Owl a weird craving for gluten free tacos.

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#3

SOME OTHER DAY

Mr Owl is trying out another outfit. “I’m not sure I can afford this one, but I sure look dandy in these clothes!”, he thinks

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#4

ANOTHER OTHER DAY

Mr Owl is a bit ill today. Nothing too serious but he chose to pause his search for a new outfit and rest for a while. “Atishoo!”, he says

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#5

Aaah THAT DAY!

Hello friends.
I’ve had a hard time posting anything in here. I’ve been caught by a couple of things : some personal projects, my lovely job, and a nasty cold.
In spite of all this, I do hope that you all have a lovely end of year. I made you a Gif, the last of 2016. I hope you like it. See you around, once we’re all done with this year.

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#6

CERTAINLY NOT TODAY

For the new year, Mr Owl thought he’d stick with his good old outfit.
Happy new year everyone!

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#7

GOSH TIME FLIES

Mr Owl is back at work. His coworkers have prepared him a little surprise. “I must admit that it’s quite hard to hide my emotions”, he thinks

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#8

THAT TIME WHEN I WOKE UP AND DID THINGS

Mr Owl received a brand new hat as a gift. His previous one was crushed in the accident. “How sweet of them”, he thinks

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#9

WEDNESDAY. JUST KIDDING, NO IDEA

Mr Owl feels a presence behind him at his “welcome back” party. So he just rotates his head. After all, he’s an owl. After owl he’s an all. What. “Could it be…?!”, he asks himself. #Mystery

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And as promised, the video :

It’s been a very long time since I’ve spoken in a microphone, or spoken English at all, plus I’m a bit ill so I’m not very proud of the quality. Still I’m super excited to share this with you. Hope it’s interesting.

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Looking back, it was rather cool doing all these different things. It was just so chaotic that I didn’t realise the potential of all this. I originally liked the idea of having Mr Owl trying out a lot of different outfits, especially cause I normally don’t pay much attention to this. But yeah, the illness had the best of me.

I don’t have much else to day, the rest I already said in the video.

So I guess that’s it for this recap. Thanks for reading! And take care of yourself.

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Hello everyone!

Welcome to this weekly recap of Mr Owl! This week started on the 28th of November 2016. And it was a rough start for Mr Owl…

MONDAY

Mr Owl just woke up in a dark alley as the sun started to rise. “Oh dear, I did it again”, he thinks.

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TUESDAY

Mr Owl is hoping no one notices how weird he looks. But it seems no one really cares “I don’t know whether it’s a good or a bad thing”, he thinks.

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl went out of town to have a good old shower. “Exactly what I needed”, he thinks.

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THURSDAY

Before he comes back in town, Mr Owl made himself a nice item of lingerie. “It’s a new beginning”, he thinks.

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FRIDAY

Mr Owl is back in town. And he’s ready to kick ass. “Or maybe just buy a new suit”, he thinks.

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SATURDAY

Mr Owl is having a kip on a statue while he waits for the shops to open. “ZZZzzz”, he says.

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SUNDAY

Mr Owl saw the sun rise. He stretched and told himself : “With all this happening to me lately, I don’t even know what a normal day is anymore…” before he set out to finding a new suit.

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So this week was a bit tight, I sometimes rushed my drawings. As a mater of fact I reworked some of them for this post. Maybe the rush also came from the fact that I’m always doing more or less the same thing with this series, and it starts getting boring so I just want to be done with it. On a more positive note it shows that I’m capable of working faster, I sort of found a workflow that is quite efficient. It means two things :

1. I’d like to do a “speed painting” video where I show the process of how a typical Mr Owl drawing is made.
2. This may leave me more time to work on other projects I have in my head, that I should release before they rot up there.

Also, for the last drawing I tried to add some texture to Mr Owl’s feathers. I’m really not pleased with the result but it’s a track I’d like to explore in the future.

I have an idea for next week that could be fun to do, and fun for you too. In the meantime, please take care of yourselves!

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Hello everyone! This week of Mr Owl started on the 21st of November. He is now back on his feet, and very little happens to him. But this very tiny event that does happen turns him upside down.

MONDAY

Mr Owl is back on his feet. After such a long absence, he has to go get the mail he missed. His concierge has been collecting it for him. “She looks really tired”, He thinks

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TUESDAY

Mr Owl received a love letter. “I’m not a expert on that matter, but this looks and smells like a love letter…”, he thinks

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl is puzzled. The letter was sweet and all, but it wasn’t signed. “Who could it be?”, he asks himself.

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THURSDAY

Mr Owl has to use his mind palace to crack this love letter mystery.
“AH! Obviously!”, he thinks.

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FRIDAY

Mr Owl just realised who his secet lober might be! “Incredible!!!!”, he thinks.
#DrawWhenYoureDrunk (Don’t you question my comintment to this series)

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SATURDAY

Altough Mr Owl cracked one mystery, it opened the door to so many other questions. “What do I do about it now?”, he thinks

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SUNDAY

Mr. Owl is normally a very respectable person. Tonight though, he turned his brain off. He couldn’t handle asking himself so many questions, and let his primal instinct prevail.

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This week was… Interesting. I’m always trying to explore new things within the boundaries of the style and the simplistic story line of this series. This time I kind of went the process of “automatic creation”. I don’t know if it’s the right word for it. I basically just started drawing and one thing leading to another, I tried to connect the work in progress to the story.  It is a process used in surreal art, and I usually like this kind of works. It’s also quite fun to do. On Friday I had a mulled wine evening. I didn’t get drunk intentionally to draw, it was just a coincidence. Kids, don’t try that at home, it could be dangerous.

I don’t have much else to say. So I guess I’ll wish you a good day. Homework for next time : taking care of yourself.

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Hello everybody!

This week has been quite unusual. It started on the 7th of November. And it was more than a week, as it lasted 9 days. And this is what I made :

“What? That’s it? 9 days to make this picture? Is that a joke?”

Hold on, demanding reader. Here are some explanations : Since the beginning of Mr Owl, I’ve posted a picture every day, made little games when possible, and tried to interact with my audience in a fun way. This time I wanted to do that all at once, and reveal a big picture by posting little pieces of it every day. Which made me want to do a little puzzle. I won’t post the daily retrospective, like I normally do, because having a look at the final thing is probably more interesting. But I’m going to walk you through my approach. First, I thought that an accident was a good scene to be broken down in little bits. Usually people report different versions, and my grandmother used to say “There is always a minimum of 3 reasons for an accident to occur”. I didn’t really show these reasons, and maybe the piece would have been more interesting with them, but oh well… It’s done now. I started with a blank square, as usual. I made it 9 times bigger than the normal resolution for a Mr Owl drawing and separated it in 9 equal parts like so :

Then I added construction lines. I knew I wanted the camera to be looking downwards so I used a double point perspective with the horizon line far up away from the canvas.

Then I drew a rough version of what’s happening in the scene. The challenge was to fit characters in boxes, not leaving important part of their bodies/expressions in between 2 squares. And that was the main problem of this project : how to propose pieces that both work individually, and fit inside the larger canvas. I don’t think I did that great a job, but these were interesting problems to work on.

Then I isolated a square and drew a clean version of it. I posted this kind of things on my facebook page :

And when you put them side by side, you can see that it’s not seamless, but still a good foundation to work on. Something like that :

Then after a little polishing, there you have the final image :

And voilà! This project has been weird. I was really excited when I started, and as time went by it became more and more frustrating. The size of the image made the process harder on my computer, for example I had to pause 10 seconds every time I saved the file, which may not seem like a lot, but I learnt (the hard way) to save my work every 2 minutes. In the end I’ve lost a considerable amount of time that way. Also, I’m not really pleased with the look of the final image. Especially the guy on the right omg, it’s ridiculous. And it took a total of 9 days to produce that. I guess that’s where the biggest amount of frustration comes from. In 9 “normal days” I could have produced better drawings if they were individually released.

On a more positive note, I’m really happy I came through, and that it still worked. I think it is very interesting to think of new ways to deliver your art on social media, mostly because it still hasn’t been explored so much. So I might do another version of this kind of thing, but I will either do something else in parallel, or a shorter version of it, maybe 4 pieces. I don’t know. Can you guys please let me know what you thought of it? I see that it received a really low amount of engagement from you (likes/comments on facebook), which isn’t a problem and was to be expected, but it gives me very little information.

Anyway, that’s it for now. I’ll be away for a couple of days, so Mr Owl won’t be back before next Monday. Until then, take care!

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Hello everyone!

This week of Mr Owl started on the 31st of October. Of course, I felt compelled to do a little Halloween related drawing. I quite liked the idea I had, but I’m not so fond of the result. As a matter of fact, I really rushed through this one, due to very little time. And it speaks for the rest of the week, sometimes it was hard producing a drawing every day, so I’m glad I still managed to make it happen. Hope you enjoy!

MONDAY

Mr Owl is struggling to put his weird hospital clothes on. He is scaring everyone at the hospital, there has already been one heart attack and three screaming nurses. “Happy Halloween”, he says, without really knowing why.

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TUESDAY

Mr Owl has been moved to another room. He is sleeping next to a panda. He’s probably called Mr Panda, but Mr Owl doesn’t know that. In fact he couldn’t ask any questions because the panda was always sleeping. “I wonder what bamboo tastes like”, he wonders.

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl underwent an X-ray scan, or something like that. This brand new technology allows doctors to see what happens inside of Mr Owl’s body. “I’m not sure how it works, but it sure is impressive”, he thinks.

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THURSDAY

Mr Owl is trying out hospital food. “It isn’t as bad as I thought it would be”, he thinks

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FRIDAY

The doctors said he shouldn’t try flying, so Mr Owl is trying to walk with crutches. “How do people manage?”, he wonders.

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SATURDAY

Mr Owl was in a lot of pain, so the doctors made him a little injection. Now he’s feeling quite special… “Agagnagna”, he thinks.

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SUNDAY

Mr Owl’s doctor is rather pleased by the progress his patient is making. This doctor looks a bit like someone from his dreams last week… That’s a bit odd. “What a wonderful moustache though”, Mr Owl thinks.

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Voila! I feel like my technique is evolving little by little, and some things are coming together. This series really helps me learning new skills, and most of all, is a lot of fun to make. I wish I could have more time to explore some ideas that I have, and refine my drawings a little further, or even make more animations. I need to get an agenda or something, to manage my time more efficiently. Anyhow… This week I noticed that I released more than 31 drawings on a daily basis, since it’s a bit symbolic, I’d like to say a massive thank you! Your support in whatever form it comes really helps me.

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“BEHIND THE SCENES” BONUS

I have spent quite some time working on faces this week. That’s why I wanted to do a man’s face for the last day. I’m not super proud of how it looks, but I got this result in very little time, so that’s an improvement I’m very happy about.

Right! Thanks for reading, take care, and see you around.

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Hello everyone! This week of Mr Owl started on the 24th of October, which is the moment I went back from a week of vacation. To justify this absence I invented an inner journey in the head of Mr Owl while he was in a coma. While creating I listened to this music a lot :

MONDAY

“Some bad news to start the week… Mr Owl has been in the hospital during the past 2 weeks. Although they don’t know owl’s anatomy very well, doctors are quite confident he will get better. It’s a mystery what Mr Owl thinks during his coma…”

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TUESDAY

Mr Owl is reliving his past in his deep lethargy. “Paris is truly beautiful”, he thinks…

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl, pursuing his trip in limbo, now finds himself on a cinemascope reel. “How did I get here?”, he thinks.

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THURSDAY

Mr Owl is going deeper, he’s now back as a kid and is sorrowful because everyone is laughing at him. “I never realised my feathers were weird until now”, he thinks…

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FRIDAY

Mr Owl is now reliving the moment someone took his wing for the first time and told him they fancied his feathers no matter what he’s been told before. “What a warm feeling”, he thinks…

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SATURDAY

Mr Owl is now falling in a psychedelic universe. “What?”, he thinks…

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SUNDAY

Mr Owl finally woke up. His body aches but his mind is somehow rested. Besides, he’s got quaint flowers by his bed. “Who could have such a nice attention?”, he asks himself.

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This week may have seemed a little more dramatic, and I hope it didn’t put you off. I really like this series because it allows me to try and explore new things. This week features my first fully drawn background, and I’m somewhat happy with this little view from the Alexander III bridge in the Paris from 1900 (Yes this is very precise haha). At the beginning I thought I would go a little bit more in depth in the 1900 Exposition Universelle, because I found it fascinating to document myself about how Paris evolved, to see what kind of technology was used in that time, or what kind of art style (Art Nouveau). And that’s what I did when I put Mr Owl into a Melies film (Wednesday). But then I went sad, so I just drew a sad Mr Owl. I also really enjoyed making a Gif, so there might me a bit more of those in the future if I find a good reason to animate Mr Owl.

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Little “behind the scenes bonus”

Hands are fucking hard to draw. Sorry for the swearing, but really, they are my kryptonite. On Friday, I decided to practice a bit on paper before I started working with my pen tablet.

That’s it for now, I hope you enjoyed!

Take care and see you next week.

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This Mr Owl’s week started on the 3rd of October. And this week, there’s a challenge again! I’ve placed some references to pop culture in my illustrations (Movies, series, video games). I don’t think they’re very subtle, so don’t over think it. You can participate up to Wednesday 12th at 23:26 (Paris time zone). If several people found them all, I’ll find a way to randomly chose a winner. The prize is a drawing again, you can chose the theme, but it will probably an ink drawing. You can submit your participation either on commenting the Facebook post, or on this post directly. Alright, good luck!

Challenge is over! Solutions here : http://www.lairlair.com/en/2016/10/13/solutions-to-last-weeks-challenge/

Now for the retrospective : I had a lot of fun working on this week’s Mr Owl. It was quite challenging because I wanted to put as many references as possible, without completely losing any coherence in the story. Not that it makes any sense in general, but it had to keep the same kind of narrative. I’ve also introduced a new character : The Minister, a charismatic penguin. I generally feel that the backgrounds are getting a tiny bit richer. There’s also been a little incident on Tuesday so I had to improvise… Enjoy.

MONDAY

Mr Owl was summoned to the Minister of the Silly Walk’s office, before he started working. “I didn’t think such a minister would take himself so seriously”, he thinks…

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TUESDAY

For some reason, Mr Owl was turned into vegetables for a brief period of time. “Oh dear” he thinks
(Sorry guys, I was called in at work earlier than expected, no time to draw today…)

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WEDNESDAY

Mr Owl is wrathful. Yes, he’s back to his normal form but some shifty individual took a bite off his bow tie while he was made of vegetables. “Well… At least normality is restored…”, he thinks.

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LAST WEEK’S PRIZE

Mr Owl finally meets his mysterious employer. And he’s a penguin. “I thought they lived in a parallel universe”, he thinks.

Challenge won by Matthias! The solution was 1909.

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THURSDAY

Mr Owl is delighted! He couldn’t dream of a better boss.
“What a great day it is”, he thinks.

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FRIDAY

Mr Owl was told how much he would get paid. “Excellent”, he thinks.

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SATURDAY

Mr Owl is still in the Minister’s office. He’s given some rules about how things work. “2nd rule of the ministry, you don’t talk about the ministry”, he repeats to himself.

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SUNDAY

Mr Owl was sent home after his meeting. On the train home, he notices a strange presence next to him. “Is it a dream again?”, he thinks.

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I’ll be off this week, so I won’t be able to draw much. There are still some things coming, but Mr Owl won’t be around until roughly the middle of next week I’m afraid.

Take care! Catch up when I get back.

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