Anime Paintings | Art Round Up #3

Today's art round up features some work I did over the past year. If you follow me on any social media you've probably already seen some of these in some form or fashion, however I recently had access to a copy machine and was able to scan them so they're much easier to see now! Woohoo!

The first three paintings are of some of my favorite anime/manga characters. We have Kaneki Ken from Tokyo Ghoul, Hisoka from Hunter x Hunter, and Ban from The Seven Deadly Sins. I don't typically paint often, I usually use copic markers and watercolors, but I figured that I should try something new every now and then just to shake things up. I'm pretty happy with the results... aside from a couple of issues I have with Hisoka (the 2nd painting), who was by far the most difficult to paint.

The fourth art piece is actually a collaboration I did with my friend, Seth Broussard, who came up with the initial concept for this fire bird creature. He did the original sketches (not included here, sorry Seth!), picked the colors, and gave me an overall feeling for the piece. I took everything he told me and turned it into the work above. It was actually my very first time ever drawing a fantasy creature and one of the few times I've ever drawn a bird! He was happy with the way it turned out and that's the best result I could have ever hoped for. :)

Which one is your favorite? Do you have any suggestions for future art pieces?

xx Anna

Happy Halloween

A casual Harley Quinn, the perfect costume if you're looking for something simple and comfortable to wear in place of a full red+black body suit. I didn't actually have to buy any clothes for this look, just the wig for about $20 from Party City, which made me one happy Harley fan. You can do this yourself by mixing and matching any red and black clothes you own. You can also find a blog post on how to create this Harley Quinn inspired makeup right here. (please ignore the terrible state of my mirror)

My personal favorite of the three costumes I came up with, a femme Kaneki Ken a la Tokyo Ghoul. But you could probably get away with just doing the face paint and calling yourself a skeleton if your friends and fam get confused when you say that you're "Kaneki". I used super basic, super cheap cream face paints from Party City that cost about $3 which were convenient but did require some finagling to get right. I also used eyeshadows to set the paint and a liquid lipstick for red bits since the red cream paint ended up looking awful. The wig was also about $20 from Party City. I used reference pictures of Kaneki to paint the mask onto my face. Just be patient and take your time. :)

Lastly is the typical, last minute go to for ladies and lads everywhere... a black cat. This is the world's easiest "costume" to put together in all of history. You wear black clothes, any black clothes you feel like, and slap on a cat ear headband (mine cost about $4). I initially went for a black cat princess type thing in the first picture but ended up more comfortable in shorts and a sweater. Makeup-wise, I opted for an exaggerated cat eyeliner and a dusty rose lipstick. Easy peasy. (My brother's friendly viking costume is also available at Party City, if you're interested in that)


I hope you enjoyed these three fairly simple costumes. If you have any questions, feel free to drop me a comment. Have a happy and safe Halloween!

xx Anna