I am a young artist from the Dayton, Ohio area. I have always enjoyed art, but never really thought I had an particular gift for it. I spent most of my time in the beginning drawing primarily cartoon characters, copying what I saw in the Sunday comics. I would also sketch animals, houses, etc. In the 90's, I even did a series of drawings for my family's home-based business. I stayed away from drawing people, however, because I felt it was too intimidating. My first attempts at people still looked a lot like cartoons, so I felt like my abilities were best used as an illustrator/animator. Being the perfectionist that I am, however, I decided to keep working at it and, thanks in large part to my middle school art teacher, learned how to draw figures and manipulate graphite for a realistic effect (a skill that I am still working to perfect...and will probaly always work to perfect). Like many artists, my first drawings of people were based on pictures of celebrities (which I still like to do). After some much needed persuasion and encouragement from loved ones, I progressed to portraits of family and friends. Personally, I like to know the name and individual traits of the person I am drawing because I believe portrait drawing is more than capturing the likeness of the subject. To capture a likeness is an amazing feat, but to capture someone's personality is magical..and that's what I like to strive for. While most of my time is spent on pencil portraits, I enjoy drawing anything that comes to mind. I recently ventured into the world of Sharpie artwork and must say I like the pieces that have come from that. I have also created a few custom tattoo pieces for friends. Overall, I have found throwing myself into artwork of any kind to be extremely theraputic and have enjoyed being able to open my mind and explore my creativity in ways I never imagined.