Gloin the Dwarf, with ale and a cupcake

This is a photograph of inks (Black Magic ink, using a Windsor & Newton, series 7, size #1 brush) on Strathmore Bristol of Gloin from The Hobbit. Long story short, the "Gloin" from the Facebook page I follow has been fun to chat with and I wanted to do a nice drawing for him. He is about to have a snack of ale and a cupcake. Why a cupcake? It's just something those particular dwarves do.

This is the first inking I've done in a very long time. Unfortunately, I was very shaky and still trying to remember how I used to do it. After a while, I tend to have trouble seeing straight, and my hand was cramping like crazy. I probably could have stopped, but I wanted to finally just get something inked. I lost some of my more favorite details from the sketch, but it's just a matter of getting back into practice. I need to get better about lighting so I don't have the gray background like half the image has, but I'll get there (hopefully I'll get a scanner for smaller pieces and just make it easier on myself).

I started with a sketch (first in blue pencil, then regular pencil, and then I transferred to the bristol using a lightbox and blue pencil).
Here is the sketch I worked from: cfgriffith.deviantart.com/art/…

I don't know if I will color this piece eventually, or just leave it as-is.

Visit the Gloin I was talking about here: www.facebook.com/gloin.groinul

Edited 9/25/13: Tried taking a better photograph, although there are still some lighting issues.

Edited 7/17/14: Replaced old photograph with a new scan.