How to draw CHECKMATE

An even dozen!

Checkmate is NY CZT Jody Genovese’s twelfth tangle on the site, most recently we explored her Klomp and Wink tangles.

Checkmate is decidedly easier to tangle as it doesn’t need quite the same focus. And I think it’s a great example of Zentangle®’s Romanancy technique with a 3D look to it.

Jody writes,

I was working on something completely unrelated in my journal, or maybe I was watching TV, I can’t even remember now, when I saw this idea in my head again. I thought I would jot it down and see how it looked. It’s really easy and a great filler.

I’m calling it Checkmate because the main character is a wonky checkmark and as you continue to add the random columns they become the mates.

In my 3Z tile I started in the middle and worked right and then turned the tile upside down to finish with the brown pen. This gave it a neat look I thought.

The idea is to do the checkmark in one stroke rather than two.

The only thing “complicated” about Checkmate is focusing on keeping your “checkmarks” evenly spaced as Jody’s fine examples show. Among Checkmate‘s kissing cousins are Jem Miller’s Clob, and Suzanne McNeill’s Waves. Shading this one is an interesting aspect of the tangle that adds that final pop of dimension.

Jody illustrates the step-by-step instructions for drawing Checkmate below and demonstrates how cool it looks on her Zentangle tiles.

Image copyright the artist and used with permission, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please feel free to refer to the steps images to recreate this tangle in your personal Zentangles and ZIAs, or to link back to this page. However the artist and TanglePatterns.com reserve all rights to these images and they must not be publicly pinned, altered, reproduced or republished. They are for your personal offline reference only. Thank you for respecting these rights. For more information, click on the image for the article “Copyrights and your blog.”

As you enjoy any of the tangles on the site, please leave a comment of thanks and encouragement to show the artists you appreciate them for sharing their creativity to inspire yours. Your comment helps motivate them to continue to share!

Check out the tag jodyg for more of Jody’s tangles on TanglePatterns.com.

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Like some help with shading your Zentangles?

It's fun and easy — forget about traditional "art rules" for shading, this is Zentangle and those rules do not apply!

As we are coached in the chapter on Shading in the Zentangle PRIMER Vol 1, "Ignore the light source ... in Zentangle shading we do not consider the type or direction of the light source. ... More often, shading is a component of the tangle itself that we use to play with dimension, emphasis, and contrast."

Everything you need to know is here in two free tutorials on TanglePatterns.

1. TanglePatterns Shading Mini Clinic, Part 1 by CZT Marizaan van Beek, and
2. TanglePatterns Shading Mini Clinic, Part 2 by CZT Sandy Bartholomew

You can always locate these and many other helpful tutorials by visiting the TUTORIALS tab on the pink alphabetic tangle menu bar as shown here:

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