#5 The sky has a zipper!

Have you ever wondered what is in the sky? What if there is another world behind the endless sky? Imagine if the sky has a zipper that you could open and close. Would the zipper be a perfect place to hide the world’s most treasured belongings? If you could get the treasure chest, where would you be standing on? Would you stand on the tallest roof in the world? Would you have a ladder to climb? Would you stand on different animals to reach the hiding spot in the sky?

I love cats and they are fairly easy to draw. In my drawing, three cats saw a small hole that looked like a zipper in the middle of the sky. They were curious but did not have a ladder so they stacked themselves up to pull the zipper. Guess what they found??? Inside the zipper is a precious treasure chest!

Follow the steps to create your own treasure hideout:

#1.       Start in the middle of a 9 x 12 inches paper and we will draw our first animal. Please draw the animal as big as an egg. We do not want to draw too small and the paper will look empty. You can imagine the animal in the middle usually have a grumpy face because he is sandwiched between and is telling the top animal to hurry up. Add speech bubble if you like!

#2.       Now draw the top and bottom animal. Watch for proportions. If the animal is small, make the animal much smaller. If it’s a big animal, use more space to draw THAT animal. I recommend my students to draw directly with black color pencil to avoid retracing everything again. Take your time to draw the furs and details like having a bag to put all the treasures. Where else would you put the treasures? Animals do not have pockets so what could they use to store something important?

#3.       Once you have all the animals drawn out. You can draw lines for the roof. Leave some part of the roof blank if you want to add other animals on the roof. I drew another cat sipping on his water like he was watching a show. Don’t forget to add shadows on the animals under their feet and tail. I add shadows on two cats. The cat sitting on the roof and the cat standing on the roof.

#4.       Finish the roof with some simple lines for roof tiles and add a window. The blue lines suggest glares from lights. You can also add more things inside the window to make the drawing even more interesting. Maybe a police man is inside the window looking at the three cats in amazement. Color the roof partially in gradient style to save time.

#5.       Use a gray marker to draw the zipper in the sky. Find the mid-point of the zipper puller near the tallest animal. Draw the zipper puller and then draw lines under the puller in a straight line. I purposedly drew the lines smaller at the bottom to look like it’s fading off. The part above the puller is separated into two directions like a V. You can then draw anything you want inside the zipper world. I have a golden treasure chest with a lock and fancy decorations. What would you hope to see inside the zipper? A fairy tale castle? A golden trophy? Or a gateway to another world like Mars.

#5.       Lastly, use blue color pencil and color the whole sky blue. Use the gradient method to color the top sky blue and then slowly softening the blue stokes downward. Add another layer of darker gray on top of the sky to give a gloomy gradient look. The dark sky can contrast with the light world from the zipper making the whole drawing more interesting.

#6.       There you have it! This is what my drawing look like! Share your artwork with me, I would love to see what animals you drew and what did you have in the zipper! Many of the students have the most amazing ideas I did not have. I look forward to seeing more creativities!

Print the file below for reference! Click onto the top right corner to print.