Archive for the ‘Drawing’ Category

Sketchbook: No Direction

Tuesday, September 25th, 2012
Sketch Study of Woman in perspective

Sketch of Woman in perspective

Direction is a strange thing.

Sometimes it’s there, and sometimes it’s not.

Lately, it’s been… not.

Usually I have the opposite problem: all direction, no time or energy. I still have no time, but I’ve had the energy, and I’ve been trying to figure out how to apply it.

When I start work on a new woodblock print, I know what the image is going to be. I always know before I even start drafting the image what it is going to be. My preparatory sketches are a chance to work out the details, but the main idea is there when I begin.

The imagery isn’t floating around my brain right now though. I’ve got the energy to carve up some blocks, but the usual imagery isn’t floating around up in my head.

When I get like this, the answer is just to start drawing. The image at the right is a little sketch to try to work out a seed of an idea. There might be a tree that can grow out of that seed eventually, but not now. I drew it to see if there was something in that image that felt right to me, something I would want to make a finished piece with.

There wasn’t.

Below is a sheet from my sketch pad that is just a smattering of ideas on the same page. Nothing significant, just a few ideas to see if there is some imagery hidden in one of those ideas that I can extract for a print.

Sketchbook page

Depicting the regression to jets.

There was nothing there.

I’ve learned that when I regress to drawing jets, that the imagery I’m working with isn’t going anywhere.

Nothing wrong with jets, they just don’t sop up my creative juices in the way I am looking for.

Also, when I say “there’s nothing there”, what I mean is that the images in the sketches don’t hold any emotional resonance for me. They don’t make me feel anything, other than “that might be interesting”. To me, if “interesting” is the only emotion that an image evokes, that image is not good enough.

So, I go to an old stand by, I draw myself.

sketch of myself on a couch

Yours truly on a couch

This is a nice little pencil study, but there isn’t any juice in this. It may look ok, but there isn’t anything in this image that makes it interesting, or provides a vehicle for meaning.

This is gonna need more work. What do I do?

Actually, I do know what to do. This “woe is me, I am without direction” post is just a set up. I know exactly what to do, and I’ll let you know, just as soon as it’s done.

The Working Dead

Thursday, April 19th, 2012

It might be a bit telling that during a conference call yesterday, I doodled this in my daily planner.

The Working Dead Ink Drawing

The Working Dead Ink Drawing

During the meeting I did a quick pencil doodle, and inked it in during my lunch break.

Let’s back up.

Yesterday morning, my alarm went off at 6:30 am, like it always does. In my haze of half-sleep, my first thought was, “why is my alarm going off on Saturday?”

When I realized it was only Wednesday morning, I thought something might be a bit off. I’m been pretty burnt out with the Day Job, and realized I needed a few days away. I looked at my schedule, and realized I could take a couple days off, and so here I am, resting up, and having a “mental health” day, as my Dad would say.

Also gives me time to post again here, and work on a “proof of concept” for an idea I’ve had brewing.

Oh, hey! Now things are looking up!

Drawing the Sierras

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

I went on a big old long backpacking trip for a week.

I managed to carry a pad of paper and pencils along with me, in addition to clothes, food, sleeping bag and tent (and various other required sundries).

We were in the Eastern Sierra.

I decided to steal an idea from my dad, and combine my notes and my drawings into a single page.

It turns out that most days, I was pretty beat after a day of hiking, and didn’t have a ton of time or energy for much other than setting up camp, getting fed, and falling asleep.

I did get a couple days of drawing in. This first is from the first night:

Big McGee Lake Pencil Drawing

Big McGee Lake Pencil Drawing

This second is after a couple days of hiking, we had a short day climbing up into Pioneer Basin:

Pioneer Basin Upper Lake Pencil Drawing

Pioneer Basin Upper Lake Pencil Drawing

Woman And Circles

Monday, August 1st, 2011

I was at San Diego Comic-Con last week, and it got the illustration juices flowing again.

One of the best parts about Comic-Con for me is being able to talk to the creators about their work, their process, etc.

Whipped this out yesterday.

Woman and Circles

Woman and Circles

I picked up some colored pens at San Diego Comic-Con last week, this is my first time putting them through the ringer.

I’m messing around with using the pens for the drawing outline, and the colored pencils for the color.

Five Facts

Tuesday, April 19th, 2011
Watercolor Pencil Pear Drawing

Watercolor Pencil Drawing of a habit-forming Pear. Click on the image to see the bigger, better version.

  • A pear and yogurt is the best breakfast that an artist can eat. Eat this daily, and it will increase your energy, motivation, and creativity. The yogurt must be plain, unsweetened, and unflavored.
  • I am both untrained and unpracticed in any medium resembling watercolors. They are unwieldy and unpredictable (at least with my current abilities of prediction)
  • You must click on the image above to enlarge it to see the more interesting details about this drawing of mine. The texture of the paper, blending of the water colors, and way the pencil fell on the paper are more interesting than the image taken as a whole. This image is better enjoyed sliced into pieces, just as pears are better enjoyed cut into slices.
  • Humans are creatures of habit. The best way for a person to change their life is to change their habits.
  • Pears can be habit forming. And life changing. To the extent pears can change lives, that is.

Dispatch: Death to the Unregistered

Friday, April 15th, 2011
PE Warrior

He signs his stamp... in BLOOD

I design things that get built.

Buildings. Pipes. Stuff like that.

I have a stamp, a special stamp, that shows I am licensed to do just this. All Engineer’s in my industry need to get this stamp.

There are many like it, but this one is mine.

This is all a matter of public record, and in fact, that is the point. I took a test (a rather difficult test, mind you), and my performance indicated to the great State of California that I can indeed design things, and that it is ok for people to build the things I design. I know enough that it probably won’t break.

So… I stamp my, uh, stamp on drawings when they are all done, just before they are sent out to a bunch of Contractors, who will all bid for the privilege of building the things I design.

Somehow, with all this jumbling in my head, I ended up drawing this little guy, fully licensed to engineer mayhem.

Engineer's Stamp

His stamp is cooler than mine, he is registered under the “Warrior” discipline, while I am registered under the “Mechanical” discipline. He seems to be registered in the State of Despair, while I am registered in the State of California.

In reality, there are no swords involved with my job, and would probably get fired if I tried to involve them in some way. Or at least, I’d get a stern warning, like when I showed up to work with a green Mohawk (it was Halloween). A sword, like my Mohawk, wouldn’t be welcome back in the office the next Monday.

Regardless, I have this doodle, which I painstakingly posted here for you to peruse.

Also, it is nice to know, in this day of electronic this and that, that my stamp is actually still an honest-to-goodness press-it-against-an-inkpad-then-press-it-against-paper stamp, like back in the good old days.

Christmas Happens

Saturday, December 25th, 2010
Pencil Drawing Christmas Tree

Merry Christmas with graphite and color

Merry Christmas.

Certainly this is the time of year that only comes once a year.

I’m down at my folks house for Christmas, and as visions of sugar plums dance in my head, and my parents bicker about how to do the dishes, I took some of the new Graphitint Pencils out for a spin.

I like ’em. Kind of halfway between graphite and colored pencils. A miracle of modern art technology.

There’s definitely a learning curve to using them, I can’t use them quite like pencil, can’t use them quite like colored pencil. A nice addition to the arsenal.

So here’s a Christmas tree. Or a drawing of one, or whatever.

My nephews are here now, hopped up on good cheer, and the fact that they got tons of presents. Time to go hang with the family.

Merry Christmas to you and yours!

When the Going Gets Tough

Monday, December 20th, 2010

The tough doodle in lunchtime meetings.

Engineer looking at BIM model

The future is now

Today’s meeting was about Building Information Management (BIM) software. It is the hip new thing to do in the engineering design profession.

BIM is a digital “smart” model of a building. The walls act like walls in the model, the lights act like lights, plumbing acts like plumbing, and all this info can be used to see how the building works. It’s a lot like when Tony Stark uses his neat 3-D computer to design his new Iron Man suit, except it’s not nearly as cool, there are no special effects, and we’re not billionaires.

The industry seems to be both awestruck and frightened at the amazing power of BIM. Some people think it will be amazing, some people are hesitant of the added liability and the increase of the adversarial relationship with contractors that BIM will create, and others think it is kind of silly to spend a lot of time building a 3-D model of something to then create a bunch of 2-D drawings of that thing. No matter what, it’s coming, whether we like it or not.

So my little doodle is Mr. Engineer with his building model. Here are a few things to think about as you ponder this drawing:

  • Note the look of shock and awe on his face as he gazes on his building model!
  • The building model is blue, and since we know from Tron that blue computer constructs are good, and red computer constructs are bad, this model must be good.
  • Boring haircut and pleated pants. Engineers are a pretty square lot with no fashion sense, after all. He might make a good husband though! (meme credit Dave)

When you doodle a goofy little drawing in a sketch pad all through the meeting, everyone wants to see what you drew when the meeting ends. That totally doesn’t add any pressure to make my doodles of the highest quality, or wonder how people will judge me and my art.

The mines have had precedence the last several months. Time to dust off the chops, or whatever.

Hansi’s Hallucinations Abound

Tuesday, November 30th, 2010

So… I set my Dad up with a shiny new blog over Thanksgiving, where he can share his strange thoughts and stranger drawings.

Go read Hansi’s Hallucinations to get an earful (eyefull?) of it all.

It is le amazing

Why, yes, I have been hiding from the internet under a rock

Thursday, August 12th, 2010

 

 

 

hiding under rock drawing

The internet is rather tricky