Productive Day!

I thought I was behind all day today. Then I realized how late it was so I started scanning the work I'd done, and well it turns out I drew a lot. Moving on to the the more animation side of my Preston Blair Study. Today was line of action in a sequence. Time permitting I'll turn these images into an animated gif tomorrow.

I'm still not sure where I want to go with that Minithology idea I had. So I thought I'd draw a Pegasus, that soon turned into this.



Some weird Dr. Seuss like tentacle.


Claude and his turtle in an epic game of tug of war.



Gilligan preping for a party.



Tried out that exercise where you draw a random shape and turn it into something. Ended up doing a Robin Hood and Friar Tuck image.


When I was little I had a fascination with drawing Abraham Lincoln Beards and Hats on everything. So I'm working on a new character the Mustache Bandit. Who basically draws mustaches on everything and everyone.



Watched a bit of Pen and Teller's Bullshit with Rhys this evening and thought I'd try to be productive while I watched.



A couple other people who were on the show.


A distant cousin to both Totoro and Snorlax.


Picked up the Art of Miyazaki's Spirited Away. I could just stare at each page for hours. He has such a simple fluid style. I just love it. I've got to learn to watercolor some day.

iDaily

Time sure does fly when you're having fun, drawing that is. Tried out a few different things tonight. Just to spice it up. Still did a little Preston Blair study. The cat on the right feels more like a John K style than Preston Blair though.

MiniAthena is the last of the big Greek gods. Now I have to decide where I want to go from here.



Claude and his turtle up to their usual antics.


I needed a new wallpaper for my Ipod and my Droid, I also needed a new daily Gilligan drawing.



Ipod Wallpaper


Droid Wallpaper


Since I was on an update kick I figured I'd update my Twitter page too, and I wanted to work with some colored pencils.



Everyday since March 16th, save for the Double post day, I've updated my drawing blog. The main reason I do this, besides that it's great to have the accountability and I'd be drawing anyways, is because I love it when the sites I visit are updated daily. Sure there's Twitter and Facebook, but I also check Cartoon Brew, Michael Sporn Animation, and the John K Stuff site daily. Lucky for me they are almost always updated every 24 hours. So I'll continue to do so in that same fashion too. Thanks for the inspiration!

30hrs a day would be great

Time and speed, two things that I need more of. Spent some extra time really working out my rough sketches before I re-penciled them. That seemed to help out a lot in the end. I noticed yesterday I was having a tough time when I left too much open on my rough sketches. Still enjoying Preston Blair's over the top flair. Wish I had more time to work on my study, but on the upside I have a few days off this week. Which hopefully means more time to draw and time to work on my application for Animation Mentor.

I had no idea where I was gonna go with MiniArtemis, so I went with a harder action perspective that I haven't mastered quite yet. The head on action shot with hands out front, and in this case using a bow. I had to google some reference archery shots to get some of the angles and perspectives. That helped out a lot.



I was up last night until about 5am and then had to work in the morning so I was pretty sleepy. I was trying to think of what to do for today's Claude and his turtle sketch and this one just rolled out of my fingers.



I'm finally at the point where I have to think for a little bit about what I have and haven't done yet with Gilligan so tonight he's practicing being good.



I've listened to a lot of Art and Story Extreme in the last few days. Which is a great podcast. It blends comedy, personality, real life and art into a really enjoyable ~30 mins. They've been talking a lot about social media and where art and it's relationship with the internet are headed. Definitely worth listening to if you aren't already subscribed to their podcast. One of the guests they have on the show quite often is Kim Holm who is hilarious. He recently came up with this new idea of integrating Twitter into a choose your own adventure style illustrated web comic. Ever week or so he basically draws whatever story arc someone tweeted to him. With stuff like this happening and the onslaught of Twitter and Facebook and how much free art is available online I can't wait to see where the industry is gonna end up.

"It ain't easy."

Today's lesson: don't let your guard down. I just crunched one of my drawings while trying to scan it in, Oye! I think it's still salvageable though. Found myself being too much of a perfectionist. I think it slowed me down a bit tonight, but I like what I worked on. I have to remember to keep focused on the whole drawing and gesture I want to portray rather than just one nit picky area. I know I've said something similar to this before, but I find it keeps ringing true.

Claude and his turtle doing the happy dance!

Gilligan and the Wizard of Oz.


I've been putting off coming up with Minithology's Apollo. For some reason this drawing was intimidating me. So I decided Apollo needed to be a Rock Star. That's right, he has a Sun Guitar.


On the heels of what I started talking about earlier, remembering to focus on the whole drawing not just all the little details. Chapter 34 of Walt Stanchfield's Drawn to Life Vol1 really explains this idea in detail. To paraphrase one of his points, picture yourself drawing a circle. You don't focus on every little section of the circle. You imagine the circle you want and you just draw it. This chapter also has possibly one of my favorite quotes from an artist that I've heard to date. It's from one of the most amazing animators in history Ollie Johnston. It's concise, simple and to the point. When talking about drawing he said, "It ain't easy." What a motivation. If a master of his art says it ain't easy, then I'd better keep on drawing.

Too sleepy!

I didn't get started till too late tonight. Hence work is gonna be fun tomorrow, but it's worth it! I really feel motivated and excited about drawing. I hope it shows through in the work I've been doing. Worked on a bit of "Line of Action" for my nightly (which lately is turning into early morning) Preston Blair study. Line of Action is basically keeping motions fluid and their corresponding reactions consistent.

Claude and his turtle getting to do what I should have done 5 hours ago.


Gilligan the Giraffe's day at the beach.


MiniDemeter ~ the thought behind Demeter was a bit of hippy mixed with a portion of trailer park wife (no offense intended).


Lastly here's another fun little concept image from my secret project.

While at the library earlier in the week I was browsing the over-sized book section and came across something I hadn't thought about in years, Babar. Babar the elephant was one of my favorite childhood characters. The illustrations were so simplistic yet elegant. I always loved the colors and the vibrancy of the drawings. I can't wait to spend an afternoon soaking up the Art of Babar.

Distraction 5555

Too easily distracted tonight. I still got a decent amount done, but not in any sort of timely fashion. Today was the last part of my Preston Blair young heroine study. Not a lot of facial work, but tried out some angles that I don't think I've done in the past. Feet and lips seemed to be my area of struggle tonight. I'm happy to be starting part 2 of Preston Blair's Cartoon Animation book tomorrow, the focus is on character movement! It should be a fun learning experience.

Gilligan needed to dance tonight.


Claude and his turtle on the run.


Hephaestus is an interesting character. After doing a little bit of research on him I came up with a mix of Al Borland, Billy Mays, and real Greek mythology.



I was thinking about these "two girls I know" who love Xmen. So I thought they would make great Superheroines themselves.


Rhys rented Interstella 5555 a while back and I didn't think much of it. After she had it on for about three minutes the music really caught my attention. The movie is basically an animated version of a Daft Punk album. The music is so catchy and Leiji-Matsumoto's outerspace rock band characters are instantly lovable. If you've ever got an afternoon to kill do yourself a favor and Netflix it.

Back Online!

Sorry for not getting out an update last night. Spent most of yesterday and a chunk of today getting my internet working again. So tonight is the first ever DOUBLE POST! Still not getting as much time to work on my Preston Blair study as I'd like. I just adore his style. I have to remember to stay on model. Keeping proportions equal, new angles for hands, and maintaining consistent perspectives were my tough spots on these ones.

Gilligan rub a dub dubbing and preparing for Toy Story 3!

Claude and his turtle goofing off.



I've gotten through all the Greek gods that I know a significant amount about. So I'm having to do a bit of research each day for Minithology. Tonight's cast members are Hestia and Dionysus.



The night before last I watched part of Fantasia 2000! Wow what a great movie. The animation is just captivating. Anyways, I was thinking about the Sorcerer's Apprentice skit and the Drunk Bumble Bee animation short (I'll have to find a link for this one), while sitting on the phone waiting for my ISP to figure out what was going on, so sketched this little apprentice riding a bumble bee.



Working on a project that I can't really say to much about right now, but I like this character design concept I came up with for it.



I mentioned Fantasia 2000 a little bit earlier and while I'm only half way through it, I love what I've watched so far. The whales flying in the air scene was beautiful, but what really caught my attention was Rhapsody in Blue. Simply breathtaking. I've talked about how I love Hirschfeld before, but I never knew this existed until now. He creates such great characters and each one has so much personality and life. I'd love to be able to draw like him. Just keep practicing.

Which brings me to today's inspiration. I caught the tail end of Chris Oatley's Artcast on Ustream tonight. It was great. Toward the end of the show they asked for questions and they actually used my question to wrap up the evening. I asked, "What advice do you have for artists just starting out?". The panel he had on said some great things. I'll try to recap what they said. Find your passion. Just keep drawing, learning, looking, and researching. Be open to criticism. Keep good connections with your friends and colleagues, and surround yourself with artists that are better and worse than you. So that you can learn from their experiences and knowledge and share it with others. Thanks for the great tips!