Rumpelstiltskin

Inspired by Peter de Sève. Suddenly trying to figure out why I wasn't inspired by Peter de Sève more often.

So much for commitment!

I just can't stay off of my own @#$%& blog!

Anyway, you can't say I didn't try to turn over a new leaf. Presumably I'll bounce between websites.

What Price, Bloggership?

It's happening again...I wanna move.

My amount of readers, let alone co-conspirators, and completed drawings doesn't justify my stay on Blogger. Plus, even a pretentious gasbag such as yours truly gets tired of espousing wishy-washy drawing philosophy when he should just be drawing instead.

Is this the end? Probably not. But here are some "parting gifts" regardless -- reckless, slightly modern, and eagerly awaiting the future.

I Got, Got, Got, Got No Time...

With a tired body and mountains of homework threatening to bury me, I retreated into a nap for an hour and a half. I was determined to return with a vengeance but decided to check my Blogger account first.

D'OH!

At least I have stuff to share, although I barely have time to create. I've been scanning recent creations like a madman, building up an archive in case all the other, better artwork in the world is destroyed (see 2012 -- or perhaps don't) and the aliens that discover our remains have to settle for my crap. How noble of me! Besides, if that doesn't get me, the oncoming extinction of the sweet banana will.

The leftmost drawing of this chic chick was done with a nib pen and colored in PS afterwards. Regarding nib pens, I've done a bunch of Steadmanesque pieces for my Character Design class that I'm dying to show you all, but one of them needs a slight adjustment before it's worth putting up. Another one needs a dramatic overhaul, which the other classes make difficult. Neither can be done tonight.

He's a stoner and he'll never be any good. Not that those are mutually exclusive, mind -- Stanley Kubrick was clearly high as a kite when he made 2001.

Most of these sketches are coming off of my current scribble phase. As I've said before, I'm constantly reevaluating why my art lacks and what I can do to fix it. There are a couple of soft-spoken guys at school who intimidate me with their funny drawings and extreme pose quality, which has ultimately compelled me to improve. My most recent solution is, rather than lightening my heavy hand, feeling through the forms at high velocity. Pens are great for this, but it only works when I really think about it. Otherwise I just make a hairy jumble of lines over flat shapes, and... well, screw that.

Revision for the "mod dog" I posted pics of a while back. The pose was nice and loose, so I took tracing paper and a Col-Erase to it. The scanner gave me hell for it, of course, so I settled on having some visual ambience (meaning urban grime) surround her.

I posted her already, but now she's in color, thanks to the Fake Marker Tool in Sketchbook Pro. Booyah!

Or just bewilderment?

By the way, there are three cigarettes in this post, and one of them is stuffed with pot. I guess we're rated R now.

In a future post: The morbidly intriguing, sometimes well-drawn dissolution of my long-running creative slump.

He's no Jesus, he's no Elvis...

Behold the Incubus.

I designed this lusty lump of lard for a project currently being developed by John J. Perez, doing multiple passes to increase the size of his wings. Watch them magically grow!

At the Zoo

Today we draw from the cartoon animal kingdom!

Except what the heck are these things?

That one is about a month old. Poor dog's got no self-control.

I can't help giggling at this one. He's just so happy, he triggers it.

Outfit on the right courtesy of Annie Hall.

One of these days, I'm going to bring more of these kinds of drawings to a finish, and color them with a little more zestiness than the ol' Photoshop wash. But not now. In the immediate now, it's really late. In the general now, school keeps me busy enough.

Hope these look good, anyway.

A Sprinkling of Girls

Q: How do I juggle a buttload of animation classes, draw for pleasure, and maintain a blog all at once?

A: I don't.

This was a pic I did last week, drawn from the typically nonsensical title of a glam-era Brian Eno song.

Bursts of inspiration like that are rare. More than that, though, the poses for drawings with less inspired subject matter just aren't that good. I've had a billion theories about why I draw better or worse at any given time, but these theories evaporate once I try and fail to push myself in the opposite direction. Yet here comes another!

It occurred to me last night that my desire to embrace simple shapes and flat design earlier in the year had come before I even knew what I was doing with fuller, rounder forms. If this was true (and I'm sure a lot more than that is true), it was gimping the fun in my drawings.

If you think that's fun, compare it to the one below.

I ogled the work of Kyle A. Carrozza (alias TV's Kyle) for at least an hour and a half before his gorgeous brand of exaggeration was effectively embedded in my head. Then I drew that picture and the next several. Even his relatively flat stuff is loaded with form and consistency of form. Obviously, he knows what he's doing and I would do well to learn from him.

Unfortunately, I still don't know how to block in drawings quickly and simply, like Kyle's blog shows he can. Once my "soft" lines are down, they're hard enough that the more tied-down lines have to be etched in ludicrously hard to stand out. From there, I unconsciously barrel into Cleanupville before the whole pose is even laid out. I've had enough training that I can spot really bad drawings and fix them, but it takes so much time it's not worth it. Anyway, I'm sure I'll look at these drawings next year and think they're atrocious.

I've drawn this Anita/Perdita-type character at her typewriter before, but this pic's better. Trust me. Unless you get some momentum through your pencil, your drawings of timid characters will just look like timid drawings.

Just adorable, dammit. This was done while I was still exercising some control over the weight of my hand, so it came out quickly.

More soon!