Learning to draw

[Aquaticdog]

It's been a while since I've checked your sketchbook, and I gotta say you've improved a lot! Please keep it up : )

[lionheartGFX]

haha im on the same page as you hahaha taking all the emotion and putting it somewhere else so i dont break down while i draw, keep the awesome stuff coming expermient with the figure, try to push things further, keep rocking!

[krysjez]

It's been a while since I've checked your sketchbook, and I gotta say you've improved a lot! Please keep it up : )

I'm glad you're back.

haha im on the same page as you hahaha taking all the emotion and putting it somewhere else so i dont break down while i draw, keep the awesome stuff coming expermient with the figure, try to push things further, keep rocking!

I tend to only draw after the breakdown, because by the time I realize it's happening I'm too busy anticipating it, and during...well. Here's one from today. I didn't have a breakdown, but I was unhappy, and going for a walk didn't help too much. Eye and part of the nose on this one from imagination, the rest from a little mirror I have on my table.


I got photos, however. I'm finding that I turn to taking photos as a way to make pretty things when I'm too fatigued (or simply not in the mood - happens very often nowadays ) to draw.



I've also found that drawing on the computer is much easier to do when I'm low on energy, perhaps because my computer is always in front of me anyway. And because I can undo etc. and erase things easily. But I'm afraid I'll forget how to draw traditionally. I already can't draw anything below the hips on a human figure without reference.

Went sketching yesterday afternoon.




My friend took a stalker photo of me.


More pics from a trip to the Yale Center for British art in a bit.

[krysjez]

Pics from the YCBA still in a bit...
Meanwhile,

Finally continuing my comic. 8 and 9 will be up a couple hours after I get access to a scanner! (when I get access to a scanner, however, is a question that remains to be answered. I'm trying to use a carefully taken photograph as a substitute for now, because I really want to color 8.)

[krysjez]

[krysjez]

I did one of these things hoping it would be inspirational to myself, but to be honest, the lack of improvement since 2008 is disturbing and altogether quite depressing. This is what I refer to when I talk about my 5-year-long art block. Those watercolor plants look literally exactly the same as they would if I painted them today, almost 5 years later.
But lol old art (see: 2006)

[Black Spot]

Cut out the middle years and then put them together. There is a big difference. Also, you have an excellent eye in photography, bring that more into your art.

I hop things are okay with your ex. What I said to my eldest son - 'You're very young. Don't get pushed into a corner, just because.'

[krysjez]

Cut out the middle years and then put them together. There is a big difference. Also, you have an excellent eye in photography, bring that more into your art.
I hop things are okay with your ex. What I said to my eldest son - 'You're very young. Don't get pushed into a corner, just because.'

Thank you Black Spot. I always appreciate your comments. It's nice to have an older (in the best way possible) perspective on things.
About the photography - my mind is quite cinematic actually. My imagination tends to work in scenes I've tried a couple of times to approach drawing in the manner of finding a shot when taking photos, and it kind of works in my mind, but once I try to translate to paper I just can't do it.
Thanks also, Xeon, for dropping by.
===
And so somehow there is now one week left to school: I am two days away from reaching my current mini-goal of staying generally decent and emotionally/mentally resilient for a fortnight. Drawing helps
===
Here's a new pic I'm hopeful about - it lost something going from sketch to lines though, and is currently very different from the original color scheme I had in my head. It's tougher than I thought to figure out how to add shadows and light while keeping the same palette and high-keyness you originally envisioned. Ah, high-key is a good word - for some reason relating to photography (the original context in which I encountered the word) makes it easier to visualize how that works with shadows.


9 of the comic.



A little thing.

[Beartankmaster]

you've improved so much it's inspiring to see. good job =D

[Black Spot]

Been there, bought the t-shirt. Nice comic. Keep plugging away.

[krysjez]

Thanks to both. Black Spot's comments are always fun to read.
===
Classes this semester:
1. Data structures and programming techniques (killer)
2. Multivariable calculus (eep - I'm bad at math)
3. Rather Advanced Chinese (course number wouldn't make sense to anyone here)
4. Basic drawing
5. Animal communication vs. human language

I'm screwed.
===
The uni bookstore doesn't wrap books, so I've very recently taken to using it as a library when I need to relax. I found a book on animals (http://www.amazon.com/Force-Drawing-.../dp/0240814355), took notes, then tried out a few drawings when I got home (from photos):

I wasn't able to find a good balance between focusing on the line of action and keeping the proportions accurate, though.

Doodle while watching the new Who companion traipse around with evil snowmen:


Had to buy new art materials for the drawing class. Stupidly expensive, as art materials tend to be. But now I have Conte crayon sticks.
(from photo)

[krysjez]

doodle

[krysjez]

I bought a two-pound block of Roma plastalina from the art supply store here. They were also charging $23 for a 60-sheet pad of low-quality cartridge paper. Outrageous.

[krysjez]

Here's a new pic. Took this a while back.

[krysjez]

Snowpocalypse!

I'm in Basic Drawing this term with a pretty chill instructor. He's definitely not the one who assigns the least work, but far from the most intense in the department, so this is my relaxing class to balance out the stress of desperately posting on all my social networks "my code doesn't work!!!!!" at 1.55am on Friday mornings (code for CS is due at 2am). And multivariable calculus. I don't understand what a partial derivative is, ugh...

Drawings from class so far, in roughly chronological order:
First drawing - instruction was "draw this still life however you want; we want to see how you draw naturally". Actually just an excuse because the instructor was away at grad school admissions and the TA had to keep us occupied for two hours.

I got called out on the following one for using little sketchy wavering lines (not confident) and the instructor showed me a different way of holding my charcoal that helped a lot - basically, press the long side of the whole stick to the paper, and drag. I did a lot of measuring on this one, the one-eye-closed kind.

This is from last Monday - instructor told me "your measuring's really good and much better than before today"...except I didn't measure anything, just made corrections until things looked right. Usually my first guess is a lot more accurate than if I measure - I wonder why that is! I often find myself measuring something, and then following the measurements accurately, and it doesn't look right - and when I don't measure and draw something with the "wrong" proportions it looks accurate.

HomeworK: still life in conte crayon from 3 angles.


Tried painting from life yesterday during the blizzard - how do I paint, ugh. My drawing wasn't accurate, and I just don't know how to loosen up and not have a fill-in-the-blanks mentality with paint.


Regular sketchbook stuff.


Lastly, here's my window. The snow is already at about 75% of its height as of this morning.

And check out this insane giant igloo people made in one of the colleges' courtyards. That's me, 170cm, for scale at the side, and I'm already standing fairly close to the camera. The inside reeked of marijuana, so I ducked out after a few minutes.

[lionheartGFX]

wow amazing sketchbook specially the latest pages you are having fun with it and mixing it up, i totally get the feeling of the latest comic i dont know how to approach people at all, specially the ones im interested with xDD either way keep it up im subscribed! its very enjoyable to see your work grow!

[krysjez]

First assignment from Basic Drawing that I forgot to post before:

And a more recent 180cm tall drawing I did over around 2 class sessions last week.

One of the other sections (=versions) of this class started drawing figures on the second lesson and they've had a model come in every session since. Envious. But I suppose being forced to draw really boring subjects and slowly work through incredibly boring exercises on negative space and figure-ground relationships will be good for rooting my understanding of drawing.


I drew a quick and sloppy thing for Valentine's Day. Although I like that my observation work seems to be getting better, my stuff from imagination is really unsatisfactory. I still don't understand how to link observation to imagination-??

[Velocity Kendall]

love the comic.
and the igloo and the malbuttoned shirt.

[krysjez]

Thanks, VK.
===
Had a rough night this morning - cried till dawn, then fitful sleep after. The day has been pretty unproductive so far. But I just drew a little bit, getting started on a sketch for something a classmate requested. Now it's time to write a short essay about vocal learning! At least that will be interesting
===
I'm quite happy with/proud of this, except her face is very flat and I still haven't really figured out how to make cartoony faces less flat:

Next page of comic:

[Black Spot]

Good work on the ellipses and nice still lives. Keep on trucking - you're on the right road

[krysjez]

From class today.

I have some self-portraits to post but I'll do it when I'm more awake.

[krysjez]

Unfinished from yesterday. I'm really bad at proportions when I don't have concrete features set down - the washes make her far too tall and stretched-out. But I'm going to finish this anyway because I kind of like it:

[diamandis]

Yale, huh? Schmancy. The above thing is from reference, right? It looks fine to me. I like it too. The messenger / Google comic farther up is great.

[krysjez]

Thanks! I have a few more sad comics floating around as pictures in my head (some of them are quite pretty too), but I know that if I draw them I will most likely get sad and heartbroken again - the subject has been on my mind quite a lot again lately. Had I known how hard I'd fall I would have just stayed way clear of a relationship...ah well. And also just that I always have pretty clear pictures and moods in my head, but I can't manage to express them when I actually draw them out, so the same thing might happen.

Pictures:

1. Comic




2. Not sure if I posted this before but slightly out-of-date progress pic on the pic that refuses to be finished:


3. This isn't visual art at all, but some poetry I wrote maybe a month? ago that I still quite like. It's supposed to be in three parts, kind of - there must be a technical term for that, but I know nothing about literature:






4. WIPs
idea I'm not sure how to execute (ok, actually, I know how - reference!!!)

picture that I'm drawing as a gift for a graduating senior

this one has gone untouched for over a month...I gotta finish it up


5. Doodles
from life 2 days ago - started raining before I could finish



I also tossed a bunch of drawings from art class this semester (got an A- because I wasn't edgy enough for the teacher or something) into the recycling, but I have pictures on my camera.