sketcheth book o learning 072410

[Eddieee]

Hell yeah! Great work sketcheth. That Beanstalk cover looks ILL! And Don't worry about getting too journaly with your posts. I like reading what you have to say too.

[GweNdZ]

Wah!! I'm back, I haven't been here in some time! Great studies! Great works! You still rock, man! Keep up the awesomeness

[LostFayth]

I never lost faith in ya. Even though I'm called something like that here on ca

The jack and the beanthingy piece really looks good. It has a nice composition in it. Triangle compositions always seem to attract a lot of attention. You combine it quick good with the dude in red (jack?)

Painting plein air is always fun, fun, fun. I'm glad it's spring again...So I'm going to do it more as well I can't wait to see a better picture of it

Keep pushing

[P]

weooooow that book cover, holy shit dude

[witcrack]

Good batch of sketches! And i really like the jack and the beanstalk piece, very fun to look at.

[sketcheth]

Eddieee: Thanks for the feedback, sir, I'm glad you liked Jack, I learned a lot with it.

the faythless one: Haha, too true. Thanks for the feedback on the composition, too, that stuff has been flooding my mind lately.

P: *high five*

witcrack: Then it's served it's purpose.
---
I had to relearn some lessons today.
-Contour line drawings from observation are hard.
-NEVER try to make anatomy studies from Rodin sculptures. No matter how sexy and alluring they are, they are such ridiculously manipulated figures. The man could probably have sculpted a sixth toe onto the feet of his figures and you wouldn't even notice. That said, I would recommend trying to draw from a Rodin sculpture, it instantly gives you an appreciation for the anatomical knowledge he must have had to be able to sculpt so gesturally and yet still convincingly.
-And lesson number three: pens are hard. Good challenge though. I found a micron laying around and I drew my hands. I'm going to make good use of this thing.

Finally, I'm considering making Sunday my day off...maybe just for this week because i have an obnoxious paper due. I don't want to feel as though I'm letting up already, but I do very much want to have time to focus on academics, because I think that kind of learning is important. No color today, sorry. Blah blah blah, the end goodnight.

[sketcheth]

Nothing much fancy for today, again, no color. Studying those legs. Drawing those hands. The imagination stuff is really freeing...wish I had more time to do it. This weekend will be crazy. I'm going to try to NOT have to take off Sunday, but if my paper requires it, then I must. Meh.

eth.

[Eddieee]

Those micron hands are killing it! Sweet imaginary stuff too. You're just kicking all kinds of ass man. And hey--daily updates!

[LostFayth]

Keep sketching dude Looking good.

Taking a day off is nothing bad. Just keep yourself busy with other useful (read: relaxing) stuff. Maybe a good movie or documentary could kill some time. If you're gonna watch a movie try to get your hands on The Secret of Kells. Wanna bet your pencils will reboot themselves and you'll be drawing?

[Giorge]

nice bunch of studies , like the linework hand study , even tough is a good exercise of confidence in drawing you have to make a way to transmit that in your imagination drawing, if that is what you are seeking .

Crazy bunch of characters, don't forget from time to time to do a character from that bunch ....

take care

[Jasper_]

Duude I've been a fan of your stuff for such a long time, it's great to see you back and posting consistently, really looking forward to what you come up with. Really dig the Jack and the Beanstalk cover, I've been meaning to do character and environment redesigns art center style on that fairy tale, just haven't found time. I love what you did with it though, keep going man!!

[sketcheth]

Serious thanks to all you guys for the feedback!
Ed: Thanks man! I'm gonna do my best to keep trending this way with the daily stuff.
LostFayth: Haha, I wish. Papers suck.
Giorge: Thank you much for the feedback, and I can't agree with you more. I really got to put some work into actually doing those guys justice. I'll make sure to do that some this week!
Jasper: Hey yeah! Definitely give that art center thing a try, you can get so much out of it. I did it once with a Grimm's fairy tale (unoriginal) but I learned a ton.
---
Ookay so I had to kinda cut my work a little short today. Just observation and imagination. I would've done some anatomy drawings but instead I just sat down and soaked in a bunch of rich information from reading Hale's writings. (Thanks Connor!)
Had to cut things a little short because I've been killing myself health wise with no sleep this week and I've got some paper writing that's gotta get done.
Hope you'll all forgive me. Don't expect a post tomorrow I guess, what with the paper and everything. But it's due on Monday so I'll be back strong then! Huzzah.

This is the beginning of a little oil sketch to get me over my fear of painting. Hahah. Crappy cell shot...meh. I'll get a decent camera eventually.

[Mat Kaminski]

Man, don't ever be afriad of this turning into a blog for you, isn't that kinda what sketchbooks are for?

Regardless, I'm really digging the anatomy studies lately, you have a ton more line confidence than I, that's for sure.

I hope to see more after your paper (trust me, focus on schooling first, this is where I'm lacking atm as well D: )

[cdejong]

I'm loving it all in here Eric, great stuff. The hands are killer, and the robot paintings are really cool, nice colors and compositions, you really are strong with that stuff.

I'm glad you got Hale's book, it's such an amazing book I'm going to read over some of it again tomorrow. It has a big reread value. Keep it going man, I joined you in daily updates today, so we'll keep working off of each other. Never stop! I'll ring you up tomorrow if you're not too busy, I'll leave gchat open while I'm doing studies so you can tell me if you're free. Take it easy man, sleep's important.

[sketcheth]

Mat: Well that's good to hear, sometimes I'd just really like to get a response on some of the things I've been thinking about.

Connor: Good to hear from ya, bro! I'm going to be commenting on your SB as soon as tomorrow is over, I promise, haha.
------
Sorry but this is all I got for today, working on a silly speedpainty poster for my illu. class. In progress...

[cdejong]

That poster looks really awesome man, honest. Only thing I could crit on is that the woman's face reminds me of your face. A lot of your painted faces look like your self portraits... that may just be a product of me staring at too many of your SPs though. Other than that I think it looks awesome, wonderful brushwork and colors and composition.

[sketcheth]

connor:I'm going to be doing some studies from Hale tomorrow methinks, since he's so great. Maybe hopefully some skeleton drawings as well. Thanks for the crit on teh illustration also, I'm not sure how much I changed it, but I think it helped.
----
Here's the "resolved" illustration. Some imagination sketches inspired by my roommate playing bioshock2. Aaaand some little 9"x5" oil landscape paintings I did. I should really photograph these rather than scan. Scans do funky things with impasto paint...

[Eddieee]

Damn man! That illo looks sick. I kinda like the text in the first one better though. It screams "FIGHT!" while the second version is just like "eh...fight." I think in a propoganda-ish piece like this it should be as in your face as possible. I prefer the Infection text in the second one though except it's at a tangent with the top of her head. It's okay to nudge it a little bit down even if it's sacrificing the clarity of a few letters. The words will still be understandable. Don't know if you look at fashion mags but sometimes on the covers, the chicks will cover (hehe pun...okay not funny) the title of the magazine. But it's perfectly okay since we know what the words are. Hope that makes sense. BLEH I rambled. That's why I don't like graphic design.

Fucking awesome oils and cool "Bioshock" sketches (though I think they're more of your own ). Looking forward to those Hale studies!

Okay bye!

[witcrack]

I like the second typo better. But i agree with eddie about the tangent, though.
Anyway, i like the whole updates. Keep it up, man!

[sketcheth]

Eddie: Wow, I hadn't really looked back at the previous version and I really see it now. It's that stupid horizon line, knocking it down to a straight horizontal was a real killer for the composition. Thanks for pointing that out! I felt like I was rushing the text and it just didn't fit no matter how I tried. I was also trying to fit it in a certain composition of 11"x17" and I think that was a very limiting idea. Thanks tons for the comment man, your insights are highly valued!

witcrack: Will do, thanks!
---
Aah not enough...this weekend threw me off so much. I'll get back on track.

[Leviathus]

Man.. I'm just loving your work! Very inspiring

[sketcheth]

Leviathus: Thank you much, sir!
---
Here's stuff...uhm. Lousy photos, I apologize. You'll notice I never posted the Hale studies. That's because that book had to go back to the library. My bad.

eth.

[Exon-Ion]

Your work's awesome dude, i really like the colours in those oil pieces in post 1068, you've done a good job of painting those vehicles.

[Jamie Romoser]

always inspiring everytime I drop by your sketchbook
keep up the hard work
till next time
-Jamie

[DHTenshi]

just 3 words: woot woot woot! (well, that's the same word three times... yeah)

-DHT

[sketcheth]

exon-oin: Thanks!

OmertA: Will do, I'll be swinging by yours real soon.

DHTenshi: haha, thanks man, I appreciate you stopping by again!
---

stuff. I'm trying to make these studies more sincere and put more effort into them. I tried tackling a photo reference today. Did some anatomy inspired figure drawings from imagination, and did this speedie of a dude in the dark.
Today I tried to reinforce my knowledge of back anatomy again. The reference photo was less than desirable because this girl was decked out in jewelry, so that was a bad idea. Let's see...I also tried to experiment with putting down a non-flesh colored ground beneath the skin tones in my digital painting. I know it doesn't have the same quality as the luminance in actual oil might have, but I was curious to see if it would keep me aware of the depth of skin tones as I paint...I'll have to try it again with imaginary stuff and experiment some more. Whee...



eth.

[Eddieee]

You're kicking ass dude! Your anatomy's in tip-top shape. The photo studies are cool man. I like the high opacity blocks of color. 5 stars, thanks for the inspiration.

[aimeemcfarlane]

Love it all, but I especially love how much life your sketches have.

[phizpietl]

Hello, cool stuff, I like your drawings quite a bit. Keep up the work, very nice.

Phil L.
www.phillietz.com
www.phillietz.blogspot.com

[sketcheth]

Okay, the weekend had me overrun with a lot of work that I can't very well post at the moment, unfortunately, but I'll be able to show it very soon. Inevitably that cut into my time for other artistic endeavors, namely my anatomy studies and imaginative work, though I kinda was doing that exclusively.
I've got a bunch of stuff in studio that I should photograph and share but that'll be later. For now, here's some anatomy business, and life drawings with pens. Thanks to Connor for that suggestion!

Eddie: Hey thank you! I really appreciate you stopping by so frequently.
aimeemcfarlane: Yeah, I guess what people enjoy the most really shines through, and I love life drawing. Thanks for taking a look!
phizpietl: Thank you sir. Will do.
----
I'll get more consistent again this week... I've been thinking about my sketchbook lately and what it's started to become. I feel like it's much too much of a conglomeration of images pasted into every nook and cranny of it and I'd much prefer if it really had more...substance. I'm just not pleased with how I'm not treating every page like it's an image and instead, just haphazardly scattering drawings across it.
So that's my agenda for now and the future, is to think more imagistically(made up word) about my sketchbook pages. That, and bring more color, perhaps restricted color, but more color into my work. Especially my observational work. I'd like to take some gouache with me wherever I go. I wonder how much it would destroy my sketchbook to be using that on the pages. Perhaps I'll experiment.
The stuff:




These drawings need explanation. Outside my apartment is a telephone pole with a bright orange triangle nailed to it. One day I took a snapshot of it and my roommate referred to it as a slow moving pole. The triangle is missing the border which makes it a legit slow moving pole, but the idea was planted in my brain and so I designed these.