Life drawing update

I'm training myself to take down lots of information very quickly while in-session with a model, and then flesh out the details on my own time. The only problem with this approach is that my lack of visual memory sometimes results in cartoony faces. That last one especially suffered from the "I forgot to record the facial features" syndrome. I also started a self portrait the other night, but when I realised it looked nothing like me I threw my pencil down in disgust and refused to do any more. It was very dramatic.

Veggie vectors and a soybean leaf

Here's a concept sketch and first drawings for the iPhone app I am working on in conjunction with a group of friends. These will be displayed both as small icons in lists and more prominently on individual fruit and vegetable pages.



I've been working on this (nearly complete) composite of a soybean leaf cross section for a while now: the underlying 3D model last summer, the normal texture in the fall, and most recently the composite for the set of posters I'm helping to prepare for display in Hyderabad, India in a couple of months.

Biological illustration

Some biological "sketches" for the biofuel book. I feel like I'm back in school...

Co-op in jeopardy

My co-op organizer sent out an email over the weekend imploring us to recruit more artists. Apparently, attendance has not been high enough to recoup the model's fee. And I was considering skipping this week! Fortunately, Monday's model was very good and she even held a couple of longer 30-40 minute poses. I'm still way too slow, but at least my drawings weren't terrible this time around. I hope the co-op is still around come next Monday!

A rather unfortunate perspective, but it gave me a chance to work on feet. I also decided to bust out the conte for one of the gestures:

And a page from my sketchbook:

Yes, more bread

I baked a rather sad round of French loaves for my master class last weekend. So sad, in fact, that I have taken it upon myself to bake every day this week in an effort to improve my skills. My first order of business was trying more French bread--see above.

In addition to solving the mystery of appalling crust pallor that had plagued my previous dozen or so loaves (my steam pan, stupidly placed above my bread, must have insulated the tops of my loaves sufficiently to prevent them from browning!) I also proved to myself that very wet dough is not as terrifying as I once thought. See ciabatte:


I promise I'll post something sketch-related in a day or two.

Pesky carbon dioxide

I decided to completely rework the "Carbon burden" graphic that has been tormenting me these past few weeks. My inspiration: board games! I decided to make each of the drawings look like playing pieces set on a board, all sharing a common perspective. I'm not yet 100% satisfied with the clarity of the illustration, nor am I convinced I should leave the pencil drawings unshaded. The primary reason I haven't painted them in yet is because I'm afraid they will compete visually with the other more important graphical elements--like the arrows or the CO2 molecules. More later.

Sketch dump

A handful of studies for illustrations I am presently working on, as well as random drawings from the last couple of weeks. Horses: two of my projects require me to draw them, but when I sat down and attempted to sketch one from memory the poor animal looked awful. Sort of a cow-meets-wolf abomination.

Sour cinnamons

A half-eaten batch of sourdough cinnamon rolls, shown here on my all-time favorite platter. My last batch didn't turn out very well, probably because my apartment was frigid. I also used less WW flour this time but added a bunch of wheat germ for texture. Very tasty.

Figures

Two more 30-min drawings from my Monday night co-op. I had a lot of trouble making headway on the second drawing in the studio--I'm still not working as fast as I would like--but I got enough information down to do a little touch up after the fact. Face is still wonky and I didn't record any lighting information.

More bio illustrations and a bug

Working on an illustration after a design by Prof. Robert C. Brown. The idea is to tie together two illustrated "vignettes" that tell the story of fuel production from differing perspectives. These are a few of the nine illustrations I put together for the piece. Unfortunately, I'm having trouble tying the piece together into a cohesive whole. I probably just need to spend more time with it, but I'm also worried my paintings differ too much stylistically.


A little sketch for a quilting project my grandmother is working on. She asked for a 'B' with a bug.

More figures

A couple of 30 minute drawings from co-op last night. I like the variety a bunch of shorter poses provide, but I am never able to move beyond a simple line drawing in half an hour. An additional fifteen minutes, maybe thirty would be sufficient for me to put in more interesting varied-line and basic shading. Something to flesh these out a bit more. Or maybe I'm just too slow. Many of the other attendees add tone almost immediately, but I can't stand shading a drawing with bad proportions.

Steamobile

Working on a concept for an illustration depicting two notable relics of the automotive industry. I really have no idea why the steam car isn't still with us today--I'd happily commute to work in one of these! The final illustration will include a fission car on the right from a similar perspective. I haven't yet decided if I want to paint the entire illustration or first draw the mechanical bits in illustrator and then paint in the happy people. My sketch is pretty wobbly, and a couple of mathematically precise ovals couldn't hurt...

Le Petit Prince redux

A first draft cover for a book being written by prof Robert C. Brown. The text is all FPO. I wanted to play around with combining vector art (the planet) with a painted character. Ideally, I'll be able to use a similar style for all of the illustrations in the book. I think I want to give the planet more character, make it bumpier like the "Loomis" planet a few posts down. I also need to add more woodland, push the distinction between cropland and forest, and maybe add a little painted texture to the planet.

A few early sketches (+ a smiling farmer lady & a funky birthday cupcake):

Tiny bakery

Don't tell my employers, but I've been baking like a madman! Last week was another sourdough week, and while my boules turned out nicely my "seeded sour" was aesthetically lacking. The dough dried out in the fridge overnight which prevented the loaves from caramelizing properly during their time in the blazing inferno.


This week: croissants!

Co-op-y goodness

I finally got around to searching the Cities for a good figure drawing cooperative, and found one within minutes! It's in a nearby neighborhood that also happens to feature my favorite food cooperative. So: 2 hours of drawing followed by perusing aisles of turnips and quinoa! What excitement!

I arrived late to last week's session but still had fun. Most of the poses were 10-15 minutes, which was fine for getting back into the figure drawing groove. Unfortunately, my drawing for the only long pose of the evening looked like this


So I've opted not to share it.