Story Game 12

Here's another one.  Image used

INVENTED STORY: After years of hard work, Vivi was finally accepted into witching university!  A month before move-in day, the school sends every incoming student their owl mentor, which also carries their required materials list.  While out shopping at the supermarket, a sales associate asks Vivi about her owl and she excitedly explains.  Vivi lives in a remote, somewhat conservative town where studying witching is more or less the equivalent to studying art: high risk.

Own your Externals

One thing I've learned that makes a large difference in my productivity is getting myself out of the house and working at the cafe.  I knew that right from the get-go when I arrived home for the summer and it's been working beautifully.  As life would have it, not one but two of our cars shut down (and for the double whammy, one of them shut down in the middle of the highway while I was on my way to ACEN) and its looking like I'm without any transportation in a town that pretty much requires a car in order to get around or to said cafe.

There were a chunk of other things happening that I won't dwell upon here, but all in all, I was becoming pretty angry at things in life seemingly blocking me out of nowhere, and they were all particularly most prevalent and hardest hitting whenever I was going down a path I knew would eventually benefit me.

So I was walking around aimlessly at my Mom's house, thinking to myself, "Man, I can't do anything if I can't get out and to the cafe."  But it was then I had to acknowledge that both the car and the cafe are, when boiled down, luxuries.  I remembered an old Bobby Chiu piece of advice that helped me a lot through my struggles at even getting to Ringling:

• Don't let the external things in life dominate your situation and don't entrust and put your life in the hands of external situations because...
• Given the right shift in attitude and focus, you have what it takes to own your externals

It took me a while to realize all this.  Maybe the many privileges we're so fortunate to have at Ringling have softened me up.  The other thing I learned is that the greatest rewards are usually right around the corner when life decides to pile on and will only be there IF you put forth your best efforts to achieve them.  I mean, just look at the post I just made about how rewarding ACEN was regardless of the freak setback of having your car shut down in the middle of the highway right on the biggest day of the convention, amongst other problems?

There are a lot of other Bobby Chiu pieces of advice that fit the bill and help what I'm writting, but I'll leave it short and sweet: Don't let externals own and dominate your life and, if you keep pushing, the rewards will be there.

-EDIT-

Made it to the cafe after all!  Did plenty in the sketchbook, but here's some tablet stuffs

Finishing content plus more notes

Just trying to keep the momentum going by generating finished content on a daily basis.  Below are some more notes I'll be updating throughout the day and a more illustrative drawing I made as a graduation card for a buddy of mine.

• If you procrastinate, then you are delaying yourself from reaching your goals
• Pencil and pen sketches use a lot of leading lines to create appeal (but don't forget that the base of the drawing are shapes, don't just draw and focus on lines)
• During the gesture, don't just throw lines everywhere but emphasize the shapes and anchors that describe the pose the most
• Don't forget that values, esp. on forms, need to contrast from one another, even when they're not close to the focal point (remember the mid stages of rendering on the ghost girl's hat and bow below)
• Thinking and analysis are good, but never forget to trust your intuition
• Don't forget about figure/anatomy, even with caricatures
• When in doubt, turn it diagonally

• Figure = what anchors your drawing in believability
• 2D Design = what makes your composition appealing to look at
• Perspective = the same definition as figure, except specific to depth

Story Game 11

Now that I'm armed with more foundation knowledge, it's time to get back into the story games again. This is the first set I've done in months and looking back it's rewarding to see the difference in speed and general improvement.

Overall, the camera moves around a bit much, but I just wanted to hit the beats and clarity of the scene.

Image used

More Personal Drawing Notes - May 23rd, 2013

Just more misc. notes that I'll be updating throughout the day for me to refer to for future use since previous entries have been pretty helpful

• Use tangents to your advantage (ie. creating bold powerful shapes, leading lines.  Refer to Bobby Pontillas)
• Every stroke either works for you or against you - try to communicate your pose with fewer lines (remember Ryan Woodward)
• When reading an image, the eye rushes through areas filled with negative space and slows down in areas drawn with more detail
• Don't force techniques if they're not working.  This can be frustrating since they might have worked so nicely the before, but it's a sign that it is time to learn something new and apply it alongside older techniques.

Applying today's notes - portraits have been a favorite warm up

ACEN 2013

ACEN 2013 was this weekend and it was awesome!  Trying to say why in a such a nutshell doesn’t really feel like it does the experience justice, but as previously mentioned, it was my first artist alley and also my first time doing commissions.  Scary stuff, but in the end, super rewarding.

My table-mate, The Kao and I (you can view Kao’s stuff here)

One of the drawings I commissioned from the show

Other finished prints:

Summer 2013: Chapter 1

Hey blog, wanted to quick post today with a few notes for future reference since looking back at the notes from winter break have been pretty helpful/refreshing

Some quick things:

• Generate finished content on a daily basis.  Studies and sketches are good, but too much of it leaves you directionless and creating finished work gives you that direction and are landmarks of your progress (remember ACEN 2013)
• When cafe sketching, an easy way about thinking of character is knowing what they are doing and how are they feeling about it/overall attitude.
• Even when sketching, try to think a few steps ahead of the phase you're doing.  For example, when doing the initial linework/gesture, imagine what the drawing would look like completely rendered and finished to give the gesture more direction (like how we think a few notes ahead with music, or driving the car analogy)
• Form is created through contrast and requires at least 3 different values
• Think about squash and stretch in cafe sketches
• Observe, and enjoy the process
• Always keep your mind on your work, not work on your mind... or else you'll go crazy
• Set goals for yourself one at a time.  Setting too many often becomes too much to handle and leaves yourself disappointed

On a side note, I started a tumblr to keep updated with friends and other artists I admire since it's becoming such a big place for sharing work.  Really motivating seeing my stuff reblogged and get some attention by complete strangers. http://lopezart.tumblr.com/

On a side side note, I'll be at ACEN 2013, so here's some prints I made since I got back home