Sketchbook: 24/01/2012

Drawings from yesterday, first three sat in the cafeteria and the last one in the lecture theatre just before the animation awards screening.

Not much to reflect or comment here I'm afraid, but it's worth noting that yesterday seemed to be quite a good day. I didn't even think twice about getting my sketchbook out and it didn't feel forced at all. It probably sounds really pretentious but it felt perfectly natural and really nice. I wasn't worrying excessively or anything. Doesn't mean the drawings are any good of course, but it was a nice feeling and I hope that it's a good sign of things to come. I suppose I'm only really mentioning it to remind myself that sometimes, things go well. :]

Sketchbook: 22/01/2012

Just some more sketches from today. Really not feeling it; had difficulty concentrating. Tried in vain to use only one line, tried using Mr big red pen to keep things loose but it just wasn't working out. I think I'm over-tired.

Sketchbook: 21/01/2012

Seem to be having a bit of an off day... I'll be lucky if I can get one decent drawing out.

More practice with poses and gestures - I used the random pose viewer on http://www.posemaniacs.com for reference. I tried to draw all of the ones it gave me but it seems to be quite fond of giving you all sorts of weird perspectives and angles that, quite honestly, I wasn't feeling up to tackling.

I don't know what on earth was wrong with me today. I just found that my mind kept wandering and I found it very, very difficult to keep looking at the model as I drew. I suppose most of it's discipline. As noted in my life drawing feedback I have a tendency to be a bit generalised and, when my eye wanders from the model, I tend to 'invent' a lot of things. It's all due to lack of observation on my part. I just need to be stricter with myself and keep drawing with my eye locked on the model. I think I'm just a bit too timid - I'm terrified of getting it 'wrong,' and so by constantly looking at the paper I can make sure I'm drawing something 'good.' Not looking at my paper kind of removes that element of control and leaves me vulnerable to failure, or producing something 'bad.' I just need to work on my fear and stop being so self-conscious about everything.

Comic & sketchbook: 20/01/2012

Today's comic reveals what an absolute wuss I am. Why do people feel they have to talk about these sorts of things really loudly in public places? Eugh.

Had a bit of difficulty with this comic. Found my mind kept wandering and my heart just wasn't in it - but I ploughed on through anyway. I really can't resort to that sort of excuse to justify lackluster work - it certainly won't hold up in employment so I need to break it now.

Spent most of the day out in town today, ended up doing some quick drawings at the train station. Nobody else was around unfortunately, but it was a good opportunity to practice and see if I can successfully apply what I've been learning to my drawings without reference. (That sentence made much more sense in my head)

Above, just some quick experiments at applying action lines to poses without any reference. I didn't really have a clear idea of what I was trying to draw most of the time - I just kind of draw a line and went with it - so they're a bit weak.

Then just some things scrawled on the way back home. Drawing on a bus is difficult.

I'm really trying to commit myself to using less lines when drawing - it's a habit, though, and a tricky one to break! I'm aiming to train my eye to really observe and THEN draw a line - just one - and really get the feel of that arm or leg or whatever. I just need to learn to look at the subject more than my paper.

Sketchbook: hyenas, cats and old people

I've been wanting to keep myself busy over the break and had hoped to be able to get a head start on the next project. I've been drawing somewhat irregularly — my aim is to make a habit of it. I'm building up slowly — trying to do at least one drawing (or page of drawings) per day, which of course in the long run is nowhere near enough, but I want to get to the stage where it becomes second nature, where I don't even have to think about pulling my sketchbook out.

I had intended to start generating ideas for the next project already, before I learned that we would probably be given a list of words or themes to work from. Still, it's probably good practice to keep the ideas ticking over.

That being said, here are some doofy pages from my sketchbook from the past few days:

Nothing really behind these... just some doodles of hyenas. Top page was an actual exercise in observation, on the bottom is a page of doodles done whilst trying to sleep!

One of the books I got from the library gave some great suggestions on generating ideas; one was to take classic scenarios or stories and reverse character roles or insert new ones. I was just kind of messing around and turned Snow White into a disgruntled housewife who has to 'rescue' (or wake up) her oafish, sleeping husband.

I didn't really take it much beyond imagining some scenarios in my head before I got distracted and started drawing cats instead.

I looked at how some other artists and animators have simplified cats for use in comic strips or animation, to better understand how the relatively complex physiology can be broken down.

Understanding how something is built is crucial before you can start breaking it down and making it move, so I tried to get to grips with the basic anatomy of cats. They have really weird legs! 

I found a great little handout online discussing the anatomy of a cat for use in animation which I found really helpful, so I did some simplified drawings based on some of the examples there.

And then some more attempts to understand how the hell their hind legs work.

I don't really know if this was headed in the right direction but it's gotten me drawing again, which is always valuable practice. I think I'm rushing myself to try and get all the stuff in my head down on paper. I need to stop that, stop the panicking and just focus on a few little things at a time.

Andy suggested that I work on keeping the energy and quality of rough drawings through to the cleaned and refined version, which is something that I'd notably struggled with in the last few projects. I'm thinking of doing some more comic strips for general drawing/ideas/storytelling practice, so it might be good to try and combine the two. The last set of comics I did suffered a lot from the 'stiff artwork' problem (and just generally looking bad) so I need to get used to being less precious and working more loosely. 

Sketchbook: 16/09/2011

Things are settling down a little now. Heading home for a quick visit this weekend before everything kicks off next week. Had a bit of a break before setting off, so wandered down to Farnham castle, saw some more of the town and got in a bit of drawing time with the chaps :]

Some shoddy figures here, but I kind of like the one in the middle!

Still having difficulty with buidings and things. Need to really be more careful with things like scale and perspective.

This one was just doomed from the start. Started at a weird angle and just went downhill from there. I wanted to rip it out of my sketchbook but I'm forcing myself to keep it. I'm not sure if there's any value to posting it here, but I'm going to call it an exercise in learning that everything I do is crap bad drawings happen!

There's a beautiful view of Farnham from the top of the fields behind the campus, and unfortunately I completely failed at capturing any of it. I think a different medium might help; with a pencil there's too much temptation to overwork things and be too precious over every single drawing. I tend to find working in ink and things keeps things a bit looser so I might give that a try.

Sketchbook: 15/09/2011

Met with our very lovely theory tutor today. Really excited to get started on the course now — I'm strting to get all itchy and wanting to do stuff... though I'm sure I'll rapidly change my mind when the big sticks come out.

Did a bit of drawing this afternoon with a couple of classmates. Tried an interesting little experiment and walked in a random direction with a timer set for 5 minutes. When the timer went off, we just sat down and drew whatever was around us. Unfortunately for me, this was a most inspiring view of a big brick wall. So I just drew some people instead. Oh, and a bush.

The aforementioned big boring wall, and the uninspired half-finished drawing that it spawned. It's mostly my fault, I'm a bit biased towards anything that wasn't living at one stage or another. I think the main reason I find things like buildings so difficult is because there are so many perfect lines and edges. It feels a bit like there's less room for error?

I've made myself sound like a bit of an idiot. Off I go!

Sketchbook: 14/09/2011

Day 2! HOORAY!!

Have some more drawings, big white void.

Think I might be beginning to get a feel for this again. Just a few sketches before an induction. Still a long way to go, but they're a bit looser and a little more lively than before.

Sketchbook: 13/09/2011

Starting something is always the hardest part. The first line of an essay, the first blog post and especially the first drawing in a sketchbook, as evidenced below.

It's been a very long time since I've kept anything even vaguely resembling a blog or diary, so you'll have to forgive me if I sound a bit stiff. It feels very alien, talking to a big white void like this. To try and kick this thing off, here are the first few terrible pages from my sketchbook!

I'm certainly not the best at drawing in any case but these drawings are a lot stiffer than usual — it's been such a long time since I've actually been drawing properly that it's a little difficult to get back into the swing of things.

Only the leftmost figure was drawn from life, the other was scrawled from the cover of the student planner we got given today. For shame Alex!

I'm hopeless at drawing inanimate objects, but it's something I'm really going to need to get to grips with.

Didn't do too much drawing today, unfortunately. The fact that I'm still only half-unpacked and living mostly out of cardboard boxes may have had something to do with it. Still, baby steps, eh?