Over at Xeno's Paradise, there's a new page of sketches featuring Tik-Tak! Aren't you thrilled?

New sketches up at Xeno's Paradise! Go see!

Yeah, I'd really like to see that movie again. Probably means I miss Halifax a bit, but I'm hardly in a position to see it in person right now.

More relevant, I managed to get to a new life drawing group, the one I tried out a few weeks ago. Since the life drawing course I was taking at the Ottawa School of Art finished up, I figured I really need to keep at it until school starts, at the very least. So I'm going to this one for 2 1/2 hours a week, and it's pretty nice. Much more chatty, friendly atmosphere than the course, which was a bit standoffish.

Here are the four pieces I did tonight. Some big weaknesses in all of them, but there are areas of all of them that I'm really proud of. I can honestly say I'm making progress, although it really shows how much I still need to make.

( hibibbidy jibibbidy )

Just to keep y'all up to date, it looks like Xeno's Paradise is coming back! Probably not until the end of the summer at least, and there's going to be a lot of changes. But it is coming back.

I'll be posting random sketches whenever I feel like over the next couple of months as I really get into the planning process, so look forward to lots of good content between now and then. There's a lot I need to figure out before I'll be ready to re-start the series, but keep checking in (and clicking my top sites link) daily, there's sure to be something new pretty often.

It's-a me, Nezumi!

( the very definition of evil itself )

A very productive day, although I'm a little out of it so few words.

First is the usual 30 minute study, best so far this week. Next are some fabric studies that turned out very well indeed. Last two, you'll have to forgive the crappy photos which wash out some of the shading. I tried out a different life drawing group tonight and enjoyed it a lot. The results are good, too. Once my regular course finished at the end of next month, I'll just switch over to this one, and get weekly life drawing for the rest of the summer. That'll be good ground work for my course this fall.

( i can't go back, until i either win or crack )

Apparently taking the weekend off from figure studies (although still doing the contour and gesture stuff) didn't do me any favours. My fourth sketch really didn't work out so well, and the fifth is better, but there's still a lot of work to go. Misjudged size in both pieces, having trouble keeping it all on the same piece of paper. Got to work a lot harder at that.

The other piece is a fabric study I'm pretty happy with. I was getting a bit sick of doing anatomy, so I figured I needed to learn this stuff sooner or later, so might as well get to it. Reasonably successful for the first real attempt.

( all that i can be isn't enough )

For those one of you who have been wondering how I've been spending my days now that I'm unemployed (one week and counting!), I thought I'd share the schedule I've managed to fall into. Now that I'm getting serious about my art, I want to start doing more and more work in order to get myself used to the routine I'll need to keep up once I get to school this fall, and afterwards as I start doing it for a living.

First off is gesture drawing. I try to do 10 30-second fast sketches via the timed viewer at Posemaniacs, which is an amazing site. However, I generally lose count, so it's normally anywhere from 12-15. This helps in a number of ways, first of all as a good warmup to get the creative blood flowing. Aside from that, it's a great way to learn to recognize and reproduce the large shapes of the body in a very short time, and to work decisively. After not even a week of doing this, I've already given myself a much better grasp of how the torso fits together and how the legs join to the body at a number of different angles. With those in mind, I'm starting to turn my eye towards the shoulders and how the arm fits to the body, which has been something I've been trying to conceptualize.

Next comes my daily blind contour drawing. This is more difficult work, and I time myself at 20 minutes a day. The idea is that without looking at the paper, my hand reproduces what my hand sees, moving along the contours of a form. In this case, my hand. Not to say outline, that's a different concept, but following the lines of the hand as well as the outline, and there are loads of places where you follow the outer edge of a line that turns naturally inward into a form. This teaches a lot about hand-eye co-ordination and the shapes and depth of forms. It's good foundation work. My life drawing instructor basically set the class to do this for 20 minutes a day for one month, and see what effect it's had on their drawing and how much their contour drawings have improved. So far it's been 11 days, and things are still rough, but I'm getting a lot of the concepts internalized, which is the point. Not that I intend to stop at the end of 30 days, but that's a good point to self-assess.

After that, it's another session of gesture drawing, followed by sketching concepts and anatomy studies in a more or less free fashion for the rest of the day. Right at the moment I'm working out of the amazing anatomy text by Gottfriend Bammes. Pity it's entirely in German, but copying from his plates and following some of the concepts he lays down in illustrations is quite informative.

Lastly comes the 30-minute timed sketch, often preceded by another session of 30-second drawings. These are the ones I've been showing here, and to me they're a snapshot of where my ability stands. Once again, these take me back to the Posemaniacs site, and their random pose viewer. I don't know what I'm going to get, and I generally pick the first pose that comes up, unless it's not very suitable for drawing (too much obscured, mostly). After that, if I feel like doing more I'm free to, but that's largely my day.

I made the decision this morning that I'm only going to do the gesture and blind contour drawings on weekends, and I'll set those aside to have a little fun with what I'm doing. Like going out if it's nice and drawing what I find, or working on projects in a more leisurely fashion. That may change, but it seems like a good balance.

So that's about it. Give me a month, we'll see how effective it all is.

( anatomy studies to keep it legal )

Tried something more complex today. Didn't quite work out, but there's more good than bad in it, so it's not a loss really. 30 minutes, you have to be kinda daring and take some risks.

( the shoulder sucks )

If I keep doing these, people will think I have a back fetish.

Another 30 minute timed study. Still a lot of weaknesses, but there's some improvement.

( i'll meet you 'round back )

Well, my work assignment ended on Friday, and so far nothing to replace it. So I'm stuck sitting at home, hoping it won't take too long for EI to kick in. Should be an okay amount when it does, at least, thanks to seven months of good pays, but it'll probably be two or three weeks until I see any of it.

So that puts me at home, practicing my drawing all day. Which is a Good Thing in its way, even if I don't have a lot of cash to play with. The more work I can do now, the better I'll be when September rolls around, and I can really grab that instruction and run with it.

( i will be better at the end than the beginning )

A couple of studies, just to let you know I'm still alive.

( extremely naked people )

Gonna be a loooong day tomorrow. And every Tuesday for a while. I got the new jorb, but it's a 9-hour day(!), including lunch, with a hour-long bus ride before it. Aaaaand afterwards I've got my first (ever!) life drawing class. Which should be really good for me in terms of art, but hoo boy am I gonna be wiped out when I get home. So don't expect a post tomorrow, unless I'm really ambitious, which I doubt I'll be.

In any case, here's another page of figure studies. Some good points, some bad. Probably the best thing is improving ability at postures, decent feet for once and better proportions althought here's a lot of work to be done there. There's bad points, but I'll let you lot figure those out.

( today's studies )

Well, it looks like the third person has officially ended, starting with this post. And to be honest, it's a bit of a relief. Back when I was LJing a lot, it seemed to just flow without any effort, even though I wasn't posting third person anywhere but this LJ. But now, after having taken such a long break, well...it just doesn't work now. And the third person style demands that it come through naturally. Otherwise, I might as well forget it.

So anyhow, here's a couple more figure studies. I think I'm getting better at them, which is good since I start my figure drawing class on Tuesday. So you can bet my ability with figures is going to change dramatically over the next two months or so (it's a 9-week course, three hours a week), which will help a lot when it comes to actually doing something concrete with my art. And rest assured, you'll be seeing a lot of the stuff coming out of my sketchbooks as I go along.

( still far to go )

So basically, Nezumi's been posting in the third person ever since she started this journal. The problem is, this is the only place she's doing it now. And honestly, it gets a bit hard to remember to keep doing it the times she posts here. And she worries a bit whether by now it's gotten a bit annoying, or at least jumped the mouse.

What do you think?

Poll #1174349
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Keep doing it?

Nezumi hasn't posted any pics of herself in a long time, and some of her old friends from back east especially are probably wondering about her current look. So since she got her hair done today, and a bunch of new clothes, she decided to grab a few webcam captures while she was showing Mate her updated look. So, uh, here the are!

( this is what a Nezumi looks like )

Nezumi went through her profile and cleaned up a bit. It's way more minimalist now, but if anyone wants to know about Nezumi they can just ask. It's not like she's got a lot of secrets. Just a saucerful, and that's not much.

Dumped a whole lot of inactive communities and ones that she's just not interested in any more. Nice to get things cleared away. But wow, it's amazing how many of Nezumi's friends, including hardcore LJ-ites, have gone by the wayside and don't publically update their journals at all any more. Now some of them might have defriended Nezumi and are posting privately, but Nezumi wouldn't know about that. Just a bit weird to see her Friends page so empty, except for the FIVE BILLION POSTS EVERY DAY from scans_daily.

But Nezumi digresses.

So Nezumi's life drawing course starts on Tuesday, 3 hour sessions, once a week for 9 weeks. Gonna be a great experience, and to get ready Nezumi's started doing a bit of figure work to figure out how the body works a bit better. She's working with a combination of Burne Hogarth's body forms idea and Andrew Loomis' proportions, but it's still taking a bit of effort to get things right. Here's today's production. 16 studies, not too bad. Gonna shoot for more tomorrow.

Oh, and the two figures on the left of the second image are copied freehand out of Hogarth's book, which is why they look a bit better than the others.

( may contain rough drawings of nekkid peoples )

Here, have a naked chick.

( no, no need for thanks )

Coupla things:

Nezumi's birthday is Tuesday. Much yay. Nezumi likes birthdays, even if she rarely gets made a fuss over, which she'd love.

Nezumi lost her job Tuesday. And she's pretty sure her knees won't allow her to return to PSW work, so it's back to searching for work in other regards.

There's a good chance Nezumi might be going back to college (again!) this fall, this time into an illustration course, to maybe try to become a pro or semi-pro artist. Also to buy time to learn enough French to find a job in this bloody town. More details as they come in.

( sketches to keep it legal )

It's late, so Nezumi'll get to the point. As of today, she's been drawing for two years. Which surprises her as much as anyone. More, even.

So since it wouldn't do to let the day go without posting something, here's an update of an earlier piece Nezumi did as part of the online drawing course she'd mentioned in an earlier entry. She'll be coming back to it again, as a tool to gauge her progress. This one is done entirely freehand with only HB pencil and eraser on sketchbook paper, using only line work and not shading or smudging to get smooth shadows. Nezumi thinks it turned out pretty well.

( wet, wet, wet )