Environments | page no.32

Page no.32 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Background from Lady and the Tramp (Disney,1955).

Listening to: Brian Eno.

Environments | page no.31

Page no.31 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Background from Alice in Wonderland (Disney,1951)

Listening to: Jamiroquai.

Environments | page no.31

Page no.31 from the 'Envronment' sketchbook.

Background from Alice in Wonderland (Disney,1951).

Note: Another look at how the color picture looks in value.

Listening to: Fakkelteitgroep.

Environments | page no.30

Page no.30 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.
Background from Alice in Wonderland (Disney,1951).

Note: Color thumbnail study from that scene.

Listening to: Zwart Licht.

Environments | page no.29

Page no.29 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.
Background is from Alice in Wonderland (Disney, 1951).

Note: It's interesting to see how they use shapes of light and dark to guide you towards the point you need to look. The curled shape curling around the black hole from left to right. The white triangle shape shaped like an arrow saying 'Look here!', that shape again is inside another black round shape with a point going inside it's own shape pointing right.

Listening to: Steely Dan.

Environments | page no.28

Page no. 28 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.
The background is from the movie Alice in Wonderland (Disney, 1951).

Listening to: Boards of Canada.

Environments | page no.27

Page no.27 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

The background is from the movie Alice in Wonderland (Disney, 1951).

Note:
"As an exercise before a day of composing, Chopin would spend an hour or two playing music from Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier. When he played Bach's music he felt he absorbed the master through the pores of his fingertips.
Why don't we artists do the same thing? Maybe because we're taught that it's bad to copy someone else's artwork. And we're justifiably concerned about becoming an imitator of another person's style.
But there's nothing wrong with copying as a way to practice and learn.
It's the shortest path to understanding."

from the chapter 'Copies from the Masters', Imaginative Realism by James Gurney.

Listening to: Peter Broderick.

Environments | page no.26

Page no.26 from the'Environments' sketchbook.

Note: This is a value study of the original image of the house.
Here are the two previous color studies with their value versions next to it.



One thing that all three images miss is lack of contrast to guide the viewers eye. You don't know where to look in these images. Also the images have a weak composition.That's another important tool you can use to guide the viewer. I'm gonna do some studies on these subjects the coming period.

Listening to: Minco Eggersman.

Environments | page no.25

Page no.25 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Note: Trying to keep the cool colors more mixed with blue and the warm colors mixed with yellow. My goal was to see if this would make the image feel more sunshiny. It's a little better than the image in the previous post, I think, but it's not only color, it is also the contrast and value in the image that makes it a little more sunny. If I squint my eyes it's best visible I think.

Listening to: Sticks & ART.

Environments | page no.24

Page no. 24 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: U2.

Environments | page no.23

Page no.23 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Environments | page no.22

Page no.22 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Note: Trying some artificial lightsource.

Listening to: Antony & The Johnsons.

Emily (9)

Started to work on the head again.



Listening to: Reflection Eternal.

Environments | page no.21

Page no.21 from the 'Environmnets' sketchbook.

Listening to: Iggy & The Stooges.

Environments | page no.20

Page no.20 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Freddie Hubbard.

Environments | page no.19

Page no.19 from the 'Environmnets' sketchbook.

Listening to: Freddie Hubbard.

Environments | page no.18

Page no.18 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Kings of Leon.

Environments | page no.17

Page no.17 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Pete Philly.

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Here's the first six pages of reversed storyboard I made of the Lost Ark.
Loving the excercise for now!
Great to train your quick drawing skills; gives me an insight in storyboarding, how much time does it take me to do these thumbnails, what language works for me, words?, arrows?, do I prefer pencil or pens to draw these?, colors/no colors?, great to experiment with; and it's really interesting to look and analyze at how the story is being told visually.
I also try to thumbnail the contrast and somewhat of the lighting used in the frames. I think I can improve in choosing my key poses/gestures in the frames, and I should watch closer to the emotional expressions of the characters. Important information that give much information about the scene.
But remember, we're not to produce pretty pictures here, but we want to see how to story is told visually!

Environments | page no.16

Page no.16 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Antony & The Johnsons.

Environments | page no.15

Page no.15 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Note:
In almost every environment I've done so far, there's a tree(s) and/or there are stone objects. Apparently those are objects and textures that you encounter a lot dealing with backgrounds. Maybe some texture study on trees and stones in the near future? Like this great stone texture post by Scott Willis.

Listening to: Kings of Leon.

Inspiration

This qualifies as inspirational for me.
I think that it's worth while to stop what you're doing right now and listen to what this guy has to say...

There's a lot of inspirational stuff swarming the internet. Only it's not that easy to find. When I do I usually look or listen at it, make some notes or order a book about it and that's it. So why not share some of the really, really good stuff? (at least in my humble opinion;-)

Environments | page no.14

Page no.14 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Kings of Leon.

Environments | page no.13

Havin' a look at trees.

Page no.13 from the ' Environments' sketchbook.


Listening to: Kings of Leon.

Environments | page no.12

Page no.12 from the 'Environments' Sketchbook.

Listening to: Mos Def

Environments | page no.11

Page no.11 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Time for some notes:

Size:
-The first 10 pages I painted the image on the entire page.
A page is A4 in size, 29.7 x 21 in cm.
-All that 'space', I noticed, was making me trying to paint details. Also filling large areas with paint was hard, and it makes the color 'dirty' because I had to go over it muptiple times to fill it, instead of doing it with a single brush stroke.
-This also made the color darker, than I meant it to be, while I was trying to keep them light.
- From now on I make the area to paint smaller. Page 11 is 22 x 13 cm.

Contrast:
- I need to focus on making the contrast in the image better.
- It will improve the readability of the image.
- As you can see in the first 10 pages there is almost no contrast in the image.


- On page 11 the contrast is not optimal, but at least there is an effort to create some 'clear' darker area's, and some lighter ones.



Color:
- I need to be more conscious about my color palette. Think more about 'Warm light Cool shadows' and vice versa. Or do a scene in a complementary contrast. Or try a tonal color scheme. Experiment, but choose your colors.

Some notes for now, now back to painting!

Listening to: Bon Iver; The Low Anthem.

Environments | page no.10

Page no.10 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Kings of Leon; The Doors.

Environments | page no.9

Page no.9 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Calexico.

Emily (8)

I did some sketching and planning for the remake of the head for the Emily sculpture I'm working on.

This is the plan that I think will work for the new head.



And these are the sketches for reference and measuring while sculpting.



I think I'm ready to start pushing some clay around again. :-)

The Birds (1963)

I am reading 'Dreamworlds' by Hans Bacher at the moment and in the first chapter about Film Analysis I came across this section in the book:

'I suggest you choose a sequence in the movie of your choice. It should be visually engaging and interesting storywise. Don't forget that we are not looking for pretty pictures, but we want to know how to tell a story visually.
I usually sketch every single scene in small rough thumbnails, as if I was drawing the storyboard for the movie. These boards are just the other way around as they illustrate a finished film. In case there is a moving camera or the actors are moving, you need to do several key drawings to indicate the most important steps.'

This seemd like a really interesting and fun excercise to me.
I am interested in how to tell a story visually, and I like to watch movies, so I thought, why not give it a try.

Here are 4 pages from 'The Birds' by Mr. Hitchcock I 'storyboarded' the other way around.






Next up is Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Environments | page no.8

Page no.8 from the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Band of Horses.

Environments | page no.7

Page no.7 form the 'Environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Midlake.

Environments | page no.6

Page no.6 from the 'environments' sketchbook.

Listening to: Aloe Blacc.