Desktop Dec 08

Another desktop thread has started over on the polykarbon bbs and this is my contribution.



The image was taken from Jason Chans gallery on his site. I often use Jason Chan artwork as inspirational desktop wallpapers. Surprisingly though I never use his actual wallpapers that he offers up, I opt to choose images with a flat colour at the borders of the page and have it centred on that background. It helps me arrange my icons and any loose files around the image.

This particular image appears on the I Am Legend DVD that one of my housemates has as part of the special features, along with other Jason Chan sequential art work. Check out the comics online over on the Warner Brothers site. Story 2 and 4 are illustrated by Chan and you can probably also find a link to a store there if you want to buy the DVD.

Merry Christmas.

Uni - Drawing 08 - Fashion pt.1

Two images of mannequins from shop windows. I thoroughly enjoyed this drawing project. I'm aware that the proportions are a little off but I think I did really well for 30 minute drawings that were meant to have emphasis on decorative and function details of the garments.

Female Clothing (trendy casual) - Pencil
Male Clothing (formal) - Pencil

More soon.

Uni - Drawing 08 - Perspective pt.1

Part of the drawing module during the 3D Design roundabout.
Kinda uninspired. Perspective bores me when you have to pay this much attention to it.

1 point perspective (w/ placement grids) City Scene - Pencil

2 point perspective (w/ placement grids) Japanese Sewers (maybe Flood Relief?) - Pencil

More soon.

Uni - Lie Of The Land 08 pt.3

Here are two more images from my Lie Of The Land sketchbook. These are sketches of two pieces of land art by Andy Goldsworthy. The first was a study mainly of his use of colour and the idea in general and the second I was focusing mainly on the idea so I didn't feel it necessary to include colour.

Andy Goldsworthy Study: Rowan Leaves With A Hole - Coloured Pencil

Andy Goldsworthy Study: Galerie Lelong - Pencil

More soon.

Uni - Drawing 08 - Buildings pt.1

This is the first post of the drawing module I have made. Each assignment within the module is related to the current roundabout module. This assignment was during the Visual Arts module and was for us to get some experience of drawing in the field and work on mark making and speed I think, we also had to apply some of what we'd learnt from the perspective drawing assignment during the 3D Design module.

Manchester Cathedral Interior - Graphite

Manchester By The Wheel From Next - Graphite

More soon.

Uni - Lie Of The Land 08 pt.2

Deadlines are quickly approaching so I guess I should start showing you guys that I actually do produce some work for university. Sometimes anyway.
This is the second post I've made in relation to the Lie Of The Land project. The last LOTL post consisted of photos and video but this time around I guess I'll show some of the images I've produced for my sketchbook. If you look at the other LOTL post you may notice the photographic reference used for some of the images.
The first image here takes up one whole page on its own and the other four are from another single page.

Red Leaves - Acrylic Paint

Unfinished Wooded Scene - Pencil
Fungus - Pencil
Tree - Pencil

Fallen Tree - Pencil

More to come soon.

Bender At Halloween

It’s been a few weeks since Halloween and a day or 2 longer since I posted last. I’ve been too busy actually doing my university work to show it to you guys but hopefully I’ll change that soon. But the topic of this post is Halloween and not my work so I’ll get on with it.

This year for Halloween, since I’m actually in big enough circles and had enough places to go to have a reason to make an effort, I decided to make a costume. I overconfidently decided to go for Bender from Futurama.

I didn’t spend nearly enough time on it for it to be nearly as impressive as some of the Bender outfits I’ve seen around on the internet but it impressed my friends a lot. It took me about a day and a half to two days (including drying time) to put together. It’s constructed completely from thin card, masking tape and papier-mâché. The paint job was grey matte spray paint and poster paints. Arms and legs consist of a pair of disposable overalls with lines drew around with a fabric pen. I was too short for time, or too lazy to do the hands and feet but that would have probably made the night even more difficult to navigate. I was able to see perfectly from a gap in the bottom of the mouth and my movement wasn’t heavily restricted. The biggest problem of the night was talking to people; no one could hear a word I was saying unless I removed my head.

Drinking wasn’t as a big a problem.

Bender

Bender, Danger Tom and Burglar Glyn

The only thing that could have made Halloween better would have been spending some of it with my little girl. That goes for most days though I guess.

I'm in a sketch exchange with a guy called erq from polykarbonbbs right now so I'll post some of the stuff I produce up after I have a few more images complete. I'd post now but I think it'd be better to see a few at once.

Uni - Lie Of The Land 08 pt.1

Our first university project entitled 'lie of the land' involved researching land artists and techniques they use. We were then to plan and construct a piece within a small group in nearby wooded area. I think the assignment was partly planned to be another ice breaker to get us to mingle with our class members. I missed the first session so I can't claim much credit for the ideas but it was my idea to wear the suits though which almost turned it into a performance arts piece. I was involved in a lot of the video editing and editing images ready for presenting. We're to hand in a sketchbook showing thought process and personal study etc. in December but I haven't really done much with that yet. I'll post up things from that when I get more done.

Photo Collage Looking Up From The 'Grave'

So basically we decided to dig an odd shaped grave which, completely coincidentally, turned out as a cross but we had no intentions of turning it into anything to do with religion. The idea that was pitched to me by my team was it was to be an interactive installation. Apparently you're supposed to lay in the grave and basically relax, the view from the grave was framed and it was actually really calming and relaxing. Although I wasn't convinced by the idea at first I went along with it without resistance because I felt I had no right to complain since I'd missed the original ideas meeting. As it turned out, the final result was quite a surreal yet enjoyable experience.

We had to fill in the hole after we'd taken pictures and recorded video so that when we left the area it was safe for other people.

Here are some more randomly selected photographs from the day of construction and the day the site was scouted out by my group.


It should be noted that the photographs and footage in this post may have been taken or recorded by any member of my group. As well as myself, the group included Katarzyna (Kate) Majchrzycka, Robert Maclese, Daniel Lunn and Oliver Ludlam. The girl with pink hair, Alice, was over from another group to see what we'd done and was not in our group.

Uni - Summer Project 08

During the summer before starting University this year we were sent a project to complete for starting. I assumed it was to assess our ability but as it turned out it was used more as an ice breaker within our assigned groups. We had to make a collection of ten or more very three-dimensional objects of the same type and produce a series of drawings and studies. Upon arriving at university we then presented our drawings to a small group and received constructive criticism and then critiqued the other group members work.
My collection consisted of branded drinking glasses. Here are two drawings. Please excuse the poor scan quality.

Six Beer Glasses - Pencil

Green Coca-Cola Can Glass - Coloured Pencil

I chose drinking glasses because I thought it would be really interesting to work with the refractions and reflections but as it turned out it was very challenging. It was still fun though.
Some self critique: The first sketch I feel could do with a lot of cleaning up and I'd like there to have been more contrast. I should have finished the second picture. It really hurt my eyes trying to focus my vision on distorted objects and such through the glass and I couldn't leave it and come back because I was using natural light. I would have had to set aside specific time each day if I was going to leave it and come back to it, but I had a lot of things that needed to be done ready for starting university and I wasn't able to commit specific time to this project.

Art Dump

This is supposed to be an art blog so to kick things off I'll dump a few random images here. future posts will be more structured and have better descriptions and maybe some news about what's going on in my life.

Northern Cardinal Speed Paint - Painter X

Large Headed Robot Sketch Exchange Response - Photoshop CS3
Ogre Shaman Sketch Exchange Response - Photoshop CS3
Random Guy Speed Paint - Photoshop CS3
Diver Speed Paint - Photoshop CS3
Spider-Man Bad Guy Rhino Sketchbook Page - Pencil/Marker

I'll upload some of the summer project work I did soon. Stay tuned.