Fairy Fort

(A selection of photos, more of which can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/15978133@N00/ )

On Sunday, I walked out to a nearby ancient 'fairy fort', all of which is left is basically a large ring made of earth, with trees and grass growing on it, and a moat surrounding the outer edge. The day was perfect weather for a walk, and it was a nice, relaxing spot to meander around and look at all the lush grass and other vegetation. There was also a bit of water in the middle, near some fallen trees and tree stumps. It was great just standing or sitting around and breathing in the air.

I also did some sketching today (I did do some doodles other days, but it felt more like sketching today). Some drawing of cows, and a tiny bit of the landscape from a little ways up the big hill behind our school. I might post some more of that later. For now I'll post photos of the fairy fort visit.

I also have gotten a small start on developing my independent project. I have lots of ideas floating around in my head, but for some reason I am being drawn to one that involves building a little mini paper-city; like...maybe flat buildings, but kind of like a diorama.. maybe.. or I may place some building-like things in a set comprised of natural objects I find in the burren. There may be some commentary on building new things in the burren. Not quite sure yet.

Cannemara

Here is the Flickr set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/15978133@N00/sets/72157625659289201/

Yesterday we had a very, very long bus trip, going through Galway and all around the Cannemara area, which is distinguished especially by its "mountains" (very large hills at least), and its beautiful coastline. It was my second time at the ocean (first time being a few days ago on the first bus tour to closer coastline), and my first time actually close to the water, and first time feeling ocean water with my hands. Needless to say, the ocean is great. I wanted to drink it and go swim in it (of which only swimming would be safe, although obviously very cold at this time of year). The color was a fresh, visual treat for my eyes. Seeing that color in person is entirely different than seeing it in any photograph or video.

Among the new photos in my Flickr set are some of my first climb up a burren hill a couple days ago, with a few friends. Some of my fellowship thought it would be fun to climb the hill-mountains in the Cannemara area, but I think I will stick to the shorter burren-hills for the time being. Maybe when I develop larger lung capacity and endurance...

Climbed a big burren hill today

Today, myself and four others climbed the nearest big hill to our school. It was a fairly treacherous journey at times... had to watch our footing, at least, almost constantly. Really breath-taking views, of the bay nearby, and of the entire valley and hills around us. Very fresh air. We found quite a bit of bones nestled in a particularly deep crack, and pulled them out and left them on the rocks to dry, and to maybe come back later to take. There were many cows pretty far up on the hill, too; they must know how to navigate very well, as even we had trouble finding the least steep and most climbable path up, and then down, the hill. I don't think we even reached the very top; it went for quite a ways up.

Just heard some cows mooing very loud, and I'm sitting in my studio. I don't know how close they are..

I hope to get some sketching going very soon.

My internet connection is slow and finicky, so I will update this blog post with photos soon (or just make a new post, linking to the photos on my Flickr)... actually, just click this link to check and see if they have been uploaded by the time you read this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/15978133@N00/sets/72157625659289201/

Irelanded

Ok, I have been in Ireland for five days now. I don't really know where to start...

First, right off the bat, I'll post a link to all the photos I have taken so far, on this Flickr... well, it's not every photo I took, but the ones I picked out:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/15978133@N00/sets/72157625659289201/

It's all pretty overwhelming. It is the first time I have been outside the midwest United States, the first time I have been on a plane, and the first time I have seen the ocean. The plane ride was OK, but not really particularly enjoyable, in terms of me being nervous, just because it was my first time flying. I sat next to my brother (our travel agent got us very good seats), on both the flight from Minneapolis to JFK, and the flight from JFK to Shannon, Ireland. There was a nice woman and her family on my left, on the international flight, who had been living in Ireland for two years. The woman was from Chicago originally, and she had met her husband in Ireland, but then lived in America for 8 years before going back to Ireland to raise her kids. So, that was good to have someone like her to talk to. There was some pretty creepy guy who for some reason had to be standing for the last 1.5 hours of the flight, literally leaning and peering over the shoulder of everyone in my row, including the woman and her sleeping kids. He was watching the stuff on their TV screens, but it still seemed awkward..I guess he maybe had some kind of anxiety or extreme discomfort with sitting down..

It's hard not to want to rush through this typing; it's probably time for me to go to sleep.. well, I'll churn out some details. Lots of nice people here, it seems like so far. Instructors and students included. There are some cats and dogs that hang out around the housing, and at least one cat on campus that obviously enjoys the attention. The land is extremely beautiful. At first, on the first bus ride from the airport, it wasn't totally clear how varied the landscape actually can be. But, after a couple bus rides (one was an official tour, the other was just to go to the Guardia, or police, to process some immigration stuff), I have seen so many amazing landscapes... you can check out the photos to just see for yourself. The first time seeing the ocean was so freaking amazing, I had never known what the sounds and smells were like, just what I had seen in pictures and video.

Orientation is longer than I expected it would be, but there are some interesting instructors and things we are learning. It's still really tough getting up so early in the morning; probably still some jet lag going on for me. I get tired in the early to mid afternoon, which is unfortunate, as that's when we have a lot of lecture-type thingies. I think I will get used to it; hopefully soon.

Going out to the pubs or just hanging out with roommates has been enjoyable so far as well. I think I prefer places other than pubs, if I'm feeling like being a contributor to the conversations going on, because I can't seem to project my voice or enunciate well enough when things are super loud and I'm surrounded by people. Just being in the company of anyone is nice, though.

I feel like I rushed this blog post.. maybe I'll type more soon, when I get more photos or do something neat or interesting. Time for bed.

Almost ready to go

I leave on a plane this coming Thursday, to Ireland. After studying at the Burren College of Art for a semester, I will travel for two weeks in Europe (Italy, possibly Czech Republic, Germany, France, England). I will write some journal entries and post pictures on this blog.

Some more Fall 2010 semester work

(I sat for a couple minutes trying to think of a good title, but could not come up with a good one. Oh well).

Here is some more work from my Tools of the Trade class I took this Fall, 2010, including a couple process-related items, too. This first piece was made after we were assigned to look at the website wefeelfine.org, which collects information from blog posts across the internet, many having to do with feelings or emotions. The blog I chose had to do with a woman who wanted to conquer a 101-item to-do list in 1001 days. All of the objects in the piece are related to items on her to-do list. Here is a link to the original blog and post:http://spooktastic.typepad.com/blog/

(Above) is the full-size version...

...and just a quick crop, to see how that may improve the composition. During critique, this was something that was suggested. I would move the health bars and some of the background elements in along with the crop, if I were to do a final version.

The following (below) are scans of an assignment involving "fashion", and with the requirement to use watercolor. I chose to depict some twigs "wearing" leaves and bark, and I tried to make use of the medium as best I could, working much more slowly and carefully than I usually do. Reference photos follow the illustrations.

The next two pieces are a diptych, created from the prompt, "human/animal", which could be anything involving humans and animals, with some kind of thing connecting the two. I just drew a human pooping, and a human using a scratching post, with an animal in the background as the master; so, reversal of roles.

Oh, and it was required to use acrylic... I chose to do a less-careful method I guess, working without really layering or cleaning my brush a ton, and mixing it often when the paint was still wet on the paper.

Delicious cigarettes

I decided to have a shorter and more eye-catching blog post title this time (which I noticed other bloggers do, so I thought I ought to try it out too :P ).

Anyway, this my final illustration for Illustration Topics, in progress. I really like where it's going right now; I'm using some elements of texture that I have not really done before, and I'm excited about the color as well (I have to give credit to Tom Garrett, and also Teagan White, for some of the color suggestions. One of these days I will absorb their color know-how into my brain well enough to think of good backdrops and line colors and such). I'm not sure how I like using the realistically drawn figure; BUT, I do like how I have it kinda surreal, with her cut off, and the floating cigarettes.. in some weird way I like that...weirdness, instead of a completely realistic illustration.

Oh, and what it's about: we had several short phrases or just single words to select from, and I chose 'Delicious' (I also considered 'Chain Reaction'...so, somehow this may be related to that, too). Anyway, it's about cigarettes and people who smoke them, and how 'deliciously addictive' they are, but then at the same time obviously unhealthy; but people for some reason like doing this unhealthy, maybe 'edgy' thing, and sometimes they even try to make it look glamorous or sexy. But in the end it's just unhealthy, and I personally don't understand why people smoke, and I think the attraction factor goes way down (in my book at least) when I find out someone smokes. So, it may be about seeing an attractive person, then finding out they smoke, and then that's all I can think about, forgetting about the initial attraction.

It MAY change in composition for the final, but probably not. There will be more textures on the smoke probably...we shall see where it goes. It's going to be a 30" x 40" print out :O

A biographical comic from Intro to Comics

Intro to Comics was a while ago (Spring 2009), but I was going through some folders and finding things I thought would be fun to post. So, here's a 2-page, biographical comic, about the war-time journalist Ernie Pyle (World War II), pencils and inked pages. The inking's a bit rough looking, but it was only my second time doing real 'comic inking'. I've always liked stippling stuff, so I like how those parts looked. Figuring out where the larger black spots and middle toned shapes should go was more of a challenge, and I think I've improved in that area a bit, but could still use some improvement (though I don't do a ton of just plain black and white stuff like this as much anymore).

New Much Better Quality Children's Book scans

Here are scans of the sheets that I have my storyboards on (now in their entirety, and scanned at 300 dpi and then merged together...I used Curves to make them more viewable, which also made the paper and eraser marks and all that visible, but oh well). One thing I'm noticing is that I need to work on line weight more, even in my sketching phase.. otherwise I like most of the page layouts. I have the writing done too, though it could change in the final version.

Anyway, here they be.

It's way later than I should be up right now, considering I have class tomorrow at 1 pm, and then night class, and will probably be tired through all of them.. :P O well, I really wanted to post these new scans.

Children's Book Storyboard Snapshots

Here are some snapshots of parts of a storyboard for our final 32-page dummy in Children's Book Illustration class. I am pretty happy with how it all turned out, even if some things may be adjusted in the final version. I just felt good making this, and even for the pages that aren't as clear yet, I still felt like I liked where I envisioned it going; it feels pretty close to the kind of way of drawing that I'd like to continue doing.

Edit: I know that the quality of these aren't too great; I was using a scanner I got off the free shelf that is in my apartment (which I don't know how to adjust the dpi on yet), because I didn't feel like walking back through the cold to the main building :P I will have better scans to post later.