Hey, Pear!

Late at night I had an idea involving fruit. I think it might be funny!

 

Humans!

 

Other people doing stuff in public.

Handtype

When I get blocked or frustrated with a drawing I like to draw words or letters. I really like doing type by hand, for projects or for fun, even if I am not a very wordy person.

I usually do it while I'm listening to something else, like a podcast or a video. That's how I end up with winners like "your blood controls everything."

Drawing block

Lynda Barry

I went to the Lynda Barry talk. There were a lot of people getting books signed and she spent a really long time with everyone individually and giving them each a chunk of drawing-wisdom. She is one nice lady and she had a lot of nice things to say when I told her I am also a lady-cartoonist. She even drew a picture for me in my sketchbook! Am I a lucky duck or what? I'm hoping my sketchbook has become enchanted by her Lynda Barry essence, and maybe my drawings will be half as lively and joyful as hers.

I don't exactly take notes, but I doodled and jotted down a few things.

Very important research

Goofing off in class.

Sketchbook dispatch

More sketchbook, almost ready to finish this one up. I've gone back to the Cansons but took out half the pages and used only half the book at a time. When the first half was used up I put the unused pages back on the binding and took the old ones off. It helped with weight/bulk, but it was messy and I don't love having so many loose pages hanging around. I don't know that I would do it again.

I'm really hoping to have some new actual content up soon, hang tight!

 

Humans!

Hello and sorry sorry sorry for my long absence! I have been distracted. Please enjoy some of this life drawing, or, perhaps more accurately, "people facing away from me on the bus" -drawing.

Also, this!

Summertime in magazines

Hands Challenge (sort of) complete!

I'd say the hands challenge is complete, to the extent that June is done and I am about done drawing disembodied hands. But in actuality I have only drawn about 86 hands, and could easily draw 500 more before I gain any real knowledge about hands. I had hoped that with practice I would be able to successfully compose good-looking hands from my memory or imagination, and I'm not sure that's happening. However, the project was a success in that now when I look at a hand I have a much better idea of what I'm looking at.



Some of these are my own hands, but some are copied from Burne Hogarth's Dynamic Anatomy, which I referred to for its insights on hand construction. Burne Hogarth's books can be challenging to say the least - he uses formal language peppered with jargon and occasionally I have to re-read a sentence several times before I catch the meaning. His drawings can also be almost impenetrable: every muscle, tendon and joint is so fully articulated in even his least detailed drawings that, in my vain attempts to copy his sketches, I often lost track of what I was looking at.



That having been said, if you want any kind of a formula for drawing the figure Burne Hogarth is your go-to-guy. The Dynamic Anatomy book is full of minute measurements and recipes that, theoretically, would allow you to draw the figure without any reference if you knew them by heart. The text is so dense that I find every time I go back to Dynamic Anatomy I learn something I feel as though I have never seen before. The thumb joint begins at the mid-point of the palm! Each division of the finger is a third smaller than the one below it! When you close or open your hand, all other fingers follow your pinkie! Who knew, right?

So that concludes the 100 Hands Challenge. Don't stop sending me your hand resources and hand advice, I will need them for a long while yet!

Keybo

Keybo might be the cutest robot ever. He loves to dance! Maybe I'll draw a little more of him sometime.

Moleskine part 2

Thanks for all your feedback on my sketchbook post. Here's what happened next, in quick and dirty comic form.



My mom was nice enough to go get me a new sketchbook! Unfortunately she got me the exact one I stopped using because it was too clunky. It will be fine for now, it seems it's about 50 pages lighter than what I remembered which was a nice surprise. Thanks, mommuh!

Moleskine

So this past year I've been using one of these hardbacked Moleskine sketchbooks with the thick yellow pages. I think I bought it online so I could get free shipping on something else. Anyway, I am probably going to blow some minds when I say that I hate this godforsaken thing. One advantage of the moleskine, though, is that the pages are too slippery to really draw in pencil, at least to draw anything you'd like to keep! It's forced me to get drawing in pen again, which I haven't done as much as I should. At any rate, the year is done and the book nearly is too, so here is a highlights reel.















For those of you that are in the know, what I really want is one of the canson (black cover) spiral bounds but with half the pages inside and a thinner binding! I love the paper but I hate carrying them around, they're so bulky. If any of you know where I could get such a thing, please do be in touch!

Just Ducky!

Me and Manny did some drawings about talking to animals. Please do check out his very super entry here. Mine is a true story, which I know may be difficult to believe on account of how action-packed it is.

Scandown!