They call me the fireman.

That's my na-uh-yame.

Car time.  With no classic car museums closer than a four hour round trip, I made do with the Firefighter Museum.  Was able to draw from their numerous truck collection as well as cases and cases of models showcasing firetrucks through the last century plus.

Not my best week.  Lots of ellipses and linear perspective by hand made it stressful.  It was a good challenge though.  Staying in the same mode this week with military vehicles.  I think I can draw military ANYTHING so my birthday trip tomorrow to the 45th Infantry Museum should provide interesting subjects for me.  Stay tuned to this station for more...



Zoobooks

Does anyone even remember Zoobooks? It seems they're still around.  I loved them as a kid.  Between all those back issues and actually going to a wonderful zoo during breaks and field trips I had a love for animals take hold early.  They've always fascinated me so I was pleased to have a chance to draw them for an assignment.

Hit the Oklahoma City Zoo last week with a good friend of yore.  Fun trip but I wasn't happy with my output that day.  Decided to take the opportunity to dive into full marker and gel pen use on top of my drawings.  I've been holding back so that my actual sketching was the star, but needed something to experiment with. 

All of these were drawn from life with the exception of the male lion, Aslan, who was put down due to illness in early 2012.  He's drawn from my personal photographs of him roaring and if you've never heard a male lion roar in person...add that to your list.  It's an amazing display of power that you can FEEL all through your core.  This was my tribute to him for letting me hear his declarations of territoriality.

Term 2

Been a while since I posted so I'll make up for it with drawings from the first three weeks of Dynamic Sketching II.  The flowers were a bday gift for my girlfriend.  The insects and dinosaurs were drawn from observation at Sam Noble Museum on the OU campus.

The remaining skeleton pages are from a local gem, the Museum of Osteology.  It's America's only skeleton museum, is one of my favorite museums that I've ever been to and is about three miles from where I was raised.  Check it out if you're close; it's well worth the admission.

 

 

 

 

 

Recently had a rough weekend with the pup.  Here's a drawing of him resting comfortably.  Love that boy.

 

Astounded

So CGMA has posted their student gallery for last term (Spring 2013).  I'm incredibly humbled by their selections.

I hold 5 of the 16 gallery spots for Dynamic Sketching I.  :o

I completely expected to have 1, possibly 2 of my pieces in the gallery because I feel really good about my work last term.  But having a third of the available slots in a class with ~35 students is shocking to me.  I'm looking into how the pieces are selected for my own curiosity and will update this post when I find out.

In a humorous and slightly boggling turn of events, I also have a piece in the Intro to Perspective gallery even though I took that class two terms ago.  :D

So thank you to CGMA for teaching me the methods to make better art and then showcasing it for me.  This has been an amazing experience so far. 

Damn Polaroids...

Here's my final piece for Dynamic Sketching I.  Designed a series of ambush predators who hide amongst the orchids.  I am not completely happy with the finished product.  I feel like I tightened up early and it constrained my drawing. 

Overall, very pleased with the course.  Even after drawing for years, I'm just now starting to feel the confidence that I can fix any mistakes that I may make during the process.  Next term will be a continuation of these techniques and will feature extensive drawing from life.  I've got all my field trips planned out and am grateful to live in a city with such a wealth of museums to visit for my artistic purposes. 



My kind of plants...

At least these won't die because I water them too little (or too much).

Went to the Crystal Bridge to do some drawing from life.  It was a fairly enjoyable experience, especially with the techniques I've picked up this term.  Amusingly enough, the kids were very respectful and the irritation was brought on by the old woman who loudly asked, "are you drawing that flower???"

:|

Fill in your own joke answer.

These were sketched and labeled on-site, cleaned up later, then digitally colored as a final step.  I'm pretty pleased with how a few of these pages turned out.  Makes me more excited for Sketching 2, which is almost exclusively going on field trips. 

 

What the heck, here are last week's plant drawings from reference photos/videos.

 

 

Finally sketching dynamically...

So this semester is going well.  Somewhat easier than Perspective since I don't have to measure everything out!  Here are some highlights of the last few weeks.