Force Equals Function

Hey everyone. Long time. I've been busy studying with Mike Mattesi and and doing some contract design work for a mobile tech start-up.

The 10 week class with Mike over at drawingforce.com is over. It's been quite a ride.

I can only think of one other instance in my life when I made so much progress in such a short period of time. Mike is an amazing teacher and one of my favorite artists, which is probably why I kept improving so fast. He's also a very analytical artist, which is very rare, but works great for me, since I learn best when I combine analytical study with muscle memory practice.

I would like to get good at what Mike taught me, so I intend to keep training and work my way through Mike's Character Design and Animals Force Drawing books in the next few months.

Thanks to Mike's instructions, I got drawing a full human figure down to 30 minutes or less. This is how far I got in the last 2 and half months:

Force Drawing Week 3 and Freehand Construction

Hi everyone,

I'm posting all my force gesture drawings for this week's class with Mike Mattesi. I'm also getting to the end of Scott Robertson's "How to Render" Vol 1 DVD. I was hoping to finish this construction and value study project quickly today and start watching the next DVD but ended up getting bogged down: plotting shadows is hard and figuring out what's wrong with them is even harder. I think I caught and fixed everything.

All images are freehand with my Wacom tablet, as always.

And I submitted these 2 for Mike's review:

More basic surfaces

Here's some more stuff. I'm working on improving speed and precision.

The sketches are a bit messy, as I was focusing on understanding the "halfway to black" system through value studies and getting used to sketching (with minimal clean-up) spline surfaces in perspective. I ended up buying most of Scott Robertson's instructional DVDs (except the one with airplanes) - working through them now.

Been producing about 50  force sketches a day for Mike Mattesi's class, but everything still looks way too crappy for public display. I hope I'll get better in the coming weeks.

I'll be posting more soon.

I Miraculously Disappeared

Hey gang! I haven't gone AWOL. I've been busy working, going through Scott Robertson's DVDs and last week Mike Mattesi's Drawing Force class started.

Doing a boat load of basic exercises. I'll post interesting things when I make them. In the meantime here are some of my exercise sheets.

Hope everyone is doing well.

 

Almost end of CGMA quarter and some new curves

Hi everyone,

I'm on my last week of Michael Hampton's Analytical Figure Drawing 2 class. Week 7 was composition, which I always find very enjoyable to explore

I've been practicing drawing straight lines, curves and ellipses with my tablet for a few months now. I'm using Scott Robertson's excellent Basic Perspective Form Drawing DVD as my main training tool. I've been getting better and better, but still far from the speed and accuracy I'm aiming for.

My first goal (and benchmark) was to train up to the point where I would be able to freehand a decent perspective grid and use it to put together a few mirrored curves. I did that 2 weeks ago. It's rough, but adequate for a target mark.

This week, I felt I had enough control to attempt my first complex curves object. And it came out quite well. I'll need a lot of practice before I will be satisfied with my quality and speed, but for a first freehand constructed complex shape - this one is not too bad.

I'm going to go practice some more now.

CGMA Michael Hampton's Class: Week 5

Started my subscription to Michael Mattesi's drawing classes ( http://www.drawingforce.com/ ). Finally figuring out his book. It's been lying on my shelf for the past several years and I couldn't figure out how to get the same results he was showing. His videos cleared everything up. I'll post my drawing force exercises as soon as I complete a few with my tablet. All my scanners are dead.

Managed to draw only one portrait for Michael Hampton's class this Friday due to heavy workload and long work hours. Not too happy with the portrait I submitted, but I did it despite my sincere desire to abandon it half way and burn my tablet.

Another crazy week

Been working 10 to 12 hours days all week. Managed to finally get some time to draw this Friday, just  a few hours before assignment submission deadline :( Wish I had more time to practice, but it is what it is. I do appreciate the time I do carve out for drawing and get a lot done during the short openings which I make for myself.

Time management and appreciation for the finer things in life :)

Here's my facial muscle studies for Michael Hampton's class this week.

I'm still alive

Hi everyone. Last month ended up being quite the adventure. I was getting pulled in a thousand different directions. My drawing and painting routine s went out the window. Nonetheless, I did manage to put in some work wherever I could, both in my personal studies and my CGMA classes.

Here's the update,

Crazy Friday Update

Hi everyone! This week turned out to be extra crazy. I did manage to draw and paint a little bit. My goal was to draw 6 to 10 muscle figures to catch up on the last week on Analytical Figure drawing which I've missed.

I managed to draw 2 figures, 6 thumbnail paint studies and started working my way through the 1out of 4 Scott Robertson DVDs. The Robertson stuff is perspective drills (cubes, cylinders and perspective grids), so I'm not going to show them this time.

I'll try to draw 4 more figures next week. That should give me some sense of closure.

I'm trying to simplify my thumbnails where the final image looks like an abstract construct with impressionist colors, but when shrunk, it should feel like a photograph. It's getting there. Controlling values, temperature and saturation all at once is quite hard, but should allow me to makes some cool work when I get the process down.

End of Spring Quarter 2013

Spring quarter is over. Made some solid improvements across the board.

Learned a lot in Michael Hampton's anatomy drawing class and Derek Kosol helped me figure out some of the bigger problems I had with design and painting. Found out what I need to improve, so I will dedicate the next quarter to perspective, value and painting. I'm also taking the next Michael Hampton class.

Here are the 2 portfolio pieces for my Principle of Design Process class with Derek Kosol. I used a piece from week 1 and week 6 to show my overall progression.

I made some more improvements to the demon at the end of week 8. My painting is still slow, but at least it's beginning to make more sense now.

Weeks 6 and 7 of 2013 CGMA Spring Quarter

The more I learn and the further into the quarter I progress, the more unsatisfied I become with my drawings.

But I did learn to stop criticizing my art while I'm working on it. That was a huge breakthrough for me. I finally freed up huge amounts of energy which I now use for work and creativity, rather than personal drama and self-bashing.


Now I spend my days patting myself on the back when I sit down and work, and spend the rest of my time trying to find fault with any and all of my completed projects.

So far, this new approach has been bringing good results. Yeah, I'm a bit too complicated and quite an asshole. I know.

Derek Kosol explained to me, and I finally understood, why it's important to keep values close together in a painting - it's to keep the underlying compositional value framework intact. Woot!

I also learned that the most important thing in anatomical drawings is to memorize and understand the points where each muscle inserts into the skeleton. Once that part is handled, a relaxed muscle can be rendered as a surface with minimal curvature (flat), while a flexed muscle can be rendered as a blob (sphere).

Michael Hampton (my analytical figure drawing instructor) is brilliant: his artwork and his teaching method are equally amazing.

So that's my batch of good news for this update :)

Here's some new stuff for my CGMA classes:

Halfway Through 2013 Spring Quarter

Hi everyone. Sorry I went AWOL for a while. I'm still recovering from the winter quarter and my spring classes are kicking my butt. But no worries - I'm watching lectures and doing my homework between those pesky blackout spells :)

On a related note, one of my pieces from last quarter's Life Drawing class took 3rd place in a local Art Show in the Figure Drawing category. So, woot!

Here's some of the stuff I've been working on since my last update. Nowhere near stellar, but at least I'm keeping up, more or less. This is homework from the last couple of weeks.

Drawing those figures is painfully slow. I watch Michael sketch his examples and get inspired to do 5 or 10 per session. A few hours later I'm lucky to end up with 2. And now I'm cringing as I'm waiting for Derek's critique of my color "weapon" designs.

I'm whining again. I'm shutting up. Enjoy the pics.

CGMA Principles of Design Process Stuff

I'm taking Principles of Design Process at CGMA with Derek Kosol. This is my 3rd class with Derek. He ended up subbing Perspective Fundamentals and Digital Painting when I was taking those.

After 3 quarters studying with Derek, I was fortunate to have him pinpoint and fix some serious design issues I've been having. My flaws have been affecting my work for years. Now I'm making designs I never dreamed I could generate and produce.

Derek is awesome!

And on a personal note, Derek's Principles of Design Process class is constantly overlooked by students, which is a bummer. I have to say, it's the most important class I took after Peter Han's Dynamic Sketching 1&2 ( VisCom) and Perspective Fundamentals.

Before I get all opinionated, here are a few images of designs I did for Derek's class.

More Analytical Figure Drawing Week 3 Stuff

It's that time of the week when I wrap up everything I managed to do for the AFD class and start my Principles of Design assignment. Here's the second part of this week's homework for Michael Hampton:

Analytical Figure Drawing Doodles

Studying analytical figure drawing with Michael Hampton. It's an amazing class! For years, I've been studying design of the human form using Bridgman and then Michael Hampton when his "Figure Drawing Design And Invention" book came out. And now I'm learning directly from Michael.

The only thing that sucks is that our live Q&As are broadcast when I'm at work :( I end up watching recordings, so I guess it's not too bad.

But enough words, here are some pictures for week 3.

Friday Paint Studies

Hi everyone. Been working on several new things. I'll upload them when they're ready.

In the meantime, here are my Friday night tiny paint studies (done during the week). Still too slow: takes me from 30 minutes to a couple of hours to complete each :( I'm not giving up - that's my consolation for now.

The mini bento box (or whatever it's called) kicked my butt. That was one of the most painful studies I've done so far. I don't know why. Maybe I liked the reflection on the surface and spent more time than I should doing it justice?

As always, the source photographic images were found on the web by typing random words in google image search and picked by me based on what I felt like at the moment. If anyone feels they need to claim ownership, please do so - I think the original photos are awesome and deserve all kinds of recognition.

Until next time.

Belated Winter Quarter Update: 2013

Hi everyone. Sorry it took me so long to upload the rest of the images for the Winter quarter. I got sick right after the quarter finished and it took me a while to get my strength back.

These are live studies from March and April. Most are 2.5 hours or so. I did color for the first time, which was very interesting, but I also find it somewhat distracting. Yet satisfying... I don't know, I still might not have recovered completely :)

 

 

 

CGMA: Finals For Winter 2013

Hello everyone,

Just wrapped up my finals for my CGMA Digital Painting and Environment Sketching. Much respect to my instructors: Derek Kosol and Phil Dimitiriadis. Both guys are amazing artists and wonderful teachers. I learned a lot from them this quarter. In fact, there is no way I could've put together anything close to the following 3 images just 8 short weeks ago.

The monochrome image is my final for the Environment Sketching class. The top line shows building  concepts together with a very rough sketch. The second block (of 4 images) is a series of value studies; my assignment was to show the same scene under different lighting conditions. The bottom section of the page is a cleaned up and detailed version, based on one of the value studies.

The final for my Digital Painting class consisted of 2 separate images: a character development sheet and an environment design. Same idea for these 2 images: ideation, color studies, final.

I have a bunch of pictures from my live drawing class, but I need to finish my quarter (in a week or so) and download them off my phone. I'll have them up very soon.