I've been putting up some sketching videos showing my process when I work in other materials like brush pen, pencil, pencil and acrylic and a variety of other things. Lots of portraits.
Check 'em out, thumb them up and share them!
I've been putting up some sketching videos showing my process when I work in other materials like brush pen, pencil, pencil and acrylic and a variety of other things. Lots of portraits.
Check 'em out, thumb them up and share them!
A lot of people ask me how I get my overhead camera angle. I use a boom microphone stand with a gorrila pod clamped into the microphone mount. This instructable could be modified to be mounted to the left or right of your work and the camera mounted to the appropriate side of the mount shown, instead of on the very end of the mount. Not a hard modification for a perfect camera angle.
It's not a big secret I've been working on a new project with my friend Jane. The new project is called Put it on Paper and you can keep up to date on it here. We need to figure out if MagCloud is going to be the right place for us to publish our new project. so we figured we'd take all 3 issue of Art Journaling: It's ALL Good and offer all 3 issues combined. I finally got the combined zine up on MagCloud today. So far so good.
I decided to offer the zine in both a printed format and an e-zine. If you buy the printed issue you get the e-zine for free. The cost of the 3 combined issues in e-zine format is at a lower price than it was to buy them each individually.
You can go to the site and flip through and see what the zine looks like. I really think that using MagCloud will fix all of the issues we had with sales of the first zine- all those technical download glitches? Gone! You want it printed- here it is.* They'll ship it to you for a couple of bucks, just like a real magazine.
I'm excited to be using MagCloud for PioP and the old Art Journaling: It's all good! Follow the link below to buy a copy and to follow ComfortableShoes on MagCloud to be notified of when we load new content!
Art Journaling: It's ALL Good All 3 Issues
All 3 issues of Art Journaling: It's All Good in one fat 100 page download. All the art journaling goodness in one!
I get a lot of questions about sketching from photos. I thought I'd share some observations on the idea.
The first thing I'll share with you is that size matters, the bigger the image the better. It's much easier to make something smaller in size than to make it larger (enbiggen). The quality of the image matters a lot. A really washed out or overexposed snapshot is very hard to work from.
For instance, the following image would be very difficult to sketch. First, the face is far to small to draw anythign accurate. Second, the face is washed out, it's an even smooth tone. NO wrinkles or points of reference are visible. It would be very difficult to translate this face to a drawing or painting.
The following image is better- larger in size and the face is not over exposed. It would work to sketch. There are lots of nice gray tones in the image and it would be easy to pick out dark and light areas to work. (Plus look at that crazy mustache!)
I've mentioned in Challenge! that I love working from the images in Flickr's Commons, and both of these images are from the set "Civil War Faces." There is a lot of history in that set and some amazing facial hair on the men.
When I sketch faces I start first by observing the image close, I make mental notes of where the darkest and lightest area are located. Then I make a light reference drawing and add layers of light gray to build up layers of shadow and end with the darkest darks. This drawing of "Modern Cowboy," shows my method.
Check out Jasmin and Traci's posts.
I use 3 main ways of getting the images from my cameras and into my journals: sketches, toner transfer and Pogo printer. The toner transfer and pogo prints require me to transfer the image into my computer. After that I decided how I’m going to print them.
When I use the pogo I often trim the images to look like mini Polaroid prints using this method. If I decided to simply print the image the Pogo will center and crop it to fit. It works best if you shoot in 2×3 mode, if your camera has a setting that allows you to chose. Otherwise you can import it into Picasa and edit it so it’s also 2×3 and have it cropped exactly the way you’d like and then print via the Pogo.
When I use a toner transfer I usually paste the images into a M!crosoft Publisher document so I can make the pics the size I want and fill an entire page with the images. (See a video on one of my toner xfer method here, it’s Ustream and longish and see this blog post on another method.) I then xfer them in to the journal. It’s best with toner transfers to do them quickly, as a fresh print works best.
The other method in which I use photos is to draw them. I’ll bring an image up on screen and then sketch from the image. Sometimes I’ll add watercolor or acrylic over the top or l’ll go over the top of a background I’ve created in the past. Sometimes I’ll use images I’ve found on Flickr’s commons as inspiration.
Photos can be used in so many different ways in art journaling it’s amazing and they are continually inspiring.
I've writen previously about my obsession with the cowboys in Flickr's Commons. I even crafted my first Challenge! on ArtJournaling.ning.com around them. For the Challenge! I recorded myself sketching a few cowboys from the Commons. View the videos here and then head over to ArtJournaling.ning.com to check out the Challenge! and join in on the fun.
Challenge! is a group on ArtJOurnaling.ning.com that includes weekly challenges for art journalers. The group is free and donation based. It seems NIng has blocked me form being able to add a paypal button on my Challenge! pages. So here is the donation page for Challenge! If Challenge! has inspired or motivated you to work in your art journal, please consider a donation to help me run the site.
I don’t often do exchanges with other artists. There are many reasons, most of which is the fear that I won’t finish or worst yet be judged by artists that I like, a lot. So when it was suggested by 2 ladies that make really excellent art that I participate in a postcard exchange I said yes, but with reservations in my ability to produce 2 postcards of any quality and worried about judgement. Ultimately I was motivated by lust greed, I REALLY wanted a piece of Jazmin and Tammy’s art in my hands.
I made a stack of postcard sized images on heavy watercolor paper and let them sit. Then about a week before they were due I rifled through the images and picked 2 that I liked. I addressed and stamped them and sent them on their journey. (To see the one I sent Jazmin go here. And to see the one I sent Tammy see here.)
In return I was sent 2 beautiful pieces of mail art.
I’ll show them off in the order they arrived:
Jazmin:
Tammy/DaisyYellow:
Everything I see is just so perfectly “them.” Even if they hadn’t signed the pieces i’d know exactly who made what and when. So awesome So Amazing. Go see their blogs Jazmin and Tammy.
Do you want to get in on a postcard swap? Check out iHanna's swap over here.