You may notice things are a bit quiet around here....well that's because it's summer and school is out for most of us.

Stay tuned in fall for more student blogs and in the meantime check out our articles and read back through all the great entries from the 2009/2010 school year!

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Today I have spent 5 solid hours and 3 cups of coffee designing. I can't believe it, I am ecstatic. My creative juices are flowing. I've never been able to spend such a long time designing before!

I'm pretty tired mentally and my eyes are shot, which is why I've put the pencil down and am typing this. The only problem is I still have tons of ideas I want to get down. My creative energy is out-pacing my physical body. I'll probably stop soon...it's going to be supper soon anyway (the salmon is on the stove as I type).

This is actually the first designing I've done since my course started. I've been focussed on that because I knew there would always be time for this. In the course though we have reached this place where we are supposed to be making things that come from inside. Just splashes of paint and strange collages, stuff like that, not illustrating anything. I only "got it" this last week and holy freaking crap something has switched in my brain. I just want to create and create and create. I even used brush and ink to paint a face on the cover of the sketchpad I'm using today in just 7 strokes. This is noteable because I am terrified of making faces and always make hundreds of lines which I erase and redo over and over and over again.

I originally took this course to learn to paint and because I thought I might want to attend the school full time. By taking this course, assuming you pass it, you do not have to write the entrance exam. Now though, half way through, I am eternally grateful to myself for doing this. The experience has been unbelievable in the way it has opened me up. It has taught me that I can do things, it has taken away a lot of fear that I experience about not doing a good job and it is changing the way I think.

And not in a small way, these are huge changes. I have already done a design course where I was taught to design from inspiration and after that I would look at a tree and see a skirt, or a building and see a jacket. This is different, I can't even explain it other than to say I am learning to think like an artist. It almost makes me not want to do fashion at all lol Because it is constrained by the very definition of "clothing". I am certain I will be one of those, assuming I work in fashion as my career, that does art as my hobby. I am so happy to have this new hobby that I love so much.

Tags: foundation course | preparatory course | fashion design | designing | art

You know I finally figured out what this part 3 of our course is all about. The whole shape and form thing...I just didn't get it. It is why I have not made many blog postings: I honestly did not know what to write about. I did not understand what was happening and could not explain what we had done or what our homework was.

Anyway, I realize that we had a 3D part for learning about 3d aspects of art. Then we had a 2D part for learning skills and being exposed to many different styles, techniques, types of 2d, etc. This part here is about literally exploring shape and texture and rhythm and colour. She doesn't want anything she can recognize, it's not the point. The point of part 3 is to improve our techniques with developing texture, combining colour, and using non-distinguishable shapes. The goal is to learn to combine these so that we can solicit emotion, that is why we were asked to do word association exercises and then making artwork that is representative of the words. And that is also what she means by cliche.

In the end it is a misunderstanding, she is not really using the word cliche right. When she says cliche she actually is meaning the pre-determined visual associations we have. So, painting blue with white to represent the sky is a cliche in her words because it is an association that already exists. Instead she would want us to pick out characteristics of the sky and use shape, colour, texture, rhythm, etc to translate those characteristics onto paper (or sculpture or whatever). I look at the sky right now and it is bright blue with little clouds everywhere so how do I translate that? Sure it's blue, but it's beautiful too and godlike. Maybe I paint yellow because to me yellow is happy and add white stripes to draw the eye the same way the clouds do.. Then to represent the rhythym of those clouds, which by the way look playful and are dancing around the sky, maybe I take a bunch of colourful childrens buttons and glue them all over the place with a rhythmic but not repetitious pattern.

The reason we are doing this is so that we can learn how to be creative in a way we didn't know how before and bring more maturity to our art-making processes. It's not about the thing I always joke about "this is representative of the struggles of....blah blah". It is not about making artwork using weird colours or materials that represent something. Instead it is about learning how to find inspiration to create our own artwork without taking the inspiration we are using literally. So maybe the sky was my inspiration for that piece of art but in the end it does not represent the sky, it is a brand new piece of art which started because I looked at the sky. Part 3 of our course is about freeing ourselves from associations we have and about seeing the world through the eyes of a child's make believe where nothing is set in stone and nothing means anything because we are making up the game as we go.

I realized all this when I showed her an apple painting that I did in response to a word association exercise using Eden. She made a comment about cupping my hands on the painting, making a tiny square and maybe that is all that is needed: Just a splash of green and a red. She was showing me one technique to free myself from that "cliche" of an apple representing Eden and instead to say maybe this extra shiny bumpy patch of bright red with a smooth white square (the shiny part) is a way of translating that inspiration (Eden) into your own art -- your own totally new art.

The exercise last week was misunderstood a bit I think by almost everyone. I will be making a post detailing the last 3 weeks now that I understand what went on but essentially we were told to make a picture. Then we attached another picture to it and did it over and over again until we had a large piece of artwork. Most people just put their papers together and treated it like one big painting. Rather than adding piece to piece they just used a bigger canvas in total. I actually misunderstood in the opposite way as I made one painting and then progressed through a series of 6 paintings into the painting at the end of the series. Mine were related in progression but did not make up a large image when placed together.

But what we were supposed to learn from that was how to compartmentalize to make things which hold their own and also which are so related to one another that they become a large picture when moved together. I think the reason they tried to teach that to us was to try to hone our exploration skills while remaining within a very tight frame of reference. Anyone can make a big painting and anyone can change their shapes into recognizable things like faces but you need great interpretation and analytical skill to make a big picture which is make up of individual parts and does not cheat by using the ability of the human psyche to recognize things we know (like faces, or animal shapes) made up from those parts inside that big picture.

Anyway, this is what I have figured out and now everything makes a lot more sense to me and I wish I could go back to the first day and redo it! (or that I had time to redo it all at home).

Tags: foundation course | preparatory course | painting | inspiration

No one in my class seemed to have any idea what was going on this week so I am confident my absolute confusion is not caused by a language problem on my part.

On Saturday we started part 3 of my course. I don't know what the translation would be exactly but basically the next 6 weeks are about doing whatever we want with guidance. They want to see our thought processes and that we can think creatively and be challenged to change those processes.

The day started out with a film about someone who I can't remember now. I will write more about that when I figure out who it was because it was really interesting and I want to share info with you. After that we were split into our groups (I was excited to discover I stay with my group for another 6 weeks) and sent off for our first day with a new instructor. We were given a poem and asked to do a word association exercise: think of a central word that is related to the poem, then think of a word related to that word and so on. A few words down you may have departed from the poem completely. Then we were asked to do 10 quick drawings/paintings using whatever media we wanted (but urged to stay away from what we were most comfortable with). They should be pictures of the words.

So everyone did it and then when the instructor went through them she kept making comments about how the pictures were too cliche and saying how she could see other ways of representing things. One of mine really was too cliche, I knew that but still I had (and have) no idea what to make of her comments. I wanted to represent blood and the author referenced glistening lips so I painted lips with blood dripping to a pool. Yes, definitely cliche. But she kept saying that she could think of many other ways to do it. Everyone would ask what she means and  could she give an example and she would say that we need to figure it out ourselves. Some people got quite upset and most of the group didn't do anymore work because they start goofing around when they get overwhelmed. As an aside: about 1/3 of us are over age 25 and I guess you could say have more life experience so we are better at taking criticism and also dealing with boredom whereas the other 2/3 get pretty loud and "act-out" in a friendly way when they are frustrated.

So anyway, for the homework we are to do some more drawings and I seriously have absolutely no idea what we are supposed to do. It will be interesting to see what others come up with. Over this week some of us will get it and the rest will be floundering lost like we were in class. It's very frustrating!! I am hoping I am one of the ones that gets it when I have time to sit down and do the work.

Tags: foundation course | preparatory course | frustration | ideation

These are photos of everything I did for the first half of my foundation course at Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht. This album includes the artwork I did as well as photographs I was asked to take and photos from a trip to a museum. I have not included captions because it would take too much time. You can read about it all through my blog here at FSO or feel free to post questions as comments and I will reply :)

http://picasaweb.google.com/Abegael.Annie.Jackson/HKUGeneralFoundationCourseFirstHalf#

All the artwork is included, even the really awful stuff. In no particular order and unedited. Apologies for duplicates or pictures that are rotated incorrectly!

The next of the course half is more specialized for students wishing to pursue Fashion Design, Theatre Design and Interior Architecture and will be in a different album when it's done (it starts tomorrow).

If you're interested in seeing my inspirational photos and my research resource images you can also check out all my albums:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Abegael.Annie.Jackson/

Tags: resource images | inspiration | research | coursework | art | foundation course | preparatory course

As promised here is the rest of the artwork which I have not posted yet. Like I said in my previous post I got a near perfect score and I was shocked by this. Other students, their artwork to me looks so much better. So much more creative. But they asked what I was interested in doing and I think they take this into account when they decide on the scores. If I had said illustration I probably would not have been graded as well but the group I will go into on Saturday will be focussed on Theatre Design, Fashion Design, Interior Architecture...and one other I can't remember right now. Essentially on observing our environment and it's characteristics and designing/creating things that fit with it. So my eye for proportion, line, colour etc is very valuable whereas someone who can paint a near perfect landscape may not have the qualities to be as successful in this course (just as I would not be as successful in the fine art group they will be going into).

I am disappointed with these photos but I do not have time to retake them. They are all at a strong angle which means the proportion looks a bit wacky. Oh well.

I am posting the good as well as the not good and even the really really bad. You can see the list of what we were supposed to do in this post. These are in the order that I did them.

pencil, 2.5hrs Btw the angle that this and the photo below are taken at is very very bad. In the drawings, the top of the bottle and the bottom of the bottle are both the same width. They are not as they appear in these photos -- I just don't have time to pull everything out and retake the photos unfortunately :(

ink and pen with brush in background and for solid colouring, 2hrs

Click readmore for the rest! (23 photos total)

Tags: proportion | line | shape | drawing | painting | preparatory course | foundation course

I had my mid-term evaluation yesterday and it went really well. In fact I did better than I thought I would and am still surprised by that.

We are graded on a scale of 4.
1 - Not good at all
2 - Acceptable
3 - Good
4 - Excellent

I got a 3.5 :-D

Most of what they said I already knew...my painting skills are poor, my drawing is good, I have a really good sense of line, I do well with ink & brush, etc. One thing they said I had never thought about before: Something about how I have a story for each thing, how I set the scene. I was unaware of this and still not really sure I agree lol though I do love to ramble about what I was thinking for each one and maybe that is what he means -- in that case I'm not sure is it a positive quality haha

Anyway I will post the rest of the photos in a couple days when I have time to process them!

Tags: preparatory course | foundation course

Unlike most of you, my term is just coming to an end. In fact tomorrow is my final evaluation for the first half of my foundation course. I managed to get absolutely everything done except one thing: we were to make these puppets out of magazine clippings and paint over them. I have my puppets but I did not paint mine.

On Sunday probably I will post pictures of everything but it is dark right now and they will photograph even worse than I usually manage. Here is everything we did since Christmas (we started the puppet project before Christmas break):

- Puppet Project: find images in magazines and cut them out, things you can make into 2-dimensional puppets. Cut arms/legs off and put wires, etc in them so that you can make them move. Make many puppets. Puppets must be painted on top of, do not use the unpainted original image. Make many, both people/animals and objects so that you can make a scene.
- For the puppet project make 3 large backgrounds
- Also for the puppet project set up several different scenes with your puppets in different positions and take pictures.
- Draw an object 5 times using 5 different mediums and different lighting situations. I picked a very difficult object so I did it twice and called it a day (small glass medicine bottle). Next I picked another difficult object (my trackball mouse) and did it twice so to make up for it I did the last one (a lamp) three times for a total of 7 pieces.
- Draw a background 5 times using 5 different mediums and different lighting situations. I used a photograph of the west coast of Canada so I could not do different lighting but I did it 5 times. Some people did things like a window sill and manipulated the light.
- For good measure to show her I have been working hard I did an architectural-like drawing of the bell tower I can see out my studio window
- In class last day while she was doing evaluations of the puppet project she set us to work on a still life project in which she put some ceramic jars and a kettle on a table with a spot light and set us loose with instructions of what we were to do:
----  Four quick drawings of the outline of the objects only, no shading. 5 min for each drawing
----  Four drawings of the objects doing the outline first, then doing the dark tones and then the medium tones (shading). 15 min each
----  One painting where we use thick paint with very little water and paint the entire background, then we use another colour and paint the objects on top, moving the paint around. If you do a bad line you just fix it by using the background colour over it. The background should be a cool colour and the objects should be in a warm colour. We all used colours because she usually makes us work in B&W but her intention actually was a cool shade of grey for the back and a warm shade of grey with black for dark tones and white for highlights for the objects. 60 minutes, one time.
----  One charcoal drawing where  you cover the entire page with charcoal and then use the kneading easer to pick up the charcoal where the object is and "draw" it into the charcoal. 60 min, one time. We actually did not get done but I mention it incase you want to do it and because I will do it later when I have some more time.
- Then this week our homework was to go through all of our past work and separate it into 3 piles: the best, good enough, and terrible. Leave the terrible stuff at home and bring the other two for our final evaluation tomorrow. The best stuff we put on display and the good enough goes in a pile so that they can go through it. We will show all of our stuff from both the 2D and 3D portions of the course.
- Also for homework we were to draw two objects then we were to change something about them that will make them into another object. So for instance, and I did this one because I was running out of time...a bunny is a bunny, but make it again and change the texture to fluffy and it can be a cloud in the sky. I also did a cow which became a hair clip as a joke because in her email when she was trying to explain what to do she said "the original object must still be recognizable so for instance don't draw a hair pin and then draw a cow."
- Finally we are to glue the puppets onto our favourite background for the evaluation tomorrow.

So I essentially did all of that except the puppet project and the two drawings of the little medicine bottle this week. Actually in 3 days. I still can't believe how much I did. I did 2of the puppet backgrounds plus gluing but before Christmas I had cut out the puppets and made one background.

On Sunday I will post pictures of all of these things and then the next post after that will be a discussion of the evaluation.

Tags: foundation course

Well I'm a victim of my own stupidity. I made a blog posting the other day and never submitted it...just left the window open until night time when I shut the computer down. Bravo AJ, bravo!

I have my first class since well before Christmas on Saturday. I have a lot of work to do tomorrow and the next day because I did not do them over the holidays. It was not so much procrastination as it was that my bf worked very few days and it was lovely to sit on the couch day after day watching sci-fi with him. It was a sci-fi, Baileys and take out holiday -- heaven!

In the next two days I have ten drawings, two large paintings plus about a dozen puppets to make. I don't know if I will get it done. I meant to start on Tuesday but a project I thought would take only a couple hours took the whole day and then last night I could not sleep and have felt too ill today to do anything creative...tired ill, not sick.

The week after that, Saturday the 16th I believe, we have our final evaluation. I have to drag everything I've made during the entire course and set it up in a display to be critiqued. Based on the critique, my instructor's input, and my input my specialization will be chosen. We're supposed to be thinking over these holidays what we want that to be but we have not been told what our options are so everyone is a bit lost there.

I guess I will find out soon!

Tags: paintings | homework | drawing

Yesterday's class was pretty awesome. We had a special "Grafik Werkplaats" which basically means graphic workshop. None of us had any idea what we would be doing but it turned out to be print making! It was a lot of fun but I ran out of steam around lunch. Most of the other students slowed down after lunch too though there were a few that were all over it until the very last minute.

It snowed this weekend so of course my first train was late. Nothing like increasing my already way too long 2hr commute to school by waiting in the snow for 40 minutes at the transfer point. Luckily I got to school while the lab tech was still talking because I ended up on a faster train after those 40 minutes.

So, without further ado, here are some of the better prints I did. We were supposed to try to create different textures and to just play around. The only thing we were asked to do was to do a couple reeds/water reflection type ones. The way these prints are made is you take a thin metal sheet, the size of regular writing paper, and you use a heavy roller to cover it with a thin even layer of ink. Then there are many things you can do to create texture. You can lay paper on top of it in areas to get pure white (as no ink will be transferred to the paper in those areas). You put the metal ink down on a sheet of paper and run it through the giant heavy roller (presser). It's hand cranked and quite a workout. I meant to take a picture but I forgot...it's the same system though that you've seen in many pictures. Here's one. I think they're officially called an "Etching Press" in English.

In no particular order, here are some of the prints I made (I made 18 but I'm showing the better ones only):

Please click the Read More link to see the rest :)

Tags: etching | printing | ink | etching press | print making

Funny story....

I went to school on Saturday, travelled all the way (it's 2 hrs on two trains and one bus), and when I got there the school was closed. So, I got back on the bus, got on a train and at the station where I had to switch trains, because it was a holiday (Sinterklaas), I had to wait 35 min for the next train. So I went and had a coffee, and then I missed the train. I thought it would be a half hour but nope, they were running once an hour. So I had a lovely 1.5hr coffee at the train station and wrote my grandmother a letter.

Which I still haven't sent actually, I should get on that.

As promised here is a collection of artwork I did on Friday after building my lightbox.  This exercise was about learning, improving skills, experimentation, and experiencing different medium. Each image has been made with a different medium: Oil Crayon, watered-down Gauache Paint, Ink and Brush, Charcoal, and Oil Pastel Sticks. The whole point of the exercise is to not worry about the object you are painting, to free your mind of the what and instead just focus on the how. I am incredibly happy with the results and proud of myself for how much I learned. I knew that this would be a worthwhile exercise but to be honest I absolutely 100% did not anticipate just how much I would learn. In fact, if I have time before this week's class I plan to do five more because I am SO excited about how much I learned in the 4 short hours it took to do all these.

Click the readmore to see closeups and more information on the mediums used for each.

Tags: drawing technique | painting technique | shade with charcoal | fashion painting | use paint to shade | shading the human body | using shading | painting girls | painting people | figure drawing | fashion illustration | ink and brush | painting with ink | ink | guache paint | pastel sticks | oil crayon | charcoal

Well, I see everyone is writing a blog and I don't want to feel left out so hello :)

Like I said in my last post, everyone on this site is in the midst of their final projects and it becomes difficult to make updates...you either don't have any news or if you do you're exhausted and don't want to write anything. For me, it's not quite so bad but I do have a huge project due tomorrow that I didn't start until today. By huge I mean we had 4 weeks to do it. My heart just wasn't in it at first and then I got excited to start it a couple of days ago and the website broke badly and I spent about 22 hours total over two days (hey I have to eat, sleep, and watch Stargate with my man you know) fixing it. Actually it's not totally fixed yet, new registrations are still turned off but it's working so I'm happy.

So anyway today was the first day, since I decided I wanted to do it, that I was actually able to. I got up, went shopping as tomorrow is my first Sinterklaas and we hadn't gotten gifts yet. Apparently the family all brings inexpensive gifts, puts them in a big pile and then plays games to win them. I spent 21euros and got 19 gifts, I'm pretty proud of that...oh, where was I?

Yes so I did the gifts. Then I came home and started making the 2-d puppets. We are to take images from magazines, use Acrylic Binder (btw I'm pretty sure after working with it all day today that this is just white glue, someone tell me if I am wrong), put it on them, let it dry, paint the puppets if we want and cut them up and use twist-tie metal to make the legs, arms, etc move. I found 15 I can use, covered them in binder and patiently waited for them to dry.

They didn't. So I decided to build a light box while I was waiting. My reasoning was that it would help with all the other paintings I have to do tonight if I can just trace onto the good paper rather than try to draw directly on it. Then it was 3pm and time for my acupuncture & cupping appointment where I got beat up by an old woman. I got home at 4:15 but was not up to thinking so I finished the light box. It's pretty awesome:

Pretty good eh? The room is not that dark but because of the contrast with the light the camera had a hard time picking anything up. This photo is from a slightly different angle and I lightened it quite a bit (you can tell because it's so grainy) so that you can see the actual box:

It's a cardboard box with one of those frameless picture frame things you can get almost anywhere...usually they are for certificates but I think people use them a lot for pictures now too because they're so cheap (3.50euros for 45x60cm). The bottom of the box I made a couple slits and bent the flaps more than usual so the light box is actually on an angle. It should be if you plan to paint on it, even just a little bit, otherwise the paint will pool. I lined the inside with tinfoil so that it would bounce the light everywhere and there you can see my lamp, just an ordinary desk lamp, which sits about half a cm inside the box. You don't want to put a bare bulb in there otherwise the light will not be even, it needs to be shone out in all directions and bounced off the sides.

Well now it is 5:30pm and I am feeling a bit recovered from my appointment (51 needles, I counted, take a bit out of you, it does take some time to recover -- at least for me!). I have to clean up the giant mess I made before my boyfriend gets home and start on those other paintings...using my new lightbox! (I'm so excited for it! I had to leave mine in Canada because it would have gotten wrecked in the shipping and I couldn't afford $100 to get another here - btw this one cost me less than 5 euros including the 70watt bulb).

Oh, I took pictures as I was making it so that I could post a tutorial when I have time in the next few weeks :)

Tags: puppets | crafts | illustration | drawing | lightbox

Pardon my lack of helpful posts lately....like most of the students on this site my course has reached a point where we are just working working working on projects that are already started. And, I don't know about the other students on FSO, but for me this has meant I have procrastinated and not done much. The original thoughts of "It's not due yet? Oh awesome, I'll have time to really work on it and make it great" have now been replaced with "oh shit, the whole damn thing is due in 4 days and I have almost nothing done!!" Have you been there? I'm sure you have.

This week I have a whole hell of a lot to do. At least 10 normal paintings plus a giant background painting plus a bunch of 2-dimensional puppets. My heart isn't really into this project which is why I haven't done it. I spent the day on Friday painting a tray for serving tea for my boyfriend for his meditation/yoga sessions. I honestly thought it would only take a few hours but because of my lack of experience with painting I had to do a lot of samples before I felt confident painting the tray and it was pretty much an entire day's project. I did learn a lot, those samples taught me some new brush strokes so that is good...though at this point it would have been better to be learning whilst doing my homework.

This problem that I have is something a lot of students have also and it is something that those students and I really need to get a grasp on. It is detrimental to learning because when you are rushing to do something, all you do is get it done. Sure you may even get a good grade but at what expense? How much did you learn? Did you have time to reflect on your knowledge? Did you learn some bad practices and now you know better? If all you do is get the project done, you will never reach your full capabilities.

It is just as important, maybe even more important, to start a project immediately that you are not enthusiastic about, as it is to jump into one you are excited to do. Maybe after doing the non-fun project you will gain a new appreciation for it and next time you will want to do it. But if you only make yourself do it once the pressure is on, how can you ever convert it from something you have to do, to something you can't wait to do?

I can't tell you how to start projects early that you don't want to start. Everyone has different tactics. Some people just know it has to be done and that is enough for them. For others they promise themselves treats if they do it (this doesn't work for me because then I say "fine, I don't want the treat anyway!"). Still others just give themselves a schedule and stick with it. Personally for me, I am trying to learn the first option. Obligation and duty is something that I need to work on. For me, I need to learn how to make those more important than deadlines because then deadlines will never be as much of a problem as I make them and I will have less stress and be able to complete projects utilizing my full capabilities and having time to maximize my learning and newly applied knowledge.

I was gone for the last several days and have been working all night last night and today on getting the website caught up. It's almost done and when it is I will be pouring into my homework. I will post when I have something tangible to share :)

Tags: learning while doing | deadlines | getting projects done | pracrastination

The first two classes of the 2D portion of my foundation course were Model Drawing and I never really told you what the homework was. There is a reason for this, I didn't understand myself. I finally got it figured out and got most of it done. I think these are good exercises to help teach your mind to apply creativity in a different way.

Exercise 1(after first class) :

Pick one of your model drawings (large size paper) and make a better version of it on the same sized paper. It could be traced using tracing paper to ensure it was the same scale but study what you did and see how you can improve it. I have not done this yet.

Exercise 2 (after first class):

Take a piece of paper and give it a grey wash (make the entire paper grey), then using only black and white paint another one of your model drawings. You can re-interpret it by making it abstract or do whatever you want. One of the examples she showed us had the model holding her head in her hands. I did this twice, both of them sucked. I'm embarrassed but I'll post them anyway so you never feel alone. She actually made only one comment for the mainly white-lined one below and that was "This one I do not like" lol Later I got her to explain that she thought I could do better, that the line thicknesses are out of proportion, the hair doesn't work and is too small, and the lines are not tidy enough. She did like the background of the weird black one but said the figure was way too much of a contrast.

Tags: 2-d | model drawing | painting

I am a very bad person. I have not written my second post this week showing my homework. Why, you ask? Oh because it's late the night before one short essay and 5 paintings are due and I am thus far done only 4. I'm so freak'n tired! I'm going to bed and will just fess up to my incompetence tomorrow.

I will also post pictures tomorrow or on Sunday, and explain what the homework was from the last two weeks as I think they were good exercises and you might enjoy doing them yourself.

sleeeeeeeep.....2hrs less than normal but I think I'll manage. Thank god for Dutch Koffee.

p.s. I feel less bad now that I notice Daniel is the only one that has posted more than once this week *yay!* We're all incompetent!

Tags:

Really tired after today's class so I'm not going to write much but I'll show you the drawings from today. I think today was the last day we do model drawing. It was a good class but boy is it exhausting. Today the model went nude which was interesting. The class was (mostly) mature about it lol but you know how people make jokes when they're nervous...

Anyway, here we go, sorry about some of the dark dark photos, it was the only way to get the pencil to show up...from the first to the last:

Tags: model drawing | life drawing

Yayyy!! All my books have arrived. It's almost information overload. Actually not almost. It is information overload. There is so much to look at and I don't know where to start.

So excited! ***Loves Books***

hehe

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First 2-D class today and we did model drawing for 3 hours -- I had such a great time! I have only taken one drawing class and it was fashion so I found it difficult to transition to a "real" human shape and I think my drawings were still a bit skinny for the most part but it helps that the model was thin. If we had a bigger model I'm afraid my drawings would have looked really off.

Anyway, I also have never worked on paper larger than 11x14inches (around an A3) and we used these huge pieces that were taller than a yard/meter. The model did some poses in panties and some poses in a dress. I tried my best to mix styles and try different things...I won't get this opportunity very often and my skills are so limited from lack of experience so I wanted to take best advantage of the class. I used pencil, charcoal pencil, charcoal stick, and indian ink with brush. All the poses were 3-5min except the last one which was 20min. There is one missing because it was light pencil and too much charcoal rubbed on to it to be able to see the pencil....without further ado, in order from first to last here are photos of my drawings:

1) Blocking it out (I started every drawing like this except the ink one and then erase the lines as I refine the shape:

Tags: life model drawing | model drawing | fashion drawing | fashion figure template

Well, one of the books I bought was actually the wrong one...I was not pleased with myself for that one! Still am not anyway but my boyfriend has bought me the one I meant to get so I am not so sad anymore at least. What a great guy :)

Anyway, last Saturday for school all of the foundation students were carted off in busses (3 full ones with nice seats) to a museum. At first I was not looking forward to it at all because I thought we would be led around on a tour in Dutch (which I am still not very good at) and be forced to stare at paintings we didn't care about. Boy was I wrong.

I started getting excited before we left because we had a lecture first where they went over some of the things we would see. Turned out this museum is half inside and half outside with lots of sculptures and interesting pieces in addition to paintings and drawings. My friend and I did the outside area first because it was going to rain and I'm glad we did. It started raining just as we were finishing and we were so tired we only half-heartedly looked at the exhibits inside....which for me was just fine, we basically got through all the cool stuff and missed the paintings though I did see a Picasso which was cool.

Here are some photos and at the bottom is a link where you can see the whole album.

Tags: sculpture | outdoor museum

[edit: I have over 150 fashion related learning books in my personal library and I will be reviewing them for FSO very soon. Click here for the first half and click here for the second half.]

I got my tax return back and I decided to put most of it on my student loans and also get myself a couple of books. There were two books in particular I felt I needed. Then I got on Amazon and I thought "well I might as well get this one also". Before I knew it, 3 hours had past and I had basically bought every book in my wishlist. I would have bought them eventually anyway so I'm just speeding up the process, right?

For $450CAD I got 13 books related to patternmaking, fashion design and textiles and 3 books for my guy. I am so very very very excited to get them. Though I do wonder what will happen with the postal strike since all but 3 are coming from the UK (the other 3 were cheaper, even with the international shipping) from the US. They have all shipped though so now I just have to keep my anticipation from killing me and all will be well.

Btw, I think I should share a secret with you all...I am an obsessive fashion design / patternmaking book collector and I have hundreds of books. So when I say that I would have bought them anyway, that's actually true lol and when I say I bought almost every book on my list, that's also true...it's weird, it's like there is almost nothing left to buy. The two books left that I really want are $100+ books each and I couldn't justify it right now (after all, the two of them together is like 5 months of student loan payments soo....priorities!).

One of the big features that will be coming to this website once I finish fixing all the little coding problems is a gigantic book directory and eventually self-study guides which list which books to look in to find the information that is on the study guide. Doing these two projects will be extremely time consuming but I think they will be a fantastic resource when they are done. :)

I start the 2-dimentional (painting, drawing) portion of my foundation course on Saturday. I'm really looking forward to it! And the books! Ooh!! Exciting week!!!!

Tags: fashion textbooks | fashion books | patternmaking | foundation course | preparatory course | illustration books | fashion illustration