Another lesson, and my first animal sketch.

This morning I relaxed by taking another page out of one of the books I'm reading on pencil sketching and working the project.  This one is the first I've done where I'm happy with the lighting on a cylindrical object.  It's not perfect, but it looks more realistic than my previous attempts for sure:

Next is one I'm particularly proud of.  I did this sketch of my family's maltese/poodle mix, Misha.  He's a friendly little dog, and the first thing I've sketched that isn't some sort of table top object (although he DOES fit on a table without any problem).

Because he's a white dog, it was more what I left OUT that made the picture.  Definitely a good learning experience.  Anyone who has advice on creating more realistic fur outlines, I'd appreciate it.  :)

Two new still life sketches

This evening I had time to sketch out two new pieces.  One I got from one of those drawing self-help books, and it actually turned out nicely:

The other is an attempt to capture a scultpture my wife and I were given for our wedding.  Given it's complex shape and my lack of experience, it may have been a bit over my head:

 As you can see, the shading is a little off, and the shape of the inner arch doesn't look quite right (in real life it's a bit more elegant of a curvature).  However, it was a good learning experience.  Given a chance to do it over, I would have backed off on the background shading, made the shadow a little more relevant to the shape of the object, and been more exacting about where the inner arch meets it's right hand base.  Oh well, with practice comes knowledge.

~Ethan

Introduction and Purpose

Here's the deal: I've always told people I can't draw. I'm a musician, a performer, I've never had a gift for the visual arts. However, I've always wished that I COULD produce some art, just for myself.

Today, after getting back from an early fire call and being unable to sleep (see my firefighting blog here), I decided to pick up a pencil and a pad of paper that was sitting on my coffee table and doodle a bit. This is what I came up with:

It's a leaf.  An awful, ugly, uninteresting leaf.  So I told myself, "Yep, still can't do it", and put the paper down.  I was still bored and suffering from insomnia, though, so after 20 minutes of reading I decided to give it another shot, this time with my pager on the edge of the coffee table:

hmmm.....not bad.  Certainly not impressive, but a damn sight better than that first artifact I'd produced.  Actually I'd enjoyed kind of just sitting there and sketching for the last 20 minutes.  It was relaxing, almost meditative, and although it hadn't produced a masterpiece, I was pretty pleased at the other benefit's I'd garnered from the session.

Later in the day I was sitting around the fire station, covering for another guy who'd had to go back to his night job for some reason.  I had forgotton to bring my computer with me, and nothing much was on TV, so I grabbed a pad and pencil from the station's office and took a chair out into the truck bay.  Staring at my turnout boots on the ground by the fire engine, I started to sketch:

"Wow", I thought, "I can actually tell what that is".  Very unrefined, yes, but I bet any firefighter would identify that as a pair of bunker pants without a problem, and I was pretty happy with myself.  As though through revelation, I felt I had discovered a side of myself that I didn't know existed:  The whole reason I'd never even seriously tried to draw was because I told myself I couldn't do it.  There's no reason I can't develop this skill the same as any other.  Determined to strike while the iron was hot, I headed to the craft store and picked up some quality sketching pencils and paper, along with some reading material, and after an hour at home I'd produced these pieces of work:

An egg, and a walnut.  Nothing fancy, just produce, but I felt as though with time I could accomplish anything. So that's what this blog is for.  I want to develop this as a lifelong skill, and I think having a place to display my work will motivate me to keep with it.  If you're an artist and have advice, I'm always open to help from those with more experience, so please leave comments where you see things that could be improved next time around.

Cheers,

~Ethan