The Zoo Murals

They really liked it!  We spent 23.5 hours at the zoo painting away at 2 5ft tall exhibitions at the Seneca Zoo from August 2nd to the 5th.  Shin Wakabayashi and I were stunned that we actually pulled it off in one week and now the zoo wrote a blog entry about us on their website! CHECK IT OUT!

Thanks also to Amber Gartung for stopping by and lending a hand!

                  

      

                  

Fencer 2

I wanted to try a tighter drawing with my opposite hand.  It's still a little shaky but it came out better than I expected. Thanks Jessica Crawford on the previous painting, I changed the lips up a little bit.  They WERE a bit scary. haha

Thanks everyone!

The Digital Fencer

I'm finally understanding digital painting.  I've been working in all sorts of traditional mediums for most of my life so far and switching to Photoshop painting is a bigger change than I expected.  It's when I stopped forcing it to work like I was painting with a paintbrush & water, using the many layer options,etc, and accepted the medium for what it was is when it started to look a whole lot better.  Traditional painting will always be my thing but I can't help but try some digital here and then.  

This is left-handed still.  My right arm is slowly coming back after 3 weeks of OT.  For some reason it's taking longer than usual for it to heal, according to doctors, but I was able to play some Badminton with it yesterday!  I probably shouldn't have but I'm not experiencing any bad repercussions from it so it must mean it's getting a lot better!

Below is the final and a close-up of the head.  And under that is the pencil drawing that I painted over.  

Let me know what you think and if you have any advice for me.  

Thanks!  

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New Experimental Work

I've been keeping myself busy with lots of drawing exercises and playing around.  The following are all experimental drawings except for the line drawing of a friend that I drew with an upside down reference.  

Thanks for dropping by. 

Strange shift of the brain?

I started reading, "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards today.  So far, I've only read her theory and her research on the right side of the brain and I can already attest to how different each hemisphere is.  After a couple of months of drawing lefty, I noticed how I now skip many steps while drawing compared to how I drew with my right. I don't know for sure if the left hand uses my right side of the brain "better" but all I know is that my right brain is liking in more.  For example: when drawing portraits I usually would make light sketches of the round skull, the vertical line from forehead to neck, draw lines from ear to ear, perhaps a couple of lines from the ends of the nostrils to the ends of the mouth, etc.  From here I would do more and more value guessing and shape guessing until there was enough information on the page for me to really start.  But now, I just don't have the tolerance for all those steps and I just "go for it."  My methodology changed from "let's plan and take each step one at a time," to "let's get it right the first time!"  As a result, these portraits have never taken more than 2-3hrs.  So somehow my perfectionism has disappeared.  Now this could also be because of my sudden interest in blind contours in February or my timed bird-gesture-drawings-so I can't be sure.

The portraits so far have not had likeness successfully accomplished but I think that also is getting better with practice.  Perhaps a balance of my right and left hand drawing is necessary.  If you can guess who this guy is then I'll give you a......ehhh...idk......a....handshake! lol    

One More Portrait

Here's another one I did a couple of days ago.  I've been trying to make more of these lately but sometimes the left hand doesn't cooperate very well.  Keep practicing, thats' what Mr. Wakabayashi said. :)

4 Old Men

This summer, I'm just going to use my left hand only.  So after doing some blind contours, I attempted to do a couple of portraits in charcoal. They turned out better than I expected: