Zazzy

I called this one jazzy because it reminded me of Matisse. It started out as a live sketch, that really celebrated the female figure, without being too overtly sexual.

Sketch - Los Gatos, 11-Feb-08

Flirt view 1

Since I have not been to a live sketching class in a few months, I thought it time to take what I have learned, and apply it back to the computer. Specifically, a computer program might start you off with a rigid and perfectly formed "model," but it will take some doing to achieve a naturalistic pose.

Flirt view 2

Yes, but is it sexy? That shadow across the back is not something you’d normally see in a photograph, but our computer model is trapped in 3D space, and the software renders it nicely.

Flirt view 3

There is no escaping the mannequin-like appearance from this view. On the other hand, a live model will almost never look a sketch artist straight in the eye.

Los Gatos. Six minute pose. 26-Feb-2007

A 3D femail figure in self-defense stance

This is a Poser project I was working on before I got too involved with the site re-design. I think the virtual muscular structure is pretty good, but there are obvious contortions when the figure does something athletic. In the spirit of this blog, I’m posting it now, as-is.

Hand with leopard skin texture

Note the animal skin and claw-like hand. Science has been talking about the possibility of “designer babies” in the near future, through genetic manipulation. What I am curious about is whether people will do the kind of genetic cross-breeding depicted here, as a fashion statement.

Digital sketching Fall 2006

This sketch was created using a digital stylus. I had the opportunity to work with this model about a year ago. Her hair style is long on the right, and cropped short (as you see it here) on the left.

The sitting lasted about 20 minutes, and I felt that I didn’t have enough time to finish. Ordinarily, an artist would simply have the model back another time. But, this was done at a drawing class, and you are viewing it on the Internet. Sometimes you are going to see unfinished work in this space. You can take it or leave it. That’s what this blog is about.

Same model sketched previous year

When I sketched the model last year, I had just started drawing with digital pen. At that time, it was all about learning to draw with a plastic pen-tip on a plastic surface. Plus learning how to use the software.

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Mother Earth amid rising sea level

This is a representation of the mythical Mother Earth, or Gaia as she is sometimes called. Her hands in the clouds and legs in the water show the hydrological cycle. Her body is the color of arctic ice, ranging from white to deep blue. On her person you can see a human hand brushing the surface of the water. Those are typical Northern California hills in the background, and it appears that the water line is rising.

If you enjoyed the movie An Inconvenient Truth and are interested in areas susceptible to global warming, you can view dynamic maps created about climate change and sea level.

Digital charcoal and watercolor

It is a rare treat to be working with digital stylus in Silicon Valley. At the last sketching class I went to, I met a guy who was working on the beta version of Painter 10. You might think he was working on a computer as well, but no, he was there with sketchpad.

Los Gatos, live sketching, digital stylus.

Digital charcoal & watercolor

Digital charcoal & watercolor

Work in progress, plus detail

Fauve Nude

The first image, top left, shows a live sketch made some time last month. (Same day as "Spontaneous.") It is a software simulation of artwork done in charcoal and watercolor. There is some disfiguration in the buttock area, same as might happen on paper in real life if too much water was applied. All is not lost, however, because in the world of digital painting, it can be fixed.

The middle image shows the same sketch, after some touch-up. Even though the sketch was done more than a month ago, the artist’s palette of colors is saved in the file somewhere, so color can be sampled and then re-applied somewhere else on the canvas. That’s what all those splotches are.

The image top right is a zoomed-in detail of the finished work below.

Los Gatos, live sketching & brushwork.

Six minute pose

Twenty minute pose