February Figure Drawing

I went figure drawing with the Periscopalians yesterday. Erika Moen hired a terrific-looking model. I'm please with some of the rapider sketches, but as we transitioned to longer studies my still-lingering inadequacies as a draftsman became more apparent. I was sitting on the floor for most of this, so my point-of-view resulted in some funny foreshortening.







Here are Steve Lieber's renderings of the same subject - can you tell where he was sitting in relation to me?

More Figure Drawing w/ Periscopers

Glad I used ink this time instead of my usual scratchy 4H pencil. Without light, form is meaningless.

Figure Drawing with Periscopers!

I went by Periscope Studio on Wednesday night for a figure drawing session they organized. Surrounded by the greats, it was pretty dang intimidating!

Great model! Though I'm feeling a little rusty. When SNitLoE is done, I wanna get back into figure-drawing regularly.

Nude with cap - still nude?

Just so you don't think this is turning into some kind of boy's club after yesterday's cartoon, here's a little Russian beefcake courtesy of this morning's figure drawing session. This model brought a hat, a prop gun and A LIGHT SABER! (not pictured) (haha)

I know you only read this blog for the nudity

Some more life-drawing. By next week I hope to have a few actual comics to show you guys, namely my submission for Stumptown Underground's Religion & Spirituality issue and my submission for Hazel Newlevant's "Ultimate Sadness" anthology. I really need to draw my butt off this week.





I've really learned a lot recently from Michael Mattesi's excellent guide Force: Dynamic Life Drawing for Animators, though I'm still figuring out how to put it into practice. Though I'd always though that, while you're in the studio, your life-drawing should be as "realistic" as possible, and that you should only "cartoonify" what you've learned later on, Mattesi gives the opposite recommendation: cartoon/caricature "as you go" so that you bring out the most important aspects of the model or pose. In that drawing above, I deliberately widened the trunk of the body by about 20%, just to emphasize the smug, masculine confidence of the pose. I also caricatured the face and gave him a cigarette. I think it's very interesting how you can do this and still be very faithful to what's in front of your eyes - I feel I'm only scratching the surface here. I've only just discovered Mattesi's incredible video blog and website.

Weekend Nudes, non-female edition

This week Hipbone's model was, gasp!, a man. Because he was older, there were tons of veins and wrinkles - these are half-hour poses, but they could easily have been twice as long, there was so much detail.



(Sorry about the censor blocks - ImageShack, the service I use for hosting the images on this blog, will take them down if they violate their decency standards. I can't really begrudge them this.)



The guy came up with some really unusual poses.

Finally Back to Figure Drawing

Hey blogsciples. I finally have enough discretionary income to start going figure drawing at Hipbone Studio again. This morning I went with Katy Ellis O'Brien; she gave me some of her big brown pieces of paper to draw on.



They're useful, because then you can draw highlights and not just shadows. Human skin is shiny, and to look convincing, part of it has to be lighter than the overall tone of the paper.



The model was very, very good, as usual. Great dynamic poses. I also assure you that she had a pretty face and did not, in fact, look like Kevin Kline.



Stay tuned to this blog! Lots of fun stuff coming up next week.

Colorful Nude

A few weeks ago I shared a cab with a woman (not pictured). I got out first, and accidentally took her grocery bag instead of my own. With no way to get back in contact, the deal was sealed. She got wheat bread and peanut butter. I got dates, prunes, vanilla wafers and... COLORED PENCILS!

The Weekend's Nudes

I have so much great stuff in the works right now, but nothing I can show you yet (incomplete comics projects, drawings that are gifts for people who haven't received them yet, etc.!) So here are some of my gradually improving nudes. (Warning! Not Safe For Church!)





I must say, I'm particularly proud of that last one - it actually looks like the subject. Er, model. Woman. I mean lady. I mean person.