Drawings, Drawings, Drawings!

   

Part 1 - LIFE DRAWINGS! 

Hooray! It's been a while since I've done them so don't look surprised if they all look sloppy. In this particular lesson though, I learnt how to do a very useful thing, measure the anatomy! How many heads tall or wide is the model, and such. Using a needle to help measure the height and width of some areas of the body allows you to create a more accurate and, dare I say lifelike, drawing of your model. Perspective and measurements have always been a weak spot in my art, so a simple knitting needle is the best thing I can use for life drawings!

Part 2 - Armature Structure

For motion studies, I have chosen to study stop motion since it's my favourite animation medium. One thing we have to make is a stop motion puppet of a dog for an upcoming animation. I chose to base my dog off a giant schnauzer (because schnauzers are the best dogs) and have created a side view plan of the armature (not to scale). My problem is how am I going to make it? I know HOW to but to actually do it is still a challenge! Also what materials shall I use? Aluminium? Wood? Latex? Plasticine? Help!

 

 

Part 3 - Tonal Observations

I'm sorry two of these are sideways. Just turn your head to the side to look at them.

When studying background design, you want to look at the darkest and lightest areas of the background, which will show you where the light is coming from. Observing the shades of tone of another background will help you get used to showing where the light source is in your own backgrounds. These tonal observations are done in charcoal and pastels, and three of them are studies from Your Name, Wolf Children and Lilo and Stitch. Lilo and Stitch is definitely an interesting one since the film goes back to traditional Disney watercolours instead of digitally painting them. It makes the scenery of Hawaii look very beautiful. Wolf Children's backgrounds are beautiful too, but not too glamorous since the true driving force of the film is the relationships with the family and their simple yet complicated lives. That's what comes first. Your Name on the other hand has the most beautiful backgrounds that I've ever seen from an animated film. I've always loved space and astronomical-inspired art, so it comes to no surprise that Your Name blew me away from it's stunning visuals of comets, meteors and constellations.

Part 4 - Personal Poses

The sketches above are mainly of my original characters (not fandom-inspired, actual original characters), but two of them in the left photo are Invader Zim and Chihiro from Spirited Away (although Chihiro looks more like Invader Zim now). I spent some time testing out different poses and emotions with my characters, mainly to see how exaggerated I can go with them. Exaggeration is also a weak spot of mine, even if it's a major part of character animation. Other sketches are to expand my skill on shading, since that used to be a weak spot, but I'm getting better at it. Cute little drawings that I do in my spare time are more than that, they are small steps into making my art look a lot better than before.

[Existential] Thoughts on Myself as an Artist

So I went to a lecture thinking it was going to be about title sequences, but the lecturer decided otherwise.

Now, our guest lecturer has made a lot of title sequences in his life and he is very talented at it. But boy, his talk about how to make good title sequences turned into a realisation that our existence as artists will become extinct in the future if we don't become the best at what we do.

Just a heads up to say I'm exaggerating a lot in this blog post but these were the things I thought of about myself after the lecture.

He hosted two lectures for us, one about making good title sequences, and another which I thought was going to be about title sequences again, but instead it was about the future of creativity and an artist's working environment. How will humans interact with one another? Are we able to get work when robots will soon take over from us? How can I show that my work is better than a robot's and that you should hire me? All this and more was discussed and I had no idea what to think.

Whilst this guy is a nice and interesting creator who has lots of positive thoughts about the future, I looked at this possible future and thought it was scary. Because whilst I practice a lot in order to get better at what I do, I still don't call myself an artist because I don't believe I'm astounding at what I do, let alone the best! And now I can't earn a living if I don't force myself to be the best?

Knowing I'm not the best gives me little confidence when I try to sell myself. The guest lecturer kind of gave advice on how to sell yourself: get talented and have an ego. These two things are good traits to have but I know lots of people who have a hard time becoming either of those things, so just to say 'get talented and have an ego' isn't good advice for introverts who aren't sure if they're talented and don't like having an ego! Sorry sir, you're a great title sequence maker, but stay away from counselling.

This lecture wasn't the only thing that made me think about myself as an 'artist'. A new project set for us this semester, called the experimental project, is a task where we make an experimental animation to show who we are. Again, listening to the subject matter of this project caught me off guard. How do I show myself in an animation?

The problem is, I don't think I want to show who I am in a film and allow anyone to watch it. I have grown in confidence over the years but I don't like being an open book for anyone to put their grubby sticky hands on (that metaphor though). It's ironic since I have a YouTube channel and I'm on lots of social media sites, but on those sites I talk about movies, games, TV Shows, celebrities, media that has made me feel happy whenever I think about it and now I want to share my love for it with the world. If I ever talk to someone about my feelings and traits and beliefs, it shows that I trust the person who is listening. I don't want the entire general public to know! And yeah, it's also ironic since this very blog post is about me telling you my feelings about this topic, but I have a feeling that the people who are reading this will understand me in some way.

I have no idea what to put in this experimental project other than memes, Undertale references and the fact that I spend most of my time slouched in my chair still trying to learn how to shade. I don't believe I'll ever be considered the best at what I do or if I get my dream job. But what I do know is that I'm at least trying to be good at what I do and that if I keep practicing, there's a small chance I could still get to the top.

There was a lot of things I disagreed with the guest lecturer about, but he mentioned an amazing photographer who only started doing photography at age 65! I agree with him that you're never too old to start creating and perfecting things. And because I'm still young (even though I feel really old), I have plenty of time to perfect my craft, and not to force myself to do otherwise.

I'm Back Baby!

Good day everyone! I hope you've had a wonderful Christmas, because I definitely have! But now I'm back for more work, which means more blogging!

This semester, I aim to write more about how I'm developing new skills and tricks in animation, and will hopefully get round to posting my own personal artwork that I do outside of university (I'll be sure to make it original art and not fanart, unless I'm unbelievably proud of it).

The art above is my own work and the result of a day experimenting in Photoshop! I love the concept of space and galaxies, but drawing nebulas are hard, along with not making the planets look so flat. but I still love what I made! Experimenting with Photoshop (or whatever arty software you use) for a day can be a great way for you to learn about different tools in the software and learn which ones are the most suitable for your art.

Looking forward to posting more on this blog! See you soon!