Measuring Relativity

Our next lesson was about measurement. With a pencil held out at armlength, we use measurements to make sure the objects are the correct size relative to each other. Then we use angles and additional measurements to get the relative positions of each object. I think my drawing turned out pretty well. When my prof came by he said it looked like a blueprint because I had so many guidelines and measuring points going on. Maybe it's those engineering degrees.

But another thing I realized is that my blending sucks. :( This is the first time I am using charcoal, and it's a bit of a struggle, as much with the charcoal paper as with the charcoal itself. I just seem to have a lot of trouble blending it. Blending with my finger doesn't seem to do anything at all, but using the chamois basically takes off all the charcoal! I really need to work on it.

The Music of the Spheres

It all begins with spheres... I think because spheres are the simplest 3D objects. I suppose there are cylinders, but every art student knows how incredibly difficult it is to draw straight lines! This assignment is basically about shading, and we learned about the 5 value system as a simplification of the range of values. Here the background is 5 (the darkest value), while the foreground is a 3. A 4 value is used for the shadow on the sphere, blending to a 2 on the light side. The lightest value, 1, is used for the highlight.

I'll just be taking one class, Analysis of Form. I was actually a bit nervous going to school for the first day because it's been quite awhile, and I didn't know what to expect from art school. But I was pleasantly surprised. My classmates seem really nice, although basically they are young enough to be my children. And my prof Jerry is really energetic and funny.

Off to Art School

I haven't been blogging alot, primarily because my Netflix queue has been full of episodes of the TV series '24' instead of movies. But also I have dropped down to part-time so that I could start taking classes at the Academy of Art in SF. I'll try to blog about my experiences there, and about the projects that we are working on.