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Posts tagged as “Drawing Every Day”

New Year’s Aspirations

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Wow! 2023. What the hell? Seems like Blade Runner was just yesterday. But it was actually pre-pandemic! But in the real world, it's a "new year", as most Americans mark it, so it's time for New Year's Resolutions.

Or is it? As far as I recall, the science of New Year's Resolutions - whether it works or not to set new goals at the start of the new year - is decidedly mixed, and a brief check seems to confirm that.

But New Year's Aspirations, yes, I have those. For one, I'd like to start blogging every day. For another, it would be great to resume drawing every day. And Wednesday, my wife and I are going to buy bicycles.

For this year, though, I plan to edit my fourth Dakota Frost novel, SPECTRAL IRON, in the hope it breaks the logjam of the eight (8!) unedited novel drafts sitting on my hard drive, and to make progress on several other creative projects, at work and in life. To get started on that ... I'm now going to get back to work.

Onward!

-the Centaur

Pictured: an aspiration made real: the hand-me-down "comfy chair" from Francis Produce, which I have kept for 25+ years, now turned into a reading nook in my new library. That nook is filled with artwork and standees and books and novels and comic books, and in that comfy space there I have actually, like, started to read books again and stuff after years of and years of stunted fiction reading, post-grad-school.

Days 206-209

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scotty sketch Day 206, a sketch of Montgomery Scott from Star Trek: scotty headshot How ddid I do? Still can't seem to draw a correctly tilted head, and face to hair proportions continue to be off: scotty comparison Day 207, Nyota Uhura: uhura sketch Umn, well, it is the same person, sort of, but she's looking down, and the original, up: uhura headshot So, no real way to make these line up, but it isn't totally terrible: uhura comparison Day 208, Hikaru Sulu: sulu sketch Again, more or less the same person, but I made him look down, and what happened to his chin? sulu headshot Overall comparison cannot be made to line up: sulu comparison Day 209, Pavel Chekhov. I don't have the original reference on this computer, but I'm sure a comparison would be equally terrible to all the others, if not worsee. chekhov headshot Drawing every day, posting when i get to it. -the Centaur  

Day 205

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cinnamon back The back of Cinnamon Frost, after a painting by my wife. Drawing every day, even if I wasn't posting. -the Centaur

Days 203-204

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Day 203: Damnit, Jim, I'm a sketch, not a headshot!

Let's see how I did:

Huh ... not entirely terrible, though it needed stretching horizontally.

What about Day 204? A quick sketch of Dakota Frost:

Day 205 apparently hasn't been cleaned up, so we'll return to that.

Drawing every day, posting when I get to it.

-the Centaur

Days 200-202

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khaaan sketch Day 200 - Khaaan! Let's see how I did: khaaan original Meh. Head not wide enough. khaaan comparison Day 201 - Khan, the man himself: khan the sketch Day 202 - Spooock! spock sketch Let's see how I did: spock headshot As I recall, there was no good way to line up the face and the hair. spock comparison Drawing every day. -the Centaur

Days 196 to 199

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janeway quick sketch Day 196: Quick sharpie sketch of Janeway, from the below image. janeway headshot The comparison is not great - the face is way too long compared to the original: sharpie comparison Day 197, Sharpie over non-repro blue roughs, from the same image: janeway better sketch Slightly better comparison this time, though still not perfect: with roughs comparison Day 198 was Richard Branson ... in spaaace: branson in spaaace That's from this fisheye lens image ... while it isn't perfect, it captures a lot of energy. I particularly like the smile in the reflection (in both my drawing, and in Branson's window - he's having fun!). No comparison this time; this exercise was in capturing the feel more than the precise lineup. branson in spaaace image Day 199 was Martin Sheen from The West Wing: sheen sketch Not an entirely terrible likeness ... sheen headshot ... but my perennial problem of having a face out of proportion to the head continues. sheen comparison Look at that hair, man. You can make the eyes and mouth line up, but that hair, man. Still, drawing every day. -the Centaur    

Congratulations Richard Branson (and/or Jeff Bezos)

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branson in spaaace

Congratulations, Sir Richard Branson, on your successful space flight! (Yes, yes, I *know* it's technically just upper atmosphere, I *know* there's no path to orbit (yet) but can we give the man some credit for an awesome achievement?) And I look forward to Jeff Bezos making a similar flight later this month.

Now, I stand by my earlier statement: the way you guys are doing this, a race, is going to get someone killed, perhaps one of you guys. A rocketship is not a racecar, and moves into realms of physics where we do not have good human intuition. Please, all y'all, take it easy, and get it right.

That being said, congratulations on being the first human being to put themselves into space as part of a rocket program that they themselves set in motion. That's an amazing achievement, no-one can ever take that away from you, and maybe that's why you look so damn happy. Enjoy it!

-the Centaur

P.S. And day 198, though I'll do an analysis of the drawing at a later time.

Day 195

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capaldi eyes sketch

"No, sir. All thirteen!" Sketch of the iconic shot of Peter Capaldi's eyes from The Day of the Doctor, roughed with non-repro blue and sketched with Pigma Micron and Graphic pens. I've included the roughs below, color-enhanced, to show that process:

capaldi eyes roughs

This one isn't a quick sketch, so, let's see how I did:

capaldi eyes original

The eye shape is not terrible, though the one on the left of the drawing has a misshapen iris, and that weird tilt of the eyes with respect to the head is back, as you can see when the eyes and hair are lined up (below) - if those features line up, the cheeks are tilted, and v. v.:

capaldi eyes comparison

It's instructive to compare this with the Sharpie sketch I did a while back:

capaldi eyebrows

Not bad, certainly bolder with the dark lines, but how does it compare? I worked from a brighter, if smaller picture last time, but did that help? I can already see the eyes are just the wrong darn shape:

lighter eyes

The eyebrows are insufficiently Capaldi in both of them, not as exaggerated as his real-life eyebrows, and the older sketch shares the property that you can line up the cheeks (black, below) or eyes (white, below), but not both at the same time:

quick capaldi comparison

Day 194

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eyes sketch

Didn't like how the re-sketch of yesterday's post was turning out, so I drilled in on the eyes, using non-repro-blue roughs (which you can see below).

eyes roughs

I'm not happy with how I'm perceiving shapes; the eyes are too wide, and it can't just be chalked up to angle (look at the eye on the right of the drawing in particular). Also, my rendering is still off, as the iris on the left is misshapen from the rounded originals. Oh, and that tilt is back.

eyes original

Drawing every day.

-the Centaur

Day 193

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afghan girl sketch

Quick Sharpie sketch of the famous "afghan girl" photograph. Not even going to do a comparison, as I messed up the shape of the face and there's no going back with the sharpies.

afghan girl headshot

Still, drawing every day.

-the Centaur