She kindly sat still for 3 hours so I could draw her. The portrait doesn't quite catch the life from reality, but I guess that it would be hard to smile for 3 hours, even for this sweet Swedish girl :)
Now, to judge from my blog, all I've been doing in the last four months of 2009 is animation. That is not true, I've just been too occupied (and sometimes maybe a bit lazy) to post all the other stuff. Well here goes, from the second week in September to the middle of December:
In the second week, week 36 that is, we had perspective with Bjørn Lomborg. This meant going through alot of different rules for making correct perspective. The only time we saw us triumphed by reality, was when trying to make the sides of a cube technical equal in length when the cube only has one vanishing point and only two visible sides. So if you know how to, do tell me!
We went to draw at the cathedral Tuesday morning:
Our first teacher Zdenko most kindly decided that we should have homework for when he came back 8 weeks later, infact Zdenko most kindly decided that we should make 8 good, solid and clean drawings, 1 sketchbook of hands and feet, and one with sketches....On top of all the other homework other teacher's give from day to day. The 8 drawings was eventually turned into 7, and the sketchbooks into half sketchbook as we grew closer to his return - only a very few students made everything.
I ended up with these 7 drawings:
The first couple of days was mostly used on getting alot of critique on each and every drawing turned in. At the end of Wednesday we could finally continue with the final assignment: Creating a line of characters based on a setting chosen by the class. After alot of discussion the setting ended up being "Clown Hunters..." In a dystopian future some kind of 3th world war has turned society into a primitive, scattered wasteland. Clowns are the only kind of entertainment, hence they're hunted by ruthless "clown hunters" hired by evil circus managers..!
Thursday morning we all sat down to create our own 3 clown characters, I made these:
After another class meeting where all clown was rewieved, 4 was picked to be further developed by all. I ended up with these designs:
The "ninja clown" is more or less the original design, the big clown is pretty much my work - it was the size that was chosen. The female clown is a combination of what I liked from my own and from the one chosen on the class. Finally, my own little clown was chosen as the 4th character, though I myself didn't get around to develop it further.
In week 44 and 50 we had "Elements of Design" with the fabled Lawrence - no teacher at the school has so many stories surrounding him and such a reputation. It was two great weeks, alot of theory, but very, very useful theory. As mentioned we worked with the elements of design:
Line, shape, value, form, space, texture and colour
In order to get the abstracts right before the details we were very limited in our use of materials, thus to prevent us from drawing, the first many assignments was to be done with a 1cm broad tusch. And to get the feeling right - which is what creativity is all about - the assignments included tasting and hearing. These are my final pictures:
Each assignment focused on one of the elements of design, but without excluding the others.
1st assignment: Taste the strawberry icecream, note down whatever words come to mind then make the taste of strawberry icecream with line.
2nd assignment: Taste the dark chocolate, note down whatever words come to mind, google them and find pictures then make the taste of chocolate with shape.
3rd assignment: Listen to jazz (I don't remember which cd it was, something new yorkish) make the sound with black and white and two values inbetween.
4th assignment: Choose a real of fictional character to make a tea set out of - focus on form. I chose V from V for Vendetta.
5th assignment: Make a burning house interior - focus on space.
As for texture we never got to have the assignment because of time pressure, and colour is such a big field that we will have a week with it at some point in the spring. You can see Lawrence's work here: http://www.lawrencemarvit.com
In week 45 we had storyboard with Uri for two days. Divided into four man groups we should storyboard "How the Elephant got its long nose." I concentrated on the meeting with the snake and the battle with the crocodile. My idea was to make a comical contrast between a scary environment and alot of build up tension contra the young elephants lack of understanding of the impending danger. We had one afternoon, evening and morning to plan things, make mastershots, thumbnails and the final storyboard, so I didn't get around to make the fight with the crocodile given my focus on the building tension. The mastershots for the two sequences:
The storyboard is as follows (they should be read in the order of a comic):
As I realised that I was not going to finish the board I decided to make the two most interesting thumbs from the battle (which should have been the other half of the board), so the last to pictures have alot going on before, between and after.
V for Vendetta is owned by DC Comics (sadly not by Alan Moore himself)
