In my journey and struggle to become a better artist - illustrator and animator, and perhaps some day painter - I have transitioned from drawing "comic book" hyperboles to drawing the everyday. The comic book characters are easy, in a sense; they're cliché, muscular... over-muscular, even. They pose in extremes, they wear form-fitting spandex. Drawing them encourages me to adopt a symbolic shorthand, which stands in the way of my pursuit of realism. Perhaps I'll come back to them, though, after I learn to draw. And so I started trying to draw more pedestrian things. I struggled momentarily, but I began to try to focus on small moments, to communicate the totality of movement, of feeling of expression. I drew a man stretching to touch his toe. I drew a woman with arms folded overhead and legs crossed, severely foreshortened. I made mistakes and created inconsistent statements... and my sketchbook started talking back to me. No, not audibly. I'm not crazy. What I mean is that I began to approach each drawing almost as a puzzle or challenge, in which the sketchbook is an instructor and I am the apprentice. As I inscribe shape and chisel out form, the sketchbook offers its criticisms: "a little fat in the waist, there"; "the position of that foot suggests a knee in reflex"; "you lost the action in the mass of the body". I finally learned why - intuitively why - artists conducted studies before commencing their works. It feels amazing. Who knew drawing the simplest things could be the most challenging? I'm infused with a new excitement, a new eagerness to try my hand at unfamiliar problems, and to refine those I've "solved" (for no solution is perfect; were it so, why would you ever draw it again?) I'm just dashing this off to ask if anyone else who draws freehand can relate. I'll post scans from my sketchbook tomorrow, when I get back from work.

Since I was up, I decided to test my scanner with my Mac (bought it about two months ago - the Mac, not the scanner). Bottom line, Canon sucks. I mean... wow.

So, yeah, my options are 1.) go buy another scanner, or 2.) use my girlfriend's and have her email me my scans, which I've had to do before. Her scanner's not bad, so I might do that in the short term, but long-term I'm going to need a flatbed scanner that works well with OS X Leopard. Any suggestions?

(Another workaround is to photograph the sketchbook, but that's... ugh.)

Quote:Original post by stimarco
If you only need a scanner, and you want a damned good one, I'd suggest looking at Epson's range. They have a good reputation for quality. (HP do as well, but I don't think there's much in it and I find HP's drivers tend to be bloated.)

Thanks. I virtually never print (for now), so I don't need an all-in-one. I might buy a printer later if/when I start doing proofs, or working in InDesign more (a requirement for the program I'm trying to get into next year).

Quote:Original post by Red Ghost
I can relate to that experience since I am learning to draw. To me the difficulty is to succeed to seize the instant of a pose (quick drawing) when people are moving. A static or posed drawing gives you time to realize and correct while a dynamic does not.

Absolutely. I used to go to places like Columbus Circle or Lincoln Center and try to capture the kids in motion, putting down the overall energy of the body in motion first, then looking to specific parts to fill in details.

Quote:I still learn to draw quickly a pose and try to fill in details later. My sketchbook helps me in understanding what I missed in my drawings.

That's a fantastic way to look at things. My sketchbooks (I've filled one completely, and have two partially used) provide me with an opportunity to look at my progress, but also to draw lessons from specific failures. Perhaps an indication of how much I've improved, but now I can see and correct my mistakes sooner - in some cases almost immediately. It's funny to think about how I would show certain drawings to people with pride a year or two ago that absolutely make me wince now! [smile]

Quote:Sometimes, I use the free newspapers we are given in the subway. They have a lot of photographs: I draw on the photograph to understand how each body part in a pose realate to each other and how to properly apply shadows. This also helps me to improve my drawing skills.

That's a great idea. I've found myself clipping pictures from the free papers, too - there's a cover from AMNY, with Eli Manning of the Giants, sitting on my desk waiting for me to draw.

Quote:However I still have much much work in front of me before succeeding to achieve capturing a dynamic pose (esp. when I compare with the sketchbook of Delacroix whose style I admire).

But that's half the fun - constantly challenging yourself, first to acquire the basic visual vocabulary and rendering skills, then to grasp color, then to execute commissions of ever more ambitious scale. [smile]

Quote:Original post by swiftcoder
If you don't mind shelling out $40, I have found that VueScan works very well, and supports pretty much any scanner I have thrown at it (including my mysterious $35 Office Max 'special' scanner). The interface is a little clunky, but the feature set is excellent, and they do offer a (very limited) trial version, to check if it will run your scanner.

The trial version only seemed to scan to PDF. Is that a limitation of the demo specifically? I was going to buy it (fugly UI and all... after all, CanoScan is fugly, too), but only being able to obtain PDFs did not inspire confidence - especially when Preview couldn't open said PDF!

I know what you mean exactly! There is the strange sensation when I walk away from something for a bit and come back to view it. I always find 'mistakes'. Others will say generic stuff like, 'awesome!' or 'neat!', but to me there is a TODO list compiling in my head as I scan over the whole thing. Luckily, now that I'm in school I have my professors to look to when I want actual opinions on what needs work.

Usually I know what the mistakes are. It's when I want to come up with fresh ideas and exploring them that I really want to hear opinions.

I have a tendency to lean toward the cartoony side. I find I grow bored if I can't express a sense of movement and for me, movement comes from exaggeration. Though I will admit that there are times when even the most realistic scene can give this same feeling. Just look at movie posters.

If you are interested I'm am beginning to keep a journal of my thoughts on this sort of stuff. You can find it here: http://deniedsluggy.livejournal.com/

Quote:Original post by lack o comments
I know what you mean exactly! There is the strange sensation when I walk away from something for a bit and come back to view it. I always find 'mistakes'. Others will say generic stuff like, 'awesome!' or 'neat!', but to me there is a TODO list compiling in my head as I scan over the whole thing. Luckily, now that I'm in school I have my professors to look to when I want actual opinions on what needs work.

I'm hoping to go back to school next year, but it'll be grad school and industrial design. I might take some (more) art classes in the interim, though, perhaps at the Art Students League (because School of Visual Arts is expensive!)

Quote:I have a tendency to lean toward the cartoony side. I find I grow bored if I can't express a sense of movement and for me, movement comes from exaggeration. Though I will admit that there are times when even the most realistic scene can give this same feeling. Just look at movie posters.

I feel that if I master a realistic style, I can always scale back toward a cartoony style by using symbols and shorthand, but reaching from cartoony to portraiture is much more difficult.

Quote:If you are interested I'm am beginning to keep a journal of my thoughts on this sort of stuff. You can find it here: http://deniedsluggy.livejournal.com/

Cool. I'm overdue to put my site together as well (and since I work on sites all day now, it's becoming more of a reflex, so I'll probably do it in the next month when I renew my domains).

PS. The gridded contour image is very interesting!