Nicoli Valuev

This is the russian mountain who won the heavyweight boxing title recently.
He really looks like this. He was an awesome sight to see.

Another cool model

Jason Naylor hooked us up with some great modeling. I'm sure he works at most of the major studios.
Thanks Jason...

Phone Doodle Friday

Martha Baxton Auction at CalArts

This piece is going to be for sale at the aution this saturday. The auction is for Martha's husband's hospital bills, which are a big stain on our honorary den mother. God bless you Martha!

Finally!

Here's something to prove I'm alive. I've been racing at work, ya'll know how it is.

She's gone!

Casandra Siegler was our model yesterday and everyone was inspired by her grace and style. Looking at her pose, you couldn't help but sit and make art. After we all were completely into the class, we asked if she would be our model again and she dropped the bomb on us..."I'm off to New York".

We've lost a great model to the east coast!

Hello bright eyes

Friday love

More to come

I'm sure you all have stopped looking at the blog for a while now. I'll be up and running again soon. Screening time can really knock you out.

So,..... more to come....

More class sketches

Fun, fun fun! These classes are so rewarding and at the moment, unfortunatly I can't teach them outside of work yet{I've had a few inquiries}. But I have such a blast because of the students who come. They all have a diversity that inspires the next one and we all have a great time. Even some of the models who come are actually surprised that we all talk and play music becuase they're used to the more classically quiet classes. There's nothing wrong with that, but I like to keep it light and enjoyable. So, on this post I wanted to high light these two artists and show a bit of my own.

Please enjoy

Devin Crane and Jenny Lerew

Walt Stanchfield sketches 01

It's not often you are able to see Walt Stanchfield sketches or artwork. Granted, anyone who has his golden notes has some of his doodles of correction. When I was back at Disney's drawing with him he was constantly bringing in his latest sketchbooks and the students, including myself would pour all over them and soak up as much as we possibly could through any process of osmosis possible. He was very modest and didn't really want us to give him praise, he constantly threw his hands at us with a big push of air through his teeth and say "Naaaaaa!" Either way his artistry and patience as a teacher was like a light that guided anyone who took his class. He wasn't pushy with style, he always looked at personal style as a blessing and something that was unique to the artist. This made his job more fun, he got to see so many different types of work that inspired him and gave him more fuel to produce his own great pieces. When Walt passed his wife Dee knew of a few artist's at the studio who Walt was close to. She took it upon herself to give some of his sketches to them. The pieces were divided up among us and we all were given a little piece of Walt's heart and passion, truly one of the best gifts I'd been given. Then there where some that where Dee's personal favorites that meant alot to her that she couldn't part with {understandably}. These she color copied and gave them to us and we were so grateful to her. Dee Stanchfield was completely graceful to have given away art that Walt produced.

These are a few of many that I will post in time. Enjoy!

Ahh, the weekend....

So here you go, this drawing isn't mine. It was done by a story artists who's been coming to my class for a while now. SHE didn't want me to take it or post it, let alone tell you who SHE was. I told her that I would respect her wishes and not give her name out, BUT! I lied. I really love this sketch, It has so much movement in it. The lean on the pose really goes far back and the legs seem to have a nice stability. It almost seems as if this character is going to move forward. You can almost here the ending of a song and the character has done his routine exiting stage. Either way the artist was embarrassed that I liked it so much and SHE threw the paper down as if to cast away this horrible sketch. I picked it up and geeked out over it and told her this is what sketching is all about, loose, spontanious and fun with a nice bit of acting to the face too. So, if SHE will forgive me, here comes my lie....Claire Morrissey, you did a fine drawing here!

Car drawing

While on break, the inspiration hit to sketch the faces that we passed in the adjacent vehicles next to us. Now I'm not crazy enough to sketch while driving at the wheel the way Walt stanchfield would but I sketched these people while my wife drove. If anyone is traveling this weekend and your "not" in the driving seat, give it a shot, it's fun. The nice thing is the window of the subject's car gives them a nice natural little frame and it helps compose the sketch on the page. Oh and one more thing don't get car sick. Have a nice forth of July!

Back from break!

Hello anybody,

I had a chance to do some sketching while up the coast so here ya go.



This sketch was done on a beach where my son was chasing waves!



The big aquarium of sea kelp at the Monterey Bay aquarium.

These next two are dear to me becuase my son and wife were having such a wonderful time swinging together on the playground near the hotel. there's a simplicity to the moment of joy my son had while swinging by himself. We should all be so lucky.

Vacation time

Im out for a week. I'll be back on the 26th of the month. Hope you all enjoy this little diddy. It's a cintiq'er.

have a good one.

a small lesson 02

Many times we as story artist and gesture sketch artists concentrate so heavily on the characters facial expressions that we sometimes forget that the person we are sketching has a cranium. I have fallen into this trap many times and it isn't always easy to remember becuase we want the expression on the face to read. Tom Gately{who works at Pixar now, and is an amazing artist}would always get on my case about it. After a while of getting this banged into my head, I think I got it...I think. This is a small sketch that I did to illustrate the simplicity of the head. Its kind of like drawing two eggs overlapping each other. If we dont put something on the back of the head of a character or sketch, we just get a flat face with no construction to hang on to.

Remember the cranium!

I love fridays

It seems that I keep doing this liquor theme on fridays. Oh well, Cheers! Heres to the weekend!

One of my favorites

I did this one a while back in the class. Her name was Marissa Gomez, a very talented model, classical poses with a bit of attitude.

a different type of anotomy

What I mean is the anatomy of a sketch. I had to take a pic of this piece because it was done a large newsprint. This is a bit of insight to what goes through my head when I'm teaching students and trying to instill them with all that I've learned from Walt Stanchfield. He taught many principles for sketching an art and I've always said to the class that it really is hard to think of all of them and squeeze them all into one drawing. This is why we do so many drawings in one class {at least 40 drawings easy}. Anyhow, in one of the last classes I held I sat down in a moment of inspiration and drew this drawing as quickly as I could. Along the way I wrote down all the thoughts I had when I was laying down the lines. The drawing took about two to three minutes to finish and it was an interesting excercise for me, as I drew I wrote and those two ideas coming together helped me solidify my encouragement for the students, I got excited! I eagerly got up and showed the piece in hopes that some of what I talk about in the class was reinforced by this little map of sorts. A map with a few of the Walt principles he taught. Certainly there are more principles that exist, not only these but within gesture drawing these truly are some to look out for.

Squash and stretch
off centered head {not stiff]
more wieght on one leg
the other relaxing
perspective on foot placement
shoulder to hip differential
twist of the spine

Keep drawing!!!

No matter how busy you get in your daily lives, try and keep the pen moving!
Draw!Draw!Draw!Draw!Draw!