Björn Mes and Jeroen van de Merwe, from the Netherlands, made a free app based on this worksheet I did for Thumb War. Nice job, guys!
Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta Resources. Mostrar todas las entradas
Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta Resources. Mostrar todas las entradas
22 oct 2012
New pencil brushes
New pencil brushes:
So my homie hooked me up with these pencil brushsets for Photoshop. I spent the day testing them out and i gotta say, theyre pretty damn sweet.
If you'd like to try em for yourself, clickety click this linkety link
make sure you click on where it says "click here to start download from sendspace" to avoid popups.
Have fun sketching!
Custom box template generator
Custom box template generator:
Blog reader Maarten sent over this useful link: an online box template generator. Choose the box design or envelope you want, then type in your own dimensions. A PDF template will be generated for you. Download and print it out on decorative paper or use it as a dieline for a project. (The PDF is editable in Illustrator, too.)
Next time you've got a small gift to wrap, it's easy to make a custom-sized box for it!
Next time you've got a small gift to wrap, it's easy to make a custom-sized box for it!
new You Tube videos
new You Tube videos:
Just posted a few videos last Friday in promotion of my upcoming studio workshop on October 21st. Hope to see you here. If you cannot make it, please enjoy the new videos at least.
Cheers,
Scott.
Cheers,
Scott.
28 ago 2012
Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool
Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool:
Though figure drawing classes and open studio sessions are frequently available at art schools and artist organizations in larger metropolitan areas (see my post on the Directory of Figure Drawing Sessions), it’s not always easy or convenient to find a class nearby.
In 2007 I wrote an article about online or on disc substitutes for figure drawing sessions, Poser, Pose Maniacs and Virtual Pose.
I recently appended the article to bring it up to date, and added reference to the Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool, a website that provides figure drawing reference in the way of timed photographs.
In many of the figure drawing classes and sessions I’ve attended over the years, it’s common practice to start with shorter poses (sometimes called “croquis”, from a French word meaning “sketch”), from which gestural drawings are made, capturing the movement and gesture of the pose rather than detail. From there, classes usually move to longer poses, of different lengths for different intentions in the degree of finish the artists are trying to achieve.
In an attempt to simulate this, the Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool allows you to choose a pose interval, from 30 seconds to 10 minutes. after which the page automatically replaces the photo with another pose. You can also advance or step back manually, or use a pause button to choose your own timing. You can also choose clothed or nude models, male or female, or a mix.
There is also a choice for a “class”, that starts with shorter poses, moves to longer ones and includes breaks.
Though some of the poses are a little oddball (having been supplemented lately with turn of the century cheesecake postcards), and the photos aren’t as consistent or high quality as a dedicated commercial product like Virtual Pose might provide, some of them are quite good, and Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool is free, supported by donations to help defray the cost of bandwidth.
There is also a secondary feature, an Animal Drawing Training Tool.
Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool is provided and maintained by Kim of Piexlovely, a web design firm in Portland, Oregon.
Though figure drawing classes and open studio sessions are frequently available at art schools and artist organizations in larger metropolitan areas (see my post on the Directory of Figure Drawing Sessions), it’s not always easy or convenient to find a class nearby.
In 2007 I wrote an article about online or on disc substitutes for figure drawing sessions, Poser, Pose Maniacs and Virtual Pose.
I recently appended the article to bring it up to date, and added reference to the Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool, a website that provides figure drawing reference in the way of timed photographs.
In many of the figure drawing classes and sessions I’ve attended over the years, it’s common practice to start with shorter poses (sometimes called “croquis”, from a French word meaning “sketch”), from which gestural drawings are made, capturing the movement and gesture of the pose rather than detail. From there, classes usually move to longer poses, of different lengths for different intentions in the degree of finish the artists are trying to achieve.
In an attempt to simulate this, the Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool allows you to choose a pose interval, from 30 seconds to 10 minutes. after which the page automatically replaces the photo with another pose. You can also advance or step back manually, or use a pause button to choose your own timing. You can also choose clothed or nude models, male or female, or a mix.
There is also a choice for a “class”, that starts with shorter poses, moves to longer ones and includes breaks.
Though some of the poses are a little oddball (having been supplemented lately with turn of the century cheesecake postcards), and the photos aren’t as consistent or high quality as a dedicated commercial product like Virtual Pose might provide, some of them are quite good, and Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool is free, supported by donations to help defray the cost of bandwidth.
There is also a secondary feature, an Animal Drawing Training Tool.
Figure & Gesture Drawing Tool is provided and maintained by Kim of Piexlovely, a web design firm in Portland, Oregon.
frenden: Photoshop doesn’t do well with light pressure...
frenden:
Photoshop doesn’t do well with light pressure...:
frenden:
Photoshop doesn’t do well with light pressure...:
frenden:
Photoshop doesn’t do well with light pressure recognition. Making thick-to-thin strokes requires a lot more fidelity than would even be necessary with a proper sable brush and ink in meatspace. It blows out pressure at the low end and makes soft lines blobby as hell.Illustrator Ray Frenden just made your life a lot easier with his Photoshop brush tool presets. Say thank you.
You can combat this by turning off the lowest pressure settings of your tablet at the driver level, but you shouldn’t have to. I want a brush engine that senses those slight variances and accurately translates them.
It’s possible. Manga Studio, which I’ve used for inking since about 2006, does a stellar job at light pressure translation. Getting feathered strokes that look like they came from my Raphael 8404 #4 sable brush is no harder than inking in the real world. Painter does a pretty good job of this too. At the very least, both allow you to tweak how the brush engine interprets your strokes on a per-brush-setting basis instead of using a sledgehammer on a finishing nail by leaving you with an only recourse of neutering your full range of pressure sensitivity at the driver level.
Photoshop, Illustrator, and Flash all exhibit this problem. I don’t know if it’s an interpolation/smoothing issue or something larger, but I do know that the result is shitty lines.
Since around the time of the Photoshop CS6 Beta, I’ve been attempting to create a brush that combats these shortcomings by dropping out some of the lowest pressure mark-making with a combination of flow and texture settings. The result is a brush that, while not 100% opaque at the lightest marks, provides a hell of a lot more fidelity and control.
This is a quick video of the brush in action. Below is a download link for the latest test version of the brush’s Tool Preset.
DOWNLOAD THE BRUSH TOOL PRESET
24 ago 2012
Another little trick I know 5
Another little trick I know 5:
Toward the end of a painting day it is often useful to know how long you will have to continue painting before the light fails. I love saying "when the light fails" it is so old timey and romantic sounding. Long ago I used to tell One lovely young woman that I would meet her "when the light fails".
Here is a way to tell how long you have before dark, this is an old woodsman's trick. Hold your hand out at arms length. Then place your hand below the sun with the bottom of your hand on the horizon, or that line of trees, or whatever the sun intends to drop behind. You might need to use both hands to do this if the sun is still high. Count how many fingers there are between the sun and the horizon. You can figure on fifteen minutes for each finger. In the picture above I have 45 minutes before the sun drops behind that row of trees.This works no matter how large or how small your hands are, I suppose because the length of your arm varies somewhat in proportion to the size of your hand.
Here is a trick for keeping your white (or whatever color) fresher overnight.
.
Put a tuna fish can upside down over that pile of color and it will be less likely to dry out overnight. If drying paint overnight is a big problem, you can always put your paint in the refrigerator. That won't hurt it at all. You might want to make a special box for it if you do this routinely. That will keep the paint and your cottage cheese separate. In the winter I often throw the palette in the trunk of my car when I am done working for the day. Even if the night is very cold the colors will rapidly warm up again in the heat of my studio.
I have the attention span of a goldfish. A goldfish has about a two second memory. All day they swim around their little bowl muttering "I think I've seen this before... I could swear I've seen this before,
I think I've seen this before". I have a case of ADD that would kill an ordinary man, I am a human whippet, I am so easily distracted.
So, I keep a kitchen timer beside my easel. When I am having a problem staying focused, I work timed hours. I set the timer and no matter what happens I work for an entire hour. If the phone rings I will ignore it. I don't do this all the time but when I am against a deadline or there are lots of distractions I set my timer. Evidently people with jobs have similar systems involving timeclocks and scowling supervisors. To be self employed you have to have the discipline to oversee yourself, no one else will.
Is this next item a painting trick? Maybe not. but it is a useful survival habit for gaunt bohemians and hipsters with uncertain incomes.
Every time I sell a painting I go to the grocery store, there I make a point of buying a selection of imperishable food items, along with my regular grocery purchases. I buy things like tuna fish, soups, spaghetti sauce, noodles. canned soup, you know, stuff that will patiently wait for a long time to be eaten. This has saved me from hunger many times. These days my income is always sufficient to feed me, but there have been times when it was not and I went hungry many times. I still practice this habit out of caution, in these uncertain and tenuous economic times you never know. I could live for a month or longer without buying groceries if I had to. If you belong to Costco or Sams Club, that is a great place to shop for survival rations. I usually have a case of soap around and enough dish detergent and household cleaning products to carry me through an extended period of financial misfortune. I feel safer knowing that I have a well stocked larder, just in case.
I do this with art supplies too. I buy my paint by the quart or five big tubes at a time. I could paint for months without resupplying. Paint won't spoil and I feel comforted knowing that it is there.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I have a few spots left in the Minnesota workshop to be held in Stillwater, Sept. 15 through the 17th.
I am excited to be teaching in Minnesota, where I grew up. I like the prairies and hills there. Minnesota has great oak trees that are fun to paint. It is often a low horizon sort of a place, reminiscent of my hero Seago or Dutch painting. Perhaps you would like to join the group? I can save you YEARS of screwing around. Workshops are a lot of fun and I enjoy teaching them. We will also have Kami Polzin as a special guest star for a day, and I am working on having a second guest artist. Each day after painting we go out to dinner and I draw on napkins and teach design skills from my laptop. So this is the most intense a program possible. It runs from breakfast until after a late dinner. You will be exhausted at the end of each day, I promise. I will work you like a borrowed mule!. I only have three days with you and I want to cram as much into that time as I possibly can. There is a lot of camaraderie and I am always sorry when work shops end. Below is the link if you would like to sign up or learn a little more about the work shop.
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.com/search?q=Minnesota+Workshop+Fall+2012
The same is true of my New Hampshire workshop in the White Mountains. I am down to only a few spaces left so let me know if you would like to come.
This is a total immersion program and I run the class about 12 hours a day. I do an evening lecture while we wait for dinner to be served.The fall color in the White Mountains is legendary and people come from all over the world to see it. In the 19th century all of the great Hudson River painters made a point of being there too, just a few miles up the road from the inn.Sign up here;
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.com/2012/05/workshops-for-sale.html
Toward the end of a painting day it is often useful to know how long you will have to continue painting before the light fails. I love saying "when the light fails" it is so old timey and romantic sounding. Long ago I used to tell One lovely young woman that I would meet her "when the light fails".
Here is a way to tell how long you have before dark, this is an old woodsman's trick. Hold your hand out at arms length. Then place your hand below the sun with the bottom of your hand on the horizon, or that line of trees, or whatever the sun intends to drop behind. You might need to use both hands to do this if the sun is still high. Count how many fingers there are between the sun and the horizon. You can figure on fifteen minutes for each finger. In the picture above I have 45 minutes before the sun drops behind that row of trees.This works no matter how large or how small your hands are, I suppose because the length of your arm varies somewhat in proportion to the size of your hand.
Here is a trick for keeping your white (or whatever color) fresher overnight.
Put a tuna fish can upside down over that pile of color and it will be less likely to dry out overnight. If drying paint overnight is a big problem, you can always put your paint in the refrigerator. That won't hurt it at all. You might want to make a special box for it if you do this routinely. That will keep the paint and your cottage cheese separate. In the winter I often throw the palette in the trunk of my car when I am done working for the day. Even if the night is very cold the colors will rapidly warm up again in the heat of my studio.
I have the attention span of a goldfish. A goldfish has about a two second memory. All day they swim around their little bowl muttering "I think I've seen this before... I could swear I've seen this before,
I think I've seen this before". I have a case of ADD that would kill an ordinary man, I am a human whippet, I am so easily distracted.
So, I keep a kitchen timer beside my easel. When I am having a problem staying focused, I work timed hours. I set the timer and no matter what happens I work for an entire hour. If the phone rings I will ignore it. I don't do this all the time but when I am against a deadline or there are lots of distractions I set my timer. Evidently people with jobs have similar systems involving timeclocks and scowling supervisors. To be self employed you have to have the discipline to oversee yourself, no one else will.
Is this next item a painting trick? Maybe not. but it is a useful survival habit for gaunt bohemians and hipsters with uncertain incomes.
STARVEPROOFING!
Every time I sell a painting I go to the grocery store, there I make a point of buying a selection of imperishable food items, along with my regular grocery purchases. I buy things like tuna fish, soups, spaghetti sauce, noodles. canned soup, you know, stuff that will patiently wait for a long time to be eaten. This has saved me from hunger many times. These days my income is always sufficient to feed me, but there have been times when it was not and I went hungry many times. I still practice this habit out of caution, in these uncertain and tenuous economic times you never know. I could live for a month or longer without buying groceries if I had to. If you belong to Costco or Sams Club, that is a great place to shop for survival rations. I usually have a case of soap around and enough dish detergent and household cleaning products to carry me through an extended period of financial misfortune. I feel safer knowing that I have a well stocked larder, just in case.
I do this with art supplies too. I buy my paint by the quart or five big tubes at a time. I could paint for months without resupplying. Paint won't spoil and I feel comforted knowing that it is there.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I have a few spots left in the Minnesota workshop to be held in Stillwater, Sept. 15 through the 17th.
I am excited to be teaching in Minnesota, where I grew up. I like the prairies and hills there. Minnesota has great oak trees that are fun to paint. It is often a low horizon sort of a place, reminiscent of my hero Seago or Dutch painting. Perhaps you would like to join the group? I can save you YEARS of screwing around. Workshops are a lot of fun and I enjoy teaching them. We will also have Kami Polzin as a special guest star for a day, and I am working on having a second guest artist. Each day after painting we go out to dinner and I draw on napkins and teach design skills from my laptop. So this is the most intense a program possible. It runs from breakfast until after a late dinner. You will be exhausted at the end of each day, I promise. I will work you like a borrowed mule!. I only have three days with you and I want to cram as much into that time as I possibly can. There is a lot of camaraderie and I am always sorry when work shops end. Below is the link if you would like to sign up or learn a little more about the work shop.
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.com/search?q=Minnesota+Workshop+Fall+2012
The same is true of my New Hampshire workshop in the White Mountains. I am down to only a few spaces left so let me know if you would like to come.
This is a total immersion program and I run the class about 12 hours a day. I do an evening lecture while we wait for dinner to be served.The fall color in the White Mountains is legendary and people come from all over the world to see it. In the 19th century all of the great Hudson River painters made a point of being there too, just a few miles up the road from the inn.Sign up here;
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.com/2012/05/workshops-for-sale.html
20 jul 2012
Ken Hultgren: The Know-How of Cartooning
Ken Hultgren: The Know-How of Cartooning:
More about this right over at C. Martin Croker's arglebargle!
16 jul 2012
Underground NY Public Library
Underground NY Public Library:
The Underground New York Public Library is a visual library featuring the Reading-Riders of the NYC subways.
(via shoebox dwelling)
The Underground New York Public Library is a visual library featuring the Reading-Riders of the NYC subways.
(via shoebox dwelling)
10 jul 2012
Disfrutando árboles
Disfrutando árboles:
Preparándonos para la cita de dibujar árboles, el sábado 19 de Mayo en el Parque Grande de Zaragoza subo este maravilloso material .
Preparándonos para la cita de dibujar árboles, el sábado 19 de Mayo en el Parque Grande de Zaragoza subo este maravilloso material .
Free Photoshop Storyboarding brushes
Free Photoshop Storyboarding brushes:
Hey! I like playing around with brushes in photoshop, so I thought you might like to noodle around with these.
Here’s my brush set that I’ve perfected over years of drawing chickens, and there is no better brush set. At least for now. Some of the brushes I made, there’s a couple from the amazing sets of Chris Wahl (check him out) that I use for tone, and one from some guy in Dreamworks. Sorry, guy. I don’t know who you are, but thanks! And the lassos are there because I’m always using them to select chunks of art, or fill shapes with color. Here’s how they look:
I use tool presets for my boarding, because it’s simply so easy to have a palette always open with the tools set up exactly the way I like them, loaded with the color I need, and with the brush mode I need. They are all set up for for storyboard panel sizes, not some huge A3 piece, so if you want to work bigger, you’ll need to make em bigger.
Instructions: Download the set here: open photoshop; open the Tool Presets Palette. Click on the black arrow on the top right corner, and choose load or replace tool presets, navigate to your downloaded .tpl file and there you go.
Hey! I like playing around with brushes in photoshop, so I thought you might like to noodle around with these.
I use tool presets for my boarding, because it’s simply so easy to have a palette always open with the tools set up exactly the way I like them, loaded with the color I need, and with the brush mode I need. They are all set up for for storyboard panel sizes, not some huge A3 piece, so if you want to work bigger, you’ll need to make em bigger.
Instructions: Download the set here: open photoshop; open the Tool Presets Palette. Click on the black arrow on the top right corner, and choose load or replace tool presets, navigate to your downloaded .tpl file and there you go.
4 jul 2012
Survival Guide for Art Students
Survival Guide for Art Students:
I met with the editors of Dover Publishing a while ago. They publish a lot of classic books on art instruction from days of yore. I told them that most of what I know about drawing and painting comes from studying their books. They asked me for a list of the ten art instruction books that I thought were most useful, with a blurb about why I love each one.
Bridgman's Life Drawing by George Bridgman
Bridgman's legendary figure drawing demonstrations at the Art Students League of New York have inspired generations of artists, from Norman Rockwell to Frank Frazetta. His dynamic, chunky form analysis reminds students of the big shapes and how they interlock with each other, which is easy to overlook when faced with the subtleties of the actual figure.
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I met with the editors of Dover Publishing a while ago. They publish a lot of classic books on art instruction from days of yore. I told them that most of what I know about drawing and painting comes from studying their books. They asked me for a list of the ten art instruction books that I thought were most useful, with a blurb about why I love each one.
They just put this recommended list in their catalog, so here it is: "James Gurney's Survival Guide for Art Students."
Bridgman's Life Drawing by George Bridgman
John Vanderpoel, who studied in France at the Académie Julian, offers a classical approach to figure drawing, noteworthy for its timeless grace. His approach focuses on the important planes of the figure understood in terms of simple light and shade. Male and female models are analyzed in many detailed drawings of parts, such as the head, neck, torso, and limbs. The plates are so good that it would profit a student to systematically copy all of them.
Harold Speed's classic text bridges the often-difficult gap between drawing and painting. He starts with a tutorial on seeing, the foundation of accurate drawing. He distinguishes between line drawing and what he calls 'mass drawing'—essentially monochrome painting. Although his writing style might strike some modern readers as old fashioned and opinionated, he makes a good case and covers useful aesthetic territory.
Speed's book on painting builds on his drawing book, offering painting instruction as it was practiced in the Royal Academy. Although not everyone will agree with his views on modern art, his advice on tone, color, and edges is concise and inspiring, and his analysis of the old masters benefits from the insights of a skilled practitioner.
Perspective can be a daunting topic, like advanced mathematics, but in its most basic form, it is easy to grasp. Norling does a good job of emphasizing the most fundamental points, especially the all-important subject of eye level. He concentrates on the familiar problems faced by most artists, such as one-, two-, and three-point perspective.
This is a useful reference book, dominated by large and carefully drawn plates. The animal kingdom is represented by a small number of familiar domesticated mammals: horse, dog, cow, and goat, together with a lion. Each animal is shown in neutral poses in side, top, and front views, with skeletal and muscular dissections for comparison.
Disney animator Ken Hultgren shares an approach to drawing animals that emphasizes the unique characteristics of all the major types of mammals. His style features action poses ranging from straight to cartoony. His pen-and-ink drawings are usually accompanied by a skeletal analysis to help students see the hidden structure. He never loses sight of the lines of action flowing through a pose, something that both realist painters and cartoonists can benefit from.
This book is a good one to consult when one needs a reminder that not all trees look the same. Cole draws upon the Victorian tradition of close observation of nature, and he analyzes trees at the level of roots, branches, stems, blossoms, leaves, and foliage masses. The book transcends the limits of a botanical treatise by exploring artistic issues, such as the grouping of masses and the simplification of contours. The text is profusely illustrated with black-and-white explanatory drawings, as well as compositions by early masters.
John Carlson, himself a noted American Impressionist painter and teacher, addresses all the common elements faced by landscape painters, including design, light, perspective, color, clouds, trees, and composition. While the book was first published in 1929, Dover has reprinted the 1958 edition, so the language is a little more accessible to the modern reader without sacrificing Carlson's forthright style. Although the 58 diagrams are in black and white, the book's chief value is its practical principles and insights.
This classic text from an associate of Rodin guides the sculptor through the theory and practice needed to successfully interpret the figure in three dimensions. It covers basic technique, materials, and anatomy. Although the text is extensive and old fashioned, it provides a rare window into the working methods and thought processes that led to some of the greatest masterpieces of figural sculpture.
Here's the list again in no particular order. The titles are linked to Amazon pages:
I'd be interested in your experience with old books on art instruction (say, 50 years old or more). What do you like or dislike about them? Do you have some favorite old-time art instruction books that I overlooked? Let me know in the comments. Later in the week I'll do a poll and compile a crowd-sourced list.
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