Showing posts with label girls. Show all posts
Showing posts with label girls. Show all posts

Monday, August 29, 2022

"Draw Two Panels" spinoff: The Deckless Wonder

 Here's an experiment that's been languishing in my files. I've written already of my work with Isaac Cates on his Draw Two Panels game. It inspired me to test an idea for this spinoff:

I drew two cards that pose a simple question: is our heroine dressing or undressing? Where the cards are placed in the four-panel sequence would direct the answer.

After completing the first strip, I toss a coin twice, choosing one of the original cards and one of the new cards. Then I make a new strip, placing the cards wherever they can be made to make sense. 

I'm struggling to recall the exact rules. In each new round, I toss a coin to choose one old and one new card. There should always be four cards available for each new round, from which two are chosen.



Here's an alternate game, placing the first two cards in a different order:

This procedure can go on indefinitely, though I wonder whether the story can ever go anywhere,... 

...small wonder that I stopped after three rounds. On the other hand, a story stuck in time is interesting in its own way.


This general idea of drawing comic panels on index cards and moving them around is something we'll explore in my upcoming online course, Comics Inventions, enrolling now.

Monday, April 9, 2018

Uses of Life Drawing

 
In my Figure Drawing for Cartoonists and Inking Comics courses at SVA, we employ live models for a number of purposes beyond the study of anatomy. Some examples:
  • one day, we have the model recline at oblique angles to study foreshortening
  • another, she'll pose with fabric so we can study folds in relation to the body
  • sometimes we turn out all the lights but one to study dramatic light
  • on another occasion, we practice composing camera shots, coordinating figure and background


  • often we take turns requesting poses for our comics in progress, using the occasion to practice...
  • ... ink wash...
  • ...or to practice building images from non-photo blue through to finished inks, permitting imaginative transformations of a pose:
  • and I've shown several examples of models performing stories.
  • of course, we keep skeletons in the closet to study what's under it all. 

SVA has the best models. Come see for yourself. The info session is May 17 at 6:30 pm. Classes start the first week in June.

Tuesday, January 16, 2018

Demonstration Drawings

Drawing while talking can be a challenge. Often I make an ass of myself, but sometimes my demonstrations turn out okay.

 

These big head/little body drawings are what I tend to favor for demonstrating figure basics and marker inking on day 1 of Cartooning Basics.

 
When I demonstrate inking with nibs, brushes, and wash in the Figure Drawing for Cartoonists and Inking Comics courses, I tend to try for a pretty girl, mostly to see if I can pull it off. 



(Sometimes yes, sometimes no.)

For ink wash, I often just apply black watercolor to a doodle.


When I demonstrate to kids, I try to keep it light and simple.

 
Spring classes start next week. Will my demos succeed or will I look foolish, yet again? Come find out. Tell your friends, too. Thx!


Wednesday, August 30, 2017

The Ghost Mermaid, an improv comic


As I keep saying, my favorite session in the Figure Drawing for Cartoonists course is the one where we have a costumed model improvise a narrative in successive poses while we improvise comics from them. This summer, our model was Miss Cherry Delight who performed in the costume she wore as Miss Coney Island 2013. A good time was had by, well, ME for sure. I hope the students enjoyed it too.





Fall classes are enrolling now. Come see me 6:30 pm Sept. 7 at SVA's Illustration and Cartooning Information Session to hear about Figure Drawing for Cartoonists, Cartooning Basics, and Inking Comics.

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Drawlloween Highlights

Trick 'R' Treat!

Like you, I'm hesitantly acclimating to the horrors of the new normal (without pretending there's anything normal about it).  I find myself wistfully looking back on a simpler time-- last month-- when I allowed myself the fun of indulging in some fake horror: the annual Drawlloween & Inktober challenges.

Hurrying to post an ink drawing on an assigned theme every day proved a refresher course in the many ways an image can go south from concept to finish, and in the ways things go wrong at the last minute-- train delays, unresponsive computers, and other interruptions. A few of the pictures posted past midnight into the next day. But it was great for warming up, trying techniques, and developing spontaneity. I surprised myself more than once.

The drawings? There were weird ones,...
Thursday the Thirteenth

They Came from Outer Space! (Inktober: "Box")



Mechanical Monstrosity
wild ones,...
Full Moon!

Superstition Sunday

Demonday

Horses & Headless Men
sad ones,...
Drive-In Creature Feature

Scarecrow Row

Black Caturday
girly ones,...
8 Legs, 1,000 Eggs

Ghosts-A-Go-Go

Witchcraft Wednesday ("flight")
silly ones,...
Slimy Swamps, Foggy Bogs

Call of C'Thursday (Inktober: "Creepy")
& even a self-aggrandizing one.

Phantom Phriday ("Big")

But then, god help us, one of these nightmares came true:
Nosfera-Tuesday