Nov 10th week of school

Another week of school has come and gone. This week in school we started landscapes. The one I did in class is below. In my opinion the photo makes it look better then it is, I wasn't very happy with this one.

I think my problem with it is that I was using ink, then I went to ink with a brush and was having an issue getting the right tones. I also had a problem getting the building/church with the right perspective so didn't start inking it until later in the class. This is not a technique that I feel I have a handle on, guess that means I should do more of it. It is too much like watercolor which I never liked to do.

Last Tues was my last drawing class for a while, this next week we have no class because of Veterans Day (Holiday) and the following week is a day the school is taking off for students to meet with their advisers so they can set up classes for the winter term. Since I am not enrolled in a degree program I am not sure where I stand with that one. Oh well, I will find out.

Our homework for drawing is to do a landscape. I have done mine in pencil which I have posted below. I may do another as I can't decide if I like this one or not. It is done with pencil, but I did spend a fair amount of time on it, and used different pencils so as to get a pretty good dark where I needed it. It is from a photo I took in our local park a couple of falls ago. Without color you can't see that the leaves are turning, which is why some of the background trees seem so light.

I also have pictures for you of my homework from 2 weeks ago, these were ink drawings, two with just black and white, no shading, and the third a silhouette of a football player that I found in Sports weekly. The missing part of the foot is because they cropped the picture and I didn't want to guess. The other two images are from photo's the instructor provided for us to use for our drawings.

I rather like the football player, he is really quite graceful

In Color and Design class I am still working on my shoes, though I think I have figured out what I will do for the other two stamps I need for my next project - Memorial day for one, and Lenard Bernstein for the last. I have been thinking about my final project, but find I want more details about what we are supposed to be doing. Another student is working on her project, which I think isn't a good idea just yet but that is her.

In Computer Graphics I am working on my final project. The instructor has been going over how the project needs to be laid out in class and I am taking notes. But more importantly I attended A Quilters Gathering in Nashua, NH this past weekend to take pictures. I now have a bunch of pictures to work with and need to look at what I have to decide how to use them. I did print contact sheets so I have thumbnails but really need to know what we are supposed to be demonstrating with this project so I can think about how I want to use the images.

Oh yes, I enjoyed the show, lots of great quilts and I was fairly restrained at the vendors, purchasing some fat quarters and a book on machine quilting.

Still haven't finished my challenge quilt, but I am working on it and a lot of the quilting is done. Today I cut the strips for the binding so that is one chore out of the way. Maybe some time next week I will be able to update the blog with an image of the completed quilt.

November, 9 week of school

Only have a few pictures for you this week. I am working on a couple of other class projects but they aren't at a stage where I want to take pictures. I did finish my portrait, so have two pictures for you from my Color Design Class. Not sure how good they are, one is done in pencil which doesn't photo well and the other on thin tracing paper. The technique was to mark 1/2 inch grids on the tracing paper then fill in the squares with different pen strokes to reproduce the portrait with values. I am glad it is done, it was not a lot of fun to do.

I think the pencil portrait works better then the ink. I had trouble translating some of the values well. Oh well it is done for what it is worth.

In drawing we were doing perspective, both one point and 2 point, at least for class exercises, then we moved out to the hallway and drew the hall in one point perspective. Below is my drawing, in pencil so the photo isn't wonderful. I didn't get my starting rectangle small enough (at least I think that is the error), so by the time I got to the opening where I needed to put doors the opening ended up too large compared to what it should be. Oh well otherwise it works. My homework is to do another perspective drawing, but he wants us to use deep space, and I don't have any deep spaces in my apt. so I am trying to think of where I can go sit and work for a few hours - I will probably tomorrow afternoon. Wish me luck.

My last image for you is actually 3 cards that I created and printed the other day. They use the ink drawings that were my drawing homework from 2 weeks ago. My instructor in the Color Design class though they would make good cards when I showed them to her, so I played around with Photo Shop on Thursday and created these. They are kind of fun, but I want more drawings to work with, so I have started a 4th and have an idea for a 5th drawing, more flowers of course.

On the quilting front last Friday we received the next Challenge for the FFFC group. I have been working on my quilt, but it isn't finished yet. I got involved with cards, and working on my shoe project for Color and Design. I was also doing research for my Color and Design Stamp project that is coming up. I have made major progress with the shoes, finished drawing my 20 and am in the middle of transferring 18 of the designs to a cold press board to be inked in. However all the work on class work means that the challenge piece isn't finished. I have it designed, the fabrics cut out and am in the process of machine appliquing the pieces down. Hopefully I will get that done today sometime, and get the quilting done so I can work on borders.

School 8th Week

I just finished the 8th week of school. I am finally making progress on the portrait project for color and design, since I have been working on it at home in the evenings. I have also started drawing shoes for the shoe project. We are supposed to draw 20 views of shoes, so far I have 5 done. Can you tell that all of the Color and Design projects tend to take a long time to do?

In Computer Graphics we are moving onto Quark Express. Had a test on the tools on Wednesday. Since I don't have Quark at home I don't think I will be focusing much of my energy or time in trying to master it, although some of the publishing industry is still using it, some book and newspaper publishers I have heard. Still many others are starting to move the Adobe's InDesign, which is Adobe's publishing program that works a bit more seamlessly with Illustrator and Photo Shop. Since I have the full suite of Adobe CS3 I think I will focus on using InDesign.

Oh yes in the Computer Graphics class we had to pick a theme for our final project, I am going to do a brochure on the Eastcoast Quilters Alliance fall Show which will be held in Nashua, NH, in a couple of weeks. I should be able to get some pictures there that I can then edit for the brochure. I may also borrow some images on-line. Since this is a project that won't even be printed I feel that in this circumstance I can borrow, though if I thought I would publish it I wouldn't. Note that the final project will be too large to publish here in any case. I may print it and show just a picture of the cover, but we will see.

Drawing class this week was was doing silhouettes and just black and white high contrast drawings, no shading at all. We used black markers and boy do they stink. The instructor had to turn on the fans and open the windows to keep us all somewhat functional. Still by the time I left I had something of a headache. I won't be using the markers at home, I think I will use ink and brush or pen instead on my homework. Below are the drawings I did in class:

The image is from clip art, I think I don't have him leaning quite enough so he would probably fall on his butt if he were real, but otherwise isn't bad for a first try.

Basketball player this time, and he isn't too bad

This is my high contrast drawing, her head should be tilted up a bit more but otherwise I like her.

I started a 4th high contrast drawing, but didn't get that one finished. May work on that one later, though it will need to be done with marker since I started it that way, so it is more likely that I won't finish it.

My last image for you this week is the homework I did for 2 weeks ago. This is a white chalk on black paper drawing. The image is from a photo in the October 2008 issue of 'Smithsonian' magazine. The article is on the Italian sculpture Bernini. I used the photo of the bust of Costanza Bonarelli, the wife of one of his assistants, whom he was having an affair with at the time of the portrait. I worked very hard on this image, and I feel it turned out quite well.

Last note for today is that the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge group has issued the 2nd challenge for this year. We are to use Monochromatic colors, and perspective in our design. I think I know what I want to do, doing it though will keep me busy along with all the other work I am supposed to be doing. I need to go sort through fabrics and see what color will be best. I plan on using my hand dyed fabrics, either the Cherrywoods or the Primrose Gradations that I have on hand. I may also sort through the batiks to see what else will work, though batiks with patterns tend to not be monochromatic, they are more likely to use 2 colors so those won't work. I am planning on using a photo I took in Chicago a couple of years ago. It is along the lake front, and has some high value contrasts which should make it work well for this design. Since my theme is structures, there is a bridge, some buildings in the background, and the lake breakwall.