My Neighbor Totoro

I have to admit this piece is a complete indulgence...

First of all...this is the character Totoro from one of Hayao Miyazaki's earlier films, "My Neighbor Totoro." Not only is it one of my favorite movies of all time, but Miyazaki has to be one of my most revered filmmakers. If you have never seen it, (or any of his films for that matter...you must.) However, Studio Ghibli (Miyazaki's company...) teamed up with Disney recently and made fairly bastardized new overdubs of his movies and re-released them in America.

This is a shame. The movies already had English versions but I guess Disney went for the marketing slam dunk and thought..."Hey, if Dakota Fanning is in the v.o. instead of some faceless no-name from 1988...these will probably sell better."

They are probably right.
But! I have seen all of the original english-overdub versions and they are far and away the better choice. (Dakota Fanning really does a v.o. for one of the new ones, no joke, i'm not just being an ass.)

Anyway, I grew up on Totoro. It was magic for me. It's like someone extracted my imagination and made a movie of what they found. I used to run around my backyard barefoot in the "forest" (a cluster of dogwood trees...) collecting seeds and berries which I would then tie up in little leaf pouches with twine and hide them under my pillow. (Only dreams will make them grow!)

So tonight I thought I'd pay homage to that enchanting part of my childhood and do a Miyazaki piece.

It is also indulgent of me to work on something like this because it goes against the credo I've been attempting to mash into my artist brain lately which is "Don't take the easy way." Basically...work on things that challenge me. Like human form, faces, clothing etc. (Hands!! Grfggjhjh!!) SO doing this handsome happy Totoro is sort of cheating because this particular "fantasy and fluff" style is easy for me. It's sort of my comfort zone.

However I figure I can make up for it when it comes time to paint. I want to challenge myself with my shadowing and blending and color choices. (I don't know what those choices are yet, but when I figure it out, I will post the progress.)

Whatever, I was in a shit mood and feeling funky so...SO WHAT!? I'm going to figuratively curl up with a pint of Ben and Jerry's on this one and do something comfortable and soothing.

A day of creativity.

I rolled out of bed today with "the itch."
I didn't know what, I didn't know how...but I had to do something "arty."
We all know that feeling: like you can't sit still and you're full to bursting so you've just gotta grab a utensil and a surface...(any utensil and whatever surface)...and get it out!!
But what??
A strange epiphany came to me as I had my morning pee. (ew! haha sorry.) Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I glanced around groggily as I sat upon my porcelain throne of creativity and thought..."my bathroom walls are white...how boring!"
And so I was on a mission.
I have no house paint or tools (Say: Behr, Ralph Lauren, Sherwinn Williams brand in big buckets, rollers, Tom Sawyer wide bristles, that blue magic tape, the "get-in-the-corner-sponge") to speak of whatsoever.
So I improvised.
I sqeezed out one of my Apple acrylic paint bottles in it's entirety into a tupperware tub, watered it down, stirred, and went at it with a washcloth.
First coat I did vertical, second coat horizontal, third coat sponging and dabbing.
Because the paint was so watery and I varied application techniques-and it was acrylic so it dried super fast-I achieved an awesome textured effect in a loamy earthy green. I'm quite pleased.

Then, later on, I made a failed attempt at assembling an Ikea sliding drawer side table...too many parts, forget it. So instead, I cut up the giant box it came in and will use the wonderful wide squares of cardboard as canvasses. (I can't afford actual canvass right now so these will do beautifully.)

I brainstormed for a while and started sketching ideas of what to put on my first 2 by 4ft slab of cardboard and this guy came on out. A little fifteen minute sketch, mostly me erasing and re-drawing and erasing and re-drawing some more to get the angle of his head and his hands just right. I wish I had spent more time on the way his fabric hangs, the way it falls over his arm and such...but it is just a sketch after all. Anyway, he seems to feel pretty peaceful about himself and so I feel I must too.

I don't know yet if he will make the journey from drawing board to "canvass" but for now...he will have to keep seeking enlightenment from my sketchbook.

Work in Progress

I'm so excited about this bad boy. Worked on him for about an hour and 45 last night while watching Futurama re-runs. Jesse was playing Star Craft 2 next to me and I started thinking about how amazing gaming graphics are...truly amazing. So it dawned on me to use that as a reference point.

After rifling around in the office I found this big ass book "Art of World of Warcraft" that came with Jess' Lich King X pack and spent the next hour flipping through and marking pages that I'd want to come back to.

I started with this guy, though I probably shouldn't have, because it was really late and he is so detailed...but I love the way you can tell hes striding across some battlefield.

I really wanted to nail the way his left arm is swinging back and his torso is twisted away from the leg he is stepping forward with, and the fact that the wind is at his back so his hair and his cape (camera phone is too small to get the cape in the frame, ha) are swirling around his body.

So far, I am really really pleased, it was a lot of fun. The different shapes, slopes and angles and symmetry involved in this piece were sooo satisfying to draw, like, someone is scratching my back, satisfying. My hand felt happy making the lines!

I started getting the detail and the shading done in the upper left corner of his armor, but I got tired at that point and I didn't want to risk getting sloppy so I put him away.

I'll post more when I finish it off.

Miranda

This sketch took me about forty five minutes. Spent most of that time on the damn hands, ha! This piece makes me want to get better at shadowing, and using light-play to create shape...that is: using a shadow to show the curve of a cheek, instead of a line to indicate a dimple...or shadow to reveal a fold in a shirt as opposed to drawing a line to indicate a fold. I used both of these methods in this particular doodle, and, had it been a color piece, I'd have explored more: the technique of lineless art...but frankly the idea frightens me. I'll get there eventually.

Anyway I'm actually pretty happy with this piece.
I feel like looking at her face you can tell she's sixteen...
Apprehensive, skeptical, aloof and somehow sexy...haha she thinks she's a woman but she's not, she's still just a girl.

I skipped that phase...I was never nubile and beautiful, or a blooming flower. I was a nerd and a weirdo and had no status quo whatsoever. I read books, not magazines...I played video games, and not boys. (though even if I wanted to they wanted nothing to do with me.) I hung out with my parents, and not the cool kids... And I had a blast. High school was fun mostly because I just didn't care what people thought of me.

But Miranda here? She cares. But she doesn't want to. She'll let go eventually.

My new nephew.

I realize my shirt is falling off and you can see my weird sunburn line...but Hunter looks too cute all snuggled up in this picture! 6lbs10oz. Tiny little noodle fought his way into the world yesterday afternoon. I've gotta admit it...I want one real bad.

It is impossible to look at a newborn and not smile.
SO many possibilities await this lil' nugget!
I am an auntie! I'd better start working on my awesome toy collection...I wanna be that cool aunt that has secret candy stashes and who lets you have ice cream for breakfast!

A hot day with some cool animals.

This guy had the right idea. A massive Bengal having a soothing soak. Took one look at my camera and turned his back. Ha! That's an attitude I'll let slide, I'm not about to go head to head with this big boy. Beautiful.

These guys slung themselves around with such ease! It's almost disconcerting how human they look, comical even, to see how agile they are weaving in and out and up the vines while picturing them to be little people!!
This healthy hyena had paws easily six inches in diameter. What a huge guy!
What a cheeky little fellow!! He must've sensed this was his moment to shine!
The sweltering heat did me in after a few hours, but it was no match for these Serengeti soldiers! I swear some of these guys knew they were being photographed!

I realllllly hate this one. Ha! I know i'm my own worst critic, but it was late, I was being lazy, and the fucking hands!! Gah! After all the erasing and CRAP I had to re-do to get the hands, like that, they are the only part of the thing I like. I don't who to give credit to for this, but I drew this using a really awesome picture as a reference. It was on DeviantART, so if you recognize this, and it was yours...thank you, and I'm sorry I bastardized it in pencil.