Art of Nick

Ho-Ho-Holy SH!T!

2011-12-25T09:10:00.000-08:00

Merry Xmas!

Sophie's Corner

2011-12-23T00:24:00.000-08:00

With a fever, migraine, and sore throat yesterday, no drawing got done...But today, after a barfing baby and a sickish Mari, I managed to sit down with the women and chat and draw something. This is Sophie's corner where she keeps all her toys and stuff.

"Sophie's Corner"
Pencil
Tombow Marker
Newsprint Paper

"I'm sorry" Flowers

2011-12-20T23:36:00.000-08:00

I tried drawing this vase of "I'm sorry" flowers yesterday from about a two or three feet away yesterday, but was immediately overwhelmed by the details. I could not think of anyway to translate the thing down onto paper, and gave up.

I tried again today after talking to Mari about it and came up with the idea of drawing them from about 10 feet away, and it worked out much better, and I was able to just approximate the thing.

"I'm sorry"
Charcoal, white-out on newsprint.

Mari's Feet

2011-12-20T00:46:00.000-08:00

Some quick studies of Mari's feet. Tried shading the one on the left with markers, but it turned out a little harsher than I would have liked...

Also I gave my stamp another version.

Self-portrait

2011-12-18T22:20:00.000-08:00

The second charcoal self portrait. This time I used the process that I developed at life drawing yesterday. The proportions turned out a lot better than last time due to the first pass with a light marker. The shading's a bit better too, but it still has strange hitches in it, and the value range is a little inconsistant, but it's a step in the right direction. I also forgot to draw my mustache. haha.

Life Drawing @Art/Not 003

2011-12-17T17:07:00.000-08:00

Life drawing from Art/not this morning. Forgot to pay last week, and then forgot to pay the meter after 2 hours... Grand total for life drawing today = $64.00. geez...luckily Ol' Ben Hopper is going to be kind enough to split that ticket, so I guess it's more like $42.00. Anyways, the materials and process for these was:

Tombow Marker for layout,
Conte Crayon pass for line and some detail,
Vine Charcoal for medium and light values,
Compressed Charcoal for the darks,
White-out pen for highlights and lines on giant newsprint.

25 minutes poses.

Foot Long

2011-12-17T00:38:00.000-08:00

And....it's back: terrible non-sensical puns mixed with drawing of extremities. And this post marks 2 full weeks (14 days) now of drawing everyday. I wonder when I'll stop counting the days and talkin' about it...haha. Anyways, here's some feet sketches with conte crayon. Some light shading going on here and over the last few days, so I'm hoping I'm ready to do some shading during life drawing tomorrow at art/not. Not sure what medium I'm gonna work in tomorrow but I'll just bring the whole f'n thing and figure it out then!

Charcoal Nick

2011-12-16T00:40:00.000-08:00

There's something weird about the proportions here...and the white guoache didn't work out quite how I'd though because it gets all mixed up in the charcoal...so I'm gonna have to think about how to get the super hard whites that I want. I might just have to go crazier and heap on the gouache tomorrow. O well...another day another drawing.

Mari

2011-12-14T23:52:00.000-08:00

More charcoal and white-out stuff. Portrait drawing is probably my favorite thing. The white-out didn't work out quite as well in this as the fruit basket in my opinion but I love it's strong whiteness. I probably just need to figure out how to work it better...or maybe I need white gouache...hmmmmm....white gouache....

Ye Ole Fruit Basket

2011-12-13T23:32:00.000-08:00

Home-made Art Horse gets taken for a test spin. Set up Ye Ole Fruit Basket still life in with a lamp and kicked it student style again.

Materials:
Big newsprint
Medium vine charcoal
Compressed charcoal
White out pen
Digital stamp

Started getting a hang of exaggerating values about half way through. Next time I wanna set up stuff with a wider range of surfaces and textures.

Home-made Art Horse

2011-12-12T23:39:00.000-08:00

Getting bored of drawing people looking at menus and shoving their face. I also want to improve in seeing and drawing values. So in preparation for some good ol' still life drawing I wanted to get an art horse to sit on so I wouldn't have to cross my leg and hunch over my pad...but Craigslist had nothing....Ebay, nothing. And the only thing I could find online was a Dick Blick art horse for $100. So I stole the dimensions from it and went to Home Depot.

Dick Blick = $100
Nick Blick = $10

Art horse done.

Life Drawing @BellSquare

2011-12-11T21:32:00.000-08:00

Got a surprise babysit from my parents so Mari and I split up to go do our own thing. I went to downtown Bellevue to get some markers from the University Bookstore and then walked over to the mall to sketch some people dressed up in stuff to go buy more stuff to get dressed up in to go buy more stuff :P I don't like malls.

Life Drawing @Art/Not 002

2011-12-10T23:07:00.000-08:00

Barely made it to life drawing again this week but the streak continues!...drank way too much and stayed up way too late last night. Pretty much rolled out of bed put clothes on and got in the car. The whole animation team (3 people) from Signal was out drawing today, was cool. Longer poses this time. 5 and 12 minute poses. Tried doing some shading for the first time since I've been back drawing again only to realize that my eye for values is crap. Everything looks the same to me....turrible. Gotta change that.

Signal and the Ale Hosue

2011-12-10T01:41:00.000-08:00

The final day of my first week back drawing I'm posting some life drawings from work and from the Ale House in Bothell. It's possible that this week I've actually put more "miles" down on paper than any other week before in my life...about...75 pages of sketches and "finished" drawings. Feels pretty good to take a step back from the computer and engage the world around me directly with "real" drawing. I'm characteristically inconsistant so we'll see how long the streak lasts, but hey, here's to an active week of drawing.

Sophie

2011-12-09T00:42:00.001-08:00

Trying to draw a toddler is no easy business. I have a bunch of pages of almost-drawings of her...haha. I had to catch her playing in tub where her mobility is (somewhat) limited, and even then she only gave me like...30 seconds or so. I didn't realize until I started sketching her how cool toddler proportions are...definitely helps in getting faster too!

Hand it over...

2011-12-08T00:08:00.001-08:00

Couldn't resist some sort of hand pun...but I can't say I'm too satisfied with the one I chose. Whatever, I'm tired, and I just left Mari alone post-X-Files, and she's probably sh*ttin' a brick upstairs...haha. Anyways I couldn't get out and draw today so I'm kickin' it student style with some hand studies.

Sketches @ Panera Bread

2011-12-06T22:23:00.000-08:00

You pick 2: black bean soup, Mediterranean veggie sandwich, apple.

Furiously sketching people waiting in line. Probably 10- 20 second gestures.

Me: "You wanna see the drawing I made of you?"

Subject 2nd from right: *rolls eyes* "Not really."

Me: "Ok..."

Haha.

'Round-The-House Portraits

2011-12-06T00:16:00.001-08:00

Sleeping Sophie, X-files, a mirror, 2 Tombows, and m'lady.

Life Drawing @Alexa's Cafe

2011-12-04T20:33:00.000-08:00

Went and grabbed the daily special omelet, substitue mushrooms for the bacon, and sketched the people around me.

Life Drawing @Art/Not

2011-12-03T18:23:00.001-08:00

Apparently it's been almost 2 years to this day since I drew something for myself. Well, well....

Above are a couple of 1-minute gestures. Below is a 5 minute pose plus some photoshop.

Twisted

2009-12-02T09:30:00.001-08:00

Focus Cancelicious Team Logo

2009-09-21T19:32:00.001-07:00

Bloody-Knuckles Flyer Final

2009-09-03T12:39:00.000-07:00

This is the final version of the Bloody-Knuckles art show at the Canoe Social Club and Gallery in Seattle.

For more info go to www.bloody-knuckles.com

Bloody-Knuckles Flyer V1.0

2009-09-02T18:26:00.000-07:00

Bloody-Knuckles Logo V1.0

2009-08-31T17:32:00.001-07:00

Reflection #3

2009-08-06T15:22:00.001-07:00

Reflection #2

2009-08-03T19:15:00.001-07:00

Reflection #1

2009-07-30T15:48:00.000-07:00

NWM Avatar

2009-07-24T15:50:00.000-07:00

Northwest Majors

2009-07-24T10:43:00.000-07:00

This is a logo I made for the upcoming Northwest Majors fighting game tournament:

This is the flyer for it. I did not create this, just adjusted the levels for black & white printing: