After doing a random AS3 search for some code that might let me outline text clean/easily, I stumbled on this post by Tom Carden.  It’s a short and sweet little post with some sample code.  However, what caught my eye was his clone function (note, that’s a screenshot to the right, please go to his site if you want to see/use the code.).

Basically, my thought process was: "what the? why is he for-each’ing an array created on the spot? –oh, that’s pretty elegant, I should share that."

So basically I just wanted to post to say "hey, check out this for loop." :)

(and go read Tom Carden’s blog! :)

Appreciating the little things,
~Danny

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009

I saw a few other sites doing this decade recap thing and I thought I’d give it a try :)  It’s amazing how it all adds up.  I’d like to give a quick word for what was going on with each year, I’ll try to be brief.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2000

In 2000 I was mostly still doodling.  Basically everything I drew was an experiment (which is why I left the "experimental" item blank).  My polished work was sort-of colored in the computer, but I didn’t quite get shadows yet.  When trying to draw from a reference, I set my sights lower than photos and instead drew other people’s drawings.  And finally, my self-portrait was at the tail end of my "goth is cool" phase.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2001

2001 was the first time I was drawing with others.  I was in LA and hooked up with people for "sketch parties" thrown by the (soon to be) admins on drawingboard.org Basically, I was socializing with real artists and art school grads who were as encouraging as they were inspiring.  I drew a lot more that year and the group passed plenty of advice my way.  I found myself drawing one-panel comics, working from photo references and attempting to take things to a much more polished state (though I still had much to learn about anatomy, light/shadow, composition, etc).  At the time I was experimenting with the nearly-overwhelming idea of drawing **an entire comicbook page**.  Something I didn’t thing I could do until I used an x-men comic as a reference and drew the whole first page. (I was excited, but ended up getting flamed on forums for copying vs making my own comic)

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2002

In 2002 someone told me that all I had to do was spend 10 minutes a day drawing and I’d get good at it.  Basically, he was encouraging me to practice.  So I created a "sketch calendar" where I posted what I drew each day and tried to draw for at least 10 minutes each day.  Even though I was still just stumbling though trying to teach myself to draw, it really did make a difference.  You can see this by my experiments with longer comics (a page or more) since they show a lot of work, but also show a lack of composition and can be downright hard to read/follow.  I also tried to participate on various forums more for motivation and ideas.  The polished piece is a self portrait done in the Gorillaz art style, which was a forum jam.  Also the reference sketch was another forum jam.  I kept up with the sketch calendar’s 10 minutes a day for 9 months straight until….

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2003

So what happened in 2003?  Why is it that I only have 3 pages of doodles in my sketchbook to show for it?  Well it’s quite simple.  My girlfriend, whom I was living with, turned out to need a lot of attention.  As in, an unhealthy amount.  2003 was over by the time the whole ordeal with her was officially done with.  A word of advice, if you’re significant other is not letting you have time to do what you love to do, maybe they shouldn’t be so significant.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2004

After kicking a certain girl to the curb, I tried to jump right back into my sketch calendar in 2004.  I only did it for about 3 months this time, not because I didn’t have time, but because I was starting to out grow it.  I was working on comics (like the Dragon Ball Z spoof) that took way more than 10 minutes, and in many cases took multiple days.  I was starting to find the patience to work on one piece for an extended amount of time and was satisfied with my progress/pace to stay excited and motivated enough to keep working on a single piece.  I was attempting to draw things other than girls and cartoons, like flowers, motorcycles, and space ships.  At that time I was also discovering manga and started experimenting with more of that style of drawing.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2005

 In 2005, I met Alberto Ruiz at Wondercon here in San Francisco.  I loved his work from his posts on forums and only went to the convention to see him in artist alley.  I was such a fan-boy that I blurted out "how do you draw so good?".  And he actually told me.  He gave me a quick lesson on how he tackles a drawing and then told me that he spends time every day doing slide-show sketching.  That is, he has a bunch of photo reference on his computer that he sets to randomly display for 30 seconds or a few minutes each and just sketches away at whatever is onscreen.  So I started experimenting with that and I’d never filled up so much paper so fast.  I also continued to drop by various online forums from time to time to participate in a sketch jam.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2006

Katie Cat and Juvenile Drivel were started in 2006.  I figured, if I could post a comic or two each week, I’d eventually have a whole comicbooks worth of material.  And it worked.  Having a milestone to post a comic online each week really helped.  I also specifically targeted art styles that would keep the project doable and possible to keep up with (while working a full time job).  I also got a tablet pc, so my process changed since inking became soooo much easier.  I did a lot of experimenting with process and approaches using the tablet in an effort to streamline my work flow as much as possible. This was put to the test when I took the 24 hour comic challenge (along with a couple sketchcrawl friends, Paul and Ryan).  Which brings me to the next point, I was also pretty into Sketchcrawl in the San Francisco area.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2007

2007 was a crazy year.  After a twist of fate, I found myself unemployed for a lot of the year.  This left me 40 hours a week to draw –I mean, look for a job….  The most notable thing was the Vacation Comic and my Comic Journal.  I was drawing a comic every day plus the comics that would ultimately make up a book for my fiance.  I got A LOT of drawing practice in and a lot more workflow streamlining in.  I was experimenting with painting via the tablet pc, but never really got a change to stick with it.  However my confidence with the tablet and cartoon/sunday-comics style.  I finally decided to invest real money in my drawing and started taking night classes at SFAI.  I also found some places to go life drawing, something I’ve never actually done.  Finally, I was drawing real anatomy from a real live reference and learning new techniques.  This was also the year I discovered Bay Area Artists Unite, which is a small group, but a dedicated one.  I gave them about 30 pages of "You had me at croissant" for their annual.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2008

I got the first order of "you had me at croissant" in early 2008.  It was, by far, the biggest project I’ve attempted and it actually got finished :)  I started taking Chinese Brush Painting classes with my fiance, which was a good experience, I’ve got plenty of posts about it.  I discovered entervoid.com (which is all about user drawn comic battles) and I started their "draw 50 hands" challenge (because I can’t draw hands and needed practice).  This was also the year I game up with the Blonde Shelly concept (which is the idea of having a nude female character in a story, but somehow making her NOT the main character –it was basically a self imposed challenge.)  I also kept in touch with Marc (from my previous job) and experimented a lot with his style of starting and ending with pen.  It was a very different way to draw.  You have to really plan before you lay down your lines.

	Comics	Experimental	Polished	Ref	Self-portrait
2009

I was working full time again, making games, for all of 2009, so I didn’t draw anywhere near as much as when I wasn’t working.  I didn’t draw hardly any comics or cartoons at all (maybe I was burned out on comics? or maybe I just didn’t have much time to draw).  Again I took night classes at SFAI, including an Anatomy class.  That class made a big difference.  For the first time, I had someone telling me "no, not like that, do this."  I mean, I finally had an instructor that did more than blindly encourage everyone.  He pointed right at mistakes and say "that’s wrong", then he showed you how to do it right.  My life drawing improved greatly in 3 months.  I also experimented with some abstract ideas in the other drawing class.  I usually *hate* abstract art… but it was a fun experience.  Finally, a friend of mine setup a private lesson with a watercolor painter.  Watercolor is much different than Chinese Brush Painting, it’s something I’d like to try again in the future (even if I am terrified of painting in color)

Now, what have I learned from all this?  Where do I go from here?  What do I do next? 

Well, I don’t have any comicbooks planned at the moment.  I have plenty of ideas, but no real plan for completing them like I have in the past (which means they won’t get done! :)  However, I’m in a different head-space lately.  I’d really like to practice at getting better.  I mean, I’d like to learn/practice new techniques and get better, not just draw what I’m already comfortable with (which is cartoony-comic that allow me to hide the things I’m bad at drawing… like hands).  I’ve already signed up for a couple more night classes: intermediate drawing and drawing motion (I’m excited about that last one).

In the end, I think the biggest lesson to learn from all this is: the years I practiced the most, I improved the most.

You only fail if you stop trying,
~Danny

PS: It’s 2010!!  Where the hell is my flying car!?

It’s pretty amazing how many muscles go under and around each other all the way down the arm. It’s also interesting that each finger is controled by two muscles in the fore arm.

Also, the muscles from the upper and lower arms interlock like links in a chain.

It’s interesting that the same lines you might use to draw hair, also work well for muscles.

Here’s a thought: don’t clean up your hobby –or whatever it is you’d like to get done but keep putting off.

Why is it that so many people come home from work and waste away watching tv? I have this theroey that it’s because tv is so easy. There’s no obsticals to overcome, no work to do –it’s already hooked up! If you had to hook up your tv every time you wanted to use it, and then disconnect it and put it away when you were done watching it, no one would bother! :) it wouldn’t be relaxing, it would be work.

So why do we even consider “putting things away”? (especially our favorite things) The act of setting up and putting away can turn something you want to do into something that’s too much trouble to do. (seriously, would you watch tv if you had to set it up and dismantle it when you were done?).

I realized that, after a long day at work, I often just take the path of least resistence, which is tv. This also means a week will go by and I’ll ask myself, “why haven’t I done any of the stuff I wanted to do ( like sketch or paint )?”

All of this clicked in my head for me after I tried out a suggestion from some one in my painting class. “the trick is, you’ve got to set everthing up and then leave it out. Don’t clean anything up and you’ll alway be able to paint on a moments notice.”

And It worked! I’d find myself wandering past my ready-to-go painting desk and spotting something I wanted to try out. I’d make a few brush strokes while standing and find myself sitting down. Then, next I realized, it’s two hours later. Much of the time I’d normally find myself in front of the tv, I now found myself painting. :)

It worked so well that I went out and bought a bigger desk. :)

I’ve been tring to make time to sketch more and I’ve been trying to experiment with approaches I don’t normally use.   

Normally I start with a gesture and start marking landmarks to keep my proportions in check before I start, then I move on to making contour lines.  After all that, I’d normally start shading.  But this always leaves me with these sketches that have hard outlines around everything.  Like a cartoon that’s trying to look real by having a lot of shading work inside the lines.

So, just for a change, I was trying to capture as much as possible without making lines.  I was blocking in big areas with the side of the charcoal.  Which means you’re laying down information to define the forms outline show volume at the same time.  It’s pretty interesting.  Here’s a couple 10 minute poses to illustrate.

In the first one you can see how quickly the form takes shape and "lines" start to form –but not as "lines", instead they are "edges".  For example, where the front leg overlaps the back leg.  It feels like there’s a line there, but there’s not.  In fact if you trying to draw a line there it will never be as thin as this "line" created by to edges meeting.

One other thing I’ll just throw out there while we’re looking at the legs.  Note the vertical strips of value I made with the side of the charcoal.  I was trying to fill in large blocks of space all at once… so a vertical line seemed like a nice idea, even though it goes against the curve of the form.  I figured I just try it out to see what it looked like in the end.  Basically, I feel like these legs look like the belong to a robot.  They’re not round, they’re angular and blocky.  Just and interesting observation.  If I had moved the charcoal from left to right along the curve of the legs they would have, no-doubt, looked much rounder.
 

In the second image, I was continuing with the "don’t draw lines" experiment.  I tried to draw as little as possible.  I have some dark spots, some medium tone and I tried to leave all highlights blank white.  Again I made a lot of long lines that following the arms and legs down.  for example, the back arm is not finished so you can see it’s just one long stroke with the charcoal.  But even though I didn’t have time to give it much more attention, it still look like it’s there (your mind kind of fills in the rest)

As I got a little more creative with those "edges instead of lines".  the heads are not outlined at all but you still get the feeling that the fingers are there.  Also note that the back was done in the direction it should be when you’re trying to make thing look round.  So you can compare the back’s shading to the legs and arms and see how the direction of the stroke make a difference.

No lines.  Give it a try some times. :)

~Danny

 

Here’s something fun to try: Pick up one or two "mark making" instruments and start making a library of marks. Start with some simple obvious marks. Maybe do some simple hatching (like in the bottom right of the image). Then start experimenting to see what various marks look like.

Make every mark you can think of. Then trying grouping them or overlaying them in different ways. Do everything you can think of and then KEEP GOING. Once you’ve exhausted all the obvious things, THAT is when you’ll start getting creative and discovering new things.

If just experimenting is too vague a goal for you, set some limitations on yourself! ;) Have fun! Trying to do a page full of only one variation of a mark or try to take whatever marks you’re already making and attempt to turn them into a gradient.

There’s no need to rush through every item in your media collection. Take your time. Make a page using a pencil and then another page with a pen. Or a page that explores how two mark making instruments interact with each other.

You don’t have to do every mark making instrument in your collection. Make a library for one pencil today and another pencil some other day. Do it often and just see what you get.

Some advice, take notes. Note what you were making marks with and then how you were making the marks. For example, if you’re holding your 4B pencil from the far end in the wrong hand and trying to make circles, make a note of that. After all, we’re making a library, so make sure you tell yourself how to reproduce these marks when you rediscover this page again 2 years from now ;)

Some ideas to try:

• Make marks with your palm on the page, then make them again with your palm not touching the page.
• Isolate parts of your body. Make marks using only your wrist, or only your fingers, or by only moving your elbow and shoulder
• hold the pen or pencil in odd ways. hold it "wrong" if you have to.
• play with your distance from the page. trying being far away and holding the pen/pencil from the far end so you have to reach
• try on difference surfaces and positions. Put the paper flat on table or tapped to a wall. You can stand, sit, lay, lean, or move while trying to make the mark.
• make the same marks or motions using very different media
• layer media
• use the wrong hand or try using both hands.
• turn your paper then try to reproduce some of the marks you’ve already made from this new angle.
• Close your eyes and make random marks, then open your eyes and see if you can reproduce them.
• Don’t forget your tools that take away marks. Throw down a pattern and then start experimenting with your eraser, whiteout, etc

Example 1: Micron 005

My sketch at the top of this post is pretty straight forward and "obvious" stuff **after the page is full.** Now I can look at the page and get ideas for patterns and gradients using a Micron 005 without having to take time out of the project I might be in the middle of when I realize I want to use the Micron 005.

Example 2: Skipping My Charcoal Pencil

Below are some more experimental attempts. In this first image, I discovered that if I held my charcoal pencil at the right angle, it would skip across the page making a dotted line. After a bunch of experimenting I was able to consistently do it.

All of these dots are downward lines made with a skipping charcoal pencil (and really took no time at all to make once I figured out how to do it)

Next I started stacking the marks on top of themselves and got something that looked like a commit. Then I tried going out in different directions to make that explosion of dots. Again, these didn’t take very long because I was drawing "lines" not making dots.

Example 3: Eraser Marks

Another experiment. I took a brand new eraser and rubbed it on a patch of charcoal, then stamped it on the page 3 times from top to bottom. What’s interesting is the 1st strike is solid (like you’d expect), but the 3rd strike is an outline.

What are you waiting for!? Start your library of marks today!

Bonus Example: Art Cars

UPDATE added 9/26/2009.  We just happen to walk by an art show with art cars.  Check out the way this artist made "marks" on these cars.

Give it a try and feel free to share your work with everyone by post some links to your marks as a comment.

 I wanted to get this online in some public place so people doing a google on this same issue might find some ideas.

HOWEVER, ANYTHING YOU DO TO YOUR COMPUTER IS AT YOUR OWN RISK.  I’m not advising you to do anything, I’m just sharing my experience with the issue.

BTW, my 2nd monitor is an LG Flatron, but I really don’t see how that would make a difference with any of the issues noted in this post.

Issue: Display settings reset about every 3 minutes (sometimes less)

Fresh out of the box, I turned on my new Fujitsu LifeBook T5010, went through the 1st time "welcome to vista" stuff and then dropped it in the docking cradle so I could use my second monitor.  I set my display setting to use both the laptop screen and my monitor and to "extend" my desktop onto my second monitor.  Then I popped on line to download firefox or crome or something, my screen went black for a second and came back with both monitors on and in clone view.  This was the issue… about 20 time in the first 3 hours, my display settings would simply reset and I’d have to reset them.  I was, of course, unhappy (an understatement) and on the verge of putting it back in the box and sending it back because it’s useless to me if my second monitor wasn’t going to work (and after paying a few thousand dollars for it…ug!).

Solution

The short answer:

1. open the task manager (ctrl+alt+del) and click on the processes tab, then locate the "FjEvents.exe".  Right click on it and end process.  
2. Now go to C:\Program Files\Fujitsu\Utils and rename the file "FjEvents.exe" to "FjEvents_disable.exe".

The long answer.  

I eventually realized that if I reset my display settings and then opened the task manager, 4 seconds later my display settings would be reset.  So I could reproduct the error 100% of the time.  From there I just started killing processes I didn’t recognise and then resetting my display settings and reopening the task manager until it didn’t happen again.  The problem went away when I ended task on a bunch of exe’s that all started with "Fj…".  I rebooted a couple times and narrowed it down to "FjEvents.exe"

after that I did a search on my computer for the exe and double clicked it… instantly my display settings were reset.

finally, I renamed the file in an attemp to disable it when the machine starts up.

Issues: Display settings reset on startup and when docked

as the title notes, if I started up the machine, it would reach my desktop and everything would be find, then something would cause my display settings to switch from extended desktop to clone view while the computer was still grinding away with the last parts of the startup.  I also noticed the display settings would also reset when I undocked and redocked the laptop.

Solution

The short answer:

1. find C:\Program Files\Fujitsu\Utils\FjDock.exe
2. renamed it to FjDock_disabled.exe

The long answer.

I found the directory that had FjEvents.exe in it and noted that it would reset my display settings if I double clicked on it.  So I started double clicking other "Fj…exe" files to see if they’d do the same.  I found that FjDispSw.exe and FjDock.exe both did… and since I’m using a docking station, I tried renaming FJDock.exe and rebooting.

The issue was gone on startup.  I then undocked and redocked the laptop a few times to make sure the FjDock.exe wasn’t doing something obviously needed… and my mouse and monitor continued to get detected every time a docked the laptop.

 

I’ve been trying to come up with ways to get myself drawing new things and be a little more serious about my drawings.  Basically, I’m trying to find a rhythm for sitting down and drawing something in a way that will be productive and help my skills improve.  I say this because I often give things one shot and then move on.  For example, my last post with the sketch inside safeway:  I just sat down and started drawing.  If it ends up being good then so be it, and if that same drawing had ended up being bad, well so what.  Either way I would have closed the book, stood up and wandered off.

So I question, how much do I learn by just drawing something once and then shrugging and moving on?

I’ve noticed that Marc tends to draw things over and over again.  It’s actually pretty amazing to watch.  He will draw a pose that may look good or bad, then continue to draw that same pose 3 more times.  After that, he looks at them all and tries to home in on what he likes and dislikes about them.  Then he just uses those rough sketches as reference for another attempt, then another attempt.  When he’s done, he’s drawn the same thing about 5 times (at least) and he smiles and tears up all but the last drawing.

This persistance to get where he’s going is really admerable.  So I experimented with drawing the same thing over and over today.  Not as allaberate as Marc, but with the intent of drawing something new and walking away feeling like I’d gained something.

So here’s what I did.  I looked for an odd object that was already on my desk and just started drawing.  No waiting to be "inspired" to draw or searching for the "perfect" object to draw.  I just looked at the first thing in site that looked challenging yet doable, cleared some space for it and started drawing.

Warm Up

Rather than do my normal "just make an attempt", I decided to try some warm ups from some drawing classes I took a while back.  I started with a 5 minute blind contour drawing. 

If you’re not familiar with this I really recommend giving it a try.  Basically, you put your sketchbook on your lap, *under* the table and then start drawing without looking at all.  You focus on only the outline of the object.  I’ve heard it described as imagining an ant very slowly crawling around the outline of the object and you’re watching it.  You tried to notice every little detail that ant would encounter on it’s epic journey around the object border.  Basically, you go really slow and you look for tiny details on the object’s outline.

While you’re doing this with your eyes, you have your pencil on the page and you’re very slowly drawing what you’re seeing.  When you’re done, the drawing will look like nothing (if it does look like something, you probably cheated and looked).  But what you’re doing is training your eyes to looks for new details and letting your hand feel what it feels like to be drawing just those details. It goes back to that saying, "you can’t draw what you don’t notice."

It’s great because you can’t mess it up.  When you’re done you have a drawing that looks like nothing, but it’s the experience in your head that’s valueble.

So I did that and I took 5 mintues or so to slowly going around my object, the old beat up headphones, twice –my pen died out a little on the second time around, but who cares?  In all honesty, you could do it with a pen that doesn’t  work and still gain the experience of training your eye and your hand on the details of the object.

Next I made another contour drawing, only this time I put the book on the table so I could see what I was doing.  I ended up also outlining the shadow and blocking it in with some highlighters that happened to be on the table already.

And that was my 15-20 minute warm up.

Focused Attempt

Next I made an attempt to draw the object with as much detail as I could.  And I commited myself to take as much time as I needed to feel like it was done (as in, adding more lines would take away value instead of add value to the drawing).

One thing to note is that I’m still using the pen a lot these days.  I find that starting with the pen really makes me take my time and think about every line before I draw it.  I’m not saying you should use a pen, I’m just saying I like my own state of mind when I use it.

I also decided to make an attempt with those highlighters again (which is a tool I’m still trying to get the hang of). 

After that, I did something I rarely do, I made a pass at cleaning up the drawing a little with the use of a whiteout pen.  Like I said, I normally make an attempt, shrug and move on.  But I’m really trying to get all I can out of this for a change.  I’m really trying to focus.

All this took about 35 minutes.

Put it to the test

Finally, I covered the object so I couldn’t see it and I tried to draw it again from memory.

Again, I commited myself to taking as much time as I’d need to finish it.  I also started with a pencil this time and tried to keep myself thinking about every line before I drew it.  I ended up drawing as you would expect to draw with a pencil, I "constructed" the object by making a lite, rough layout of the shapes and slowly homing in on what the final lines should be.

I inked it and shaded with a pencil this time around.  Then I did some cleanup with and eraser.  I was trying to take my time, but I think I went a little too fast because I was done in about 20 minutes.

After that I compared what I had just drawn to the drawing I had done earlier and then I compared against the actual object that was on the desk.  Right away I noticed I’d shifted the orientation of the head phone on the right (which is just "interesting", not "right" or "wrong" or anything), but for the most part, I drew something with no reference that I wouldn’t have been able to draw at all about an hour ago.

I was pretty exhausted afterwords (mentally), but I do feel like drawing something a few times in this order really helped me walk away with a lot more then a shrug.

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll try to draw it again from memory, just to see what happens.

Give it a shot, I think I’m going to be taking this approach more often (and I’ll be trying more than just one viewpoint of the object),
~Danny

PS: you may have spotted the "fill in the blanks" I wrote on the page in my very first photo.  Basically, I’m at the end of a sketch book and I’m trying to go back and fill in all the blank (or mostly blank) pages I skipped for some reason or another.  I figure it’s paper and I shouldn’t waste it :)

 

So I’m sure you’re thinking "well that’s a pretty stupid flash app," –and you’re right!!  It’s very small and insignificant however it involves a huge frigging workaround since AS3 doesn’t have a clone function for MovieClips.

Warning: If you don’t code AS3 this is going to get really boring really fast.

Okay so all I wanted was "newMovieClip = SomeRandomMovieClip.clone();"  I wanted to clone the frames, the timing, the current x/y location, rotation, scale, etc, etc.  I just wanted it to work but "clone" doesn’t exist.  It’s what you might call a huge frigging oversight in the language’s framework.

So I look up on google and found lots and lots of people are all having this same problem.  What’s worse is each time someone asked the question "there’s no MovieClip.clone()? what should I do?" they are met with answers that don’t help at all.  Like the following:

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