Photoshop Layers-0, Paper Layers-4

My younger sister Melissa's piece.
So winter-break comes and I need projects! My wonderful girlfriend Kylie and sisters were here today. I had the idea of creating one art project everyday. This is what we came up with for day 1.

My New Companion: Nikon D5000

What's your Poker-Face? Pretty sure my heart stopped once I saw how much everything added up to at the checkout counter. I posted this same pic on Facebook and almost had another heart attack when I saw the quality it was reduced to!

Alchemy: A Little Practice

One of my buds showed me this program. There are many awesome variations you can get with it. There is everything from sound to pen pressure to change the pen thickness. You set a time limit and ever so many seconds the page is refreshed and your sketch is saved.

Doomsday Project: Final

The day has finally come folks! DoomsDay! enjoy.

Life Drawing : The Final (Shell)

I think I can hear the ocean!? Or maybe it is just a crab that is yelling because he got stuck in my shell. I will have to say that I personally had the most fun with this final shell drawing. Adding the ink and color gave us more creative freedom and made everything a little more interesting.
(sorry for the difference in colors- one was taken in the gallery and the other in my room)

Nice To Meet You- The Shaking of Hands

Never got a chance to post any of my hand drawings from about a week back. This has to be my favorite...most likely because of the cross-contour lines. Funny story: this may be my best drawing...but everyone else in my groups worst. Well I was the model and instead of just sitting there and doing nothing I decided to drawing my hand in my sketchbook. Lets just say my hand did not stay in the same position for too long. I seemed to have gotten a pretty solid drawing out of those 20 minutes...I think they are just being ridiculous (ha-ha). It has been way too long since the last time I drew hands. I remember the days I would draw hand after hand and was really quite good. Now it has been some 5 odd years and I have not gotten to know my close friend so well anymore...boy you have grown since we last met!
This is the 'limp fish' hand shake. Every met a man like this problem? Well he is no longer considered a male after such blaspheme.

Life Drawing: The Final

Well it is finally here folks! The final class period of Life Drawing 1 and what an adventure it has been (shedding a few tears a well). I mean that in all honesty. There are days when the drawing is coming along great and those where...lets say, not so much.
Looking back on my drawings from the first few weeks of class I want to curl up into fetal position and point to my neighbor and accuse him of the heinous crime of creating this bad drawing. We all know that wouldn't be fair to anyone so I just stick by my work and show how far it has come.
I can now draw a gesture drawing without spending half of the time trying to figure out how many and what direction they spine should start. Just yesterday I looked at my sketchbook from before this class...lets say it was alright. Looking at my sketches from the last week, so much better! All this hard work has payed off. As I stated in an earlier post...I was trying to at least draw for an hour every day (usually ends up being math class) and the improvement has been great. I just want to work on drawing with greater action and sharper foreshortening.

My thoughts: I really enjoyed this class and am very sad that it has come to an end. The first few shell drawings were not my favorite but how this last one turned out made me think...well I have gotten much better and practice make perfect. I do wish we had finished all of the muscles on the mannequin but oh well and possibly for future classes there could be more homework. I understand this sounds insane but I really did not mind homework from this class at all.

Mannequin: My good ol' friend the mannequin why have you deserted me. I was one of the very few who enjoyed my lovely muscled friend. I really wish we could have finished him and gave him life. Boo-hoo...and sad face. He only has a spine, glutes, and upper leg. I guess we will see him around campus walking on all fours. WAIT! he does not have arms...too bad he will just have to kneel there. As far as Mr. Manne goes so long and fair well, wish we could have gotten to know each other much better.

Drawings: WOW! As stated above they have come a long way and will increasingly get better the more time I spend drawing each day. I am much more confident with my drawing abilities as well which is never a bad thing.

Blog: Before this class I had never posted anything on a blog. After this class I am really enjoying what they have to offer and will continue posting my recent work as awesome videos as I deem necessary. I think we needed something like 25 posts...well I have more than 55! I guess you can say I enjoyed this part of the class.

Future: If I happen to get the chance I am looking forward to joining life drawing 2. Now that there is no more life drawing class I guess I will just need to study up on my own (bought a couple books, why not use them).

This is most recent sketch I have done outside of class
(link to flikr)

Library Signs: Linda's Little Warning

This was just a quick little sign I made for one of my fellow employees at the Library to make it obvious. Had a little fun with the wording at the bottom.

Doomsday Project: Cards

Here is what the final cards look like. Not the greatest quality pic in the world (taken from my cell phone at midnight) but it will do for now. The world will officially end on Monday, December 14th so be prepared. I will post high-quality photos in the near future.

I Present to You the DoomsDay (proto-type)

Here is are final proto-type. We are using this one to get all the kinks out before our glorious final product. Each player will have a 'life counter' that will turn the clocks hand (upper right) as well as their own mini clock for counting their 'life' before they get knocked out of the game. Good work fellaz!

Weekly Math Sketchbook

A facial structure study. Kinda fun to do. I may possibly work this into my sketches and work more on bones. I really need to get back to drawing faces more often. (side note: I understand the left eye is deformed. My pen decided to freak out on me.

Working with overdoing female ribs and had fun with the hips. Oh, the toes do not look too shabby either (no reference).

Another thing I really want to work on is female hair. As you can see the hair is a bit meh.

Mr. and Mrs. Saggy Eyes

Only 3 folks stayed after class was dismissed so we switched off modeling. Maybe all classes should be a total enrollment of 3 personas.

DoooomsDay Is Almost Here

Below are my designs for the logo as well as the cards. There are disaster, humanitarian aid, people, and special cards. They all have almost the exact same layout. The logo has definitely come a long way since my original sketches. We are hopefully going to finish our research as well as print most of our cards this weekend. As well as printing the cards we are hoping to have a final prototype of the clock done by Friday as well. I will post that once we have it all pieced together and looking beautiful.

Well not quite. This is the 6th and final character for our DoomsDay Project cards. Wow this project has been a great deal of fun.

Class Canceled = Me Learning Anyway

Well I was quite sad today when I found that my Life Drawing class was canceled. I am really excited for the next section we are entering into. No class? No problem, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I have been wondering about back muscles for quite some time. I have a few books as well as an endless internet resource to find pictures of back muscles. After studying my books and looking for pictures online this is what I came up with. It is only the first study I have ever done on back muscles so there is always more space for learning. That is why we go to school correct? Well anyways, enjoy.

Doomsday Project: Dictators

My DTM (Design Theory and Methods) class is working on creating game boards. Our group chose the Doomsday clock as our event in history. My section of the project right now is to create the card design and characters/people cards. Here are the dictators that we have chosen to be the pieces. I will post more later as the project develops. We have a full working plexi-glass gear system the makes the clock rotate as you turn it with the 'dictator' cards.

We Have An iPhone App For That!

Driving a Car with an iPhone!
"we turned an Oldsmobile Delta '88 into a remote control car in just 4 weeks. We built our control systems using a few motors, potentiometers, a Compact RIO embedded controller, and LabVIEW. We then set up wi-fi communication so we can drive the car from an iPhone as well as from a modified Power Wheels truck."

Good Heaven's I Can't Wait

Charlotte Gainsbourg - Heaven Can Wait from Charlotte Gainsbourg on Vimeo.

Naked, Dead, and Muscular Bodies All Around

Last week we got the chance to go to 'Bodies: The Exhibition' at the mall of America. It was fantastic and I would definitely recommend others to go. I actually figured out a few corrections I could make to my muscle mannequin from looking at the actual muscles rather than those pictured in a book. We were not allowed to bring out cameras in so the only picture I really have is my 30 minute drawing I did. The models were great but since each one was focusing on certain part there were a few chunks missing so don't mind the random anorexic arm.

Posting In the Gallery

Quite literally, but not because our work was fantastic by any means. The gallery was empty so we all pinned up our shell drawings. After looking at my shell drawing on the wall I saw a few more things wrong but also found some fantastic items as well.



First off, the drawings all look better from 10 feet away rather than sniffing the conte-crayon dust off of the paper. Some of the contour lines I was not sure of actually looked alright once I stepped back from the piece. I also found some parts that could possibly be more defined or cleaned up slightly. As I commented in my previous post...I used a new medium as well as did not worry about super clean lines and it shows.

We also had group critiques. My group suggested that I should work on line weight (why I originally used the conte-crayon) but still push it more. Part of the reason for my lack of line weight was that I had not sharpened my tool I used a dull crayon to loosen up my lines. They also suggested to chose a view with a little more foreshortening as well. Overall they said I did a good job but to work with those for the next drawing.

side note:
I spent a good 6-7 hours on my drawing but it seems many students spent much less time. As a student and one that loves to expand my knowledge and skill I find it frustrating to see other students with a lack of work ethic. If your drawing is going in the wrong direction, restart or fix what is wrong rather than just settling for less. The shell drawings may not be the most stimulating thing I have ever done but I find the shapes very intriguing and a good way to work on modeling.

What the Shell!? Oh Glorious Shell

This post will soon make more sense once I post the actual drawing I am talking about. We were to purchase a 38 x 50 or so sheet of heavy paper and draw a cross-contour of a shell. That cannot be too hard you think to yourself.
Well first of all it was! Two reasons...the scale of the piece (mine are usually done on 8.5 x 11 sheets of paper) and problem number two is my shell. The shell has some sort of freaky legs growing out of it. Question: since when do shells grow appendages? NEVER! (at least that is what I originally thought). This drawing was a little bit of a struggle to say the least.
One thing they mentioned at mid-program review was to work on loosening up and freeing up my lines. That is exactly what I did and not sure how great it worked out. When I draw I want everything to be clean and stripped to the essentials without extra clutter. I had to go back and fix many of my lines because they were incorrect for the simple fact of how I held the conte-crayon.

note to self: conte-crayons and un-controlled lines are evil

Well in the end I think I learned more from getting a little bit frustrated than I have in a while. Sometimes I need to try new things and get over everything being clean up and perfect. If I were to spend time on making all of my lines clean I would have died before I finished.

11.19.09 Skull Drawing

This is officially the first successful skull I have ever drawn...granted it is only my third try ever I guess that just isn't too bad. I am excited to get working with the face. Once I understand the skull better I will try to work it into my sketches and faces. Knowing more of the structure underneath the skin will help me further define the jaw and other features. Another concept I may work with is adding a skeleton under the face and possibly some cross-contour lines.

More Library Signs

This recent project was a sign for a laptop station that had hook-ups for a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Students around the library were wanting to hook up their laptop the a second monitor and were disconnecting the desktop pc's. Hopefully this solution will work out nicely.

La-La-La Love

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Remember the Days of Yo-Yo's?

Well I was sitting in math class once again just sketching along and this is what I came up with. I think it is a fun character. Everyday I am trying to work on developing and tuning my illustration style.

Its Time: For You to Get a Pie Clock

Reminds me of a chainsaw. AHH watch out for the Chainsaw Massacre.

Below: This has to be one of the greatest clocks I have ever seen. It breaks time into 'pie-like' shapes and angles rather than just directions of hands. Watch the video and you will see.

11.4.09 Long Pose (1.5 hours)

Well to say the least...my drawings are getting much more shape than when we first started this journey. I now have drawings to be proud of and they will only get better from here.

Oh Dear, I Have Not Abbandoned You

I am finally getting back to updating my personal site solliedesign.com. I have been very busy lately and not had any extra time. There is still much to work on and more to update but hopefully sometime in the near future I will try to update my portfolio every few weeks.

P.O.S. Isn't Ruining My Life

'P.O.S. Is Ruining My Life' must be my favorite song by...you guess it, P.O.S. but this one is definitely worth a listen. I never thought that a hip-hop album would have a beat based off cup stacking but here it is. There is also a great indy feel to the video and the stop photography. One of Minneapolis' own and finally a rapper with skills as well.

Lets Float Away

Flikr: Where Did the 'E' Go?

Well anyways...I have officially created my very own flikr account. I will periodically post pictures from life drawing as well as other random photos as exciting experiences come along. Here is the link for my account- http://www.flickr.com/photos/solliedesign/. Check it out!

Attack of the 50 Foot Hand

"Hand from Above" by Chris O'Shea. What a great concept. Maybe if we had more art like this American's would quit being lazy and walk everywhere...and watch out for the monster hand.

Library Signs: Adding a little more visual interest to the UW-Stout Library

These are not the most amazing thing that anyone has seen but it is definitely an upgrade from the original signs we have had for many years previous. The signs are attached to the side of the monitor with instruction on how to log on, print, and log out. I only spent about 20 minutes designing them. No one ever read the signs before (computers were always logged in or not shutdown) so I thought to make it blatantly obvious I would make the How To (for dummies) really large.

The original signs for the last 3 years or so


These are the signs I created

Learning New Things Every-Other Day

One of my first posts pertained to the subject of being over-excited to take life drawing. Well now we find ourselves at the halfway point and boy-o-girl has it gone too fast. The question is- What have I learned so far this semester? My answer to that would be a great deal of little tricks and an eye for the human form. When the class had first started I had been working on my sketching skills and drawing characters here and there everyday in my sketchbook but did not have a true understanding of many things.
Now that I have been in Life Drawing for half a semester my understanding of the figure has changed. Now when I look at people walking on the street I try to find their rib cage and where there pelvic bones would be. Creepy I totally understand but hang in there with me. The hips and shoulder angles point to the foot that supports our weight when standing so I seem to pay much more attention of how the upper and lower parts of the body interact with each other. So when people are standing I figure out what leg is supporting their body.
My 'life' drawing skills have gotten much better as you will be able to see from my sketches posted on my blog or my flikr account . At first I had a problem with creating the torso and rib cage far too large. After practicing in class, outside of class, and watching the tutorial video I found that it is almost a square for the most part. Adding that to my knowledge has greatly increased the quality and proportions of my drawings.
We have also spent much time working with the hip and pelvic bones which have become another reference point. The more reference points and markers we add the easier if seems to create drawing that look much more correct than previously.
The major thing that I could work on would be to give my drawings a less geometric stylistic feel to them. This is great for the mood I am going for in my outside work but when drawing from life I may miss some of the smaller details when the drawing is more geometric. I really enjoy graffiti and street art and that is part of where it comes from as well as just giving my stuff a different stylistic feel.
One of the things I do well is keep my drawings clean and to the point. I do not like to keep stray lines on my page. For lots of my inked drawings there are only as many lines as needed and no extra. When drawing I like to have everything clean and that is one of the reasons I use graphite rather than charcoal sticks. My marks get bolder with my level of sureness on the lines and shapes. Throughout the semester I have seen myself becoming more sure of the lines I lay down and not as much second guessing.
Before the end of the semester I want to have a much better understanding of the muscles on the surface of the skin and why they appear that way which will come from studying the mannequin. I also want to get a sharper eye for negative space when there is not a picture border around the subject at hand. My drawings from picture seem to be much more precise but who's aren't? So I would like to improve my overall drawing ability but now have an understanding of why certain things look the way they do. The last thing that I would love to learn would be the bone and skull structure but that seems to be a figure drawing two subject so I guess I may just have to sign up for that class.
I understand that this class is a life drawing class but I think that it may be a good idea to give us a little more outside homework such as draw a picture of a person and add all the tricks we know as well as the structure underneath? Just a thought. This is the one class I would not mind homework for.

Eye Popping Fun (just in time for Halloween)

This is absolutely unbelievable! I wish that I could pop my eyes out of their sockets...well then again maybe not but it definitely makes for a great Halloween costume/mask.

Play Me A Song Piano Man

Obliques