From my graphic novel development. Still in development...

I had good fun with this assignment. The image I find most compelling is the one with black figures on a white background. It’s also the least realistic. I tried to teach myself to do this with Procreate but the learning curve was too steep for the amount of time I had. So I resorted to old fashioned pencil and paint.

Tried doing this first in charcoal, and decided to do it again digitally with Procreate and it was a lot easier to read. It was a fun assignment that definitely had me struggling to not slip into muscle memory as far as value goes, so I was kept engaged the whole time.

I created four versions, three different values for the sky and three different foregrounds. Having chosen a less complicated scene it helped me see subtle ways the the elements took the eye through the scene, with the rolled up sleeve in the foreground, pointing to the men on the right and then the tilt of their hats towards the house, along with the two small square structures between the men leading to the house.

Days of Heaven. As a kid, I had an Issue of National Geographic which featured the work of N.C. Wyeth illustrations for Treasure Island (a title that only the best illustrators are called to do ;), as well as his son Andrew Wyeth's Christina's World. It haunted me, literally gave me unsettling dreams. Days of Heaven has so much of that visually as well. Incredible film. Talk about images that speak... Anyways, here's my playing with that still.

Struggle with the separation/contrast; gravitate to the mid tones…2nd simplified version; think I need to put a time limit on myself😁

Another image from the Fractal Heart series. If you get up to New York this month, head to the Society of Illustrators to check out this piece, along with four others from the same series.

Sketch one: current space - when I moved in, I sort of already designed it in a way for working remotely at my day job. And only recently got an old wacom to get some digital art practice in. The space is office/art/misc - a few small sit down desks with the intentions to do traditional but it really is just cluttered with cups/loose paper and junk mail… sketch two: I’ll actually apply this today, clean up the space to keep things clean and organised (helps with a clean space to think but I have a bad habit of letting that slide). I plan to split the area to have 3 working modes - of digital, analog and hybrid. Hybrid is to plan and use the laptop but analog would be an area where I just log off electronics and do the analog art practice without distractions and books by my side for inspiration.

My current setup, which feels a lot more cramped than it appears in the sketch 😆 redesigning it to have a space to set up a tripod for filming with a clear view of my painting easel helped a lot.

Epiphany on day one! As I sketched my workspace, I realized that I have not prioritized my workspace for Art. I think I subconsciously felt that my Art wasn’t important enough in our household to deserve a whole room of its own. As a result, the space has accumulated unloved furniture and random household junk. So my redesigned space shows how I would like my room to be: free of clutter and with furniture that is designed and arranged to facilitate the artistic process.