Behind the Scenes

Posted on by amandaacton

I’m just in with a quick update on the things I’ve been busy with, primarily in the vein of “how not to do things!”

I am excitably working toward a tutorial series on concrete sculpture, but to do that, I first need to remember how to do it properly.  Aha! Also, I need to work out the intricacies of recording process. I’m having some success on that front, but also plently of failures. I’m learning how to edit video. Next on the list will be audio.

In the meantime, I am getting plenty of “What not to do” footage and it will totally add to the  completeness of the series so we can pretend I did it on purpose. 😉

A quick, visual journey of my activities:

 

Let us begin with a snapshot from the art of plaster moulds:

 

 

Hark! A tub of curing concrete scuplts! Note all the bugs and leaves that have fallen in. Also the strange surface floaty bits that I have, without any scientific backing whatsoever, decided must be related to the petroleum jelly used as a release agent. I am probably wrong.

cof

 

This, a small concrete sculpture that broke on demoulding because I got the cement to aggregate ratio wrong.  Ah, relearning you old fiend!

 

cof

 

And this, a giant pile of clay scraped from the depths of this one piece mould that really would work better as a two piece mould, but here we are!

 

cof

 

And Finally, a lovely demonstration of myself working on the part of the sculpture that’s facing AWAY from the camera. Also see: Wobble because I’m hitting the charging cable.

 

Blobby Body Manequins

Posted on by amandaacton

When it comes to activities like painting or writing, being interrupted every few minutes is kind of infuriating. There is something beautiful about the creative process and getting into “the zone”,  but if you’re like me, the big blocks of time are limited. What I do have, though, is loads of little bits of time. I have started using those little bits for simple exercises. First one?

Blobby Body Manequins!

 

Yes, there is probably a more eloquent way to express what I’m doing, but it sure as heck won’t be as fun as yelling BLOBBY BODY MANEQUINS!

 

In an effort to train myself to draw from memory, I’m… dun dun dun… drawing from memory. These little sketchy guys below are all about trying to understand the body posture, weight distribution etc. You can see that the earlier ones the weight is way too much to the back of the figure. I’ve been gradually bringing the weight forward, but I’m not quite there yet. How the body moves is a subtle thing with lots of little moving parts.

Heck, I HAVE a body. I move it ALL THE TIME. Surely I know how it all works?

Ha. ha. ha.

 

Ocasionally I will do the movement myself, and then get back and try to draw it. What I won’t do is look at actual reference for this. This is all about translating what I know into a visual form. In theory, I understand how it should look.

Now its up to the practice.

 

Colour Comps and Lasso Tools

Posted on by amandaacton

This week I have been busy with the first bit of homework for the Magic Box course over at The Oatley Academy. Its a self guided course in all things digital painting. I’ve been meaning to do it for a while now and have finally had the chance to dive in.  My brain is fried and I’m only on module 1!

But it has been awesome. It’s helping me with figuring out how to use reference effectively, how to plan a painting and specifically, how to create colour comps with a soft gradient.  Random side note, in all three years of Fine Arts studies, not one lecturer actually broke down how to PLAN a painting. Isn’t that crazy? How did I go through three years of Art Study and never do colour comps? HOW?!

Mind.

Boggling.

Alas.

 

I’m begining to feel way more comfortable with the Gradient and Lasso tools than I did at the start of this week and I’m really starting to enjoy the effects I can create with them. Here are the results of my learning:

 

cof
cof

 

Next up, Brush techniques!