planes, trains, and...more trains...and coffee shops...and laundromats...

 Last few months i've been pretty diligent drawing from life at every opportunity.  I usually get these chances when I've escaped from my dungeon apartment to run some errand or some such thing, and find myself on MUNI.  Since everyone else is idly fondling their various smart phones or E-readers, I get out my sketchbook so that I also have something to do with my hands.  These pages are mostly from these little trips, with a couple other random things thrown in.

Many artists keep a much more organized and carefully composed sketchbook, and thus their works are much more presentable...I am not one of them, sad to say!  I have drawings facing every which way, not necessarily relating to anything else on the page.  One thing I have been trying to do though, is to pick out smaller compositions and fill out any blank space.  Makes for an interesting if sometimes hard to decipher overall impression.

Happy New Year!  Health, Happiness, and Good Fortune to all in 2012!

steampunk gent

for fun, finally getting around to painting some stuff from the steampunk costume workshop some time ago!  here's the first.  more to come (if they don't completely suck).

new(ish) figure drawings

these are from the workshop at the mission cultural center.  great models always!  not without flaws, but overall i'm happy with them.

jenny

terry whom i've drawn since my art school days.

chris who has such a sculpted physique, he is a walking
 anatomy lesson.  i've also drawn him many times.

interesting model - very pale hair and
eyebrows...interesting face.

this one i did some time ago at the gallery girls costume workshop..although i had a pretty good night, i felt a little hobbled by the drawing tool i had on hand.  lately i have been keen on the lyra water soluble 9B graphite stick for my drawing needs.  they are thick and soft so a great range of value can be easily reached, and large areas of paper are easily covered.  similar to charcoal really, but less brittle.  anyhow, on the eve of this workshop, i ran to the store and grabbed what i thought was just that.  however, it turns out what i grabbed a 'normal' 9B graphite, which was significantly harder.  as a result, i had to work much harder to get the value i was expecting, and my drawings turned out less than i had hoped for.  still, they are decent studies, and i have been working a couple of these into paintings.  i will post them later when i'm done and if they don't suck.

slow loris

for a friend...so i guess one could now say it's in a private collection, heh heh!

Fontana di Trevi

Happy Thanksgiving to all!
A small 4"x5" study.  Probably the first of a few.

albino dwarf

a sketch of an idea a friend of mine had: an albino dwarf (hence the red eyes).  probably his arms might be more muscular and hands larger, but oh well..there were other aspects to this character that i didn't really address...perhaps at a later date.

halloweenie

the remainder of this year's halloween sketches...didn't get to quite as many as i'd hoped, but there you have it.  i was lame this year - no costume at all...we went to see the rocky horror picture show on the saturday before halloween, and it totally didn't occur to me that that actually might be the night where people go out and dress up and have fun.  as a result, we were the only weenies at the movie not wearing any sort of costume at all.  oops...

from last year

Must have forgotten to post last time...quite happy with the way this turned out...has a sort of 70s horror film feel to it, somehow...not that I've seen many on which to base my conclusion...

halloween approacheth

good excuse to do stuff for the hell of it...looks to me like he has just said 'cha'...

fleet week

this (USS Bonhomme Richard) was an intimidating amount of detail and proportion to tackle..whew!

V22 osprey parked at the front of the ship...never seen one for real until today.

sailors waiting for the MUNI train...

Other

My dear father in law doing the crossword puzzle, plus more impressions from a train...this time going to the Neuburger Schlossfest, which is basically a renaissance fair except in a real castle!  A beautiful castle, and a lot of fun.  It seemed a good 75% were in costume, and the costumes seemed pretty consistent to the time period, as was the food to some extent (so i understood).  I had no time to sit down and sketch, but i took a ton of photos of costumes and such...will do studies from them some time.  A pity we missed the tournament of knights...

A kind of imposing looking fellow I saw above a video surveillance store.  Probably some bishop or something:

Between Munich and Augsburg

As my sister and her family and other friends live in Munich, we do much shuttling between the two cities.  My impressions looking out the train window...an interesting exercise:

Another view from the train (the three young people in front were so annoying); looking up towards the Theatinerkirche in Munich as we took cover from a sudden downpour at an outdoor cafe; some chocolate cake, and my niece's impression of her aunt and uncle (my wife and I);

Princess Kate!

And the contribution from the nephew (who has soccer on the brain): Allianz Arena, where FC Bayern Munich and TSV Munich 1860 play:

Cafe Puck in Munich, where we always seem to end up, and where I always wonder where my friend Julia (who created the logo) has gotten to..

Augsburg

In the living room, with the knitting obsessed wife:

My dear mother in law..I'm always a little hesitant to draw people i love and care for, for fear of offending with a bad likeness.  Except for my friends..they are not safe from me!  This wasn't too bad though i think:

A lovely coffee shop in Augsburg.  It seems to have been remodeled from an old theater perhaps:

Ah...the Damenhof was an oasis of cool in the blistering heat!  I think I might have accidentally left a stray pen mark on their impeccable white linens, though...oops!  It's water soluble ink though!

Amsterdam pt 3

Our last day in Amsterdam was spent just roaming the streets, mostly in the Jordaan.  Sigh!  Really nothing better!  It was, however,  a little odd to see so many trash bags left strewn about the otherwise clean streets there that day.  We assumed they were waiting for a particular trash pick up time?

Damn good apple cake! Mmmmm....

Amsterdam pt 2

Between fighting jet lag and dealing with extremely variable weather in Amsterdam, we did a lot of dodging into cafes.  Here's one in the Spui area:

...and the view from one we visited shortly before hitting the Rembrandthuis (also extremely cool!).  Pictured is the Rembrandthuis itself.

Haarlem

Before our trip, we'd been watching a DVD lecture on Dutch art and were inspired to visit the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem, which is about 30 minutes west of Amsterdam.  Really glad we did.  Haarlem was just charming, and Hals' work is just jaw dropping. Highly, highly recommended!

From our vantage points from a couple different cafes on the same square (Grote Markt):

An amusing anecdote: we were walking outside another church near this main square when we heard muffled but clearly tortured screams..Mind you, this was Sunday just after mass...turns out it was this video installation in a nearby museum.  Extremely cool!  Nothing like a little Sunday afternoon black metal!

We decided to make our way back to the train station to head back to A'dam when lo and behold, we spotted an honest to goodness turning windmill in the distance!  Had to take a look.  And of course, once there i had to do a quick sketch:

Really pretty inaccurate and bad, but i was falling asleep and not making good decisions.  That's my excuse anyways.

Amsterdam pt 1

Just returned from 3 weeks in Europe - about a week in and around Amsterdam and the remaining time around Munich with family.  Unlike previous trips, I managed to get in a good deal of sketching this time somehow.  My first sketch of my pristine new sketchbook:

It was more ambitious than I had planned, considering jetlag and all.  Really doesn't look a whole lot like the Westerkerk what with all the stray marks (wasn't at my best).  Plus a van pulled up in the middle of my scene, messing up the lighting i'd been trying to get. But overall the image turned out better than i expected.  

From our second day at De Doffer:

Really rich food!

for the hell of it

based off a workshop sketch some time back...not the heaviest paper unfortunately..

for the nephew

meh, not the greatest thing in the world...looking at it again, couple of places i ought to fix.  later!

Tübingen

thinking of my cousin...

my friends

eric and brian.  great chaps both!