Sketchbook 7

And NARNIA AUTOGRAPHS.

Yeah.

I geeked out a little in this video.

This video is a little longer, a little hyper-er, and a little bigger than the others.

Yes, that means that I figured out how to get my video to download to the computer full size. I'm still having issues, though-- the film whirred while I was filming, and the film is right next to the mic on my video cam... for some reason it didn't upload widescreen onto youtube... argh. :P

See more sketchbook tours on my youtube channel.

So... which drawing was your favorite? Do you like seeing the way I've progressed with my art? It sounds cheesy, the way I just phrased that...

Glorious Old Supplies

First off, I wanted to let you all know that I had several great posts planned for over the weekend/ early this week. More sketchbook tours, more bookart, more new jewelry designs...

But I am being haunted by the Mysterious Blue Screen of Death.



A couple of weeks ago, we were unpacking some more moving boxes and I found a treasure trove of interesting supplies. I snapped some pictures and am uploading them (unedited) via the back computer. I have thus won one small victory over the Terrible Blue Screen of Death.

This is what we found:

Mom actually got it at a garage sale a few years ago.

It's engineering drafting tools. You know, from those dark ages before computers. Or at least before computers that could do design work.

This is the same sort of stuff that my parents used in high school and college.

Weird. :)

Apparently engineers had to be artists. Just look at this glorious collection of pencils! Sharpened to an inch tall... these are well loved pencils with lots of history.

And just look at that pencil tin! I wish that artist pencils were still sold in tins rather than cardboard and plastic.

There is also a really bizzare pencil in the mix. Mom calls it an old style of mechanical pencil. It is a wooden pencil with an interesting, albeit broken, mechanism in the hollow part.

This is when I got really excited. Old watercolors... sandpaper stacks for sharpening pencils... an interesting bottle of ink (with the labeling all auf Deutsch, in German), a horsehair brush, and a strange pillow of white sandy stuff.

The sandpaper is going to be super useful, and I was excited to find the horsehair brush. It is good for brushing eraser bits off of drawings without smearing pencil lines.

Mom says that the interesting pillow thing with white sandy stuff is used in a similar way: you rub it onto your drafting work to keep the graphite on and other things off. I don't get it, though. Why would you want to get white sandy stuff all over your artwork drafting work?

Rulers and a huge assortment of thingamabobs. I know what those thingamabobs are called. Honestly, I do! Mom and Dad have many old ones that we kids love to play with.

The word is on the tip of my tounge, but is playing hide and seek with my brain.

I do know what they are called.

Here are a few of the more interesting thingamabobs. The only one I recognize is the well-loved French Curve. The top thingamabob is all swirly and pretty. Me likey.

The middle thingamabob is a lettering guide. It had instructions taped onto it: they are very confusing. o.O It makes me glad that I have Photoshop (well, I would have a working Photoshop if I weren't haunted by the Blue Screen of Death)-- if I want to add lettering to anything, I can just type it in and move the text wherever I want.

However, I'm going to learn how to use the confusing-looking-lettering-guide. It might prove to be useful for calligraphy! (The real calligraphy. The kind that doesn't use a computer.)

(Ha. Take THAT, Mr. Evil Blue Screen of Death. I have thwarted your plans. I have posted on my blog. A quick and rambling and mildly uninteresting post, but a post nonetheless.)

When I was 10... (Sketchbooks)

When I was 10 and 11...

• I was finally double-digits
• I did ballet but never got my pointe shoes like the rest of the class because my feet are weird
• I started homeschooling
• I read The Lord of the Rings for the first time-- but didn't understand most of it
• I first began "building" my imaginary play-world of Nevdroonia. It all began with my little brother while we were reading Narnia on the hammock swings...
• and I drew.

And some of those drawings have been saved in my sketchbooks.

And, as you know, I am "giving tours of my sketchbooks."
Because you, dear blog readers, asked for more artwork-- and I didn't have anything new for you! So you get to see all my old stuff. :)

Welcome to the tour of Sketchbooks Number 3 and 4!

You get two this week because they are both very short. :)

See the others on my YouTube channel or here on my blog.


Book the Third

and The Fourth

Jean Pocket Purse

I made these quite awhile ago for some friends. I took an old pair of jeans, cut out the pockets, ironed on some iron-ons, and hand-sewed a string onto it. Voila!

More Old Drawings

These are fom the past year or two or so.

Marker!

From 2008, picture of an Elf from my imagination

Random thing for school 2008

Random thing for school 2008

Okay, this takes some explaining... if you think it looks weird you are right. I did this art thing over at the senior high when I was 13 and they said that you had to made the number 11 say something about you. Very.... interesting. So I drew 13 fairies, because I was 13 and have always loved fairies. Each of them are doing things I enjoy: reading, writing, dryawing, acting, being silly, dancing, etc. I had that sword thing from King Arthur because I love myths and legends, the castle because I love fantasy, the AWESOME quote by G.K. Chesterton who has since become one of my favorite authors. I shoved in tons of other references, too. :P I wound up getting third place, which was really weird, because I was like 7th grade and all the other people there were juniors and seniors. I got a portfolio out of it, which was awesome.

2009 A fun little sign for the dressing room door at the theater during Pirates of Penzance

Pastel. 2007?

Old WIP

WIP= Work In Progress. I forget how long ago this drawing was. It was certianly over a year ago.

Art Wall

Until we had to clean our house to sell it, I tacked my pictures onto my wall. Partly a show-off display. :P Partly a way to make me continually fix them. You see, if I had to fall asleep looking at them, I would soon get tired of the mistakes, and notice new ones. I kept a pencil by my nightstand and fixed up those little mistakes. Pictures went up and came down for years-- every so often I took a photograph. Here are some pictures of the wall, in no particular order.

So! These are some of my old drawings! Click to enlarge picture.

Random Old Drawings

I've been uncovering more and more old pictures from an undated CD. I really should get more organized and start dating my CDs. Some of the pictures are really, really old. Some of them are from barely 2 years ago. I really don't remember! But here they are!

A Mothers' Day gift (or was it for Mom's birthday?) a few years ago

A tiny painting

A drawing of our parish for some family friends who moved away

A drawing of my sister playing in the snow, a birthday gift for my dad. I SO messed up the proportions

Oh, wow. This is really old. Like, third or fourth grade old. It was a poster we did for school-- only every other school in our district did it, too. I forget what the contest was. :P There was this big reception thing, in the school gym, and there was a beaver and a guy who talked and talked and all Iheard was blah blah blah. Funny, the things I remember? :)

A painting of my sisters' godparent's girl that I never did do-- I tottaly messed it up and gessoed it over.

Wow. She was LITTLE.

A coloring contest. I was, 11? 12? And I got third place in the 11-18 year old bracket. Actually, its still up on the website! HERE.

A painting for a family friend's cousin in Germany who visited us when she was down here in Hillbilly Land. :) Its a drawing of a picture I took when we all went out to Meramac Springs Park. You can see part of a notebook I'd decorated.

That contest picture, a drawing of St. George, and a colored-in photocopy of the drawing of St. George.

(Old) Abstract Paintings

There are going to be plenty of old pictures coming up on my blog. I actually have no idea how long ago I made these... and these files are all undated. They are most likely from two to three years ago. All I remember about these was giving them to a friend.

Well, I normally dislike abstract art. I mean, what is it? Just random blobs of color. Sometimes such random blobs can look nice to pull the colors of a room together... eh. But you know, abstract art is really, really easy to make. So easy that I finished both of these in half an hour. :P

And don't forget the fun angle shot. :)

Old Artwork, Again

Found more art pictures in an old file! :)

I made the above picture when I was around 12. It was for a church/school auction. The Last Supper drawing below was also for the auction. (Click READ MORE below)
I remember being so amazed at the price they sold for-- 50 and 80 dollars!!! Obviously, it was for a fundraiser auction, but that is still crazy and cool. :)

These were some of my first attempts in a new mess of mediums-- pen and colored pencil. It remains my favorite.

Detail of the Guardian Angel drawing

The Last Supper.

In progress

 Some drawings I made three years ago for the director of the play The Prince and the Pauper, which my brothers and I were in. Oh, I should find a picture of the set. I helped paint it, Dad did most of the building!

A portion of the set. 

I made this acrylic painting when I was 12. It was my first major painting, and so far the only face I have ever done.

A random set of drawings, when I was 13 or so. I have always been into elvish/fairy stuff!

A pen and ink drawing for the cover of the booklet thing for my aunt's wedding, when I was "nearly 14"

Georgie Henle as Lucy Pevensie. I made two of these; I actually sent one to Georgie Henle when I asked for an autograph. :)

My second pen-and-colored-pencil drawing, obviously I made this before Guardian Angel and Last Supper.

Old cards. These were my very first attempts at Celtic knots and Celtic calligraphy, a few years ago.