Latest Gesture Class efforts

1 We start with 30 second-1 minute warm up poses.

2 Simply looking for the flow and rhythm of the pose . . .

3 Always pushing the pose while maintaining clarity

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7 Too much emphasis on anatomy in these-

8 Starting to get some acting in here . . .

9 . . . and now some fun stuff!

10 All these were made from the same male model, using his pose as a springboard for character and story.  Two minute poses.

To see it done properly check out these drawings on Alex's blog.  Some even more fun stuff here

Exploring & drawing SFO

A selection of recent sketches made around the city.   

The neon facades of SF's 'red light' zone.

The view from the terrasse of the Cafe Zoetrope on Columbus.

Behind the Ferry Building waiting for the Sausalito shuttle.

Cat napping on the Hyde St Pier

The impressive & imposing East Bay Bridge, in its own way just as majestic as the Golden Gate Bridge.

The Palace Of Fine Arts in the Presidio

A mini-sketchcrawl around my neighbourhood Noe Valley yielded these corners of interest.

Funky delapidated little house up on Diamond Heights.

This is how I moved to California! Now on permament display in the Oakland Museum

Gesture Fun!

The most important thing in Gesture Class is to have FUN! If I get too wrapped up in anatomy and try to capture the 'real' pose the drawings tend to be boring.  However it is possible to go too far in the opposite direction.  Here's a selection of cartoony poses that came out of the last few sessions.

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Alex insists we study the pose for 15 seconds without drawing  and decide what it is exactly we want to draw.  We write down the attitude we have in mind and let that inform the drawing.

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Japan

We're working on a special event at Pixar to contribute to aid relief in Japan. I'll post my effort when that happens but in the meantime here's a drawing I made for the exhibition organised by the London animation community.  It's for sale over on the Animators vs Earthquake blog

 'JapanTown, San Francisco'

A3 Indian Ink & wash on paper

Based on the sketches I made at the SF Sketchcrawl in January.

Gesture Class-the struggle continues . . .

I'm starting to absorb Alex and Louis' methods into my approach. It's all about simplifying the anatomy, pushing the pose and imbuing story, attitude and character.  I struggled like hell at first to consider all these aspects with 30 sec- 1 min poses but with sustained practise it's coming-just like learning to drive!

1 One minute warm ups

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4 Thirty second warm ups

5  PUSH the pose!

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8  Working from the same model and using the pose as inspiration we look for character and story.

Wondercon!

Last weekend San Francisco hosted WonderCon 2011- a smaller, more intimate version of San Diego's ComicCon.  Costumed heroes came from far and wide to join the parade of comic book characters. I had a blast sketching all the different outfits and capture the heroes posing for photos.

Even San Francisco itself  began to look more like the architecture of a comic book Metropolis.

I met one of my personal comicbook heroes- Bill Sienkewicz-who actually looks like his artwork!

Most generous artist at the Con- Mr Alberto Ruiz - gave me his book and made a great dedicace inside.

My esteemed colleague Mr Jamie Baker was holding down a booth with Rafael Navarro.

Be sure to head over to Pixar animator Terry Song's blog to see his super sketches of the event.

Great video here on YouTube of all the costumed Heroes