Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Drawing in Public: Europe

      So I'm back from Europe. I was busy soaking up the sights, people and parties, BUT, I did manage to squeeze in some drawing time. Mostly I drew at airports and train stations and along at a few parks. The subject: people
      Drawing people is a bit tricky, bc once they find out you are drawing them, they stiffen up, or try to get in a better "artificial pose". Or they.. (my favorite) they grab their shit and leave. There's an art to pretending you are not drawing some one. It on par with training to become a ninja...

Here are a few drawings from my sketch book. Nothing grand, just figure drawings from europe. As you might observe, people on the the other side of the globe sit and wait just like we do in America.. fascinating...

At the Airport, Flights are DELAYED... I used a blue animation drafting pencil.. WHY? because it just happened to be the one my hand grabbed from my pocket. I don't think when sketching.. I just sketch.
On a Subway tram, I knew that SHE knew I was drawing her.. 


I wonder what people did at the Airport before the Iphone was invented...

So here is an example when I ADD a little ME to the drawing. The guy with his dog moved around way too much while he was reading his book, and you would think an old lady would hold still for more than 2 seconds! So I said FML and gave up drawing people for a minute. I let my mind wander  and I ended up drawing some weird Hippie Space Age stuff on the top of the page. (FYI the 'special' brownies in Amsterdam are called 'SPACE AGE BROWNIES' lol)  And for the lady, I drew her looking through a door with some fire on the other side.. Reflective of my feelings? Perhaps..  ..Sue me.

I like draw 'till the whole page is filled. They tend to come out like this, with no up or down orientation. Very annoying to who ever looks through my sketch books. I like to fill the whole page bc I am forced to vary the size of my figures

When I see an interesting face I try to capture it fast instead of wasting time on the body or clothes.  


It's ok to be messy when you sketch. As long as you capture the pose and the person, that is what counts

I like this small section because I have a very detailed face next to a very simplified drawing. both show a type of personality and are clearly different people. Like I mentioned earlier, it doesn't matter HOW you draw you figures, as long as you get the specifics of WHAT MAKES THEM UNIQUE


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb80qq4JUpE   ...LOL sorry but I had to..

Pencil over Blue Drafting Pencil.. not as fancy as it sounds...

On thing I like doing is drawing the environments I am in and then Filling them with people. People you can find ANYWHERE. but places.. there can be only place for every place. You can not have two places of the same place.. (if that even makes sense..) This is another airport.

Another collage of drawings. The background is the street map of berlin. The page looked dull with a white background so I spiced it up a bit. There was nothing interesting on the train I was on, so I took the map out of my pocket and made some magic.

This would be the city of Ghent.  I didn't get a chance to draw, my brother wanted to keep moving. But this drawing captured the edge of a canal. I think drawing places is worth your time bc it makes you work on perspective and proportions.  

people dancing..

This one.. When we missed our train. (that's why I wrote, "I hate fuk'n trains.." in the bottom right corner) So at 3 A.M. I drew this train station. No matter how complicated your view is before your eyes, always try to capture as much as you can on the page. Draw every pipe, every line, every bench, no matter how far or irrelevant it is. I didn't get to finish bc our train came. So after one painstaking hour this is all I could sketch down. There were tons of beams and wires in this station but I tried any way. Don't always go for the easy landscapes and the easy environments, CHALLENGE YOURSELF!!!

I sat in a park and drew a Museum...

More people posing and climbing a statue. The lady in the bottom right is on a bicycle taking a picture..,just in case you were wondering.

At another park in Europe... or outside my apartment in California.. hmm. now I got you wondering... goes to show that people no matter how different we perceive ourselves to be from one another, we are more a like than we would like to admit.  

Looking outside my Hostel window out onto an Amsterdam street. Yes that a canal in there too, hence the boat. 

A lot of live music over there in Germany, and what did they play? BOB MARLEY :) 

He gave an hour long show for some coins, turned out he plays at the local bar and just decides to play in the plaza once in a while.


So sorry for not being around to post something in so long, but I'm back now, so expect some awesomeness on this blog soon. Remember to draw draw draw. You don't need to put aside 3 hours to draw. All you need is 30 seconds. Just do it.

-Danny

10 comments:

  1. seriously, i just want to know who copy pasted the link to see what it was... haha

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  2. Hi Danny,
    your drawings are awesome, and Eva loves them, too. Was the street musician in Cologne?

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  3. Hi,
    no that was actually amsterdam. Every night I was there there were people playing, I got wise and took my sketch book finally to one.

    -D

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  4. love the pictures, they are awesome
    how long do you spend on these drawings there great


    gotta say i really enjoyed the link for about 20 seconds lol

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  5. haha the LINK. it's too much..

    but the people i did fast, 30 seconds more or less. sometimes 2 minutes on a few. but really short. The buildings and places, I took my time and just soaked it in. maybe 40 minutes + or something like that. I like to take it slow when I work on places. You see things you wouldn't see otherwise see. You see the people move in it and you just appreciate it more.

    but there are a few "place" drawings I had to do in around 15 minutes.
    thanks for the comments!

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  6. no i lied. some people drawings took five minutes. like the one of the lady on the tram. drawing #2

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  7. the link is brill i even ship 2 mins a head hoping there would be something else lol.

    silly question but lets say say i wanted to do some life drawing like your self, what would be the best method in trying to capture the shape of a particular person whilst that person is moving in a enviroment.
    I gotta say looked at your work its fantastic, inspiring given me a lot to think upon :)

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  8. Oh one more thing do you know any tips on rigging for maya??
    Cause i tried to rig a character, with very little success so far lol. :)

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  9. Tips on rigging, NONE. I'm a horrible rigger :P
    And on how to capture movement, The most simple lines will have to do. You need to just capture the line of action. all the deatails have to come from memory. You wont have time to look at the hand pose or see how the Calf is shaped. that has to come from your BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE of anatomy and practice.

    try a lot of BLIND CONTOUR drawing, it'll help you out a lot.

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  10. oh cheers thanks for the advice :)
    def take this advice and try to improve from this thanks you very much :)

    your no good at rigging!???!! lol blasted thing gives me headache lol

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