I spent some time earlier in the week refining the drawing algorithm even further, focusing on color palette selection and line weight distribution. I think I’m getting closer to something the produces pretty consistent results.

My next step — or perhaps experiment — will be to create some color palettes based on actual color fields that I produce using real paint or some other image source. I want finer control and intention over the possible color palettes, and while toxiclib’s color utilities are pretty amazing, I’m finding that the ColorRange constraints produce less-than-desirable results most of the time (too much or too little saturation and brightness at undesirable moments).

Here’s a demo of the Processing app so you can see the renders in realtime:

And here is some more hi-res output from the app:

+ View hi-res.

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Thing learned tonight: the quality of your materials matters. Period.

This is from last night’s life drawing session at The Stables. It was a 1.5 hour pose. I feel like I did a pretty good job of hitting the likeness, but I was really pissed at the quality of my charcoal and paper. Looks like it’s time to ditch the crap I’ve been using.

Drawn tonight at the semi-weekly life drawing session at The Stables. This drawing took about an hour and a half, which totally flew by. I’ve been trying to focus on measuring during the last couple sessions, and this is the first time a decent drawing and likeness came out of it. I’ve seriously been away from drawing habitually for too long.

Just gotta get back into a schedule for creating.

This one’s accumulating over the course of many nights. An hour here, a half hour there. I think this page’s pencil work is done. Not sure if I’m going to continue the theme on the facing page. But I wanted to make sure to document the progress before I did anything truly destructive to it.

I’m bound to mess this up.

The process of doing these is pretty fun because I have no idea what my intentions are from start to finish.

+ View the drawing on Flickr.

Today The Stables had a 4-hour workshop focusing on The Portrait. Pretty humbling experience for me. It had been a [seemingly] very long time since I had drawn from life. And Alec and Joe are really good artists (the guys that run the Stables and the workshop).

So I was definitely fumbling and mis-measuring a bunch during the drawing of Jake from above. But with lots of erasing and re-measuring and remembering how to see, I managed to pull out a decent likeness.

Allison’s portrait was more successful only in the sense that I had the measurements down much quicker. Probably because I was warmed up by this point. But I failed to capture the beautiful volume that describes the form of her head.

Beginning to think that it really is better to find a middle value before attempting to lay down other values — that way you can find that volume much easier. But today’s workshop was more about measurement techniques and accurately seeing.

Couldn’t leave it at just one today. References anna☆morosini‘s photo “cold cold.“

I’ve had a lot rolling around in my head lately — specifically around how to go about being a “real” artist. Being a “real” artist is merely a concept. It doesn’t actually mean anything. It’s not something measurable or tangible or even universally definable.

But I have this Platonic ideal of what an artist is. And I am not this thing.

For a long time now, I have been privately fighting an uphill battle to find a looser technique in my [occasional] work. To find less precision in my linework. To find more expressiveness in my gestures. To convey something demonstrably human-made, I guess. And today, I decided to stop fighting the nature of what I am decidedly good at: tightness.

So much of what I do is so measured, calculated, controlled. And perhaps a bit cold because of it. This goes well beyond pencil sketches and into every facet of my living day.

So I’ve decided to embrace these traits in what I do now. I’m going to push this aspect of me that I’ll never be able to shake out of my being.

But I still want to find a sense of looseness. I want to learn to give up control. I want to learn not to hold that which I create as precious. And so I started a new sketchbook today. I’m calling it my Obscure, Destroy Sketchbook, and I’ve got some simple goals and parameters:

• Each sketch must consume the entire 2-page spread.
• Each sketch must in some way obscure or destroy the under-work in some way.
• Each sketch must use at least one color.

I want to examine controlled destruction. I want to build up and tear down and watch the interplay between the two acts. I want to have no idea of the outcome. I want to have intention, but I want to let the “now” lead me where it may.

Maybe along the way I’ll manage to create a compelling image. Here’s hoping.