Live from the L.A. Zoo

Today seemed like a good day to visit the zoo, so that's what I did. Armed with my drawing tools I headed 15mins east of Pasadena.

I was partly here to scout The Tom Mankiewicz Conservation Carousel and several new attractions for my theme parks design class, but little did I know that today was the grand opening for this brand new carousel!

This must be mating season for the Masai long neck ungulates! So many visitors equipped with their camera phones waited patiently for Artimus to make his move on Neema. The wooing took ages! What a gentleman! :D I was almost there for 40 mins, nothing happened except for a couple of misfires! The only thing I got are several pages of sketches using col-erase Prisma pencils. I just used it once for an assignment recently and I thought why not use it today. The pencils feel like magic - an easy application! Ha ha... I was happy with the turn out of some of the sketching. After which, I popped into Swains to get some more!

See the sketches here http://imaginativeworkshop.blogspot.com/2011/10/live-from-la-zoo.html

The Norton Simon

Monday's painting class became a field trip to Pasadena's Norton Simon Museum (it's only five mins from where I live! :D) It is probably the most informative museum visit I have ever had. And the best part was that Karl got us in for free.

We started outside with Rodin's most famous piece Les Bourgeois de Calais. I never knew how animated this piece of artwork is until now. Moving on into the museum, we covered 14th - 17th century art, 18th - 19th century, and then finally to modern art. It was interested how some of the pieces in the modern art section were created by Karl's friends.

Take home: Every famous artist from Degas to Picasso, from Mondrian to Sargent, all went through lots of pain, either that or they were kicked out from convention to break out from what everyone else was doing. They took the risk. But before all of that happened, ALL of them understood the classical and traditional way of doing things... yes, even Mondrian. If you don't understand what's traditional, what are you going to break away from? Here's an example: We're all familiar with Picasso's style. But if we go way back, we'll see that he came from a traditional art background. Here is an image of his work when he was a student at 15 years old. Enough said.

Gouache Rocks

This past weekend, I attended a Mike Hernandez 3-day seminar on Gouache. The closest I came to dealing with gouache was doing colour swatches for Colour Theory oh so long ago.

The two plein air locations over the weekend were Vasquez Rocks and Laguna Beach. So besides learning a new medium, I get to see two pretty (and far away) sites within the LA county! Vasquez Rocks is a place many film productions use as a location for their shoot. But the minute I saw the rock formation for the first time, I thought to myself... Cars. Not only did I get to see breath-taking sites, I got to meet a wonderfully talented bunch of classmates too. :D The finishing texture of gouache reminds me of the fine sandy rough edges that Mary Blair's produces in her art pieces. I like!!

Gouache is here to stay. :D

To view the other pieces, click here.

Blairing out colourfully

Photo taken at the Disney Galley at the Disneyland, Anaheim to celebrate the art of Mary Blair and 45 years of the It's a Small World attraction.

Today, Google honours Mary Blair's 100th birthday. No wonder the Oscar hosted a tribute for her last night at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. Yeah, I had class so I didn't go.

From Alice in Wonderland to Cinderella, to the It's a Small World Ride, Mary Blair has been the one behind the concept art for the Walt Disney Company. Her style so uniquely engaging and colourful, has definitely impacted the work I have done! *tear*

During character class last night, our lecturer confessed that he was almost to a point of shedding tears when he first stepped into his art class. (He studied something completely different and only got into art in his 2o's.) He realised that there were so many good artist out there, and that he was so way behind. But he pushed on. He loves what he does, and continues to do wonderful pieces, especially with animals! You can check out his work here. Later, during class, I mentioned that I am kinda going through the same phase right now. Of course I left out the fact that I'm as old as him which means I'm only, well, say... 14 years behind?? That's a lot of catching up! So... back to work. :P

See what happens at 12 noon at the It's a Small World Ride's Front at Hong Kong Disneyland:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4Ikg8RgM2w

A Day in the Life...

I began assisting Karl for the recording of his in-class lectures. These will be hosted online for anyone is interested. The seminar I attended is called Story Beats: Drawing Character moments that show story sequence. And my... what a valuable class! :D

I was able to pop in and out of Woodbury between the seminar and night class to say Hi to former classmates and Deans during the Graphic Design 80th anniversary celebrations yesterday. Good to see Mr Bill Keeney, my former dean, who lives in the south of France now with his wife. What a life!

The official Imagineering Day session on Thursday (14 Oct) was packed! The only thing I got out of it was how big the company is. Too big! Ha ha...

Homework is pouring in... putting on my busker's hat and doing the juggling thing again!

Check out that Vinyl

Okie, so I'm not into dolls... I think. But because I was passing by the Disney Store yesterday in the city of Glendale, I popped in to check it out. The Disney Stores around aren't what it used to be. I remember more noise, more toys over flowing from the shelves, more sale items... everything has toned down a couple of notches.

But there was this one collection that caught my eyes! Basically, the toddler versions of the Disney Princesses designed by Glen Keane and Mark Henn - two veterans that have been animating Disney Animation for decades - especially the princesses.

My favourite one seems to be Rapunzel. Details right down to the freckles on her cheeks!

Baby steps

After class last Saturday noon, I popped by my alma mater for a visit. The school of Graphic Design is celebrating 80 years this coming Saturday, and have invited 80 Alumni to come give one piece of advice to current students. The session itself should take 80 minutes. I was asked months back even before I knew I was heading out here to prepare something. Since I have classes on that day in the morning and in the evening, I have prepared a one minute video for my segment.

On top of that, alumni were asked to submit their recent works for an exhibition. Four pieces of my current work has been selected. Can you spot it in the picture above? My first works exhibited in L.A.! :D

All my classes have begun and the homework along with it. A total of 30 hours I will clock excluding a couple of seminars here and there. It's going to be creatively intense!! Ah... now I remember what I missed in the last 15 years or so. :D

I finally bought a scanner. I had no choice. The classes need work to be blogged. It would have been absurd to pay a dollar for each scan as a service knowing I'd be scanning quite a load of stuff. Good thing is Target was offering an all-in-one (with wifi) for a low UDS39.99. How crazy is that? And also in perfect (Kairos) timing!! Why are quite a number of things here so economically priced?

So look out for my works online... soon.

Yo-ho Yo-ho...

This evening, I had my first character design class with David Colman. And into the second hour, out of nowhere pops John the Pirate. I painted him two weeks ago at the American Animation Institute. If there's a pirate related anything that calls for a model, John Tucker is your Buccaneer! If you have seen the book, Force: Character Design from Life Drawing, there he is on the cover! :D

A very professional model... in fact, because he knew we were going to do short poses, he brought with him his entire regalia in his treasure chest which includes a barrel of rum, pirate swords and replica guns, a spyglass, and oooh, did I mention a bag filled with pirate themes soundtracks??

And so that's why the Pirates of the Caribbean Ride at Disneyland has been down for weeks! Arrrrggggh...

FIgure Drawing 101

It's getting colder in the nights. Winter's fast approaching.

But during the day, it's very Mediterranean-like. Warm hot sun, virtually no perspiration. Or what seems like zero humidity. I appreciated intense sun today as I was feeling a little feverish.

Last Saturday, classes with master draughtsman, Glen Vilppu, started. Taking these classes from him and Karl really puts me back right in the very beginning. I am constantly re-learning and correcting my old drawing habits. Like Karl Gnass mentioned once in class, "You must encounter resistance in order to grow."

Did I mention how everyone here is so so so good at what they do?

That's Glen showing me his little secret weapon for his guerilla washes, made with love using a small empty Altoids container, some putty, gesso and a clip! :D