9/16/05
....annnnnd we're back!
Someone asked to see some of my old sketches the other day, so I had the occasion to go through a few sketchbooks. Here's what jumped out at me...
Layout from an unfinished children's book. 1996, I think?
I gave up when I realized that the subject matter, characters and story were all pretty unappealing... some crazy thing about an antediluvian society and a chronologically-displaced inventor who lived there.
Any text would have gone in the lower right-hand corner.
Drawing of my wife, 2000.
Note the fish-eye effect, where her forehead is roughly the size of her torso. Anytime I draw freehand, that happens. It's like someone made a Mercator Projection out of her...
The little tears are from a fight we had later in the evening, and she rended this drawing into 18 perfect little squares. It was such a traumatic event that it ended up being written into the first lyric on the album. She's made good since then...
This was started somewhere over the midwest, 2000.
Between '96 and 2000, I didn't draw much at all. The above is the first drawing I'd done in a long time. I deliberately brought nothing but a sketchbook on a plane trip to make sure I would HAVE to draw, or go dopey with boredom.
I got really intense with this, simply because of the sheer effort involved in starting up an engine that hasn't been run in half a decade. The guy sitting next to me was clearly alarmed by the development of this thing - mostly the hacking motions I was drawing with... which may have been accompanied by alarming grunting noises, for all I know.
Paired jumpers, ca. 1995
For some reason, a lot of my sketchbooks from '95 feature variations on this pose. Just something about the weight and motion of it that I couldn't let go... or get right. Either that, or I was feeling very suicidal.
Atrocious anatomy. What's with that guy's left arm? It looks like it's attached to the back of his neck...
I do like the Conehead, though...
Sketchbook page, Europe trip. December, 1994.
A lot of my sketchbook pages look like this: a few drawings - some observed from real life and some from the idiot movie that plays constantly in my head; needful information; some random comments, etc. This one seemed so archetypical that I thought it worth posting.
This page features (counter-clockwise from top):
currency exchange calculations,
a from-memory doodle of the "Gentle Giant" giant,
a list of Gentle Giant albums, some of which I was actively looking for on this trip (note: in the days before the internet, you usually had to go to Europe or Japan to get certain albums on C.D.),
a disembodied cyborg eye,
notes on how to make an international call to the U.S.,
sketch of my then girlfriend, and
later commentary from my wife on said girlfriend.
Here's a detail of the sketch:
Anyway, the Europe trip was exhausting. Eurail and Hostels through six countries in 10 days. This is a quick sketch done when the girlfriend fell asleep leaning against me - in the middle of a mall, as indicated.
Note the date. As I recall, there really isn't anything like a 'holiday shopping rush' in Europe. The mall was uncrowded like a Wednesday in April...
Millennium Falcon, 1996.
From an officially designated regression page. Every once in a while, I have to prove to myself that I can still draw these things from memory. The kids love it.
I think I was heavily influenced by the Carmine Infantino version from the Marvel 'Star Wars' comics...
Beach house in Ocean City, NJ. Vacation sketch, 2001.
Anatomy has never been my strong suit, but I always had a decent feel for architectural rendering. Drawings like this make me look like I have more talent than I really do. I prefer to do them, just for that reason.
Vacation Sketch, Ocean City, NJ. 2001.
Same trip. The view from the balcony of our bed and breakfast.
This sketch got out of hand really fast. I've always had a tendency to get obsessive about detail and ignore the overall scene, leading to a lot of bad angles and distortion. I'm pretty sure that telephone pole was several meters to the right, in real life.
Doodle, 1996
My favorite one here. It's one thing to sit and labor over a drawing for hours and not get it right (like some of the more fully rendered sketches I've posted here), but to capture what you're aiming for in about 30 seconds is what I strive for. Less work!
I still like the sentiment.
- Dave
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Link: The "Piano Bar," from Moog. Just in case anyone is wondering what to get me for Christmas.