Originally my interest in art was well, misplaced. Growing up I was extremely interested in race cars and from that stemmed in interest in automobiles. That interest grew and finally set me on the course to becoming an mechanical engineer. After two years however at the University of Minnesota TC I had grown complacent with engineering and began looking to alternatives that would still place me in the transportation field. Industrial Design seemed a logical choice and the more I learned about it the more interested I became. I transferred to UW Stout for the Fall 09 semester and have been here since. The transition to art was easy since my older sisters have careers as an architect and graphic designer.

The piece of work I'm easily the most proud of is my Swamp Monster costume from 3D Design. It was made for Fashion without fabric and took second place over all.  I don't feel like I have too many things that have been standouts but the redneck/junkyard heli-pack that I made for sculpture was fun and fans on it actually worked. As far as courses go Drawing 2 has been my favorite because I found the stylistic approaches creative and useful. Another reason why Drawing 2 really appealed to me was because I've never been a huge fan of just duplicating a photo or still life and it let me put my own spin on my work.   I'm in Life Drawing because honestly if there's one thing in drawing that's always stumped me it's been people and hopefully I can get a handle on it. Also I took Drawing 1 at the U of M and got to draw from live models before, although I really never got the knack of it I really enjoyed it. Transferring and changing majors has set me back some years but it's been worth the change. If everything stays on track I should graduate within the next couple of years.
















9/13 - 9/19

Continuous Line Drawing
"Ned"

 This was our first complete week and my jump back in to drawing. On Tuesday we focused on our shells since we weren't able to get a model. We did some blind contour drawings and finished up with a continuous line drawing (Posted Left). After critique in small groups, I found that perhaps I needed to more carefully observe "Ned" (my shell) and try to vary line weight as well as speed. I had drawn very bold simple outlines that looked a bit too much like cave men paintings for my taste. After talking with Amy for a while I found that my drawing angle would have to be adjusted for certain tines on the shell. And that in fact drawing as I saw it wouldn't necessarily translate to an accurate drawing due to foreshortening and perspective. To account for this the artist must take a few liberties with the work. If I adjust the angle for certain tines on the shell I can make them appear as if they are curving away from the center of the viewing plane to help alleviate the problems with them directly facing the viewer.

10 Minute Pose
Live Model

Thursday we were able to draw from a live model which would be my first time doing it Stout, I had some previous experience with models in my drawing 1 at U of M . Needless to say I had become more than a bit rusty with my prolonged absence. At first the drawings were to bulky and disproportionate but after I started to loosen up and stand back then began to look a bit better. Variation in line weight and pressure ( light to dark) were two things that I need to use more. The sketches in which I used them stood out much more and just had more visual interest.














9/20 - 9/27

This week we received our manikins, which at first I was giddy at the thought of using some clay. However, my dreams were quickly dashed whence I realized the tediousness of some of the muscles. In spite of my newfound contempt for the manikin, I decided to name mine Olaf. It seemed a fitting title for type of company he provided me with over the past week. Here is a before and after shot Olaf, I must admit he held his pose for the camera quite well. The clay itself can become extremely frustrating, as it is often easy to finally cut down pieces to the desired dimensions but then tear them when trying to actually mount them. Also the clay is extremely temperature dependent, when cool (after carrying back and forth from applied arts) the clay is harder which makes it a bit more desirable to cut but harder to mold. Conversely the when warmed up the clay becomes sticky and hard to cut but significantly easier to mold. There seems to be no easy solution to this problem because prolonged handling indoors quickly heats up the clay. Despite claims that the book would be unclear I found the biggest problem to be the pictures not being taken from a standard distance and the variation in the model used particularly around the spine area.  Hopefully the muscles in the upcoming groups will be less sophisticated, the twists and turns in the neck muscles make for frequent breaking and the small size makes simply attaching them to the manikin a chore in itself. But having the right tools can make a world of difference too as I found out the hard way. I thought an Exacto knife would be well suited to the task but the cut is so thin it is often hard to separate the pieces. I tried a paper clip and noticed that the wider diameter allowed the clay to be more easily separated.