Baby Pebbles

Since copying seems to be something I'm half decent at, I thought I'd try and copy a cartoon baby.

Using this as a guide:
(originally seen here), I give you this:



I'm embarassed to admit, it was a long journey. Here are the stepping stones I took.



At least the final product is pretty close to the original!

Toddler crafting - Santa and gingerbread

These were created at our local Ontario Early Years Centre.

Instructions for Santa and gingerbread man can be found at CraftDay.

If at first you don't succeed....

Try, try, try and try again ....



The following were done after I received this insightful comment. Apparently I haven't completely internalized my Preston Blair lessons!







I found that rotating the head more gave me a better chance to use "solid" object guides than the "head on" approach.




Clearly I've still more work to do on this. But for now, I'm putting this baby to bed!

I've been published!

Check out the beta of a techie resource for SQL tips and tricks for Oracle developers. Then see the artwork!

Making realistic snowflakes

Tired of making snowflakes that look like they're squares with holes in them? I've posted instructions for making realistic six-pointed snowflakes!

Quick and dirty

Spurred on by a little prodding from Matt I'm posting two quick scribbles.

The first one in honour of the TV show my daughter can not see often enough. (With humble apologies to Chuck Jones)


The second one inspired by this year's brilliant Pampers seasonal commercial positioned in the spot.


You'll notice that when I copy other people's cartoon creations, they look pretty cartoony. However, when I try and take a real-life image and make it cartoony it always ends up looking more sketchy than cartoon-like. (For example, compare the above with Matt's excellent baby post.) Must resist the tendency towards realism!

Toddler crafting - plate for Santa

This craft, created at our local Ontario Early Years Centre exclusively uses Christmas themed foam stickers. Instructions are documented at Craft Day.

Al Hirschfeld on YouTube

Al Hirschfeld creates a Paul Newman caricature.

Thanks to Drawn.ca for the tip-off.

Instructions for making pop-up cards

I finally got my act together to publish instructions for creating pop-up cards.
Vertical fold and horizontal fold directions can be found at CraftDay.

Animator vs Animation (I and II)

Animator vs. Animation

"A simple stick figure created in Flash gets sick and tired of being tortured,
so he fights back. Check out this John Woo-style fight scene that takes place
entirely within a Flash program (which gets trashed in brilliant fashion). "

Animator vs. Animation II

"The badass stick figure is back and this time it's personal. In this
episode, victim becomes victimizer as he breaks out of Flash and takes on mighty
opponents like Firefox, the AOL IM guy and the Photoshop* icon. "

Still more random drawings

from September

Successful


Analytical


Hair


Not sure


Wow

More random drawings

... from September:

Thoughtful


Sleepy


Guilty


Entertained

Line drawing

I hesitate to call this style a caricature. Mostly because it doesn't really take any artistic liberties with the subject matter. So I'll refer to it as a line drawing. I'm working on this one for a client of mine. (This is being displayed with his permission.)

Later I'll post some that I did a few years back so you can see how the style has changed over time.

Random drawings

Here are some random drawings from September. I'm not that comfortable drawing with ballpoint on paper -- and it shows!

Poem: Friendship Wish

Somewhere out there,
There's someone who needs a smile.

Somewhere out there,
There's someone who needs a touch of your hand.

There's someone who needs a kind word,
Some understanding,
Forgiveness,
A whisper of appreciation.

Somewhere out there,
There's someone who needs something to eat,
A place out of the cold,
A pair of warm socks.

Somewhere out there,
There's a soul who needs to be remembered,
Just remembered,
Even that will do.

As you live your life from this moment to next,
Please think about those whose paths you cross,
Even if they stand right in front of you,
Take one little step that can,
And will,
Make all the difference in the world.

copyright 1992, Susan Simmons

www.alansimmons.com

Note to self: Mentos + Soda = Fun!

I'm old enough to never have done this in school, but I hear it's big in science classes these days.

I first read about it in The Star's article "Pepsi and Mentos -- How a high-school teacher's science experiment became an Internet phenomenon and taught kids about nucleation sites along the way."

The first paragraph reads:

Before hitting the big time, the "Mentos effect" was a schoolteacher's gimmick to make 13-year-olds listen up in science class. Drop an unwrapped roll of Mentos into a freshly opened 2L bottle of soda and stand back. The pop becomes a geyser of foam guaranteed to soak the ceiling of anybody foolish enough to try it indoors.

And the obligatory Google search turned up a bazillion sites describing this experiment.

But my favourite one is this from EepyBird.com. Two-hundred liters of Diet Coke combined with over 500 Mentos mints. It's amazing and completely insane.

Lesson 9 [Hands] part two

The $100,000 Animation Drawing Course - Lesson 9
(also seen at ASIFA-Hollywood)

Notes:

• Here are the rest of the hands from Lesson Nine
• I've highlighted some of my favourite hands. Not necessarily favourite because I matched proportion -- just a feeling I had about the hand. Typically it was one that I didn't think too hard about -- the kind that just "happens."
• I consistently had issues getting the "fleshy" parts of the digits and palm to look fleshy. At least to look as fleshy as Blair's.
• Wahoo! I'm finally caught up on my lessons. It's a good thing that JohnK took the summer off from teaching!
  

Hand One:


Hand Two:


Hand Three:


Hand Four:



Hand Five:


Hand Six:


Hand Seven:


Hand Eight:




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The Whole Mom Rocks!

A big thank you to TheWholeMom.ca for picking up "Sods'n'Odds" as a regular feature! Now I've just got to get cracking on more strips. No pressure!

Lesson 9 [Hands] part one

The $100,000 Animation Drawing Course - Lesson 9 (also seen at ASIFA-Hollywood)
Notes:

• After a two month break, it took quite a while for my hand to become reacquainted with the pencil and paper
• I'm not focusing on proportion as much as the previous lessons (won't be doing digital comparisons), because I want to make sure I focus more on perspective and variation
• More pages and commentary to follow... I put these up just to prove I'm still working at it!

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