So Long, Pete Seeger

Yesterday, folk singer Pete Seeger died at age 94. I heard him perform several times at music festivals in the Hudson Valley of New York state, where he lived. 

That's him in the middle of the group of three faces at the bottom of this sketchbook page. Whenever Pete got up on stage, he always got the audiences caught up in the choruses.

Another way we got to know Pete Seeger was through our tattered copy of his songbook, a collection of classics like "Clementine" and "If I Had a Hammer" that we often sang together at home in the evenings. In 1991, When my son Dan was a four-year-old budding accordion player, he wrote Pete a fan letter, and Pete wrote back on a postcard drawn by Ed Sorel showing Pete with his banjo trying to outrun the Horsemen of Time.

At his concerts, Pete made every person feel that they had a good enough voice and that it was worth joining in. And he made everyone believe that the dream of a peaceful world is possible, not just by dreaming about it, but by singing about it it or painting a picture of it.

More about Pete Seeger at Wikipedia
More about my son Dan at his band website YanksBand.com or his music streaming company ConcertWindow

The Value of Copying

Photo by Dominique Faget/AFP/Getty

In the Daily Beast, Malcolm Jones makes the case for the value of copying the work of earlier masters as a way of improving one's artwork.

"More than fun, it was an education. If you assiduously try to copy something, you can’t help learn about what you’re replicating. I understood more about Vermeer by painting my own Vermeer—about his use of light and sense of color and proportion—than I had ever learned by simply staring at his paintings." 

"Then it hit me (yes, I’m a slow learner): this was how I’d learned to draw in the first place. When I was little kid, I didn’t learn much from all those teachers urging me to express myself—frankly, I don’t think I, or most people for that matter, have much to express, certainly not when they’re six."

There’s Nothing Wrong—and a Lot That’s Right—About Copying Other Artists

Thanks, Patrick O'Hearn

Music video with digital transformation of singer

BOGGIE - NOUVEAU PARFUM (official music video) from THE SOUP on Vimeo.
In this music video, Hungarian singer Boggie's face is given a digital makeover throughout the course of the song. Blemishes are removed, the neck is elongated, hair swapped around, and the colors are graded to make an increasingly glamorous—and increasingly artificial—appearance. (Link to video on Vimeo)

The result is a clever reminder that every photo and video we see may be far removed from the initial capture.

In fact, the video itself is not quite what it appears. Of course, the makeover doesn't happen in real time. The digital control interface surrounding the singer is invented. Really, it's done in Adobe AfterEffects. Also, the singer was shot with two or more initial live action plates with different practical makeup effects.

Thanks, Marney Morris!

Art Teacher Portrait Winners

We received several dozen entries for the "Sketch Your Art Teacher" contest, and it was really difficult to narrow them down to the winners. I'm very excited to present you the ones I chose as the best of the best.

First, here are the five finalists:

Sean Cheatham, drawn by David Patel at Art Center in Pasadena, CA.
David captured Sean's way of holding his painting brush and his off-hand brushes, plus the tattoo on his left arm, and I love the slight exaggeration of the shapes. The nervous pen line has a lot of energy.

Pratibha Singh, drawn by Annada N Menon  at the College of Fine Arts in Bangalore, India.

This is a very sympathetic portrait which makes every mark count. Very nice feeling to the eyes and the expression.

Andrew Peno of Peno School of Arts in Adelaide, South Australia by Nic Arrighi.

Fine job capturing a personality, with wonderful shapes, and a bold brush-and-ink line that really reflects the strength of the character.

Dwight Harmon by Thomas Webb, Art Center.

Wonderful expression, and it's great to see the tools. This shows how much character you can get by departing from naturalism. 

Barron Storey by Finn Beazlie (lead artist on the game Full Bore)

The quote says "Barron Storey wants art to come out of your body." That sounds like Barron. And the posture looks like him, too. 

And now, the Grand Prize Winner:

Kaspar Schäper by Daniel Napp, Münster UAS-Illustration.
This portrait is efficiently painted, and yet it conveys the poise and concentration of the subject. This could only have been done with a big brush, well loaded with paint, straight ahead with no lay-in. I love the way the wet shapes of the arm and the neck merge into the blue of the shirt, and I love the bits of white paper left untouched. Masterful job!

So thanks to everyone who entered. It was really tough to choose. And to the winners, please email me your mailing address, and I'll get the posters and the DVD on their way to you.

Non-Photographic Rendering

Pixar's technical development team recently unveiled a new set of tools to offer CG animation the potential of a more painterly look. The idea is to give art directors more stylistic options, so that they're not always stuck with the hard plastic look that tends to come by default in CG animation software.

The new process begins by having a stylist hand-paint a few keyframes. The tools then extend the style of those keyframes throughout the whole sequence, keeping the strokes and textures stable. One of the options is to extract outlines and give the output a hand-drawn look.


The initial demo that they showed gives the feeling that the painterly style is just stuck on the surface of smooth digital animation, and it's been criticized for that reason. But this is just an early test, and the full promise of the tools haven't been seen yet.

In order to make the style seem more organic, it might help to introduce some randomness into the timing and the arcs of the animation, or perhaps even to use a completely different technique for rigging and animation, perhaps with a waldo armature, like the DID (Digital Input Device) developed by Phil Tippett. 

I believe one thing we'll see in coming years are all sorts of unexpected combinations between handmade and digital techniques, such as the 3-D printing-enabled stop-motion of Laika's recent Paranorman.

From Cartoon Brew

Dinotopia on King of the Nerds

If you have TV with cable, check out the "King of the Nerds" show tonight at 10/ 9 central. It's a reality show about brainy kids beating each other out to be the top expert on fantasy pop culture. This will be the first episode of the new season.

A while ago, the producers wrote and asked me to send them some Dinotopia prints to put up in the game's headquarters, which is called Nerdvana. Dinotopia will be part of the décor, keeping company with Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Star Wars. Nerd Heaven!

King of the Nerds

Animated paintings

Rino Stefano Tagliafierro created this video by taking old master paintings, separating elements into layers, and applying gentle movements with a digital animation program. 

Together with the music and audio FX track, the animations take on a strange, dreamy, and at times disturbing feeling. (Link to YouTube video)

It's amazing how compelling any movement is—it kind of overrides everything else about the picture, and gives a sense of the painting as a possible moment of a larger continuity. In places, the visuals are sensual and gruesome, but so are the old master paintings they're based on.

Thanks, Mel and Eric

Storytelling tips

Illustration by Tom Lovell, 1941

If you're interested in telling stories, you'll love these lists of tips:

The first list comes from storyteller Joel Ben Izzy, a contributor to the podcast Snap Judgment. Like Moth Radio, This American Life, and StoryCorps, Snap Judgment is one of the best sources for stories told out loud.

1) Have a clear conflict
In its most basic form, a story is about someone who wants something, and either gets it or does not. That character's desire brings out the conflict that moves a story forward. The appearance of the conflict is the beginning, the resolution is its ending.
2) Keep it simple
You can always elaborate by adding details and nuance to a simple story. It is much harder - and less satisfying - to simplify a complicated story. To make a long story short is to ruin it. Find the simplest version of your tale and build on that.
3) Take your time when you tell the story 
Beginning storytellers often worry about their audiences getting bored and sometimes try to avoid this by speeding up their telling. Unfortunately, this has just the opposite of the desired effect. Take your time in telling the story, let it breathe, and your audience will appreciate it.
4) Remember the sensory details in your story…
Your words are making a world real, and to do so you need to bring in all elements of that world - sounds, sights, smells, tastes and feelings. These are what root your listener in the world of the story you are telling.
5) …but don't get lost in extraneous details
…because extraneous details can make a story boring. The problematic details tend to be expository, giving information that is unnecessary at the time. Give your listeners information on a “need to know” basis, providing just enough to understand what happens next.
6) Every story is a mystery
A well told story is one where you can stop at any point and have the reader wonder “….and then what happened?” Each time a piece of the mystery is solved, another one appears, and that's what keeps us listening until we reach the ending. If you find yourself lecturing, step back and find the mystery.
7) Know the ending of your story
Know your ending line. And after you say it, stop.

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More about storyteller Joel Ben Izzy at his website. 

The second group is from Pixar's story artist Emma Coates. I made a few slight edits for clarity.

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PIXAR STORY RULES

#1: You admire a character more for trying than for succeeding.

#2: You gotta keep in mind what's interesting to you as an audience, not what's fun to do as a writer. They can be very different.

#3: Trying for theme is important, but you won't see what the story is actually about until you're at the end of it. Now rewrite.

#4: Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___. OR: Establish norm. Upset norm. Complicate & Escalate. Climax. Resolution.

#5: Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You'll feel like you're losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.

#6: What is your character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal?

#7: Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front.

#8: Finish your story, let go even if it's not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time.

#9: When you're stuck, make a list of what WOULDN'T happen next. Lots of times the material to get you unstuck will show up.

#10: Pull apart the stories you like. What you like in them is a part of you; you've got to recognize it before you can use it.

#11: Putting it on paper lets you start fixing it. If it stays in your head, a perfect idea, you'll never share it with anyone.

#12: Discount the first thing that comes to mind. And the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th – get the obvious out of the way. Surprise yourself.

#13: Give your characters opinions. Passive/malleable might seem likable to you as you write, but it's poison to the audience.

#14: Why must you tell THIS story? What's the belief burning within you that your story feeds off of? That's the heart of it.

#15: If you were your character, in this situation, how would you feel? Honesty lends credibility to unbelievable situations.

#16: What are the stakes? Give us reason to root for the character. What happens if they don't succeed? Stack the odds against.

#17: No work is ever wasted. If it's not working, let go and move on - it'll come back around to be useful later.

#18: You have to know yourself: the difference between doing your best & fussing. Story is testing, not refining.

#19: Coincidences to get characters into trouble are great; coincidences to get them out of it are cheating.

#20: Exercise: take the building blocks of a movie you dislike. How do you rearrange them into what you DO like?

#21: You gotta identify with your situation/characters, can't just write ‘cool'. What would make YOU act that way?

#22: What's the essence of your story? Most economical telling of it? If you know that, you can build out from there.
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Via Pixar Touch. Also, check out the book: The Pixar Touch

Joel Ben Izzy's recordings: The Beggar King and the Secret of Happiness: A True Story

Flying on the Back of a Giant

Here's a picture of a kid riding through the sky on a giant troll by Swedish artist Gustaf Tenggren.


The detail shows the loving exaggeration of the nose, the droopy lip, and the tendrils on the ear. I love the worried expression of the rider.

Speaking of young person riding a giant magical humanoid through the sky, I'm reminded of one of my favorite pictures, painted in watercolor by José Segrelles (1885-1969). It shows a young man flying on the back of a genie. You can't see either of their faces, only the paired hands and feet of the giant, who swims through the golden vapors, his hair and the hem of his garment blown forward by a spice-scented tailwind.

There's not enough published about Segrelles on the web, so please share this one with people who you think might like it. There's only one good book on Segrelles that I know of, Jose Segrelles Albert: Su vida y su obra (Spanish Edition), rather expensive, but well worth it, especially if you can read the Spanish.
More about Tenggren at the Gustaf Tenggren blog
Thanks, Bertil Saukkoriipi

Small Figures

About 35 years ago, when I was in art school, my buddies and I would take turns posing for each other in one minute costumed poses. 

In the series at the upper left I tried to capture the basic gesture of the folds of the costume using pencil and white gouache. At upper right is more of a tubular form emphasis, using just light and shadow and no outline.

In the middle row, I used a brush and ink to try to capture the black silhouette. In the bottom row, we moved the light around to the back and I tried drawing edge-lit silhouettes, where the light side becomes the paper color.

Drawing directly with the brush, I first drew the side away from the light before sorting out the complex lit side. This way of sketching gives a very photographic effect.