September 25, 2008

Artistic or Autistic (or all of the above)

I have been around acrylic paints, oil paints, pastels, Sakura Pigma Microns, Prismacolor markers, X-Acto knives and the like all my life - and that was just Mom's kit. With Dad it was Testor paints and train kits and loads of balsa wood. He scavenged little chains and wires to make realistic details to a train rig that was laid out for perhaps four years. He worked on it from the time my grandmother gave he and I a starter set for Christmas when I was five until I was about 17 when he finally decided to start selling it off. He'd buy a kit, take it out to his toolbench in the garage and work on assembling it, painting it, and then adding clever little touches to make it more realistic. When he was done, he'd carefully box it up so it didn't break and add it to the stack of like boxes on the shelves in the garage.

Mom bought books on art and when we lived in Austin, it seemed like she painted all the time. She did a lot of tole painting at that time as well as working in pastels and doing some portraits. Because she was overly critical of her own work, she often used others' drawings as her "template" and mimicked them onto the wooden object she was decorating. They were fun, whimsical paintings ... and now that I think about it, they shared a fair amount in common with comic strip or cartoon art. I kept a couple of her pieces for years, but alas, too many moves finally took their toll and I'm not sure that I have any of them now.

Suffice it to say it was not unusual for our home to reek of art supplies which covered even the smell of my parents' chain smoking.

My sister and I were surrounded by music and artistic endeavors during our childhood. Besides their different artistic pursuits, they both played piano. My mother became self-conscious about it eventually, but when we were very small, we would beg her to play us to sleep in the evenings. Dad played by ear, Mom played by the rules. In other words, Mom always played sheet music ... Dad made up his own song and occasionally played other songs by ear - but that song generally became "his" song. I couldn't tell you what genre of song it was ... perhaps honky-tonk comes closest (but not in that country-western way, not really). It was a rocking, rollicking series of licks up and down the keyboard.

My sister picked up the bulk of the musical interest and talent in the family - she was in training to begin international competitions as a pianist when she decided that wasn't what she wanted and pulled back some. I hit my own wall a little sooner.

I was, to be perfectly honest, overly sensitive to any criticism from my mother from a very early age. So when I bragged about how wonderfully I was colouring a page in my colouring book and was met with a critique - I was sure already that I was not artistically inclined. The truth of the matter is that I was colouring like a kid. Mom was colouring with me - like an artistic adult. As I remember the look on her face as she coloured with me, she was quite obviously lost in the art of what she was doing. I was happy to stay in between the lines for once. What she perceived as a helpful comment - sharing with me what she'd learned about making the colour as consistent as possible, I perceived as "you're doing it wrong."

I was also a child who did not foncorm to much of anything at all. If I had an arts & crafts project with a suggested pattern or suggested paint scheme, you could pretty much guarantee that I would be oppositional and refuse to use that guide. Sometimes this meant some pretty chaotic projects - but a lot of times it meant something pretty cool to me.

I can remember getting a cartooning book one summer at my grandmother's house and spending days practicing that book ... and for some reason feeling like it was not a form of art that Mom would approve of, so it didn't last past that summer. Then there was the art enrichment class I took a summer or several later. I had loads of fun with that class until we were assigned a still-life drawing.

I couldn't get it to work right and I was ready to throw that damned apple right through the kitchen window. I wanted to do a black & white chiaroscuro drawing, but I really didn't understand how to do this and had never had anyone try to explain it. Finally, frustrated and pissy, I slammed everything down on the table and pronounced it done.

Mom threw a fit and began the "I know you can do better than that" over-achiever line at me.

I was marched back into the kitchen, forced back into the chair and I eventually did produce something better. Something that I actually kept for years.

What we didn't know back then was that I have some mild learning disabilities. I've not been officially tested for dyscalculia and dyslexia, but there definitely seems to be some similarities. I was diagnosed with ADHD about 7 years ago, but frankly, I distrust the psychologist who did the testing, so I'm unsure of that diagnosis as well.

I can say that I have a series of symptoms or issues which do tend to correspond to learning disabilities. One of those is a kind of frustration and rigidity of thought which occurs during a math or math-pattern based activity which can really escalate into a shutdown for me. An example is this: I play guitar - I'm no great shakes, but I can play several songs well enough to be recognized. My difficulty is in changing them up. A few guitarists at my church got together to play a song - and at the "last minute" (to me that's what it felt like) they wanted to change the rhythms that we strummed. This takes some time to practice, but it's really not that hard to do.

I could not do it. My brain totally shut down and I refused to play. I tried to be reasonable about it - I told them to play the song without me - not as a threat, but because I just couldn't get it in the few days left before the performance and I knew it. I can remember learning Boston's "More Than a Feeling" - and my guitar teacher trying to get me to add a grace note after I'd learned the bulk of the song. I could NOT fit that damn note in there no matter how hard I tried. I had the pattern in my head and that was it.

What does that have to do with art? Well, in many types of art, you layer shadings or colours on top of each other until you get the look you want. That appears to be the equivalent of adding a grace note to a song I already know ... my brain begins a weird shutdown pattern and tries to freeze.

I noticed this a few months ago when I was attempting some sketches of some mesas and canyons. I wanted to get the outline right and then begin the shading. And what would happen time and time and time again was I would get halfway through the outline, the rough sketch, and get seriously pissed and frustrated and go to a clean page. Finally, in the van on the way to New Mexico, I was able to force myself through the entire process and wow ... the drawing actually came out half-decent. The problem is that I can only see what's on the page at the moment - I can't always hold that drawing in my mind, the piece that I'm sketching from and the unfinished bit on my page - and blend them into a finished project. The brain winds up focusing on the unfinished so much that I can't actually complete the sketch.

Luckily for me this only happens in realistic drawings requiring subtle shadings. I suppose this is one of the many reasons I prefer drawing cartoons or comic strips.

It has taken years of my playing in Photoshop, web design and even action figure customizing to realize that I do have an eye for design and an eye for art, but that I have my own style which is very different from that of my mother's or of my father's. Or, for that matter, my sister's.

Today, I suspect the brain melt-downs over attempting to change patterns is either a function of ADHD or, I lean a bit more now to thinking it may be a function of Asperger's. After all, it's quite odd when a normally very logical person suddenly has a meltdown over something essentially stupid and inconsequential.

But the bigger realization for me has been just how artistic my family has always been. And that I'm not so far outside the mold as I may have once thought.

Or maybe I've just sniffed too many art supplies over the years.

Posted by Red Monkey at 2:27 PM | Comments (2) | Sketches | Storytelling: She was, of course, supposed to be sleeping. | Stumble

August 29, 2008

Baby Book Complete

So, I've been working on a baby book for my baby sister's baby for the last ... well, let's not go there. Finally, the book is done and ready to be shipped out to mi sobrino in the morning.

Click through to thumb through the whole book.

And, if you're interested in having a custom baby book made for you, use the contact link here on the blog. I'd be happy to discuss your needs with you.

Posted by Red Monkey at 3:44 PM | Comments (2) | Design | Sketches | Stumble

August 26, 2008

Sketchiness

Just a wee li'l preview of a particularly overdue project.

Posted by Red Monkey at 5:10 PM | Comments (6) | Sketches | Stumble

June 15, 2008

Done Right

When I was born in 1968, my mother thought she was getting a nice, docile Shirley Temple child. A daughter she could bond with, could dress up, teach to dance and sew and sing and be a delicate flower of baby-woman-hood.

Instead, she got a wild li'l red monkey baby, whose first words were practically, "I can do it myself."

In short, we were at odds from day one.

We fought about the length of my hair - my scalp is sensitive and I had very fine, very straight, very fly-away hair. My mom insisted on combing my hair with a very very fine tooth plastic comb. This meant screaming, crying rebellion every day.

We fought about appropriate toys. I wanted airplanes and cars and trucks and six-shooters and drums. And a banjo, but that's something of a digression.
Mom wanted me to have pretty dollies and Barbies and play dress-up princess.

We fought about clothes. I preferred to live in jeans and t-shirts. Mom wanted me in if not frilly dresses, at least cute li'l jumpers. I came home in tears on more than one occasion in kindergarten because some little boy tried to look up my jumper whilst we were on the jungle gym or slide or swings or what have you. Mom's solution was to not do those things in a jumper - my solution was not to wear jumpers.

The problem was more in the time period than anything else. Parents at that time had been led to believe that children could be told this is how things will be, and so mote it be. At the same time, however, it was the time of "Free to Be You and Me" - where kids were encouraged to be themselves.

I also grew up with two very creative parents. My father played honky tonk piano for hours, completely losing himself in the music he generated. I never heard him play anything other than "his" song, but it was an endlessly mutating and developing creation.

Mom also played piano, although she played less frequently and always played from sheet music - not because of any lack of skill or desire, but, I think, because she feared doing it "wrong." And, in addition to her piano playing, my first memories of her are of her painting and drawing and sketching. Whether it was Toll painting some wooden box or serving tray or actually doing a pastel portrait or acrylics on canvas, Mom was always creating something new.

But like with her piano playing, Mom seemed scared of somehow "doing it wrong." She laboured over every detail, often stressing herself beyond belief to get every detail exactly "right." And, she was far too hard on herself when a shadow wasn't perfect or some tiny detail was out of alignment just the slightest bit. I would watch her scrape paint off, in tears, sure that this was another example of her failure as a human being. And I would watch her, once she was finally done - put herself and her work down. I didn't get it. Her stuff looked easily as good as things I saw in the stores.

I think it was sixth grade when I took a serious interest in drawing myself. I was interested in cartooning, in comic strips, and in technical drawing. I enjoyed drawing fictional maps and would spend days creating new lands. In social studies, we had an assignment which included drawing - and I discovered a latent talent for drawing flintlock rifles ... and then more modern rifles ... swords ... and airplanes. (I have no recollection where that jump came in except I loved F-15 and F-16 planes.)

So that summer, when told I needed to take a summer enrichment class, I picked a class on drawing. I had a blast with it - it was mostly just a scheduled time to draw with the teacher critiquing us gently and there was little actual teaching of technique or theories of perspective or something along those lines. The class went along swimmingly for quite some time.

And then we had to do a still life.

I set up an apple on the kitchen table and scrawled something. Erased, re-drew. I hated it and I couldn't get the chiaroscuro to make the apple look 3d instead of flat. I finally got it "done enough."

Mom looked over my shoulder. I don't remember our exchange, but the gist was "You'll sit here and re-do it until you get it 'right.'" I sat there for what felt like weeks, and I think I switched from pencils to pastels or pastels to pencils. Eventually after much temper tantruming and fussing, I had something that did resemble a decent still life of an apple.

But the shine had gone off of it. I didn't see it as an exercise in improving my drawing eye. I didn't see it as a learning experience in shading or use of colour. Drawing had become just another thing that I didn't do well enough to please my mom ... and so I stopped sharing that with her ... and eventually decided that I simply could not draw since it didn't come easily and perfect the first time I attempted something ....

Instead, I turned to writing stories and novels - and simply didn't share most of those with my mother. The bulk of them involved children in peril from kidnappers or evil parents - not things Mom would actually approve of.

I doodled now and again ... I reveled in Chaim Potok's My Name Is Asher Lev - kind of the Jewish Portrait of the Artist as He Develops. But I had stopped drawing "seriously."

Then, in the mid-90s, I discovered this nifty thing called the world wide web. For ten years, I learned digital art in the form of creating website designs with Fireworks and then Photoshop. And I re-gained my interest in art and creating imagery.

But I still insisted that I couldn't draw.

Then, I took a job as a copy writer who was to also help with web design at a large e-commerce company. I worked with a gentleman who'd had his own design company at one point ... and another with a degree in graphic design. And as I observed them working, I realized something. The skills I had honed over the last ten years were comparable to theirs. I didn't have all the techniques nor all the same knowledge and theory - but I had the skills and the instincts. I started reading theory and observing more - asking more questions, learning more programs, growing more confident.

And then I picked up pencils again.

I'm still more confident with my digital art than my sketching, but both have improved dramatically over the years. There is no doubt that web design is more forte, at least for now, but my ability to create brochures, flyers, layout manuals, create signage, all of that has suddenly exploded - because I stopped being afraid about how to do it "right" and began studying theory, studying good design and began trusting my self.

I'm tickled to be in the process of designing a tattoo for a friend over at Cre8Buzz. I started out sketching it by hand until I had the design the way I liked it - and then I transferred the design to the computer to clean it up. I'm beyond flattered that she likes the design so far.

Tomorrow, I'll take a copy or two of the design to the hospital with me so I can continue to tinker with it whilst I wait three freaking hours for them to prep me for surgery on my leg. (Will someone explain to me WHY I need to be at the hospital at 6:30 a.m. for a 9:30 a.m. procedure???) Over the last couple of years, I've taken artwork to the hospital to keep me busy whilst my other half had surgery ... it's a wonderful way for me to focus on something other than the stress at hand.

Like my mother, I do still worry about doing my art "right" ... but I think of that a lot less nowadays than I used to. Instead, I'm spending time looking at what other artists do "wrong" which actually gives them their own distinct style - and then working on my own style.

Today, if I sit down to draw a still life, I'm still not going to enjoy it. It's not the type of art that I really enjoy. But today if I sit down to draw an apple, it's because I know that really concentrating on capturing the form and essence of an apple will help hone my eye and my hands and that I'll apply those skills to my own way of doing things.

Meanwhile, I have to laugh at all the times I told my students who were afraid they were not writers simply because the first draft of their essays were not perfect ... no one is perfect on the first draft. There isn't a writer today who completes a short story or novel or academic essay or even speech writing in a single draft. What makes you a writer - or an artist - is a passion for what you do so that you are willing and wanting to do it over until you get it as close to that picture in your mind as you possibly can.

I get that now. There's no way to do it "right." There's just the way you enjoy doing it.

Posted by Red Monkey at 6:06 PM | Comments (7) | Design | People Say I Have ADHD, But I Think - Hey Look, A Chicken | Sketches | Stumble

May 14, 2008

JetPens, take a pen

So, yesterday I wrote about the JetPens site - today I'm going to write about five of the pens that they sent me to review. Let me repeat the disclosure from the first post:
They sent me some pens to play with and to review - and in exchange I'm writing two posts about them. One about the site (today's post), and I'll be writing another one going through each of the pens they sent me. Before I can do that one, I have a project I have to finish - hopefully this week. Oh, and also? If I hadn't already liked the site, I'd have turned this "gig" down. They didn't ask for a favorable review - they put no restrictions on this review and did not even ask to see it before I published it. If you've read my blog long, you know this - I ain't gonna sugar-coat it. Happily, there was no need to do so here as I was already a pretty big fan of the site.

They sent me five "standard writing pens," a chalkboard/markerboard marker, a white gel pen and two Pentel Color Brush pens. I'm limiting today's post to the five "standard" pens. The others will have to wait until I get some projects completed and have a chance to use these pens in action.

Can you tell they sent me my favourite colour?

Pilot Hi-Tec C in Apple Green .3
This is literally my new favourite pen. I didn't think I would like Apple Green, but it's very similar to a neon green gel pen I discovered many, many moons ago (and haven't been able to find in ages). First, I prefer "wet ink" pens to the sticky ink in most "regular" ball point pens. So gel inks and rollerball inks have always been my preference. The problem is that even the "fine" point like the Sanford Uniball Micros usually aren't fine enough for me. Or, when they are, the tip of the pen actually scratches (and sometimes tears) the paper.

The Hi-Tec C is a little on the scratchy side in terms of feel, but the ink flow is just beautiful and I haven't yet noticed any scoring or scratching of the paper. I'm more than willing to put up with the tiny bit of scratchy feel to the pen in exchange for such a wonderful line. I noticed next to no clumping or blotting of the ink - very consistent application. And the colour is great!

Pilot FriXion .5
Again, very consistent application of ink. I always worry with gel pens that I'll get a "dip" of ink the middle where the ball actually prevents ink from being laid down, but to either side of the ball, you get trails of ink. This was not a problem with any of the pens I'm reviewing. This just blows my mind. If I go to Staples and buy a package of gel pens, I can guarantee you that at least half of them will leave that "clear" area in the center of each line. WHY can't we get good gel pens easily???

Anyhow, this pen has a much more smooth feel to it than the .3 Hi-Tec C and a darker colour green ink. Very pleasant pen and one I'd be more likely to use on more formal paperwork since the green is so dark.

Pilot Choose .7
Nice feel to the pen, nice ink flow, but as with most wider tipped gel pens, there's a bit of splotchy ink at the ends of lines. It's certainly got a better flow than most gel pens I pick up in the U.S., but it's not quite as smooth as the previous two pens.

Zebra Sarasa Clip .4
Another instant hit along with the Hi-Tec C. Less scratchy feel than the Hi-Tec C and I'm curious to see how the clip aspect works out over time. Any writing pen (as opposed to drawing pens) which does not have a cap for me to lose or chew on is a huge bonus for me. I can see this pen being a workhorse for me quite easily.

Sakura Glaze Grey
This is more of a craft or art pen than the previous four and probably should have been reviewed with the white gel pen and the Pentel Colour Brush pens, but ah well.

This is not a pen for everyday use. It's got a very thick line which makes writing small difficult. It's really meant for accent work and the coolest thing about it is what the package says - Writing you can feel. Yep, let the ink dry (it has a longer drying period than a regular writing pen) and then run your fingers over the words - the ink sits on top of the paper and you can feel your letters. They recommend this pen as a decorative art tool to embellish and emboss in scrapbooking, rubber stamping and cardmaking.

I can also see where I would want to try to use these pens (they come in some really nice colours) as accent or highlight pieces in some of my artwork - there's a good chance I'll be using this on the project I'm working on now - IF there's an appropriate area which doesn't require a fine line. The Glaze pens also come in Clear and I can see using that a LOT just to garner a bit of effect on some area of a drawing.

All-in-all, I was really stunned at the quality of these pens. I am used to my Pentel Hybrid Gel Rollers which skip, don't apply ink evenly at all and scratch. Of course, those Hybrid Gel Rollers are old pens, probably nearly 10 years old now (which explains why I can't find them anymore) and they came out early on in the gel pen fad. It seems that the ink process has matured greatly since then - and I've got a LOT of new pens to become obsessed with!

The post continues:
I wrote a paragraph or two with each pen in my Moleskine, talking about hand writing, handwriting and how the pens were working for me. If you want to attempt to slog through a short introduction to my atrocious handwriting - or just look at how the pens performed in a slightly longer test, then click through:

All 3 Pilot Pens

Zebra and Sakura

Posted by Red Monkey at 7:56 AM | Comments (1) | Sketches | Stumble

May 13, 2008

JetPens, take one

A few weeks ago on Twitter, Mike Rohde made a comment about a great site he'd discovered, JetPens. Always on the lookout for the next sweet pen, pencil or marker, I headed over.

I have been looking for a simple pencil case that I like for about two years now. I've made do with some hard glasses cases (too short), a soft leather roll-up case in which the pockets were not big enough for the pencils and a host of other things. Nada trabajó.

Discovering JetPens led me to a beautiful pencil case that I have actually enjoyed. I also picked up a new white pen which I plan to use this week and a nifty new (okay, new to me) kind of water colours called Aquash.

Then Mike Twittered me again. JetPens was looking for a blogger to review their site and products - would I be interested?

Since, to be honest, I was planning on at least linking to them (if not actually writing about the site) when I finally got around to using my Aquash water colours, naturally I jumped at the chance to review the site and some products in exchange for some pens.
So, full disclosure here: they sent me some pens to play with and to review - and in exchange I'm writing two posts about them. One about the site (today's post), and I'll be writing another one going through each of the pens they sent me. Before I can do that one, I have a project I have to finish - hopefully this week. Oh, and also? If I hadn't already liked the site, I'd have turned this "gig" down. They didn't ask for a favorable review - they put no restrictions on this review and did not even ask to see it before I published it. If you've read my blog long, you know this - I ain't gonna sugar-coat it. Happily, there was no need to do so here as I was already a pretty big fan of the site.

First, I have to say that not only do I love their li'l logo guy, but I adore the site layout. Far too many art supply e-commerce sites are just too darn busy or messy. I enjoy perusing dickblick.com for the breadth of products they offer - but they need a complete site re-design as they are simply not easy to navigate. JetPens, on the other hand is easy to navigate and has a nice, clean look.

NOTE: if you're not interested in web design, click here and you'll drop down the page just a hair so as to skip my gushing over their design.
As a web designer, one of the features that impressed me about their site is the multitude of ways to browse - without being confusing. There's a left hand text navigation which sits below the search feature. That's generally where I start surfing, but JetPens also has a nice photo-browse set-up. Just below the tabs at the top of the site, they have a featured item and below that a Selection Guide in text links.

I love this Selection Guide. They've kept it small, to the point and fun. The first category is "I want..." and below that are 5 text links to popular categories of pens. Next to that is "I am a(n)..." and below that are 5 categories of people who might be looking for specialist pens or sets. The last category is "I want something..." with the choices being cute, elegant, ergonomic, rare, retractable.

Below the Selection Guide text links are small photos of different categories they offer - anything from fountain pens to highlighters to cases.

Okay, so they've got a tight design for their site - but that really only indicates how much thought they've put into their business - where's the follow-through? They've got a great selection of product. AND, unlike a lot of art supply sites I've frequented, JetPens allows you to enter a review of the products you've used - so you have a good idea what it is that you're ordering.

In addition, they've also got a Penpedia - this section of the site has videos and articles demonstrating or talking about various products. You can watch a short video on just how the NeoCritz Transformer pencil case opens up and stand on your desk. (I think the video was perhaps 15 seconds at most.) An article with great photos shows you how to "hack" a particular pen to use a different type of ink refill. One of my favourites is a nice image showing you just what different pencil hardnesses look like on the page. That used to drive me crazy when I was using a .3 technical pencil as the leads I purchased were usually 4H or 2H at best - and my teachers always complained that my work was too light for them to read.

They've got a forum for building some community - in short, this is a solid site selling some really solid products and they know what they're doing online. Too often, I see a specialty site who uses the default Yahoo Store and whose web design skills are back in the mid-90s. JetPens isn't like that. They're smooth and solid.

Their shopping cart applies the same good web and GUI design as the rest of the site. And, always a bonus in my opinion, they take PayPal.

And, they ship their items FAST. I expected my first purchase to take up to 5 days to get here since I did not choose one of the speedy (more expensive) delivery methods. Nope, was here in a couple of days.

The email notifications were easy enough to read and some of them are funny - worth reading instead of skimming quickly and tossing in the appropriate mail folder. I'd like to see them expand their copy writing on those emails a bit more and make all of them worth actually reading instead of verifying the shipment info. (Not long messages, mind you, but a couple of silly and friendly sentences.)

Some of my favourite stuff from JetPens:

• white pens - they've got a wide variety of these in different widths and consistencies
• gel pens - I have a distinct weakness for these and they have some really nice ones at reasonable prices - and, impressive to me, in a wide variety of colours and thicknesses
• good quality stuff - including my very beloved Sakura Micron pens - sadly, they don't carry Copic art markers ... but then they don't carry Prismacolor art markers either.
• a nice blend of good, writing pens - and some nice art stuff. It's unusual for me to find such a nice blend of product

Seriously, if you like good pens (which does NOT necessarily mean expensive, btw) - you should at least browse their site and decide for yourself.

Posted by Red Monkey at 11:13 AM | Comments (5) | Sketches | Stumble