Benedict Cumberbatch

This is starting to get like a copy of Radio Times (other listing magazines are available!) but Sherlock returns on Sunday, yipee! 2012 should prove to be a big year for Benedict Cumberbatch as War Horse should propel him into the headlights of Hollywood...however Sherlock takes some beating. I promise this is the last TV listings blog...I think.

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Can't Take Brushes Seriously

I try and I try but I just find making an image with Brushes a bit of fun. I look at some of the work that some people make with Brushes and I wonder how they are able to do that as I find myself just having fun when using brushes. I know you can do a lot more with the technology but I just don't seem to be able to do this. Take this drawing of Sean Connery. I started out with all good intentions but very soon I lost interest in making a serious sketch and drifted off into the 'fun' territory. I suspect part of the problem is that I find the whole drawing experience when using Brushes so very sterile and cold - there is no organic feed back from screen that you get with paper.

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Dr Who sketches

Just been messing about in Brushes and came up with these quick sketches

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Frank Skinner

A bit of fun - a combination of real world drawing and brushes - I like this.

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Remembering times past and futures to come

It is so strange to hear cutting edge programmes from the past discussing the future and realising that no one really has any idea what is going to happen over the long term. I was listening to a podcast from the archive of In Our Time, one of my favourite radio programmes. This one dated back to early 2000 and was discussing the future of information technology. Bragg was talking to two people who had just written a book on the subject, one with a pessimistic view of the future and one with an optimistic one. The most striking thing was that neither understood how the world would change over the next ten years. One example illustrates this:
In 2000 200 million people had a computer. Now over 500 million people are a member of Facebook alone - something that wouldn't come along for another 3 half years. Neither even mentioned the new driving force in information technology - mobile access to the internet/communication.

So what to draw from all this? Well I suppose the only thing is to realise is that when someone says that something is bound to happen you have just as much chance the opposite happening - a really good example is the latest 'rouge' trader. Banks would have us believe that all their bad habits are in the past and then guess what - they're not - yet we still listen to these people.

That felt better. Anyway, why the drawing of Dominic West? Well last week he portrayed a really evil man - Fred West (no relation to Dominic) - and as I was drawing this this morning something struck me. You might never be able to predict the future with any degree of certainty but you can always be sure that there will be evil in the world. Now there is a gloomy thought to end on.

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Baby you're a rich man

Having just watched The Social Network again I can't get 'Baby you're a rich man' by the Beatles out of my head, in fact it is playing at the moment as I am typing this. Anyway, a question for Facebook - why haven't you developed an ipad app yet? I have the iphone app but this is really clunky when using the ipad.

Anyway, the drawing...just did this by eye rather than using the Colestream method..I like it...hope someone else might.

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Keira Knightley

Over the past few days I have been working on a whole assortment of little projects, preparing a selection of prints for a forth coming exhibition, research into the iron age buying a new pair of shoes - the list goes on and on. One of the things I have been neglecting is the sketching I so enjoy. Well I have started to concentrate on this again with a series of drawings of Keira Knightley based on screen shots from perhaps her best movie to date, The Duchess (That is, of course if you discount The Bill or Phantom Menace - this is a joke BTW).

One of the advantages of the screen shot is that you can really examine the face and try different approaches to try and capture something interesting. IT isn't like drawing from life but rather a forensic examination of one person's face - the line of the check bone, the relationship of the eyes to the nose and so on. This allows you time to really get to know the face of one person in one instance in time. It matters not that the person is nothing like this in real life it is just the capture of that moment. For me the problem I had was with jaw line - Ms Knightly has a wonderfully pronounced jaw line and trying to capture this was always a problem. I'm not sure I have managed that yet but this is a start.

I am using the Apple wireless keyboard to type this and it is so much more enjoyable than the on screen keyboard...so top tip ... if you have an iPad get a keyboard they become so much more useful things and the Apple keyboard is such a dream to use. Anyway, that is enough of my rambling on - another advantage of the keyboard.

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Sketching

Having a bit of an off day today so I am just taking it easy and sketching with an ink pen in a small sketch book I bought from Edinburgh - here's the Duchess of Cornwell's husband.

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Nude man

Tomorrow I am attending a life drawing workshop and so I thought I should do some prep so I have spent part of the day sketching nude men and women - quite an interesting experience - let's hope tomorrows workshop is.

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Benedict Cumberbatch

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Working with brushes

Once more unto the breach... Or something like that. I made similar sketch this afternoon with paper and pencil and found that far more rewarding. I just can't get my heart into using Brushes - I know I have been moaning about this for a while but I am trying to over come my ambivalence by just working with the program. It just has no warmth and feel the same way that paper does.

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Cartoon Tiger

As I was drawing this I really didn't realise what a cartoon character I was making Tiger Woods. In my defence I did make this drawing from a tiny portrait on a TV screen - in truth I rather like this effect - very 1970s.

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Brushes Painting - a bit of a mess

For some one who spent many hours working with brushes I find myself less and less able to use the package. Some how I no longer can connect with the process. For me it is all too clinical and detached. I know like the touch feel and dirt of making an actual drawing on paper rather than the antiseptic cation via the iPad. I loose patience with myself and my ability to create an image - for me it is just too complicated way of making a drawing. In short I suspect it is me rather than anything else. My how I have changed!

This is a case in point. I have made a number of drawings of this photograph of Jim Broadbent with a varying degree of success however none had the detached feel of this work. Is this a good drawing or something else - well I think that is a lungless question. What I do know is that I didn't derive the same amount of pleasure from it's creation and I think it shows.

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Big brother is watching you

This drawing didn't turn out the way I had hoped. Nonetheless it is still an effective effort. As k progress I think the drawings are getting physically and emotionally darker. I wonder where this will take me?

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Morpheus

Well I suppose it was always going to happen - yes I watched the original Matrix movie or at least part of it, tonight and I had to make a drawing of Morpheus. I think the treatment I have made in post production on the iPad has made it into a really great sketch.

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Women in Love

This inspired by the BBC adaptation of DH Lawrence's novel Women in Love.

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Releasing the frustration

After I made the last drawing that went so spectacularly wrong I drew this cartoon sketch which low and behold produced a better likeness in 5 minutes than I managed in over an hour of work and toil. Now there are many reasons for this, perhaps the most important is that I knew the face I was trying to capture so very well that when it came to the cartoon I was able to draw it with better accuracy.

Anyway, I like this and I'm particularly taken by the deep blue eyes. Now I know that Kidman's eyes are a much lighter blue but this blue seems to work better with the drawing.

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