Birdie Fitzgerald: Bird Enthusiast

For the Figure II final, we designed a human counterpart for our animals. For a worrywart like Bobby, his owner would naturally be a crazy daredevil. Meet Birdie Fitzgerald, business tycoon, Sarasota retiree, motorcycle gang leader, and overall: bird enthusiast (it's on her business card). She's full of energy and enthusiasm for everything, and drags poor Bobby along with her (all he wants to do is be with his girlfriend). Sorry Bobby. At least Birdie can afford all your anxiety medication.

Here's some rough sketches of trying to figure out the character:

BOBBY

More Bobby. It's 2. Gonna sleep now

FLAMINGO BONANZA

 In figure drawing we picked an animal to observe and study.

Meet Bobby, the nervous flamingo!

Updates: I Swear I'm Not Dead

Howdy! So... we're halfway through the second semester of freshman year, and I figure I should update to inform all that yes, I am still alive. I've been busy with class, piles and piles of homework, and (cough) leagueoflegends. Priorities, priorities. Here's some of my (from a personal opinion, better) work from this semester.

A big focus is moving towards stories and narratives, and working with characters. For example, in figure drawing, we've been exaggerating models' poses and giving them stories, new clothes, expressions, props, etc.

Working with developing characters in Figure Drawing II:

A project in which we started out with a 15-minute pose, and then changed it to give it a story.

Check out the transition from the original pose (on the far left) to the final project.

Working with drawing different expressions.

We're actually developing characters in 3D Design and Traditional Animation for use in further projects. Check it out!

For 3D class I'm going to make a sculpture and environment for one of my favorite characters, Swampy.

Gus the Skunk!

For Traditional Animation, we were given a random animal to design and animate in a character jump. I ended up with Gus the skunk, an easily-frustrated loner who enjoys solitude, napping, competitive curling, and scaring away small annoying mammals. He's not afraid to speak his opinion, or gas those who don't agree with him. I'm looking forward to animating him :)

 Stay 'tuned- I've got much more coming up!

Figure Drawing Final Week- Cafe Drawings and Nostalgia

The final week was an excellent one for figure drawing. We focused our efforts on cafe drawings, and quick narrative sketches of people. We also did a couple of twenty-minute poses but only to wrap it all up and compare it with our drawing from the beginning of the semester. I can't help but feel that I've definitely improved. Can't wait for next semester!

Observational Drawings

 drawn in cafes, Burger Kings, and figure studios.

 

Nostalgia: Before and After

 This disproportionate lady was drawn the first day of Figure Drawing. Note the freakishly tiny hands.

Here's the figure from our last class. Not too bad a drawing for a stressed-out sleep-deprived zombie.

Updated 2D Final

The final project was interesting: we had to make an abstract grayscale picture that employed all the design concepts we'd been learning about. In the second half of the project we had to make a colored representational picture using the abstract piece as a base.

  

The big bad overlay project

In figure class we've been studying and observing the anatomy of the figure.

For the overlay project we had to choose two base drawings-one of the front and one of the back-and draw a skeleton and a muscular system on separate layers.

I did these in two nights... not something I'd recommend. 

Overlay numero uno:

 Overlay numero dos:

Ringling August Drawings- Week 1 & 2

Well, the first and second week of Ringling have been completed!
It's been crazy adjusting to this whole college thing, from having a roommate (an awesome one at that!) to living in Florida (lots and lots of rain and humidity) to just not having any family/old friends around.
Weird stuff.
But I'm getting used to it.

Here's my figure homework- the only familiar thing going on with all the projects and classwork and stuff.

5 minute drawing

30 second poses

drawn with a highlighter and then a micron pen

1 minute sequential drawings

2 minute drawings

2 minute drawings

Here's what it really looks like:

Yeah, at art college we hang out in our free time and make silly poses.

Last Semester of Figure Drawing *SOB*

Goodbye, Visual Arts Conservatory!

15 minutes?

5 minutes- I love this one, I only wish I had more time to work on the face.

10 minutes- good shading; near-invisible chair.

10 minutes- this is a good example of something I ran out of time on but was shaping up to be pretty good.

15 minute portrait- I love her expression so much.

20 minutes- Two different colors. Gasp.

Trying out new techniques in shading.

Kind of reminds me of Pocahontas.

Drawn with the flat side of a conte crayon.

Drawn with charcoal pencil

Toned paper with chalk and conte crayon.

All conte crayon

15-20 minute portrait- conte crayon

Well, this is a lot of my better work from this semester of Advanced Figure Drawing. I'm quite pleased with the results. This year I tried a lot of different techniques and mediums, trying out conte crayon, chalk, charcoal, and pencil, and really felt more secure in fast drawing and both traditional and experimental techniques.

Also, I got an award at my school for Figure Drawing! I am so thankful to Mr. Blackwell, my teacher, for selecting me for the award. I'm gonna miss all my talented peers and the art classes in high school- can't wait for college though!