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Sunday Workday
Matthew and me working away in our home studio on a Sunday, making progress on commissions and freelance stuff.
Matthew and me working away in our home studio on a Sunday, making progress on commissions and freelance stuff.
In my process post about creating the Jiz Lee portrait, I showed you guys how I totally ruined the image initially and then had Matthew come in and make it presentable. He has a great eye for colors, layout, and overall making an appealing picture.
I’ve once again roped him into making an appearance (of sorts) on my blog by breaking down exactly how he took on fixing that picture. If you’re into that kinda thing, here you go!
Hi, I’m Matthew. I made this picture better in about an hour, and this is how I did it. (All of this was in Photoshop).
-Firstly I had to reduce the file size; it was crushing our computers to work on it. Removing all of Erika’s superfluous layers and using the crop tool set to ‘delete’ rather than ‘hide’ I was able to get the image down to working size.
-Next step was to see what I liked about the picture and use it as a starting point. I enjoyed the reds of the banners and most of the line work.
-I started by separating out the background line work from the pattern. It’s a good pattern, but very detailed and distracting for an already busy picture. This took a bit of time, but can be summed up quickly; desaturate, tweak levels (so lines are black and background white), use channels to select line work, make new layer with selection, delete old layer, and then fix oddities by hand. (tip, if you have a layer like this [line work and transparent], add a thick stroke to the layer in a terrible color; it’ll blow up and show you any pixels/places where there is dirt or any noise that isn’t part of the line work, so you can delete that stuff out [remove stroke when done])
Interjection from Erika: He also replaced the original background paper with another from my collection. I keep my paper collection hung on the walls of our home studio, where Matthew works every day and I use when I’m not well enough to go to Periscope Studio. Normally I use these for actually collaging, but I’ve finally started to turn them digital to use in projects like this.
-I decided that I didn’t like the border/window at this point, so deleted it and built a new one out of shapes (0 fill with strokes), to keep the file size low (shapes are vectored art; this is easy on your computer’s brain).
-Time to think about color. I liked royal blue to match the red; wanted to make Jiz pop out.
-Made background royal blue, added in new texture; reduced in opacity so it was still there but not distracting.
-Tweaked Jiz’s placements and stance; wanted them more up right, and taking up more space.
-Added white strokes to things to again help them pop; black line work over dark blue doesn’t appeal to me.
-Added gradients to the banners (20% opacity set to overlay [black and white gradients]) to give them some depth. In hind sight this should have been a lower opacity.
-Added a similar gradient to Jiz (bodies are naturally darker on the bottom and lighter on the top)
-And another gradient to the background to give it depth and a pseudo horizon.
-Picture’s almost done; brought in a texture overlay to replace Erika’s (her’s was too strong for my liking). Mine is a tiling image of water color paper roughly 50% grey, so when its set to overlay the whites and darks (that go over or under 50% grey) show up. I set this to maybe 30% opacity; just enough to give the picture natural noise.
-Final tweaks were done in curve editor; small tweaks until I was happy.
So yeah! That’s how he did it! Isn’t he the best? He’s the best.
(Photo by Joshin Yamaha from 2007)
(This is part of my series of recaps about traveling to England and France last year from October 25 – November 8th, 2011)
Here is the thing, I adore the Musée d’Orsay. Focusing primarily on French artwork from the mid 1800s – early 1900s (which is super decorative and opulent), the museum itself is housed inside the most gorgeous, Beaux-Arts former railroad station– which itself is decorative and opulent to the gills.
It is my most favorite museum in the world and in the handful of times I’ve had the opportunity to visit Paris I always make a bee-line for it and draw for hours. This place inspires me like crazy, I would stay in here for days if they let me.
Until this trip.
My entire reason for coming to Paris in the first place (Matt haaaaates big cities in general and Paris in particular) was to 1) meet my internet friend, Mr. Pan, and 2) draw in the Musée d’Orsay. This was already the second day of our two-and-a-half-day long stay in Paris, tomorrow we’d be leaving around noon to catch our train to Strasbourg. Honestly, I was pretty heartbroken that I would be missing out on it this time. (I know, I know, First World Problems and all that, but really, this place means a lot to me.)
We ducked under shelter of another building’s awning while we figured out what to do from here. Already soaked through and with no rain gear whatsoever, the prospect of walking all the way back to our hostel (45 minutes away, I think) in that state was just not an option right then.
We needed shelter.
We needed… an over-priced cafe called Le Royal Orsay.
We tea’ed ourselves and leisurely waited out the worst of the downpour, Matt with his book and me with my sketchpad.
It wound up being nice a little stay, long enough for the rain to let up some– though that dang line to the museum never did. It turns out they were having some… special occasion that day? Which is why a million and a half people were waiting patiently for hours in a downpour to get in. SIGH!
(This is part of my series of recaps about traveling to England and France last year from October 25 – November 8th, 2011)
In Paris, Matt and I stayed at the Vintage Hostel, which, despite its name, was actually pretty modern.
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Matt reclines on the bed. We decided to splurge and get the tiniest private room, which felt pretty fancy-pantsy.
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Vintage Hostel 73 Rue de Dunkerque Paris 75009 France |
(This is part of my series of recaps about traveling to England and France this year from October 25 – November 8th)
The best part about visiting England is spending time with my wonderful in-laws. Matt has the most loving, accepting, multi-national family anybody could ever hope to have– they made me feel like a member of the clan well before we even started talking about marriage. I love them like my own flesh and blood and feel just as loved and embraced by them in return.
If you’ve visited Matt’s website, you’ve noticed his domain name is InternationalHobo.com– a name he chose on account of the eclectic mix of nationalities his family is composed from.
His grandmother immigrated to France from Wales as a late teenager, where she had Matt’s mother and continues to live to this day. His mother, in turn, immigrated to England from France while in her early twenties, and though she has lived in the UK longer now than she lived in her mother country she still has a lovely, strong French accent mixed in with her British one. Though Matt cannot speak it, he understands French nearly fluently on account of growing up in a household where his mom and her second, French, husband spoke the language to each other every day. Matt’s father immigrated to England from Australia, where he met and married Matt’s mother, which is, in turn, why Matt’s accent slips into an Australian twang at times (along with the American he’s picked up from me).
Coming from a family with such trans-continental itchy feet, it’s only fitting he then immigrated to the USA to marry me! He is my International Hobo.
Lookit Matthew at 18, just a year before we met. Can you blame me for cradle-robbing him as a two-years-older woman? NO, I think NOT.
The heart of his mother’s house is definitely the kitchen, where all spend most of our time together.
Matt is the cook of our little two-person family here in the states, a skill he learned from his own mom. I never ate so well in my life until Matt came along with his French cooking.
As an entire group, both sides of Matt’s family got together to go on an epic two hour (each way) bike ride along the English countryside.
Then we stopped at pub and had an enormous lunch followed by this dessert, that I forget the name of.
And then on a completely different day, Matt and I went to a fish’n'chips shop with his mom and she took this photo of us. It is the old guy in the background that really ties this shot together, I think.
Today Matthew and I received the tiniest package from one of my favorite artists and good friends Lucy Knisley! She is one of my most favorite people and I love her to pieces. If you are not familiar with her work, I really, really encourage you to check it out.
Matthew documented the process of opening up her present.
Thank you so much, Lucy!! You are the best, forever.
(This is part of my series of recaps about traveling to England and France this year from October 25 – November 8th)
Matthew and I traveled without any sleep for pretty much an entire day (Departed Portland October 25th at 3:30pm, arrived in London on October 26th at 12pm) and then we had to stay awake the whole day so that we could force our sleep schedules to realign to our new time zone, set eight hours ahead of Portland.
Whenever we go back to visit Matthew’s family, he always makes a point to repair as many things around the house as he can. This time around, he had this to work with:
Notice that the left lid’s knob is not like the other’s. That’s because it got left in the oven and melted to that flat disk you see now. Due to its new transformation, it was nearly impossible to extract the bottom screw holding the top bit in place, so nobody’s been able to fix it.
Well, ol’ Matt got to work and with a lot of patience and persistence, finally managed to undo the screw and replace the knob wiiiiiiiith…..
This delightful wine stopper cork thing that he screwed in through the bottom.
Ta-dah!
He is so handy.
On October 25th this year, Matthew and I set off on our two week trip to Europe! Specifically, England and France. I’ve been meaning to share my photos and sketches with you guys since I got back, but I did so much of both over there that it’s been kind of daunting for me to break them down and write about ‘em all. But! Hey. I gotta start some time.
This year one of my (many, many) goals was to actually sketch more. And by “more”, I mean “at all”. Every day I draw comic pages and character designs for my various scripts, but when it comes to sitting down and just doodling away for no reason? NOPE. My mind goes blank. And as a result, I’ve felt that my drawing progress has been somewhat stagnant for the last couple years.
The last time I visited France, in 2005, I went through a real artistic blossoming where I couldn’t stop sketching and journaling. My hope with this return trip, six years later, was to maybe rekindle that spark of free-flowing creativity.
In preparation, I bought a (A) Mead Five Star soft pencil case holder that stands upright, a (B) Faber-Castell pencil sharpener specifically made for colored pencils (I have the WORST luck sharpening colored pencils! Their lead always, always, ALWAYS snaps off when I use a regular sharpener.), and, on the recommendation of my brushpen-savy studiomates, two refillable (C) Niji Waterbrushes (small and medium), along with a bit of paper towel to act as an ink blotter because the brushes have a tendency to, well, blot a bit.
On hand, I already possessed a collection of Small, Fine, and Medium sized (F) Faber-Castell PITT Artist Pens (I am so partial to these guys. SUCK IT, MICRONS. Oh yeah, I went there.), my beloved (D) 0.5mm Alvin Draft Line mechanical pencil with blue lead and my back up, crappy, (D) BIC 0.7mm (also with blue lead), my brown ink (E) Staedtler Triplus Fineliner pen that I bought during my 2005 French trip and used extensively over there, though never again once returning to the USA, and a regular ol’ (E) BIC ballpoint pen. And then, of course the (G) colored pencils.
It was during my stay in France as a 21-year-old that I truly fell in love with my Prismacolor True Blue pencil, wearing it down to a diminutive length, and then never using it upon returning back to the states. It has kind of been one of my totem items that still has a strong, powerful memory-bond with me that I have kept with me for the last six years, always keeping an eye on it so that it makes it through every apartment moving I’ve undergone.
Though I would be bringing it along for good luck, I knew that it wouldn’t be able to survive a second trip as a useful drawing implement, so I picked up some substitutes in the form of Dick Blick’s Pthalo Blue pencils, which drew with the same consistency. That is, they are like drawing with butter sticks of color, it’s almost like painting.
With my art tool kit freshened up, I started sketching a bit more in the days leading up to our trip, though admittedly I still wasn’t drawing very much. But hey, any progress is welcome!
A doodle about taking a bath with Matt to help chill out my pre-flight jitters.
Dan Savaged asked his listeners to send in their worst holiday sexy stories to his podcast, The Savage LoveCast.
Though mine doesn’t actually include any sex, I think the story of how Matt met my parents for the first time during Christmas is pretty epic.
While we were walking back from The Albina Press yesterday, Matt suddenly pulled me to the side to keep me from accidentally stepping on this little guy. We immediately dropped to our knees and pressed our noses to the cement to better check him out and I made this little clip while Matt talked at the inchworm at length. Matt swept the little dude to the side so he wouldn’t get squished by the next pedestrian. It was only when we stood up that I realized an old man had been watching (and laughing! Good naturedly.) at us from his porch.
What can I say? We get excited about shit like that.