THANKFUL FOR...

Happy belated Thanksgiving wishes! What a year. I feel like every year I have more and more to be thankful for because as I get older, I am more aware of all the people and things that contribute to a life I am so grateful to have, and my life becomes more rich every day. Thank you for reading my blog and adding to that richness. The support is always appreciated.

This year I went back to my parents' for the first time in like 10 years. They live in Mt. Prospect, IL, a northwest suburb of Chicago. Ah yes...I am a product of suburbia. I learned at an early age that I wanted to leave that as soon as I could, but I digress. It was an absolutely perfect visit of quality family time paired with great eats. The feast was a satisfying mix of Korean and traditional Thanksgiving fare. Delicious! During the visit, my family and I spent the next day at the Evanston Art Center and the Art Institute of Chicago which underwent a major renovation. The museum is now even better than the already exquisite museum it had always been. We finished the evening at four star restaurant, Spiaggia (meaning sea in Italian). I know. Very fancy. We were celebrating my dad's birthday and if you can't splurge for a birthday, then when can you, eh? Here are some highlights of the outing.

BOOKSTONES

These were at The Evanston Art Center and were made by artist, Pamela Paulsrud. These stones are carved out of old books. I just loved the way the text in the pages create the texture of the rock. I also enjoy that you can still flip through the stone like a book.

DETAIL OF PAINTING BY LARI PITTMAN

Although I'm not the biggest fan of Pittman's work. I really enjoyed this part of the painting.

HINOKI by CHARLES RAY

I was, of course, very attracted to this piece. It was inspired by a fallen redwood found in California. The redwood was then shipped to Japan where master sculptors copied the redwood out of Japanese Cypress.

BIRD by ANDREW ZUCKERMAN

My parents bought me this book and I am so awed and inspired by it. It is a catalogue of photos featuring birds. I don't know how he does it, but I have never seen birds captured in the way he captures them. They are hyper-realistic. I just love love love it. He has another book called Creature and it is definitely going on my book wish list.

I hope you all enjoyed your Thanksgiving holiday!

EVOLUTION

My friend, Hannah Berman, turned me onto a store in New York that sells natural world splendors. Looks like the East Coast has a Paxton Gate or Bone Room of its own.

THE EVOLUTION STORE

WHAT A HOAR

A hoary bat that is...

HOARY BAT

Lasiurus cinereus

Scratch board is a medium that is sort of the opposite of pen and ink. You apply ink on clay coated paper and then scratch away the ink where you don't want it. You will often see scratch board that has been pre-inked in black, but the disadvantage to that is you don't always want the whole surface to be black. Whoa. Imagine if I had to scrape away black around the whole bat. It's much better and faster to only paint the areas that need it. I'm learning that science illustration is learning how to make the most efficient yet effective illustration. Ha! Despite that, it is still pretty time consuming. I guess some things you just can't speed up.

LINKS

Awesome links sent to me by awesome people:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJjeG4ZFn6E

http://thinkanatomy.com/

http://www.axs3d.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blVEC0ERdnE

CYNTHIA

These are drawings that were done by my classmate, Cynthia. Cynthia is the kind of person that makes you smile every time you see her. She is like japanimation with a plethora of information. You can basically ask her any question regarding biology and she has an answer for you - not only an answer, but the correct answer. I absolutely love these drawings. I think they pretty much sum up what I know of Cynthia. Incredibly intelligent, great sense of humor with a simple and clean aesthetic. You must click on the images to see the labels and really appreciate these drawings. One of my favorites is how she showcases a hair on the whale. On top of that, I love how she includes japanese translations. See? Japanimation. Awesome.

OVERCOMING FEAR

I have a pretty intense fear of water due to a bad experience with it when I was really little. I wouldn't put my head underwater until I was about 8 and learned how to swim at a similar age. Then once I learned how to swim, I was like a little fish. I was at the YMCA all the time or at the outdoor pool in the summertime all the time. I loved it. Growing up near Chicago, I obviously wasn't getting any exposure to the ocean or a feel for what it's like to swim in it. The extent of my swimming took place in pools or lakes where the water is pretty still and very inviting. My first ocean experience was in Italy when I was 20. The wave took me out and I swallowed a bunch of sea water. I got out and didn't go back in that day. I didn't attempt to go back in the ocean until moving to California. My first attempts were in LA where the temperature of the water doesn't shock all of your muscles into tensing simultaneously. I did okay. Never actually "swam." I then decided it was ridiculous that I harbored a fear of the ocean and that I needed to do something to get over it.

Surfers - Man, I've always been attracted to surfers and surfing, and the more I watched them, the more I wanted to be able to get out there and do it, too. This past year, I was determined to learn. So I did. I've been 3 times. Each time was terrifying, but each time also got easier. Yesterday was my 4th go and I actually popped up AND more importantly, it was the first time I went in without fear. I'm not sure which I'm more proud of. Yay! I loved it and I can't wait to get back in there.

WATERBOX

ORIGINAL ARTWORK

They're finally here!

Anjel Van Slyke and Connal Hughes at Cabbage Design Company commissioned several artists to create designs for Waterbox - a stainless steel water bottle company. They not only worked with Waterbox to create this new line of bottles, but designed a great identity logo for the company as well. I was commissioned months ago to come up with a design and they are now available at REI among other retailers. I don't want to list those just yet until I know for sure which stores carry them. Several of my talented friends also created designs including Hannah Berman of Pie Bird Press and Olivia San Mateo of Olive-Route Design. Thanks Anjel for thinking of me!

OYSTERS ANYONE?

CLICK TO ENLARGE

I'm super excited about this drawing that I just finished. I think it's my favorite so far. Maybe because it has to do with food and diagrams. No. I think it's food. I'm not going to lie. I thoroughly enjoyed eating the oysters after shucking them. My hand model was my fabulous Information Graphics teacher, Amadeo Bachar.

PAINTING IN PHOTOSHOP

Cynthia, one of my classmates, made the funniest comment in crit yesterday. "It's like coloring in a color book." And it kind of is. We had to scan our last coquille drawing in and paint it in photoshop in grayscale and color. Photoshop rocks. You can do so much with it even with just basic knowledge which is what we are learning. Say hello to my striped hawk moths again. :)

WILD THINGS

We had a pretty interesting assignment in our field sketching class called Replica Illustration. It was just that. We each chose an artist to duplicate, using the same medium and size on an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper. I chose to copy Walton Ford. He is an incredible artist painting in an old natural history style with political undertones. I discovered that we share a similar story. We both obtained a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and we were both selected to spend a year in Rome through the European Honors Program. I thought that was pretty neat. Anyway, because he works very large, I could only fit a detail in an 8 1/2 x 11 frame. Housatonic Ghost Cats is 60 x 120 inches. It's really big and really beautiful.

COPY

ORIGINAL

I had a hard time getting into this assignment at first, but I ended up loving it in the end. It was really gratifying to be able to copy a work that you admire and love. You also end up learning about new ways to use the medium. An upcoming assignment will be to draw in the style of the artist we just copied. I think it will be great to be able to utilize what we got out of the replica into our own work.

Last Wednesday, the class field trip was to a place called Wild Things. Wild Things is a non-profit organization that provides homes for displaced wildlife. Many of these animals work with trainers for movies, tv, or advertising. You've probably seen some of these animals. I didn't know how I was going to feel when I got there. Although this place isn't a zoo, I was worried that I might feel a bit sad like I often do at zoos. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I felt like all the animals seemed happy and content.

This was the first time that we drew from live animals. It was exhausting. Non-stop observation of moving specimens requires a lot of concentration, and by the end of the day, I was pooped. Stupidly, I forgot my camera, so all I have to share are pages from my sketchbook. I didn't get to all the animals like I had hoped. It was such a treat, and the experience left me with such admiration for all of the animals.

ELVIS, Red Kangaroo, 6 yrs

BARBIE, African crusted porcupine, 9 yrs

At one point, I moved my chair a bit and frightened her out of her relaxed state. She instantly became twice her size as her needles burst open. It was quite intimidating and she startled me right back.

THEO, Mara patagonia cavy, 5 yrs

and

CHIP and DALE, Capybara, 1 1/2 yrs, brothers

Remember the rodents of unusual size from The Princess Bride? Well, capybara are it. They are the largest rodent.

FRED, Ostrich, age unknown

LADY and ZAIER, Lion, 13 yrs

BUTCH, Elephant, 31 yrs, only male elephant

ED, Spotted Hyena, 2 1/2 - 3 yrs

MR. HOBBS, Tiger, 4 yrs

MISCHA, Siberian Lynx, 21 yrs

HUMPHREY, Camel, age unknown

TAKING ADVANTAGE OF FREE TIME

I don't know if this is obvious, but this program is extremely rigorous. Not only are we in class all week, but homework as you can imagine, is incredibly time consuming. It is not uncommon for a drawing to take 20 or more hours start to finish. Although we were given the usual work load, I found myself with more time to also enjoy myself outside of school. So I did!

THURSDAY and FRIDAY:

As I mentioned in an earlier post, two of my classmates and I went to dinner at a wonderful place in Big Sur called Nepenthe. I forgot to provide a link to the restaurant so here you go: http://www.nepenthebigsur.com/ And on Friday, my friend Mark came down to say hello. We went to Lallapalooza restaurant in Monterey. I don't think you can ever go wrong when your weekend is kicked off with two really good meals and good people.

SATURDAY:

I went birding for the first time. I never realized how surrounded by them we are at all times. They are good at going unnoticed and that's just what they are most of the time - unnoticed. It was great to notice them. The tour guide, Rick Fournier, and his wife, Cheryl, were so fantastic and made the newbie feel very welcome. It's pretty fast paced, and the more experienced birder will call out, "Ooh! I just spotted an Aleutian," and I'm like, "Yes. Of course. An Aleutian." Below are pics I took while birding. Unfortunately, there aren't too many with birds in them because the birds we did see were often in flight or too far for my camera to capture.

MIX OF SHORE BIRDS

EGRET

PEOPLE ON THE TOUR

SUNDAY:

Then on Sunday, a bunch of us spent the day in Santa Cruz. We started our day at the Harbor Cafe on 7th Ave. Two of my friends own the restaurant and they do such a great job with it. The atmosphere is super laid back with a beach shack feel. I've never ever been disappointed by a meal. Yesterday, I had a chipotle tri-tip omelette. Delicious! It's inexpensive and the owners Dan and Max are two of the nicest people I have ever met.

Afterwards, we drove along Highway 9 where several state parks are located including Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park. The weather was perfect for hiking and we spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying our surroundings. These trails are also popular horse trails. Have I ever mentioned how much I love horseback riding? I was super excited every time I saw a horse and I swear it had nothing to do with the fact that he was carrying a hot guy wearing a cowboy hat and a plaid shirt. Below are pictures from the hike. I didn't get one of the hot guy on a horse. Sorry.

BANANA SLUG

INSIDE A REDWOOD LOOKING UP

OYSTER MUSHROOM

My classmate, Angela informed me later that these are edible. Wish I had known that at the time. I would have foraged!

PINE CONE GRAVEYARD

Sarah cleverly came up with this caption. It really did look like a graveyard of pine cone. It was like all the pine cone in the forest were dumped in that one spot.

MY BOOK WISH LIST

I just saw this on Bay Area Tendrils blog and want to get my hands on it!  And speaking of books, here are a few more books I have my eye on.  The list is very long, so I'll share only my most recent desires.

PLAYING CATCH-UP

It's been too long since my last post and too much has happened to not post and exciting things to happen this weekend to post about.

PHOTO MANIPULATION

We've finally graduated from Adobe Illustrator into the satisfying world of Adobe Photoshop.  Don't get me wrong, now that I know the basics of Illustrator, I can think of a million ways it will be useful to me and would have been useful to me.  Oh, but Photoshop....

Our first assignment using Photoshop was photo manipulation of two or more photos.  So CSUMB was established on part of the former Fort Ord Army base.  While a good portion of the campus has been renovated, many of the old buildings still remain.  I'm sure the whole campus will eventually look brand new, but I appreciate and am attracted to the remnants of Fort Ord.  The original assignment was to take photos around campus and change the photo by restoring the buildings or the landscapings, adding elements, subtracting elements, etc.  Obviously, my project is not of campus.  When we were going over different tools and techniques we could use in this assignment, I thought it would be neat to create a hybrid of two things.  I was thinking an animal would be fun.  You know, like a Liger in Napoleon Dynamite but I decided to put two of my house plants together instead.  Fortunately, Amadeo (my teacher) was nice enough to let me alter the assignment a bit.  I chose one of my favorites, the Chicken Gizzard, to blend with a philodendron.  I love my Chicken Gizzard, not only because it is really beautiful, but because it tells me when it needs to be watered.  It droops over the edge of the pot when it is thirsty and once I water it, it springs back up within an hour.  It's really amazing to watch.  Yes, you can actually see it rise!  When this one droops, I know it is time to water the rest of my plants. 

I feel the need to make a disclaimer that in no way was this a scientific project.  It was purely an imaginative rendering.  I have no idea if these two plants can realistically be cross-bred and if they could, what the visual end result would be.  It would just be neat to have a plant like the one I made up!  :)   I particularly like the coloring I added to the leaves of the philodendron.  Yay!

TEXTURES IN PEN AND INK

STRIPED HAWK MOTH IN 3 VIEWS

Our last two assignments in our Intro to Natural Science Illustration class were another pen and ink exercise and a final coquille drawing.  The purpose of the texture exercise in pen and ink was to experiment with the different ways with which line can be used to create a variety of surfaces.  From right to left:  

1.  kitchen sponge

2.  raccoon tail

3.  philodendron leaf

4.  back of a carved owl head

5.  monkey puzzle tree

6.  starfish surface

7.  towel seaweed

8.  frosted mini wheat

9.  puffin cereal

10. turtle shell

11. cork coaster

12. magnolia carpel stamen scars

We each had to make enough photocopies of our textures to give to everyone in the class.  What a treat!  It was pretty fantastic to see all the different ways my classmates rendered different surfaces and in ways that I would have never thought to render them.

Coquille is a type of paper with a texture when drawn on, mimics the look of stipples.  It is a much quicker way to achieve texture and a great medium for reproduction.  While coquille isn't exactly the most precise medium, when reproduced and reduced, the drawing tightens up quite a bit to become a sensitive illustration.  I borrowed these hawk moths from the UC Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History.

Last night my classmates, Annette and Sarah drove down to Big Sur for dinner at Nepenthe.  The restaurant was a really cozy log cabin feel with a fire burning in the center.  There is outdoor seating over looking the beautiful landscape.  Of course the food was great and we had a great server named Julie.

WEEKEND PLANS I'LL BE POSTING ABOUT:

I'm excited about two things in particular this weekend.  Every first Saturday of the month, Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve in Moss Landing hosts an early bird tour.  This is a special birding tour led by Rick Fournier of Monterey Birding Adventures.  

The second thing I'm looking forward to is hiking off of highway 9 in Santa Cruz with a couple of classmates (Annette, Sarah, Arianna).  We haven't decided which trail but whichever one we choose, I can't wait!  I'll be taking a lot of photos so check back to see them.

Hope you all have a great weekend!