SAY HELLO TO BOTH...

BRANDEN MELENDEZ

Branden is the other male in the program. Yay! Branden's background is in anthropology and much of the work he created during the year reflected this passion. He does wonderful, stylized historic figures with great attention to their wardrobe. Below is a beautifully rendered metate in stipple. He shows us both the top and side view of it. I am very impressed by the elegance of the drawing. It is really challenging to render stone and smooth surfaces in stipple.

EVA LANGHORST

Eva's energy is contagious. She is lively and funny and makes the whole class laugh. I really appreciate her spirit and of course, her talent. Her illustrations are always unique and fun. She can always provide a different angle of perspective. Below is a wonderful illustration of parasites found in and on a common house cat. I think it is a charming illustration and captures both the tenderness of sleeping with your cat and the eeriness of unfriendly parasites that lurk around. You can see more of her work at www.scienceillustration.de.

YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK

Hi! It's been a really long time and it's time to catch everyone up. Let's see...since my last post, I've finished the Science Illustration Program at CSUMB, was taken on an amazing two week vacation to Costa Rica and finally, I just arrived to Yosemite National Park where I begin my first journey as a science illustrator.

Our last final was June 3, 2010. If you can recall from previous posts, the four classes we had in our final term were Zoological Illustration, Botanical Illustration, Applied Techniques in Science Illustration and Interactivity of Information Graphics. Below are images of my final projects. I haven't quite figured out how to post animations but will do so once I have. We had to create a simple flash animation for our graphics class. The topic I chose was tree ring growth. I can't wait to share it with all of you. Meanwhile you can enjoy my other finals. :)

PLANT USAGES

This piece was for Botanical Illustration. The assignment was called "Plant Usages," and I chose marijuana as my topic. I created a timeline of relevant dates within the history of marijuana usage.

TRANSIENT

This painting depicts threatened or endangered migratory animals that we often don't initially think of when thinking about migrating animals.

Mexican free-tailed bat
Burrowing owl
African wild dog
Wild yak
Finless porpoise
Pacific spiny lobster

I painted this piece on reclaimed drywall not only to contrast the general lifestyle of mankind to the transient nature of migrators, but also to remind the viewer of the amount of waste that is generated in order to have the lifestyle we lead.

SCIENCE NOTES

Science Notes is on-line zine that is written by the students of the Science Communication Program at UC Santa Cruz. Both this program and our program (when it was at UC Santa Cruz) started at the same time. For the last 20 some years, the illustrators of our program have teamed up with writers of the Science Communication Program to create illustrations for their articles. Every year, the finished work is published on Science Notes. The author of the story is Jane (yes, Jane) Palmer. Her story is called Cultivating Autism. This illustration shows the scientist in the article working over a petri dish of cultivated stem cells. It's a wonderful article. I don't think the latest articles/illustrations are published yet, but when they are, I will post another little shout out about it! Yay!

That about sums up what May/early June looked like for me. After school, I was swooped away on a much needed vacation to Costa Rica. Sadly, I forgot to take my camera with me and I don't have a single picture. So our vacation will have to remain a very precious secret between me and Thayer. I will mention, however, that I got to hold lots of snakes. Awesome.

So here I am in Yosemite National Park in the town of Wawona. I just got here and am settling in and already, I watched a botanist (one of my housemates) make his own beer, am in the process of making plans to go on 8 day backpacking trips to Sequoia to observe toads and join researchers as they capture and tag spotted owls. Tomorrow, with the batteries to my camera fully charged, I look forward to taking and sharing many pictures of how my life looks here at the Livingston House at Wawona Station.

SAY HELLO TO...

ANGELA MELE

Angela is our mushroom guru. Her amazingly graceful hand lends itself perfectly to the intricate world of lichen, moss and fungi. You can see more of her work at www.sporangela.com. One of my most favorite things about Angela is her no bullshit humor. It cracks me up. But aside from that, she is an incredibly talented artist with a keen attention to detail. Below is one of my favorite paintings of north Florida lichen.

NORTH FLORIDA LICHEN in GOUACHE

SAY HELLO TO...

KIRK GAO

Kirk is one of two males in a class of 15 students. It's either lucky him or really feel sorry for this guy. It all depends on the day. Paleontology is Kirk's main focus as a science illustrator and he is incredibly talented at what he does. He has so many fascinating ideas and I am always amazed by how much art history and general history knowledge he has. Kirk is also a true southern gentleman and I always appreciate a fellow cat lover.

DEINOCHEIRUS

SAY HELLO TO...

DANZA CHISHOLM-SIMS

Danza is one of my roommates and an amazing person and artist. I am always impressed by how much she knows about the natural world and she is my favorite reference book. Below is an illustration she did last semester of a hatching dragonfly.

HATCHING DRAGONFLY in GOUACHE

SAY HELLO TO....

LIZA MCELROY

Everyone in the program is so talented and all around wonderful people. It would not be the same without each and every one of them. For this reason, I will be featuring each of my classmates! Today is Liza. I really admire her creativity and her work always makes me smile. In addition to the work being beautifully rendered, Liza is able to take very serious subjects and create work that has a wonderful sense of humor as well--much like Liza, herself.

POLAR BEAR, SEAL, and OIL RIGS in WATERCOLOR

WHY NOT JUST USE A PHOTOGRAPH?

This may be one of the most commonly asked questions about science illustration. It's a good one and we have a great answer to it. The Santa Cruz Sentinel recently wrote an article about this very topic and they did a wonderful job pointing out what an illustration can do that a photograph can't. Read the article HERE. They also make a nice mention about our upcoming show at the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History along with a show exhibiting work of Northern California Guild of Science Illustrators members at the Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History. Jenny Keller (faculty of our program) and several former students of this program are in this exhibit.