"Keep swinging that....." He grinned very wide like a young boy about to get into trouble. Ray gave me a sly look as if he was going to write something perverted. I stared at the book and kind of tilted my head trying to better grasp the situation. The blank spot remained empty.
"Er what?" I kinda scratched my face nervously.
 After a moment of confusion he scribbled the rest of the saying and added a drawing on the paper.
"Can you read it? Do you know what that says?"
"Ummm keep everything that uh brunnnch or is it lunch?"
"Nope thats not it."
"It says keep swinging that brush I write that in everybody's book."
"Its all about brush mileage the more you draw the better you get. Your making a step forward on your journey."      
"Oh ok I see."
"If your doing artwork like this now then imagine what you'll be doing in forty years or even in five."

For the last couple of months I've been going to the Saturday Portrait group. Recently he's been giving me pointers on how to improve my paintings. Ray is the mentor and the grandpa I'd never had. I've been seeing weekly improvement.

Honestly I look forward to what I will become and what I will do next.
I'm starting to understand what Robert Henri meant when he said, "As an artist you have to makeup your mind to be alone in many ways." When I first ran across this I thought oh my goodness hes endorsing hermit artists. Do I really want to live my life like that? Seriously who wants that? Weirdo.

Having thought of that for awhile what he means and reviewing the entire quote, "The work of the art student is no light matter. Few have the courage and stamina to see it through. You have to make up your mind to be alone in many ways."

My reinterpretation and from my current understanding. Not everyone can be a grand master sensei in their craft. It takes hours and years of  dedication and intense practice sort of like knuckle push ups. Not everyone can be at the summit of the mountain.

This journey will be interesting. I'm on my way. Watch me. Behold I am like a shark. No one sees me coming but when you finally see me, I'm already there bout to chomp out the competition.


These  paintings have were done in the last few Saturday sessions.

Last session Daniel 02/15/14

The week before Toma  02/08/14

 Just for kicks I was working on this around the same time last year. I think the model was Deb.

I

I also was hired again to be a artist model. A few weeks ago on Saturday and yesterday. Normally I draw from models but one of the other artists in the group back in January requested I sit and be the model.

It also has been a strange week. Having gotten sick again for over working myself followed by an allergy attack which feels just as terrible. With all this going on I was hired for an odd art consulting/ photo manipulating job with a person of an eccentric personality. Making this business relationship and arrangement longer than it had to be. Might as well been attacked by a cougar baby. 

Most of the members of the group were fascinated by my skin and features which are not that common. My mother was a native of the Philippines who came to the States around my age with my African-American father who was in the military. At some points it felt like being mobbed by aunts. Oh look I never noticed you have a small nose, ears, etc. Eh sometimes I wish I was taller or bigger. I always blame my Filipino mother for that.

One of the strangest aspects of this was I'm used to being on the other side of the canvas not on the canvas. Or the second time around I felt like a spectator a bench warmer. I wanted to draw the people around me and be a part of it. Kind of ironic in middle school when there was un-even teams with basketball the PE teacher did not mind if I sat out. I was so bad he preferred I sit out.

II

Now as an artist I see things. Observe them. Everything has meaning. Not like in the A&E tv show Hoarder's way. A lot can be told in one's gesture, posture, mannerisms, facial features. One of my favorite things that reveals alot about a person is their hands. They tell a story on their own. For instance there was this person who almost all the times I saw him had small cuts on his fingers or wore band-aids. Now I wasn't exactly sure what they were from but I made up a fictitious story about that. What caused these incisions? Tiny gears? Why and how?

Or another instance when I used to work at a restaurant there was a semi-regular customer who one day I noticed had a trace of oil paint on his hands and fingernails. I asked him if he was an artist. This freaked him out. He did not have any obvious ques he was an artist nor mention anything of the sort. He panicked and looked at me as if I was a psycho stalker freak and quickly left.

Well the next time I saw him I explained how I knew he was an artist was he had paint on his hands like mine when I work traditionally. After that he somewhat respected me more and did not just judge me as a fast food worker. He gave me his business card and terrible directions to a gallery he sits in on the weekends. I have yet to find it. With my terrible sense of direction.

The point is while I observe my surroundings as an artist other artists do that as well. A sketch hunter. It's like being in a room full of ninjas. Everyone is a ninja. Deadly. Almost nothing goes unnoticed. Practically every ninja can do a back flip. What makes their back flip unique from everyone elses?

My friend Elizabeth Jose's photos and painting. These 2.

                                                                            John

                                                                      Ginny

George Chacon

Giovanna Papponetti

Art Dump. For the lack of art in the updates. Working on a new theme that I hope to share soon.

Figure Drawings 

I'm a fan of over-the top style assassin movies like the Bounty Killer. Overload in cheesyness but nethertheless wanted to run with my theme of lame action movies. Pt. 1 was a guy based
off of a phrase of a mix of bad Spanish, Italian, and English, "Mucho Gusto nice to killz yous. Requiscant sin Pace Bastardo." Which is "Nice to meet you. Nice to killz yous. Rest without peace bastard."

Pt. 2 Unknown female character.

Titled "Does Your Soul Cry?"

Haven't done anime style in awhile. Sketch for a marker piece in progress.

It is based off of the song "Retrograde" by James Blake. 

When I first heard it I cried. Recently heard it again the other day 

and involuntarily the same effect happened. So I sketched that feeling out. 

I hope to convey that same feeling well.  

At my New Year's party my friends and I attempted to watch many movies. Watched part of movies and didn't pay much attention what was going on before moving on to the next movie. Nothing was accomplished except singing karoke to 90's hit music and Back Street Boys. With a side track mission in doing the Gangnam style while drunken style. Which I won second place in not messing up by default.

 Back to the main point finally had time to watch one of my favorite movies that evening. That movie was Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog. It is about an aspiring villain trying to be accepted in the Evil League of Evil. While singing blog posts about his life. A short 45 minute movie on Netflix.  Its an awesome movie and I recommend it.

SSS! in the game Devil May Cry4 in stylish point ranking =Smokin' Sick Style.

Finally. After a few months of eyeing a solid state hard drive I have one now. And new ram. Yuuuuss! WoowHoo! I'm on a joy ride. I was hesitant of getting one. But it was worth the risk despite what friends of mine have said. Feels like a new computer.

My setup is a dell studio 1737 which now has 8gb or ram and a Crucial Solid State Hard drive 240gb. Booting up the computer only takes about 30 seconds. And programs like Photoshop and Corel Painter load instantly.

About SSD drives

A new feature in the latest versions of Corel Painter 12 and X3 is the real watercolor and oils. It simulates live paint and dries once the stroke is place. Which is amazing to watch the paint dry but at the same time it makes the computer feel like its sprinting up a mountain. And failing miserbly.

The slow computer has put a halt on digital painting for a few weeks and doing speed paintings have been almost virtually impossible.

This was done last month. >___> My bad.  Arroyo Seco 1hr 45mins. Saw a herd of cows one day wished I was closer to observe them and sketch. It reminded me of a place near where I grew up called Vacaville. Which if one knew basic spanish they would get the idea of what is there.

I'm back on track with my upgrades. Everything is so fast I'm readjusting with a stress free no hiccup performance computer. All this makes me go Nemurenai Aru mode.

Nemurenai Aru from the anime Gintama. One of the best long-running animes out there. 

Hit and miss. Missed more than hit something. But those moments the Ah-Ha! moments make it worthwhile and exciting.

This quote is from the book the "Art Spirit" by Robert Henri which is very inspirational highly recommended.

“The sketch hunter moves through life as he finds it, not passing negligently the things he loves, but stopping to know them, and to note them down in the shorthand of his sketchbook.”

Last week I was bummed to be extremely late for the drawing session. I made it to the last hour where only two twenty-five minute poses were left. I did not warm up and felt like fish out of water. Made a horrible drawing. This was a disapointment. I didn't expect to make a masterpiece or a magnum opus. But there wasn't a single redeeming quality to justify this action. To top it off midway through I had forgot to bring an eraser. Which topped the stress level.

During the break before the last pose something clicked. I remained in my seat and started warming up making random strokes. I observed the model. The mannerisms the quick gestures I caught them. Within the next session I was able to focus and got into serious mode trance. Where everything just flowed. My hand was in coordination with what I was seeing. Next thing I know I was able to recreate the model.

I live for those moments where I get into a trance with drawing. Not thinking about anything just doing. This is one of the reasons why I draw.

Another note when I mope around about terrible drawing I refer back to this.
I've reposted this I don't know how many times. Its a good kick but be warned there is excessive profanity to prove the main point. ;]  http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=135551

Had a good New Year. Nevertheless some turbulence but back on track. Then hit the jackpot of the sickness roulette. Which was strange because I got the complete opposite of cold symptoms of people I have come in contact with.

Anyways my point is when I got sick and like a sick middle schooler who stays home I lounged around and played video games for the good portion of the day with no care in the world.

For a long time I was hesitant buying the game because of G4's Xplay review leaned more to this game was a bit broken and needed some work. Well finally got this game for Christmas along with Red Dead Redemption whom my buddy on the psn has been suggesting I should get for the multi-player.
 This was a nice unexpected surprise its way different in a good way of any game out there.

Overall the game at times brought frustration and anger in my life and multiple times I had to stop myself from throwing the controller at the tv. To me the difficulty was reminiscent of older games where one had to rely on memorization techniques to clear a level. Games in contemporary times are much easier but this game was a challenge but not impossible.

Catherine is a unique game that has consequences to many actions and questions asked in the game. There are multiple paths and 8 different endings. A friend of mine suggested playing the easy mode so the in-game techniques can be used. But being stubborn I rose to occasion and maintained and finished on normal mode. Woohooo!

*Spoilers!*~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The story changes as the main character Vincent responds to other characters. There was a brief moment were I despised both of the main female characters and avoided them and played the blame game that it was not my fault for anything that has happened. And I turned the tables. The ingame friends were skeptical when I accused someone else for also doing what I have done.

 It is interesting the story is dictated by a mysterious meter which at first thought was a morality meter like other games. This was not the case. The meter is revealed in the end if the player opted for a life of true Freedom or Order.

After talking to a friend who had played this game who I talked to around starting the game told me to play the game as I would like to regardless of hurting others feelings. He told me that whatever ending that happened tells a bit about who you are. I was curious how I would end up. I was close to the freedom ending at times.

 Toward the end of the game I got dumped by the girlfriend and brooded in the rain for awhile. Then I realized she wasn't such as bad person and really thought about the situation. My character and attitude changed and so did the nagging girlfriend. In the end there was another chance and we worked it out. I got the normal lover ending where you wake up with the other person and talk about the future. My friend on the other hand got the Freedom ending where Vincent rides solo and is not chained down and is a free spirit.

 Catherine has a lot of hidden Easter eggs which were brought to my attention through my friend. Like for example in the real world if Vincent is real drunk he can move faster in the nightmare stages than if he was sober. It is a really a mature game not for kids.

It took a week to beat this game even when I put it down for a few days because of the frustration levels at times. But it is interesting the endings range from being a demon king with a harem of demon chicks clinging onto you, living your ultimate dream of raising enough money for a space tour by yourself and of course getting married.
_____________________________________

You can look now :P


Definitely give this game a chance if your into something that is different and rewarding after solving the block puzzles.