Learn to… Art!

3 Things the Sims Taught Me About Painting

Jul 28, 2011 Art General, Painting

Finish a painting, toss it into the air and get cash…

If only it were that easy!

Okay, so the Sims isn’t completely realistic when it comes to being an artist, but it actually has a few things to teach us about being a successful painter.

For those of you who are living under a rock and are thinking, “what the heck is the Sims?” here’s a quick rundown: The Sims is a game that simulates real life. You take control of a household of sims, or people, who have unique personalities, aspirations and goals. You are responsible for making sure your sims are cleaning house, cooking food, going to work, socializing, and having fun.

And here’s my dirty little secret of the day… I love playing the Sims! Yep, I’m that much of a dork.

The cool feature about the game is that your sim can be an artist. It’s more a hobby than a career, but with some practice, it can be quite lucrative. As I was playing yesterday, I began to realize that this mindless game has some valuable things to teach us about what it takes to be a successful artist.

Here are three lessons about painting learned from the Sims:

1. Don’t Quit Your Day Job

Even in the sim world, bills have to be paid. The myth of the starving artist is just a myth, and the reality is that a day job serves a very necessary purpose. It’s the day job that keeps you clothed, fed, sheltered, not to mention able to buy art supplies. The key to having a job and being an artist, in life and in the Sims, is making sure you spend time painting. Try to dedicate an hour, or even half an hour a day in the studio. It doesn’t have to be  a lot of time, but making that commitment is important.

In the Sims, as you progress as an artist, you are able to sell your paintings for more and more money. When you get to the point that you are selling paintings for more than you can make at work, then it’s time to quit. In reality, this would take much, much longer! The same rules apply, though, and when you get to the point that your art can consistently sustain whatever lifestyle you have determined necessary, then lose the day job. Until then, keep it up and don’t resent it. Without that day job you may not have a roof over your head!

2. Paint, Paint, Paint

The only way for a sim to become a better artist and increase the value of his paintings is to paint. A lot. The more the sim paints, the more quickly he will gain skills. Isn’t this true of real life?

We’ve all heard the phrase “practice makes perfect,” but do we really buy into it? I don’t think we do, but we should because it’s true. The only way to get better at something is to practice, and the more you practice the more you improve. If I spent as many hours out of a day in the studio as my sim spent painting, I’d quickly become more experienced and more skilled. It can be hard to fit everything in, especially considering number one, but give yourself permission to skip the dishes one night and do a little painting. It’s important and it’s worth it!

3. Quality will Follow Quantity

Perhaps the toughest lesson to accept.

In the Sims, artists have different types of paintings they can create: regular, brilliant, and masterpieces. The more skilled your sim, the more likely he is to paint brilliant paintings and then masterpieces. But, he will never consistently produce either. It’s totally random.

This absolutely applies to real life. People often think that quality and quantity are mutually exclusive, but the more paintings you paint, the more likely you will be to paint a really great piece. I don’t mean that you should be whipping out piece after piece regardless of the quality. It’s more that you should focus on producing as much as you can of the best work that you can, but don’t get caught up in creating a perfect piece every time. Accept that some pieces will be better than others and instead of worrying at it forever trying to fix it, move on to a new painting. You can always come back to the other piece to fix it.

There you have it, three things I learned about painting from playing the Sims. Follow these three lessons and you could be selling paintings for upwards of $5000 in just a few weeks just like my sim!

…Or not.

Tags: getting started, motivation, time management

The “Get Your Art Into a Gallery” Checklist

Aug 23, 2010 Promotion and Exhibition

A couple of weeks ago I talked about the importance of informally acknowledging your goals. This practice can help you begin the process of breaking an overwhelming aspiration into manageable steps, an essential part of attaining your goals.

Probably the most common and overwhelming of an artist’s goals is that of getting a gallery exhibition. What do you need to do? Where do you start?

Here is a checklist of the steps I believe are necessary to prepare you for applying for a gallery exhibition. Where you are in your art career will determine where you are on the checklist. Obviously many of these steps will require time and dedication. This isn’t something you can do in an afternoon! If you are early in your career, it may take a year or more before you’re ready to apply for an exhibition.

For a  more detailed explanation of any of the steps, click on the links provided.

The “Get Your Art Into a Gallery” Checklist

Create a cohesive body of work.

From your body of work, select the art for your proposal.

Get good quality documentation of your selected works.

Research galleries to find the right venue for your art and find out their submission guidelines.

Write an artist statement.

Write a proposal outlining the details of your exhibition.

Create your artist resume or CV detailing your education and accomplishments as an artist.

Write a short cover letter to each gallery introducing yourself and your art.

Assemble your exhibition proposal.

Ensure that your entire package is presented in a professional way.

Once your exhibition package is complete, you are ready to ship it out to your intended galleries! Don’t forget to check their submission deadlines.

Also remember that you probably will not hear back for several months. It takes time for the curators to go through every submission.

Extra Advice: Keep track of the galleries you’ve applied to and their responses. Don’t get discouraged by a “thanks but no thanks” letter. You can always try again the following exhibition year!

Tags: exhibitions, galleries, getting started

How to Make a Tortillon in 5 Easy Steps

Dec 6, 2009 Drawing

1. Get a piece of paper. Any kind of paper will work, including computer paper. Experiment with different kinds and see if there’s one you like best!

2. Cut the paper in half diagonally, about an inch from each corner. You now have the makings for two tortillons.

3. Starting at the short edge, roll the paper up as tightly as you can. This might be a bit tricky at first, but you’ll soon get the hang of it!

4. Use something long and thin to poke into the end of your tortillon. The wrong end of a skinny paint brush works well! Push the tube out to create the point.

5. Use a small piece of tape to secure the end and voila! Your very own homemade tortillon!

I used to do this all the time when I first started drawing. I had to practice a few times before I could remember the exact technique, but it’s not at all difficult.

A blending stick is just a tightly rolled piece of paper. Tortillons are not exactly expensive, but making your own can save a bit of money. It can also save your butt if you desperately need a clean one and you can’t go buy one!

If you’ve just read this and you’re thinking, “What the heck is a tortillon?” a tortillon is a tool that you use when shading pencil drawings. It can also be called a blending stick or blending stump. Have a look at my drawing tools page for more details!

Tags: blending, getting started, tools, Tutorials

How to Shade a Sphere – Tutorial

Sep 4, 2009 Drawing, Tutorials

Aside from being an impressive skill to brag about to your friends, knowing how to draw and shade a sphere can really help you when it comes to realistic drawings. The shading of a sphere is what shows us that it is a round, three dimensional object and not just a flat circle. Once you know how to shade a sphere, you also have the tools to shade an apple, the tip of a nose, the cheeks and forehead. The principle is the same!

When drawing a sphere, you need to consider your light source.

Here we can see that the light source is coming from the left of the sphere. This puts the highlight on the left of the ball, and casts a shadow to the right. You can see on the bottom right where the light has bounced off the floor and back onto the sphere to create a reflection in the shadowed area.

Here, the light is coming from the front and to the left of the sphere. This changes the shadows. Now the cast shadow is coming from the back of the sphere, and the highlight is more towards the middle. Notice that we still have a reflection at on the back edge of the sphere.

In this example, the light is coming from behind and to the left of the sphere. The cast shadow is in front and the highlight towards the left, top edge. The area of reflected light is now much bigger, and our shadow is darker.

Backlighting is much more dramatic. The highlight is along the very top edge and the shadow is very deep.

How to Shade a Sphere Tutorial

I’m going to be working from life for this one, using the first example as a reference. Your first step is to draw the outline of your sphere and the shadow it casts using a B pencil. To get the shape of the shadow right, it can sometimes help to draw the whole thing on top of the sphere, then erase your lines.

Next, outline the edges of your shadows and highlights. I usually draw the highlight bigger than what I want so that I can shade up to that point and blend past it. You want to keep the highlight as white as possible.

Still using your B pencil, start to very lightly shade the area around the highlight. Work your way to the edge of the sphere and the edge of the shadow.

Squint to see the more subtle shading of this shape, and add another darker layer along the edge of the shadow. You don’t need to press any harder, just keep shading the same area until it gradually gets darker.

Now take your 2B pencil and shade in the entire shadow area. Try to make a gradual transition between the shadow and the midtones. You don’t want a solid line between the two.

Again, we’ll use the same pencil to shade in another darker layer where we see the darkest shadows.

Now the fun part! Use your blending stick to blend your pencil marks together. It’s important to work from light to dark. Start at the highlight and blend inwards, keeping the center free of graphite. You want the white of the paper to show through as the brightest part.

Next, we’ll work on the cast shadow. The edge of the sphere against the cast shadow should be nice and sharp. Since the cast shadow is the darkest value, use a 4B pencil to shade in the area directly underneath the sphere.

Using your 2B again, shade in the rest of the shadow. You’ll notice that in my reference, there is a second light source (the window) that is causing different shapes to appear within the shadow.  This second, dimmer light source is casting a second, lighter shadow.

Now you can blend out the shadow. Pay attention to the edges of your cast shadow. It is sharper closer to the sphere and gets lighter and softer the further away it gets. At this point, you’re almost done! All you need to do is use your kneaded eraser to clean up your edges and re-define your highlight and the reflection. Voila, a sphere!

Now you can use your skills to draw virtually anything with a rounded shape. The rules are the same! A highlight, a range of midtones, the shadow with a reflection, and a cast shadow! Practice this using a ball and a lamp to hone your skills and try out different light sources. Have fun!

Tags: blending, getting started, shading, Tutorials

All About Drawing with a Reference Photo

Aug 29, 2009 Art General, Drawing

As you learn to draw, your reference photo is going to be your best friend. Aside from life drawing, using a reference is the best way for you to learn structure and proportion.

Why Do I Need a Reference?

If you’re the kind of artist who likes to draw from his imagination, by all means, continue! You can still find references for the individual elements of the composition you want to create. A hand from this photo, a facial expression from that one, a pose from another. Having something to refer to will go a long way towards making your drawings more believable and realistic.

An example is a drawing I did a few years ago. It started with the idea of a medieval style woman leaning against a door with her hand on her hip. The image on the left is straight out of my head. Notice how awkward and unnatural the figure seems! It wasn’t working, so I snapped a picture of myself in the pose I wanted. The picture on the right is the result of having that reference to look at. It’s still a simple cartoonish drawing, but the figure is much more natural and believable.                              

So now that I’ve convinced you that you need a reference, let’s talk about finding the right one!

• Detail

You need to find an image that has a close-up, detailed image of the subject you want to draw. It’s no good trying to draw a portrait when the person in the photo is so far away their eyes are just two dark spots. If you’re going to draw it, you should be able to see it! In this photo, we can’t see enough of the flower to be able to do a drawing of it. 

• Quality

The better your reference is, the better your drawing will be. Don’t choose a photo that is blurry or pixellated. When I do commissions, I ask for as high-resolution a photo as possible. I know that my customers are expecting a recognizable likeness of their loved ones, and the only way I can get that is by using a good quality photo. Here, you can see the general shape of the flower, but it’s too blurry to see the details. 

• Lighting

Lighting is extremely important to consider when choosing a reference photo. You don’t want a dark, gray photo, but you don’t want one that is too bright and washed out. Pick a reference that has a good range of value from dark shadows to highlights, and midtones in between. Try to avoid photos with flash, if possible. The light from a flash is very harsh. It creates unnatural cast shadows and makes everything closest to the camera too bright. You can see how the flash creates very dark shadows and actually changes the colours in this photo.

Photos from Magazines

Magazines are probably the most accessible high quality images you will find. They can be either really good, or really bad. The problem is that they are beautiful photos that translate into flat drawings. This happens because they often use several light sources to evenly light the subject. This gets rid of most of the information that tells us about the contours of the subject. If I were to draw this face, there’s not much shading I could do. The drawing would be her head and her facial features.

On the other hand, you can find some “artistic” photos in magazines. These use more dramatic lighting and give you way more to work with in terms of shadows. It’s all a matter of choosing carefully. Be aware of copyright laws, though! You can practice with these images, but you can’t exhibit them or use them for profit in any way.

Ways to Use a Reference

There are different ways to draw from a reference photo. The firs two involve drawing realistically and trying to recreate the image in a believable way. You can use a grid to do this, or you can “eyeball it” using measurements and proportions.

The third way is to use an image as inspiration and draw your interpretation of the object. This can be as expressive and abstract as you want it o be. Maybe it’s the colour arrangement that interests you, or the patterns of light and dark, or the contour lines. I went to school with an artist who painted abstracts that incorporated delicate, wiggling lines of paint. You’d never know it, but her reference for those pieces was tree branches.

Where to Get Reference Images

Most agree that it’s best to take your own reference photos. That way you can control the lighting and composition. Do this as often as possible. I’ve also asked to borrow other people’s photos to use as a reference. Taking your own photos isn’t always possible, though. If you want to draw the Eiffel Tower and you’re able to pick up and go to France… well, good for you!!

What can the rest of us do?

There are online services, that provide royalty free stock photos. This means that the photographer has given permission for that image to be used for commercial purposes. Some of these sites, like Free Digital Photos, are free. The higher quality ones, like iStockphoto, usually have more selection and require a small fee for each image.

Another option is the Reference Library at Wetcanvas. This is a user-run forum where anyone is welcome to upload their own photos for others to use. The good thing about this is it’s free and you know the photographer has given permission for the picture to be reproduced. The bad thing is that the quality may not be what you’re looking for. It can be a good place to start, though. There are lots of categories to browse through, and if you can’t find what you need you can always make a request.

Be careful about using photos you find online (or in books and magazines). Don’t use someone else’s work without their permission. Respect copyright laws, as they are there to protect creative works, including your own!

Combining References

Don’t feel like you have to stick with just one reference. You can combine different images to get just the composition you want. I’ve often done commissions where the customer wants a portrait of their kids, but only has separate photos of them. In a case like this, I would usually combine the images digitally to find a natural way for the figures to fit together. Be careful about size and scale when you do this, you don’t want someone to end up with a freakishly large head!

For another commission, I was asked to do a drawing depicting a woman’s birthday. She wanted herself in there, her son, her daughter, a banner in the background and the cake! Each of these was a different reference. There were no photos of her son at the birthday, so I used a completely separate picture for him. The photo of her daughter was very poor quality, so I used it for the pose and the dress only. I used a different reference for her face. By doing this, I was able to capture the specific details of the birthday, but also draw a recognizable likeness of each of her kids.

In Conclusion

Reference photos definitely come in handy! Eventually, you may become familiar enough with your drawing subject that you don’t always need one, but in the beginning, you just can’t rely on your memory!

Tags: art tips, better drawings, drawing tips, getting started