Self Portrait 33

Hey guys!

sooo... finally made it to a third of the way through. It's very difficult to discipline yourself to do this every day, but I guess it's something to continue anyway, and press on till the end. It doesn't always matter that you win the marathon, just that you finish it.

At any rate. Continuing on... I didn't really feel up to starting this, but I did. Then I wasn't happy at all with where it was going, but I continued. I spent more time than I wanted to on this guy, but less time than I needed to. Ha-ha! I would've really liked to have gotten the rendering worked out better.
I hope everything's well with you all. The baby's due today, but still no sign of her coming. Stubborn little girl. Amy's upstairs calling around saying "Where's my baby!? It was supposed to be delivered today!" Ha-ha! What a goof. It'll probably be more like next week. We're really excited, but mostly just waiting for the waiting to be over.

Take care and be good.
Your friend
Jeffrey

Self Portrait 27-32: Battling my insecurities

So I mentioned that I fight with myself a lot. I second guess, make mistakes, commit too early, fail to commit... it's stuff we all go through. This guy is an element for a drawing idea that I had awhile back. "King Coyote Constantly Battles His Insecurities" Ha-ha! So the Hydra seemed like an obvious choice... many heads, same beast. The next element I think is going to be sort of a nordic warrior... Maybe a Greek hoplite... I don't know exactly yet. Then I'll go to town in PS and color the whole thing. Should be fun.

I actually think this drawing is pretty strong, by the way. I hate to say I'm getting comfortable, so we'll go with it's getting easier to try new things, and new poses. There's still a lot of work to do though.
As always, thanks for looking. Take care and be good!
Your friend
Jeffrey.

P.S. I've been listening to the Sidebar Nation podcast lately. If you haven't checked it out yet you really should. There's a lot of excellent interviews with working artists.

Self Portrait 26

Hey Kids!

It's an interesting thing that there are blogs that I check everyday, and that I'm disappointed when they don't update. Yet, here I am with at daily blog that hasn't been updated in two months.

All I can say is sorry, and try to press on. Once you fall off the horse, it's sometimes hard to get back on.

Thought I'd do a little design portrait. I've been concentrating on drawing so much lately that my meager design skills are going down the toilet. I fight with my self a lot... ha-ha! I hope it doesn't sound like I'm a whiney bitch. At any rate, this is the first of the second quarter of Sp's. The design is kind of blah, but It's late and I need to get to bed.

I hope everythings good with you all. Take care, and be good.
Your friend
Jeffrey

Self Portraits 24 and 25 of 100

Hi kids!

Boy, I'm really running behind! Ha-ha! (okay, okay, not funny.) So I have two today. First up is a revisit of the SP from a couple of posts ago. I know it's not really new, but it is new work. Please forgive me.

So... painting in photoshop. I have a few things to say about this.

I'm not much of a painter. There are some nice painterly things about this particular job, but it's really my inkwork that saves it from being a big mess. I'm still learning, and I think getting better (I really am trying to listen to what people have to say about my technique, and I promice that I will try to pay heed to learn control over value in favor over color) but there is still a long road to go. I truly admire those people that can do this without keeping their original drawing intact or without one at all.


This second drawing... I don't know. It's kind of part of a Character concept idea I'm working on, and partly the start of an illustration idea that I had for how I was feeling that day... The idea was abandoned because I was tired. I'm a lot skinnier in this drawing than I actually am right now. The Gym is calling to me... I spend far too much time sitting and drawing (and eating stuff that's not good for me). I did the body out of my head, and the head from a mirror.

Just a sketch, but I think my bodies and hands are getting stronger. I still have to redo a lot of things at work, but I'm getting better. My boss and I have a lot of frustrating days. I hope that in the near future I can be less of a worry to him. I know he has more than enough other stuff to worry about. Speed and accuracy... (sigh)

Okay, that's it for today.
Take care and be good.
Your friend
Jeffrey Johnson

Self portrait 24 of 100

Hey kids!

Got another little graphic gem for you, Ha-ha! I finally got caught up on some of my projects, so hopefully I'll be getting to this more regularly. I looked at my calendar yesterday, and It looks like on friday I'll be 27 portraits behind... Oops! So, I'm getting back to it, and getting caught up... ish. Ha-ha!

So, anyway, I built this whole image in Corel Draw. It took about three hours total. I have another one in the works using the same head, with some small changes. I'll have that one out in the next few days hopefully. I think there're like three pieces I still have to do to it.

I've been talking to Ryan about art, and where I'm going with it and what I want to do with it lately. One of the things he had to say, is that (at least for him) there's been too much working toward trying to impress other people, and not enough just because he enjoys it. To add to that, I was looking through some of my old drawings, and there was a lot more stuff that I just did because I wanted to do it. I think part of my path right now is to find a balance between the two. It's really hard to produce "quality" work, and sometimes the effort gets depressing, but it still has to be done in order to be marketable. I still gots to eat, right?

Thats about it for today. I think my "internet provider" finally password protected his network, so I'll have to update when I can (mostly after work) so I'll see you when I see you.

Take care and be good.
Your friend
Jeffrey Johnson

Self Portrait 23 of 100

Hey Guys!

Got a little graphic illustration for ya tonite! I'm kind of going back and forth about how accurate this drawing is... At any rate, I think it's a pretty good one. I was inspired by the awesome ink work of Scott Fischer. Didn't really come close to emulating his style, but I think I'll give it another go.

Ryan says I need to do more work in Black and White (I don't think this is what he had in mind though) and work on form. Deal with showing volume in a two dimensional space. I agree totally with him, and (Believe it or not buddy) I do think about it a lot. This blog is just as much about experimenting with styles and techniques as trying to do some drawing everyday, so I do plan on working consistently towards that goal of form.

What I'm trying to get around to saying, is to look for more grayscale drawings and digital paintings in the future. Seventy-seven more drawings in this set, and I really hope to have made a leap or two past where I am now, by then.

Man... I'm looking old, and am getting fat. huh.

Take care and be good!
Your friend
Jeffrey Johnson

Self Portrait 22 of 100

Okay! Last man standing is finished! The deadline kept on getting pushed back, so I had more time to work on it, and still no time to work on my 100 in 100 project. Sooo, I'm a little behind. When all the entries are posted, I'll add in a link so you all can check it out.

My first drawing back from the new year. Not terribly thrilled with it, but not totally unhappy either. It was done from a photo I took of myself in the mirror last month. I totally messed up the bottom of my face, particularly the chin and jawline. This is partly a result of committing to some lines too early, and partly a result of bullheadedly pushing through. I only gave myself an hour to work on this one though, and all and all ... Okay, Next time will be better. Ha-Ha!

I'm still super busy. I have a couple of comic pages for my friend Guggenmaneuver, and I'm working on painting and setting up the guest room at home, so I can paint and set up the babies room... But all in all, things are going well, and I should be able to catch up (and keep up) here within the next couple of weeks! Yay!

Okay, I'll talk to you all soon!

Your friend
Jeffrey

Self Portrait Twenty-One of One Hundred

Whoops! I missed a day. Okay kids... So right before I started this thing, I signed up for the Last Man Standing (check out the link on the sidebar) competition on Conceptart.org. Thinking I would have enough time for both things (and not wanting to put off this project any longer) I went ahead and started the Self Portrait thing.

As it turns out, I don't have time for both. The LMS deadline is December 30. That's nineteen (actually, eighteen) days away. SO, I'm takeing the next eighteen days off to finish (and win ha-ha!) this round of the Last Man Standing. Wish me luck!

I'm leaving off with this little photoshop experiment. It's not much to look at, but I learned some stuff from it (I think). Sorry it's such a lame placeholder.

I'll try to stop in sooner, but if not I'll see y'all in a couple weeks!
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Twenty of One Hundred

A lion, as promised. I'm pretty happy with how this guy came out... It was a struggle to get the head to fit on the body in a way that made sense. Yeah, it's pretty silly. Maybe I'll do something else next, even though these ARE fun. Ha-ha!

Talk to you again tomorrow!
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Nineteen of One-Hundred

Ha-ha! Okay, another cartoon update. This was inspired by an illustration friday topic from a couple of weeks ago. The topic was zoo, and I was going to do a few of these cartoon animal self portraits as elements for a larger picture for it... obviously things got away from me, and I ended up putting them off until now. So anyway, here's the monkey cage. I don't really have a beard right now, but I cheated to keep them more monkey like.

Tomorrow I'll do a lion.

Take care and be good, kids! I'll talk at you again tomorrow.
Your friend
KC

SelfPortrait Eighteen of One-Hundred

It's late, and I'm going to bed. No talking tonite.

Good night kids! Be good, and don't stay up too late.
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Seventeen of One-Hundred

Ryan says this one is creepy... I guess I can see that. There are some issues with this drawing, partly I think they stem from the angle of the pose. It was hard to keep still, and see what I was doing. I think I got kind of distracted too, which never helps. I'm upset with how skewed both the glasses and hat are... they're just not right. I think I know what's wrong with them, but I'm NOT going to fix them.

I'm feeling like being annoyed by this drawing is maybe a good lesson for me.

Take care and be good!
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Sixteen of One-Hundred

Remember how I said I was worried about using my mustache and beard as props when doing my Portraits? Well, I decided to shave it off so I could see my face again. It's wierd... It's been at least two years since I last took everything off. I don't look as bad as I thought I would, and Amy thinks it's super-cute. Probably won't last long though... I'd like to have it back by christmas. If it starts to get too close without a significant regrowth, I'll shave it again though. Can't look shabby for christmas, can I?

I think I got a pretty good likeness today. I think this exercise is really helping me out. I just hope I can keep it up. Some days it's really hard not to just go to bed... Or mess around on the interweb.

See you guys (and or gals) tomorrow!
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Fifteen of One-Hundred

This is the fourth and final image in the abstraction set. rendering down the form to just a hand full of black and white shapes... I think it was an interesting excercise, and while I could've pushed it further, I think I got some of what I wanted out of it. Mainly seeing what shapes were the most important to holding the image together, and forming a foundation for starting to paint the images. Maybe I'll explore this again a little later. I do have 85 more drawings in this series after all.

That's it for now guys, and I'll talk to you again tomorrow!
Your friend
KC

Self Portrait Fourteen of One-Hundred

Ugh... Again, I'm not really happy with this drawing. I think that's mostly because of the materials used, though. Basically, my mid tone blue marker is running out of ink, so I wasn't able to get the hard edged lines I was after. :(

Anyway, this is the third in the series of abstraction images. What I was going for here was breaking down the Tonal areas of my face into solid shapes using little to no line. In need to reinvest in some grayscale markers, I think.

See y'all tomorrow!
Your friend
KC