Self Portrait 53 of 100: Illustration Friday, Repair

Another drawing for Illustration Friday. This weeks topic is "Repair".

A lot of my time working at Walmart was spent repairing stuff in assembly. A lot of things got broken, and I had plenty of time on my hands back there. One good way to kill time was to take things apart and put them back together again. I used to say that I hated working there, but looking back on it I think I was just bored a lot of the time.

I'm going back and forth about whether I think this is a good drawing or not. There's a bunch of things I like about it, but there are some things that are bugging me. Will there ever be a time when that's not true though? Ryan, I tried to put a little bit of effort into the background today, but it's getting late, I need to go to bed, and it's already almost another Friday (Just two more days) so I couldn't put this off any longer.

I hope you all are doing well, and I look forward to talking at you again soon!
Your friend
Jeffrey

Self Portrait 52 of 100: Illustration Friday, Strings

"An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet,
regardless of time, place, or circumstance.
The thread may stretch or tangle,
but it will never break."
- an ancient Chinese belief

The topic for Illustration Friday this week was "strings". One of my first thoughts was of the "Red String of Fate". I first encountered this story when I was a kid, in the comic book "Excalibur". There was a guy who could see all the strings connecting everything in the world, and kind of like using the force, he could grab and pull the strings making things happen to whatever was on the ends of that one. So I had this idea to actually have my arm unraveling as the red string, and meeting up with, and turning into my family.

Doing a little research, I came across this bit of verse on Wikipedia, and changed my mind. I remembered a photo I'd seen a couple of years ago of a young couple laying in the grass, and really liked the idea of me and my wife, hand in hand with the red string intertwined up our arms, tangled in some places, kind of loose in others, but basically tight and inextricable. I would also like to note that this is a terrible drawing of my wife... maybe I need to do 100 portraits of her. Ha-ha!

Thanks for looking, and I'll post again soon!
Your friend
Jeffrey

Self Portrait 51 of 100: Some thoughts on character

So I've been doing some thinking about what I want this blog to be, and where I want to go with it. Both in general (I guess this could be a forever thing) and in particular, what I'm doing with the rest of this set of 100. It doesn't seem like a huge undertaking to say that you're going to do 100 of something, but it IS bigger than I'd realized. So, at any rate, where my head is at right now is that I would like to finish out this set by doing a little self exploration (Not that way, sickos).

Basically exploring the idea of SELF as a character. It's actually something that we all do everyday, anyway. We all have a self image (Matrix style), things we see ourselves doing. We stand in front of the closet every morning and pick out clothes, and there's a REASON we pick what we do. Environmental (it's cold out), contextual (I have a wedding to go to), practical (I don't want anybody to see my little weiner) or what ever... there's a reason we choose to look the way we do.

More than that though, is emotional stance. How many pictures have I seen or done that are basically "guy #3 standing in front of a wall dressed as an adventurer" that have no real sense of the character. What other things about him/her are there? Stance, expression, action, interaction, reaction, protraction, detraction...

The more I've thought about this, I've come to realize that the portraits in the first 50 that I enjoyed the most, think back on the most often, and am most pleased with the outcome, are the ones that have this idea of character. They are not just a straight on view of my blank face worrying over the details. I don't want this to be an artificial "project" type of thing, but I do want to make a concious effort to put more character into these drawings.

Thanks for looking, and for the comments! They really mean a lot. I'm going to try to knock out this weeks "Illustration Friday" this weekend so there should be another update soon. Until then, take care and be good!

Your friend
Jeffrey