Travel Art

My Favorite Word

I took 2 old pieces of mat board, sheets of old packing paper, dental floss, elastic and hemp and turned it into a nice Coptic-bound sketchbook.

 Here's a closeup of the Coptic binding, with criss crossing to help tighten the binding, which if done by hand tends to be loose. I couldn't pull too tightly because packing paper is somewhat delicate.

 Coptic binding allows your pages to lay completely flat, which makes it nice for sketching. That's my cat Poco.

My cat friendly woke me up this morning. I think he misses me.

On the cover of my sketchbook I wrote the word "Endurance"

Endurance is my favorite word in the English language. With regards to sports, it means pushing through physical pain and continuing on. YOUR BODY IS A WIMP. It ALWAYS wants to give up, and endurance is your mind telling it to continue. With regards to life, WE ARE ALSO WIMPS. We have goals we want to attain, but we have a thousand reasons to not go for it. Too old. Not enough time. Not enough money. Too lazy. Too scared. Do it anyway. Endure the hardships. Find away around obstacles. Complacency makes you normal, but endurance is what makes you great.

Using exercise as a metaphor again, working out isn't fun. Go anyway. Endure. It's the people who go anyway even when they don't like it, that can keep themselves fit, hot, healthy, focused and a cut above. That's life too. Sometimes you're down - you don't want to do what it takes - do it anyway. Endure. With art, with love, with life, with exercise, with cancer, with AIDS, without your arm, eyes, with your significant other or without, with all, endure.

Drawings coming soon,
Tiffanny

observational pen drawings

I do a lot of observational drawing. They're fun and they keep the pen moving. When I draw out of my head, I mostly stare at the paper blankly and get a nosebleed from thinking too hard about what to draw. Observational work is fun because there's no shortage of things to draw. You get lots and lots of practice and it prepares you for when you do have to do imagination drawings. This discipline informs the other. So carry your sketchbook with you everywhere and draw everything in sight!

My Sketchbook!

I love my sketchbook (Fabriano Classic Artist's Journal). But it is VERY ANNOYING TO SCAN. Anyway, this post is dedicated to my friend TED!, who if he didn't guilt me into doing it, I would probably still not have updated my blog, because I am SO BUSY! I'm preparing for two conferences right now. The SCBWI conference where I will be part of a Q&A panel and giving a short presentation, and the Game Developer's Conference, for which the game I'm working on has to be polished, and have slick marketing materials. I can't wait to show you guys the t-shirt I designed for the game!!! My first t-shirt! I believe I will be allowed to post up some art after the game launches, which should be before Oct 10, when the conference is.

So I have pet ducks now. Some wild ducks flew into our pond and my Toller tolled them. Now we are friends. Me or my husband visit and feed them everyday and feed them cracked corn. There has to be actual crack in the corn, because they wont eat anything else! I tried oats, peas, carrots - no. It has to be cracked corn or they turn their beaks up at it.

I'm kind of proud of the variety in my sketchbook. There's people, animals, and cars. There was a time where I would freeze if I had to draw a car.

Anyway, I'm getting fat. (At least I feel like it). All this overtime is preventing me from exercising as much as I should. So I'm going to go ride my stationary bike now. I hope you like my sketches!

tiff

my kraft paper sketchbook

Some pages from my kraft paper sketchbook. These pages aren't random. They're hand-picked because they're halfway decent and wont make your eyeballs melt. (I'm considerate like that). The rest of the pages are REALLY BAD, like staring-into-the-Arc-of-the-Covenant bad. . But that's ok cos its a sketchbook :)

 These are from today. Sped to the Witte museum in San Antonio as soon as 5:00 hit to visit their free-on-Tuesdays-and-open-late natural history museum. These were some of the taxidermies.

 these were from the live exhibit. poison dart frogs are flippin adorable!! I would want one as a pet but I dont exactly feel like winning a Darwin award just yet.

I have a new story to tell you but I'm not done drawing it yet. Hope I can post the story tomorrow! So please visit me again :)

Tiff

Christmas Day Sketchbook Paintings

 It was really cold yesterday, but I still wanted to go out and paint, so I just went to Austin and did these from inside the comfort of my car (and at home, after taking lots of color notes). Parking downtown is usually excruciating, but since it was Christmas, there was tons of easy parking. I smell a new Christmas tradition for me! I hope you like my little sketchbook paintings.

Until next time!
Merry Christmas!
Tiffanny

Sketchbook - Trucks, Cars, People, Goats

 Went to the zoo today, drew these...

 I only had an hour to draw the goats before it started pouring!! Bummer. The zoo trip ended quickly.