A Day with Porch Kitty

So a bit of backstory... About 2 years ago, by husband's family found that their porch was chosen to be the new found home for a neighborhood stray cat. It was very skiddish and aloof towards most, only really getting near one or two people. Since no one could get near enough to figure out if it was a boy or girl, we deemed it 'Porch Kitty' and from thenceforth was known as such.

As far as we knew, Porch kitty would wake up. Wait for food. Eat. And then be gone exploring all day. Another, probably a more plausible, reason that Porch Kitty wouldn't stay near the house all day is because of the other stray cat, Chachi -- a orange tomboy cat who had the personalitly of a mean landlord who always treated you like you were late on your rent. But I digress--- I continued to wonder where PK would travel off to? What did it discover or play with? Did it get into any trouble or did it have pretty peaceful, long summer days in the Tennessee heat. Which is what inspired this storyboard/color script!

My color inspo was from a single image from Studio Ghibli's Whisper of the heart. The colors and depth, lights and darks, is so rich and warm. I wanted to learn from their use of color is this shot to unify my pallete for this script.

It all started off as a quick sketch and my love for this cat, and now two years later I've been able to complete it. I'm really happy with how it has come together, though I know it still needs some fine-tuning. I think if I keep working on it, by the end of another two years I'd like to turn this into an animated short and possibly a picture book. But we will see. Porch Kitty sadly passed away last year. We were all so heartbroken, and so was the neighborhood. My mother-in-law was able to connect with some neighbors to see if anyone else had their own photos and memories with PK. Turns out PK was actually owned by a couple two streets over. They moved several blocks away, but continued to let PK be an indoor/outdoor cat. After sometime they noticed PK didn't come home one day. Turns out it trekked all the way back to it's orginal neighborhood that they moved away from - my in-laws neighborhood. I guess it missed it's home. The owners saw that people were taking really good care of PK, and kept in touch with neighbors to see how it was doing from time to time. We also were told... Porch kitty was a boy! A very cute southern gentlemen who liked to sit on his porch.

New Kitty!

 by Chloe Arvin

I recently welcomed a new cat into my heart! I adopted Pippin (formerly named “Cheesepuff”) from the Nashville Humane Association a month and a half ago. (If you are considering getting a pet in the future, I implore you to adopt!) Don’t let the sleepy sketches fool you, he is an energetic and dense boy that plows through anything in his way! He is also, appropriately, a glutton. 

He was a real cuddle-bug at the start, but once he realized I wasn’t going anywhere, he toned it down. Now he wakes me up at the crack of dawn and threatens to topple over my monitor so he can get me out of bed and lead me to his food bowl. They call this settling in. I’m settling in too! I’m learning his habits as he learns mine, countering his early-morning routine, and thoroughly enjoying caring for a cat again. The companionship of a cat is worth all the early mornings, plant-casualties, extra expenses, and even the inevitable heartbreak at the end. 

I had to draw him in the fellowship cloak. And yes, he does ask for second breakfast. 

Fool of a Took!

Let me Tell you about Lasers

Ahoy there! Ellie here. 

Alrighty, so you may be a typical artist who loves pencil and paper but have you ever used a paper cutting machine like a Cricut or a Brother?

You load a mat with paper or vinyl or whatever and the machine, attached with a tiny little knife, cuts out little shapes. Some machines can even do lettering with markers. Pretty neat right?! There’s loads of possibilities with something like this, especially if you want to make art that is layered or maybe using different materials. This is the primary tool I used in high school. With this, in consort with my mom’s iPad, I was off to the races making a bajillion cards. Every year I cranked out something for my grandfather. As much as I love hand cutting horrifically tiny details for hours on end, this tool definitely saved me a lot of strife. And as far as traditions go, making a Christmas card every year is a sweet one.

Obviously I'm blacksmithing.
What did you do as a kid?

Actual Real Life image
taken through safety glass

Now, what if I told you I found something even cooler, using the exact same idea? It’s a freaking laser! I know it sounds dangerous and these machines can be pretty pricy, but don’t be scared. I am a proud member of the Nashville Maker Space. If you haven’t watched a lot of Adam Savages Tested like me, you may not know what this is. Essentially it’s a gym membership. You go to the gym and use the stair-master, clean up, and get fit. Except in this instance you don’t get to use workout equipment, you get to use power tools and printers and in this specific example, a freaking laser. All tools come with training classes so you never do anything dangerous and the price of the membership is way less than buying a laser. Plus, it operates just like a Cricut! You just upload your file to cut and place the material under. Now, you are probably wondering why I even need to use a laser. Well, I’m achieving my engineering dreams my fellow adventurer. 

I went to animation school because I loved crafting and after learning a lot of the little clubs in the digital arts, I so strongly want to make things with my hands again. Plus, I have so many projects that are becoming more multi-media.  For example I participated in the Nashville Animation Conference called “Animation Y’all”. 99% of you dear readers have heard of it and for that 1%, you get a cookie. You can contact my totally real assistant for the mailing details. 🍪📫

Animation y’all was so rewarding for me. It gave me the motivation to prepare the little crafts I couldn’t justify making on my own. I don’t know if anyone else struggles with this but I really have a hard time making art for myself. It’s so much easier to have people relying on me. (However, if you read my last blog post - you know I’m working on it.) My goals for the conference were to laser cut little magnets, resin print some models, and the biggest goal - to cut a whole sign! Since we are talking lasers here, I'm going to skip talking about those models for another day.

In order to make little magnets I needed to first make a design. I grabbed my favorite gouache and very quickly mocked out what kind of shapes and designs I wanted. I always find it easier to plan colors with real paint. (Physical media) Then I traced silhouettes on my Ipad and converted those into a vector that the laser could cut out of some plywood I had. These got painted in the very same gouache and sealed with UV resin. The last step was just to attach magnets or pins to the back!

My very legit and messy plans

So many...

Now, I'm fairly comfortable with little laser projects, but the sign was so challenging. This is a big piece and I had limited materials to use. I knew I wanted to do something stain-glass-like but I couldn't just cut acrylic and glue the edges together. I even briefly considered soldering cut pieces together like you do for real glass but the heat would melt the pieces and probably leach some horrible fumes into my apartment. So, I settled on using a piece of wood as the backing and gluing the acrylic on top of it. Just like how people glue cardboard to the back of a finished puzzle to keep it together. I needed to find my largest size of plywood which was around 4x2in. This would become the base measurement for how I would design the sign. My design went through so many iterations. I knew I wanted the text to look like real glass so I found an internet archive of stained-glass lettings and traced the letters for my own front. Extra. I know. Once I got the type I just put my name into it and create the base "Ellie A Lenz" for the logo. I drew connecting lines and details before struggling on the color choice. I only had so many sheets to choose from and one sheet would not be enough material to fill the background. I settled on combining two purples together to get the look.

Referencing color swatches
from other items on my booth

Final Design (Almost)

The assembly portion of this thing was crazy. I designed all the bits just like stained glass but I wanted there to be lines in-between the colors just like the soldering in real stained glass. Ordering 10 yrds of crafting chord would be too expensive but I remembered they make an 1/8th in black foam chord, perfect for my needs. It’s window sealer. Yeah, the little chord they use in-between a window and wall would be my cheap solution.

The last problem I had was attaching all these pieces to wood. It was here I had another clever idea. I didn't want to hand place every pieces by memory and glue them because they might not be lined up perfectly. I was also hesitant about what kind of glue to use. So, I ordered big sheets of acrylic sticky. It's like big sheets of double sided tape and they happen to be a little transparent. I printed off my design to scale and placed the sticky sheets on top. I peeled the top layer and used that guide underneath to place all my cut pieces. Once I was done, I stuck the entire thing to my board. The gaps between the sticky was perfect for putting in my chord -- which was very satisfying to do.

The puzzle

Assembly

Final Sign!

After this adventure I feel like I can tackle anything Laser related. I've made some cool presents including a Catan boarder, a Hollow Knight display for my BF, and even a Wingfeather Keychain. Now I'm working on some boardgame inserts and even a DM screen for a friend! Maybe I'll keep you posted.

Catan Boarder

Hollow Knight Display

Wingfeather Keychain

Thanks for reading my adventures! I hope this inspires you to have some of your own!

-Ellie

Impressions

 Hi Everyone! 

A shorter post today. I wanted to share this painting I did (keeping in the spirit of working on things for shorter amounts of time), It took me just a little over an hour. I was very inspired but the Impressionist exhibit going on at the Frist right now (Unitl May 29th, you still have time!) 

I did this as a break from studying for my Private Pilots license checkride, which consumed my whole life leading up to May 8th. So my hands were ready to paint - anything other than write out my acronyms or VFR minimums or regulations. After all that work, I passed!  And a private pilots license is for life! So I never have to take that checkride again. I'll include a video from one of my solo cross countries, where I am alone as the Pilot in Command of the Plane trying to go 100+ Nautical Miles. It's so beautiful up there I wish I could look out the window more, but alas they want me to "fly the plane" and "make calls."

Dummy Attempts to Make a Movie

 By Jon Densk:

    

    "just draw", "animation is such a hastle", "why do I have to do this", "im done making movies"

    "I have a new film I want to make".

    

    Alot of what has pushed me to make my first film was being greatly inspired by the many pessamistic words of Hayao Miyazaki. Something about his films, the studio space, and his opinions resonated with me. I felt truly thrusted forward with making Axolodyssey, which im truly proud of what we all achieved there. 

    About 2 years ago~ I started whipping up this idea for a feature film, named The Dream Giver, while working on Axolodyssey. Now that the film is done and I saw what the team could do, Ive felt confident we could actually make a film. Than Ai became really popular, axolodyssey failed to impress festival runners and tech giants have made it harder to reach the fans that believed in me. In these times its almost felt like miyazaki is this ghost behind me telling me to just draw, just keep going, dont focus on all of the craziness because the inspiration is still there.

So either a film is in the future or im a crazy idiot. Regardless, Here is some art work from the start, to where things are now.

Early design drawings for the main character Caleb.

Early Character Lineup. Only a few of these have stuck around.

I was proud of these sketches for a long time but they never felt like my drawings, and were always leaning to hard into looking like someone else which I didnt really want. It was part of my learning process.....but than I got angry, and with anger, came unlimited power MUAHAHA 

jk I just wanted to stop looking like others and start looking like ME, but feel like the people that inspired me.

Im not done with all the designs

With exploring how I could twist and turn designs, I found myself overly excited with the characers I created. I felt like I was actually making a good drawing for once! Pushing through the barrier of what was comfortable and into unknown scary town, lead me to a more unique and personal style with each drawing.

Caleb after his plastic surgery

trying to find my own voice as a designer was really hard but also really rewarding. Though the internet loves to continue to tell me how im just copying everyone still. However the real challenge has been the WRITING of this story. 

Ive been throwing the story around the brain wall for 2 years now and finally two days ago, I started to think the story was working. I didnt think this would be so challenging, yeah go ahead just write a feature dummy! I thought the ideas and imagination would come quick and clearly. but nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

what came quick and clearly was the filter in my head that says 'that idea wont work' or ' ok if you do this, than you have to effect xyz, and wheres the pay off?' ' whats this characters arc and motivation?'. 

woof. I didnt feel qualified at all.

Old concept piece. I wish I naturally understood watercolor.

The process of writing has truly been very hard. And the story for the film has fundimentally changed since i first started thinking about it. But Im still enjoying the nagging feeling over my shoulder of Miyazakis influence pushing me to do what inspires me the most. 

Another crummy image board

Making a film is so personal, and sharing it with the world is even more revealing. Now I understand why Miyazaki wants to retire every 3 months. It all leaves me feeling, why try and make a movie if youre getting pushed around by outside forces? 

sadly this airship no longer made the cut

But like the title says, the dummy attempts to make a movie, and that dummy is me. With all the self doubt and 100% burnout, I still feel excited and pushed to try and make a test for this film, to show what a team of cool peeps are capable of, if you push through every boundary and create something unique and personal. 

brrrr

did this photo of this old ticket dispencer ignight the entire beginning of the film? maybe.

Dream Give Tower Concept. If only I could paint not like a 6 year old.

Im excited to finish 'v3' of the story treatment and hopefully get some friends who know how to paint to help bring this world to life! 

Me getting back up from being knocked down x amount of times.

Song of an Unlived Childhood

It's been a long time since I played piano. I guess I feel like I don't have a lot of time lately. Less motivation to learn a new piece. I'd like to get back into it more because playing piano sparks something in me. The satisfaction of nailing a tricky package or getting to express my love for a certain song through performing it. I miss writing on piano too. This is a piece I wrote a few years ago and never really used for anything. I wrote it back in my video game music era and I wouldn't stop listening to Nobuo Uematsu's Final Fantasy soundtracks. He would create these gorgeous sort of music box ballads that sounded like a sort of bittersweet, tender nostalgia. Like sweetly mourning a childhood you never got to have. Songs like "Interrupted By Fireworks" or "Tifa's Theme" or "Fisherman's Horizon" or "A Song From Her Memory." I was dismayed to find I really couldn't find any other songs like these, except maybe in other 90s JRPGs. It's such a specific and beautiful feel that I wanted to hear more of it. Hence this piece. Let me know what are some types of songs you wish there was more of in the world?

Scandal and Secrets

By Natalie Peterson 

​Actual Title: On Reference and Quentin Blake 

“Hi dearest ducklings”- is what Phoebe told me to write on her letter to her church friends and also what I am writing now 

To address you 

Dearest ducklings 

Does that make you feel really sweet and cute or do you not like it or both? 

This week/my whole life I’ve been thinking a lot about the way I use reference. 

I often feel like I use too much reference, but then again using reference is a good thing right? 

My picture book illustration process usually goes 

(after the meetings with the author and wrapping my head around what I’m supposed to do and getting the character designs down and approved)

Like this….. (these images are form a book called The Storyteller’s Bible illustrated by a whole bunch of different artists- me and Aedan were invited to do three illustrations each) 

Step 1: Pinterest mood board 

I gather up all the images that capture what I hope the illustrations “feel like” 

Step 2: Storyboard/thumbnail the book 

I take the whole thing in my hands and scribble it all out a hundred different ways and hopefully get some versions approved (for this example I’m just using a three picture project I did- so I don’t have a whole storyboard but you get the point- the scribble stage)

Step 3: REAL drawing 

For this step I use so much reference. 

I try to find the very best most specific pose reference and background reference and then collage it all together for each spread 

Step 4: Digital Color Studies

This is another step in which I use heavy reference from other people paintings or my own photos 

Step 5: painting and gettin it done 

I think this way of referencing is fine, however- the method gets frustrating when I feel like……

1. Finding the reference is taking up way too much time- specifically the pose reference or

2. The reliance on reference starts possibly hampering my own creative intuition (what if I may have had a better idea but I stopped it by jumping straight to Google)

Also, in my free drawing/life drawing time I feel like my heavy reliance on reference makes my drawing stiffer 

I am a weak improviser when the person is in a perfect pose and they move- sends me into a straight up tizzy 

In comes Quentin Blake 

At the flat here in Oxford (so hoidy toidy of me to say) 

I found a book called Michael Rosen’s Sad Book illustrated by Quentin Blake 

It’s a very sad book, but the illustrations made me realize how different my thinking is from Blake’s 

In Every picture of his- story is key 

Look at this one- are the backgrounds exceptionally specific or pretty?

do you care? 

no 

and neither does anyone else 

and he knows that 

Because what do you care about? 

The people- the story- the expressions- the poses- if that is all strong the rest fades away 

Now, I’m not saying I don’t love attention to detail, but I think I need to pay more attention to the details that serve the story- especially in kids book illustration 

Another thing I’m not saying is that reference is rubbish. On the contrare duckling! Everything is reference! We need real life reference to build up our imagination reference. The people who don't use reference but draw real good either once used a tooooon of reference or 

pay attention with their eyeballs and store up images in their imagination

 or both! 

Part of why I use so much reference is because I’m still in that part of being an artist where I feel like my imagination reference box is not full enough. 

BUT 

Sometimes I get so caught up in finding the perfect reference for say, Kensington Garden, that I waste hours on the internet looking for the right east facing angle up shot when I could be drawing, letting what little information I do have or find inform the story. 

Also- the internet- that’s the true time suck of reference. 

At Hutchmoot we heard a great talk from an artist named Catalina Echeverri. 

We also got to look in her sketchbooks which were so fascinating because she had so many random little details jotted down that she uses to inform her illustrations.

For example, she once saved a chopstick wrapper because she liked the wavy pattern on it then she ended up using that pattern to design Jesus’ robe. Then she painted the robe blue because he is the living water…. Genius….. I would’ve used red or purple or googled a pic of a different painting someone else did of his robe to inform the decision. 

Seeing her sketchbook made me realize my references can be more here and there and mish mash.

I can find little treasures in the real world and save them up for when I need/want to add special specific details. That feels a lot more fun to me than looking around on Pinterest or Google images for hours for the very perfect picture.

Not that I will stop using Google and Pinterest- I still neeeeeed it, but I want to supplement. 

So what am I saying here? 

I guess my main points are 

1. I would like to spend more time thinking about the story when I draw rather than how pretty the drawing is or how perfect the background looks 

2. It would be cool to build a library of reference as I go along in life- both with my own two eyes and my sketchbooks and even my own camera roll. I think it would be more engaging and special than purely googling 

In the spirit of focusing on story rather than pure reference here are some drawings I did this week

Sorry we don’t have a scanner here 

Phoebe said “draw dada saving us from a bear” like seriously this is what happens in my brain without reference- so scary 

I am the hunchback of Oxfordshire pushing around royalty 

All done! Let me know how you use reference or any tips or tricks you have when it comes to reference 

Have I said reference enough?