drAnn's Art

An Example of How I Use my Wacom

I have a Wacom Intuos 3 graphics pad and people who hear I am an artist often think that I use it to draw.

Well, not exactly.  I use it more for playing online computer games than for drawing!

But it's real function in my life is for retouching line art and photos.  Generally when cartooning I start with a soft pencil on newsprint and then transfer the image by hand to white paper where I ink over the pencil.  Next I take a picture of my drawing with a digital camera.  My Canon Powershot has a 1Gb multimedia card that I can insert into my laptop's card reader.  I open the file with Paintshop Pro (the last version before JASC was bought out includes PSP and Animation Shop) and that is when I start using the graphics pad.

Here is an editing sequence showing how I got from the hand drawn cartoon to a drawing I posted previously:

 

Happy Holidays

Here is a toast to all of you:

  I took the original photo (on the left) to illustrate an article I wrote about Amaranth Tea:

A Pretty and Nutritious Tea

Then my photographer brother enhanced it to make this holiday toast.  I like it!

A New Avatar

 


Got my shiny new Google Wave invite and had to play! Should be riding the bike instead, huh?

I Finally Found a Planner That Might Work

Life got a little more hectic than usually recently so I have all these lists I make up and they have boxes to check for things like "exercise" and "draw" or "paint."  Sometimes next to the box it says "eat."  Yes, lately I've been so busy that sometimes I forget to eat.

Well, no more, because I've found an online planning/calendar/list-making service that is going to make sure that I get everything done that I need to do and still have time to smell the roses.

It is called GTDagenda and if you want to check it out, here is my link:  Check GTDagenda Out for Free

The lite version is free, but they also have a 30-day money back offer for those who want to hit the ground running.   The problem I have had with planners in the past is that they are sort of rigid, and being an artist I just could not fit my data into their cubby holes.   This one is different.  It is goal-oriented and you establish your basic needs (like ART!) first and then plan around them.  The calendar is integrated and there are lists.  I'm still in the learning curve, but I love it already. 

A Lizard

I finally got close enough to this guy to take a picture.  Now I want to try to paint him:

      
Now that I know which flower pot he lives under I can take some better pictures.  The last time I checked under this pot there were two of them.  My plant lives in another pot that usually nests inside this one.  That way I can take the plant out of the ground to tend it without having to bend over or dig it up.  Here is the plant:

 

A Distelfink

James Michener's The Novel is about a writer who is also devoted to art, and especially to the rescue of old Pennsylvania Dutch barn designs.  No doubt it was the impetus for a revival of interest in the "barn  flowers" as the hexagonal signs used for outdoor decoration were sometimes called.    Although a number of fakelore artists of today are busily attributing magical properties to the art of this genre,  hexagonal simply means six-sided, ergo the name "hex signs."  Can you picture a farmer using a pitchfork to help measure out the patterns?   

Speaking of barns, this link has some nice barn photos, including that of a delightful star barn:  Star Barn  

This brings to mind that the barn flowers were also called barn stars.  Well, I could not resist making some fakelore of my own:
I did not have a pitchfork, so I kept the figure six-sided.  That way nobody can say it is not a hex sign :-) 

Art at the Beach

Some creative people stacked these rocks above the pier along Ventura Beach, giving me something fun to photograph:

 
People's desire to "do art" can express itself anywhere.   Ventura is a nickname for San Buenaventura which is the town's real name. 

Here is a Pretty Picture from our Indoor Garden

My petunia growlog is here:  Pretty Petunias

Chocolate Mousse in Pyramid Shape

Looking for an online review of The Gourmet Room at Don Laughlin's Riverside Resort in Laughlin, Nevada, the first one that came up mentioned this dessert:

But the review did not have a picture of it and I did, so here it is.  Mmmmmm, tasty and also a work of art.  That did not stop me from eating it.

A Tomatillo Flower Bud

I think.
Tomatillos are husk tomatoes, and we love to eat them in salsa verde.  When the first little puff of green appeared on a tiny stem in the crevice where the leaves branch off from the stalk of this aggressive plant, I thought it must be what some gardeners call a "lantern" but chances are it is a flower bud instead. 

Well, I have never grown one of these before, but it is going to be a challenge for me to play honeybee with it indoors, because, for one thing, people commenting on the process online are divided as to how self-pollinating it is.  Some say all it needs is a vigorous shake and others say you need more than one plant to get any fruit. 

When I figure it out, I will post my findings on my other blog:

Ann's Air Gardens