One Point Perspective

Anybody who has taken an art class has done one-point perspective at some point. It looks kind of like this in real life:

The docks in Silverdale, Washington.

And nothing like that when drawn for those Middle School art projects we did.

That is one looooong living room.

And while it's useful to learn one point perspective and doing those drawings taught it to us, they never ended up looking very good. Which can be frustrating if you want to draw something from your head.

One of the keys to drawing without explicit reference photos is getting a good grip on perspective. I've had pictures ruined after a lot of work was put into them simply because I realized the perspective was wrong and it was too late to fix it.

If you want to get perspective right, it really helps to have a photo or a real life reference. It is, however, not completely necessary. It is possible to get very in depth on the subject of perspective*, but I thought I'd just share one tip for one-point perspective that I wished I'd been told a long time ago. It was mind blowing.

The hardest part (to me) of a one-point perspective drawing is getting the spacing right. If your objects are spaced evenly going out towards the horizon, then they're going to seem smaller and closer together as they go farther out. But how much do they reduce by? You could try math (which I have), but there's a much easier way.

Draw your point and the lines coming off of it and then add a line exactly between the two (this is important).

Then place your first layer. In this case, I'm doing the boards on a dock, but you can draw palm trees or tiles or whatever. These lines are simply to help space your objects out.

Here's the trick: take your ruler, line it up with the bottom right corner and run your line through where the center line bisects the top. Where the ruler meets the left line is where your next upper line goes.

And repeat!

Voila, perfectly spaced one point perspective. You may now continue and finish the drawing.

*If this sort of thing appeals to you, I would recommend the book "How To Draw: Drawing And Sketching Objects And Environments From Your Imagination" by Scott Robertson. It's very technical, so it may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's very helpful in this area.

Poem: Opportunity

Opportunity doesn’t knock,
It whispers and eludes.
Lies dormant for years and years
And sometimes never moves.

Opportunity doesn’t knock,
Doesn’t bang down your door.
It scuffs at the edge of your chimney
And seeps between the floor.

Opportunity doesn’t knock,
Doesn’t politely wait outside.
You really have to hunt for it
Because it loves to hide.

Opportunity doesn’t knock.
It either simpers and evades,
Or mugs you in an alley
And leaves you quite afraid.

Slant Rhymes

Confession: I have poetry pet peeves. Sad, but true. One of my biggest is the overuse of perfect rhymes. Especially the cliche trifecta of "fly," "high," and "sky." Yuck.

Perhaps this requires some explanation.

There are many ways to dissect a poem, and a lot of words can be used to explain them. I mostly ignore the minutiae of technical analysis of poetry (to some that may be obvious) but the difference between perfect rhymes and slant rhymes bears some looking into. They're the most obvious rhymes to differentiate and the most fun to play around with.

A perfect rhyme is a rhyme where the last vowel and consonant sounds correspond perfectly, such as in the aforementioned "fly/high/sky." Other examples include "head/dead," "visionary/cautionary," and so on.

On the other hand, a slant rhyme is a rhyme where the last vowel sound corresponds (or comes close) but the consonants don't necessarily have to match. These can range from the very similar, such as "art/dark" to the more dissimilar, such as "palm/lung."

Perfect rhymes have their place, but slant rhymes are open to much more possibility. I feel a lot of stress is placed on rhyming things perfectly, especially to people just starting to write poetry, but it's simply not critical.

Give them a try!

(I was first acquainted with slant rhymes when I started writing down and looking at song lyrics, especially those of Death Cab for Cutie and Radical Face. If you need a further example of what I'm talking about, take a listen to the lyrics for "Winter Is Coming" by Radial Face and "Stable Song" by Death Cab for Cutie.)

Poem: Everything Costs

I once was told
That “nothing comes free,”
But the phrase never made
Much sense to me.

It’s better to say
That “everything costs,”
For each breath we take
Is a breath that we’ve lost.

For every upside
There’s always a catch.
After all, our lives are just
A great balancing act.

I don’t mean to alarm you;
It isn’t bad news.
For things that don’t cost much
Should not be worth much to you.

Tips On Drawing Faces

As stated earlier, drawing people can be one of the most challenging things you can do as an artist. Here are some things that have helped me to improve.

1. Learn the basic rules of proportion.

Proportion: (n) how one thing relates or appears to relate in size to another

This first tip might seem on the boring side, but like any skill you attempt to master, you have to start with a solid grasp of the basics. Just going off on your own will result in flawed foundations that will come back to haunt you later.

When we first start drawing, the efforts we make are more akin to how we see things than how they actually appear. For example, children draw people with really big heads, sometimes all head. Looking at the basics of proportion analytically will make a huge difference in your artwork.

There are many rules of proportion, but the one's I've found most helpful and easiest to remember are these five:

1. Heads are round or ovoid, but not a perfect circle.
2. Eyes fall at about half the height of the face, the nose falls at about half the height of the remainder, and the mouth is about half of what's left after that.
3. No, people do not have anime eyes. Make them smaller. Usually, about 1/5th the width of the face.
4. The ears generally run from about the tops of the eyes to the bottom of the nose.
5. People have a wider forehead than you think. Seriously, the hairline runs way high. Even if they have bangs, those bangs have to start from up top.

Of course, these are just the rules of thumb (or face). What truly sets one face apart from another is how people's individual proportions deviate from the 'norm'. You can play around with proportion later to achieve faces with unique characteristics. The important thing is to apply this at the start. You will immediately have better results.

2. Gridding... it's not cheating. Really.

Sometimes, gridding (taking a picture and applying a square grid over it, then drawing a proportional grid on your own paper) feels a bit like cheating, like tracing someone else's drawing. But really, it helps you to be more accurate when you're starting out and helps you to get a better grasp of proportion. Not just how things seem to look, but how they really look. And while you may someday want to be able to draw without a reference picture or grid, it's good practice for getting there.

3. Draw people you are unfamiliar with.

This one might seem a bit odd, but trust me it helps. People you are familiar with (family, friends, anyone you see a lot of) are harder to see objectively. You know their faces well, and you and others will be able to tell if something is even slightly off. It's better to first practice getting proportion right on people you are unfamiliar with because a) you won't expect it to be as perfect and b) you can actually see the individual facets of their face and how they fit together. With someone you know, you might not be able to distinguish that at all.

4. Don't be afraid of sucking.

Middle School tempera paint project. Our teacher took an (unflattering) picture of us, which was then printed out with a four layer gradient and traced out. We then had to paint it "Andy Warhol" style. This was one of the projects that put me off of drawing people for years. To get the complete sense of this little beauty, imagine it about three feet tall.

Let's lay this out right now. You are going to make some horrible drawings. You will have sketchbooks full of things no one will ever see. And even if you do make something you're happy with, you may find it looking pretty shabby a few years down the road. This is normal, this is expected. This is okay. The important thing is to not get bogged down by perfectionism. No one has to see anything you don't want to show them. Just make sure you practice and thus make progress.

5. Practice.

So of course, the last tip is simply this: practice. Draw faces. Many faces. Look at pictures. Look at people. Fill sketchbooks with your efforts and eventually, you will improve.

I get told a lot "I wish I could draw well" or "I'm just not naturally gifted" and I always find those comments confusing. While it is true that a certain amount of natural talent or predilection for artwork helps, true skill comes from doing something until you improve. Anyone can draw. You just have to practice and find enjoyment from the effort itself.

The Novel I'm Writing

I love to read.

Like, really love to read. I finished the entire Lord of the Rings in five days. When I worked at the library I used to bring so many books home that my mom complained I wasn't getting any of my chores done, I was too busy reading. I've lost count of how many books I've read over a year, let alone a lifetime.

The thing is, all this reading has a cost. It gets harder and harder to find a "good" book. And it was this push to find something good to read that got me into writing again.

I wrote all the time in Elementary School, but when writing in school stopped being fun I stopped doing it. It wasn't until we had a two week long creative writing segment in eighth grade that I picked up the pencil again. I was having a hard time finding good books to read and this was school sanctioned creative time. I wrote a one page opener about a girl fleeing through the woods from some monster, in contrast with the beautiful post-storm scenery around her. That was it. But looking at that, I knew suddenly that I wanted to write again, and not just anything. I wanted to write the book I wanted to read. From start to finish.

This is many years later. And of course, easier said than done. It's so easy to write first chapters. Story ideas. Names. Dramatic scenes. It's the brick by brick build up that makes up the whole book which is hard. I wasn't very good at that. So I dabbled here and there a bit and never took it very seriously. But the idea, to write the stories I wanted to read, wouldn't go away.

The story's changed a lot since that first page. I've had many false starts and stops. But the novel I'm writing is the first one I ever decided to write out completely. I've had what I have thought of as better ideas for other stories. They've all been dutifully outlined in their own journals and then put back on the shelf, so I could finish this one. Someday, hopefully, they'll be told as well. 

I once read somewhere that if you want to write when inspired, write poetry (which I do). But if you want to write a novel, you have to sit down and write it page by page, whether you're inspired or not. Now that I've taken that admonition seriously, this one, first book will finally be laid to rest by May of next year. This is what it's about:

     In the isolated kingdom of Lannan Dús, nestled between the ocean and the mountains, alarming events are taking place. Entire villages are disappearing, and the current King is doing little to address the needs and fears of his people. But all of this is far away for a young girl called River, who was found in a peripheral seaside town, senseless and either unable or unwilling to divulge her own past. Through a series of events, she ends up saving the life of a boy named Javin, an outsider with a past and agenda of his own. Despite their differences and the difficulties involved, the two seize their chance to find some answers and head to the capital city. But what starts out as a simple hunt for River's home quickly becomes more complicated as they find themselves pursued by soldiers of the King and start piecing together how the problems of today are linked to themselves, the royal family, a missing prince, a decade and a half old tragedy, and the slumbering past of the kingdom itself.

Poem: A Musician And A Painter

[Musician]
There’s a magic in paintings that I cannot hear,
A moment ensconced and perfectly clear.
It grabs your reflection and shows you the truth
And static remains a reminder to you.

[Painter]
There’s a magic in music that I cannot touch,
A swelling of sound that pours and drips out.
It echoes through time and then disappears.
The faintest of memories, the whisper of tears.

[Both]
I’ll always appreciate my counterpart,
For together we fill space and time with our art.

I Do Photography Too!

I enjoy art and writing, but I take them pretty seriously sometimes. It's important to have diverse but complimentary hobbies to keep things fun and interesting, and one of mine is photography. Most of my photographs are taken with making artwork in mind, but some are just for the sheer fun of it. More of my best can be found at my Zazzle store here.

But here's a few of my favorites:

Water droplets beading up on our newly stained deck.

My sister in our Dad's oversized coat at Ocean Shores, Washington.

Praying mantis, captured at a gas station in Idaho.

The creek on my grandparent's farm in Ellensburg, Washington.

Fireworks from the backyard.

Two crows in Colorado, looking for all the world like two judgmental old men watching the passersby.

Essay: How To Write

My Senior year of High School I took Advanced Placement Language Arts. It pushed me to my limits of writing ability and undoubtedly made me a better essay writer.

And I hated it beyond words.

Actually, most of my writing experiences in school left me with a bitter taste, and by Senior year I'd reached the pinnacle of frustration with the school system's idea of the written word. Thus it was that for the first assignment that year (and only non-essay assignment), prompted "How to...", I wrote about how to write.

And yes, I read it in front of my teacher. As I recall, she laughed throughout.

The Writing Process
From Kindergarten to Publication

       The madness begins with a simple child’s song. A, B, C, and D (and let us not forgot elemenopee) are really your first introduction into writing. Little do you know that in this seemingly innocuous song lies the foundation for years of writer’s block. The first thing you can scrawl is your name. After learning to read, the teacher then introduces the basics of writing. And since the teacher decides that their life is much easier when they don’t have to decipher chicken scratch, mounds and mounds of handwriting worksheets and spelling lists are sent home and must be laboriously filled out. Later, you are introduced to this wonderful thing called “Word” and “spellcheck” and never need to write legibly or spell correctly again. Something similar is also done in cursive, an archaic form of lettering that is never used past the third grade.
After this painstaking initiation into the writing world, you are then free to –for a time– write whatever you wish. For a couple of years, many fun and fanciful stories are created until they are squashed by something grown-ups call “reality.” If we had known the tidal wave to follow that first persuasive essay, I’m sure we would have balked instead of cheerfully throwing ourselves into the surf. I mourned the death of the fiction assignment, but worse things are to come.
  Much like the ABC song, the next phase starts out innocently enough, maybe even fun. After all, who doesn’t like to write in colorful pens? Blue for topic and concluding sentence, red for concrete, and green for commentary. But Jane Schaffer’s writing system strikes like a snakebite to the heel. The next few years are spent churning out fodder essays, mindlessly filling in the blanks until you’re sick of concrete and commentary sentences.
If you survive the inundation of Jane Schaffer, you reach High School and are told that Jane Schaffer is not only evil, but that further, to write well you must break all those painfully accumulated, maddeningly eccentric English rules. In the end, it is okay to start a sentence with words such as ‘and’ or ‘but’. And to top things off, you are taught many tedious citing format standards, which will probably change in the upcoming years.
  And finally, should you decide to go to college, within the first five minutes of English 101, a clear minded professor will confidently and quite smugly tell you that your High School teachers were oh so very wrong and that they, the Instructor with a Bachelor’s degree in English, is here to teach you correctly. At this point you’re probably trying to get a picture of Yoda out of your swimming vision, gently admonishing you in his gravelly voice, “you must unlearn what you have learned.” Again. And perhaps at this point, you begin to think back to a dimly recalled, distant time when writing was fun, and wonder what the heck happened here.
  But I guess you like pain, because instead of merely finishing the class and washing your hands clean, you decide to take all those stories that have been festering and forming and dammed inside of you and write them down. After all, it would be a shame to waste all those writing skills you’ve been learning for the past decade and a half. And what job can you think of off the top of your head that requires you to write MLA style formatted research essays? A scientist, maybe. But you have bigger problems to contend with now.
After years of writing expository, persuasive, and research essays, you have developed an almost incurable shyness about any writing that isn’t based on the world around you but is spawned inside your head. In fact, anything read aloud carries almost a sense of shame, like someone accidentally catching a glimpse of something they weren’t meant to see. People can be cruel about creativity and art, and any story that is written is a tiny glimpse into somebody’s fragile soul. So heaven forbid anybody actually read your stories! And yet, overpowered by a sense of almost desperation to find anybody of a similar mindset, you might fearfully show a little bit of your story to your closest family or friends. And with a little bit of gentle encouragement, you may actually take the chance and send your book to a publishing company.
Now, when you submit a book, not only do you send the first ten pages, but also this really daunting thing called a “cover letter.” I honestly think that the publishers came up with this thing just to weed out all but the most dedicated and to laugh about the bad ones over coffee. This thing requires a (non-trite) hook, a catchy title, a summary, and a desperate plea at the end. The summary is actually the kicker. The cover page must be at most one page long, so you have to take your 300+ page book that you have poured your heart and soul into and condense it into a paragraph. This must be done without neglecting the major characters, events, and your writing voice. To top it off, you have to state the ending and everything, so before your book is sent in, it has to be finished. Many sleepless nights are spent trying to cram everything into a summary and getting a really nice hook. It’s got to be perfect, because you’ve got one shot and people are lost or won in the first few sentences. After all the toil, sweat, and blood, you shove the hope-laden package into the mailbox with a tiny prayer.
If you’re lucky, you’ll only be rejected by thirty or so people before you get the point, but if you’re really lucky, you might actually be accepted. Of course, for that to happen, your story can’t be too far out there. Publishing companies only have so many slots open per year and prefer to play it safe (i.e. what’ll probably make money) than go for the masterful piece of art that’s probably going to flop.
Once your work is accepted, the trials are far from over. Mounds of revisions are made (not always with your expressed permission) there is a lot of back-and-forth, contracts have to be read and signed, and finally, finally, you’ll have a watered down version of something that resembles your story sitting on a bookshelf. And if you’re really, really, lucky the masses will decide they like you and you’ll be able to keep writing. But, if you’re like everyone else, you’ll keep your day job.
In fact, it could turn out that the most important (or at least most useful) thing you learn in your writing career was also the first thing you learned: how to scrawl your name on the dotted line.