I was supprised with how this project went. I had never drawn my shoes before, so this thing was entirely new to me. This Drawing was made fairly early into the semester, and it was actually pretty difficult to draw. I had to constantly keep erasing and erasing and actually had to draw this thing nearly twice because I got the sizes wrong! The main goal that we were trying to achieve with this drawing was to make one shoe overlap the other. This can be achieved multiple ways, but we were to make the closest shoe a darker shade than the one in the back to help convey a sense of distance. I remember having to take this shoe drawing home as homework because of how complex it got at some areas and from all the little mistakes i kept worrying about. I could have picked a much simpler shoe, but I liked my running shoes and I loved the designs on them and I loved the challenge it presented of drawing them. During the planning of the composition stages I had actually planned on making the veiwer seeing only the bottom of the background shoe, but I scraped that idea as the underworkings were actually even more complex than the top of the shoe! Even though i wanted a hard shoe, the bottom of the shoe put in that way just made it seem unrealistic and i couldnt get it look how I wanted and I didnt want it to be confusing, so i just settle for drawing the top part of it. Making the shading in this drawing was a bit tough to do, because the shading had to represent the actual colors of the shoe. With shading you only have shaded areas, and non shaded areas. Sure you have the different hues and such, but the shoe in real life actually has multiple colors, instead of just plain black and white. However, by putting dark areas in the right spots and leaving some areas blank, I was still able to add a lot of variety because of the value in the design of the shoes. Overall I recall having a lot of fun with this drawing. This project helped me realize that doing sketchlike projects, pencil shadings point perspective drawings (even though this project didnt include any vanishing points in it) are my favorite kind of artworks to create, and that I can never get too bored of doing them. (Even when it SERIOUSLY cramps up my hand at times!)

This is probably my absolute favorte project that I have done in this class. Mainly for the fact that I had a lot of room to make something weird and exciting and it was able to include an almost alien atmosphere. This project was for an MC Escher like drawing that we had to do. MC Escher was an artist who liked to make outlandish painting and drawings. A lot of his work includes creatures and things that dont follow our laws of reality here on Earth. Earth. That was the key word that I heard when deciding what to draw. The drawing that I have is not on Earth, oh it is FAR from it! that is what made me so excited to make this drawing. For a long time me and my family have been heavy gamers. And if anyone else is a fan of the computer game company Blizzard, they should quickly realize that this drawing was bassed of a game called StarCraft. Now, this isnt an exact replica of the game, as I wanted to add my own special flaire to it, but it was heavily based on using a Terran Marine, a Seige Tank, and a Zerg Den that is seen through the reflection of the Marine's helmet. When I created the Seige Tank, it was actually planned before hand to be a bunker. But because in the actual game, i hardly use bunkers and Seige Tanks made more of an appearance when I play, I decided to go with my heart and add it in. I had a lot of room to create what I wanted in this drawing and I wanted to add so many more units, but i took a LOT of time in making the complex interworkings of the siegetank that I had to settle for what you see. The Seige Tank was the first part of the drawing that I worked on. You may not see the exact vanishing points right away, but I used perspective drawing to create the legs of the seige tank to add its sense of distance in the background. I also used a different set of vanishing points on the building inside of the visor. This is easier to see it vanishing as it is a smaller building and the vanishing points are much closer, but this was actually a late addition to the artwork. After i had finally completed most of the Tank in the background, i decided to work on the Marine. The Marine had to be close to the action, and if I had more time, i wouldve added one of his buddies in the backround in close combat with the enemy right behind him. However, i kept this out because after testing to see what would work, I found that i had to complete the closest marine first, and that the other Marine could come later. Plus the fact that there wasnt much space behind the first marine, and it might have confused the veiwer as to what was happening in the drawing. As most fans of the game know, a battle can get very confusing as to what is happening and it is very hard to see what is actually happing between each and every individual unit in the game. The reflection off of the Marine's visor came next when drawing this out. I wanted to add a drone or two, and maybe a zergling, but i decided to stay with the Den due to time constraints. I may at a later date actually add the little details and extra units, but for now I am pleased with what I have. The Den had to have extra layers in it wich would work perfect in using the point perspective techinque that I used. The Den was actually one of the easiest parts of the drawing and took the least amount of time to add. Then finally, I just HAD to add in a background showing the Terrans on a distant planet. The almost spiky surrounding shows that they are in fact, NOT on Earth, and most likely on a zerg infested planet. I had a lot of fun making this part of the drawing because of all the nostalgia that was going through my mind with all the campaigns and battles of previous games that I had emerged both victoriously and defeated in. The background was actually the easiest to shade in after shading in the units and the Zerg base. The light is brighter on the left side of the Marine, but becasue the Zerg Den is in the reflection, i had to reverse the sides of where the light was coming from. I was very pleased with how this project turned out despite the fact that I had to force myself to leave a lot out, such as an entire other army (the Protoss) that I could add in or the countless other units that could have made an appearance. Overall, it was the funnest time Ive ever had in making a art project.

This was the very first time that I have ever dealt with anything ceramic. This was a fun little project that I enjoyed doing! When i started this project, i wanted to create a bowl so that it could have a potential to be usefull inside of my house. It is actually being used currently to hold apples in the kitchen as almost a decorational piece, but it still holds an edibile food ready and waiting to be eaten. While i was creating this project, we cut out on paper what the project would mold after, and what it the outside (without the paint) would look like. I started out making it almost like a snowflake. I wanted complete symetry with this project and tried to create it without an end or a beginning. The was a bit scared in adding the edges of the bowl. But i wanted to add a texture to this project and I wanted something that I didnt see anyone else doing, so the tiny yet plentiful ridges fit the bill. I didnt exactly plan for it to be very big, however the final product is actually a bit medium sized when comparing it to bowls around the house hold. It is not the size of a mixing bowl, but it is noticibly bigger than a bowl that would hold cereal for example. The medium that we used for this project, was white clay. Ofcourse, it is called white clay because when it dries it becomes white, but when molding it in its earlier form, it is actually a very gray and dull color. The clay was very easy to mold around a bowl i used to create the bowl like shape of the ceramic. A lot of students used the slump technique to make their ceramics, but i decided on the hump technique. This means that I put my slab of clay over a bowl, instead of inside it to create its shape. If i had put it inside the bowl, I wouldve been using the slump technique. Now, back to my wanting to base this ceramic around a snowflake. The red portions of the ceramic was created with red clay, that worked to add details to the project. I wanted it like a snowflake (as before mentioned) so the symmetry was important. I applied the paint in triangles by using free hand because there was no template for this part of the ceramic. It was actually an almost last minute idea to add, but I am glad I did it. Unknown to the viewer because of the pictures, there is actually a design on the bottom. This design is an almost sun looking symbol that was made with the white clay and acts as the stand for the ceramic bowl. I would say that I learned a LOT from this project. I had never used clay to make something usefull, and I had fun doing it! It also made me respect the people who do this for a living becasue getting the thing to stay in the shape i wanted was a BIG challenge! the clay was a lot bigger and more plentiful than there was place for it to fit on the bowl! if I could go back, i would change the object that i mold my clay around so that it looks a bit smoother on the structure of the ceramic.

The pastel still life project. The paper that this project was put on often give whomever is holding it orange or red fingers, due to the fact that i applied a LOT of pastel to make it. When i first started this project, I was at a loss of what to create. I didnt know what I should add, what items I could draw or anything! Fortunantly enough for me their was some plastic fruits that where laying around and the crackers where actually a part of my lunch! So now i have the items....but what to do with them? How should i arrange them? This is where the thumbnail sketch comes in. A thumbnail sketch is used by artists to quickly sketch out and plan how their artwork will look, so that they can use it as a reference point and know where to put items on a later date, and to just know where things go. However, for this project we also used a veiwfinder-or a hole cut in carboard-to put everything into perspective. To help us see where our objects would fit, and how big to make them. This helped me a lot cause with all of these items I as already confused with all the possibilities of how to arrange them, and so the view finder helped me to see that having a pear overlaping just a bit over another fruit, would help to add and show where the objects are. The composition on this project is a bit interesting to me. Normally if we want objects to appear bigger, we would put them near to the front. However the giant fruit in the back is still bigger than all the other objects, even though it is in the back. I wanted to test that out and see if I could get it to work, and lo and behold it did! The best part about this project in my oppinion, is the lighting and how it affects the objects. As you can see, a light is coming in on the right of the project, and reflects on the plastic of the crackers in their wrapping. Its not a big powerful light, but it still adds little shadows off of the items in the pastel and adds to their 3Dness. Without the shadows not only it look a little...bland.. but it would take away from the roundness and circularness of the fruit! However, just simple shadows didnt make the objects appear 3D. Although if it did that would be pretty nice! But art doesnt work that way so I had to had a bit of darkness to the lower portion of the items, and make the top part of the items a bit brighter as to show the 3 dimensional part of the project. This was a little bit challenging because I had to make sure that the colors were still the same, but that their hue was just a little bit different.

The color scheme that I used in this painting was the analogous color scheme. It actually took me a while to finally settle on this desicion, but after picking out my photos i figured that this color would look closest to the scene that i wanted to create. In organizing my painting I looked at multiple pictures. I had so many ideas and things i wanted to add such as a fence running along the background, but to do that would make it less wild and take away from the complete isolation from society that I wanted to create. When i first started this painting, my composition seemed to be heavily lacking. All that i had was two big mountains, a little bit of sky, and a whole lot of nothing. The river was always planned, but even with that i knew something was missing. It wasnt until a few days later that I realized I needed a tree, and this white one just fit the bill. However, when i created this tree I had a few options i could do with it. I could make hundreds dotting the landscape, or make something like what you see here. I wanted to close in the atmosphere and make the veiwer seem like part of the picture. So i put the tree almost running into the veiwer as they stare off into the distance of the mountains that are miles and miles away. When i created this painting, i almost put the light source on the top leftmost side, however as I started painting i realized that it would look really well with the light coming in over the top right of the mountain with the clouds. You may not see the sun, but you can tell its up high because of the small shadows coming off of the mountains. My brush strokes that are seen most vividly with the bushes and clouds varied actually not all that much. Mostly because to create alsmot everything else, long straight brushwork was required to bring in the feeling of distance and space. Also my canvas was really big and so the quickest way to get the paint on there was to apply a lot of it and drag it around as much as possible. Finally, I want to point out the value. No, not the value like the, cha-ching I've got money, kind of value. But the value that you see on one side of the tree as the sun finds it hard to reach its left most side and how on the right it is vividly shining. Value can also be seen somewhat in the fields on both sides of the river, the mountains do stand out from the ground ofcourse, but they still interact with the grass by blocking the light and casting shadows and thus, creating a darker green where light cannot shine. Overall i was very pleased with this painting because i am not used to using paints and generally try to avoid them as i usually create a big mess. However, suprisingly enough, this turned out to be one of my favorite projects to create!