Part II....Where are you, but I'm M.I.A. too....

woah tiger!  part II is coming...i think i can promise that without becoming a liar. but i think this is more about spring (fall/winter) cleaning.  my house is going through it, along with my mind.  and my car!  should i be ashamed, i hope not, and i really don't think so because i'm still making progress, i'm still on the way, it's just that there's a bunch of stuff that's cluttering my space, so the time used in getting all of that nice and open is worth the time.  

in the RFC, we travel on two roads, parallel roads that are both going to the same place, in the same direction.  both are about getting there, and making progress, just one road is more geared towards the academic, and the other is more about fine art.  so, we've been diligently traveling those roads.  

myself, i've been continuing to study japanese, and have started studying it along with 4 other classes via MIT OpenCourseware.  it's kind of an awesome program, highly recommended!  and i've also been continuing along, rockily, with the illustrated novel.  but i got sidetracked because in the process of updating my site, which is about just as badly behind as my blogs, i wanted to do more with it.  more more more, like billy idol.  that's what's on, in my turtle beach earbud....btw, thank you turtle beach for this awesome gift!  but, yeah.  i wanted to do more with my site, i wanted to add some movement, which led me to thinking about learning flash, which led me to thinking about programming in general.

so i got a little detoured.  and now, i can't decide whether or not to leave it alone or add it in, but i'd like to see more distinct progress, but i'm really interested in learning programming.  what to do?  i don't know.  

so that's the kind of stuff that'd been happening.  nothing, but something because it's clearing the way for more things, but essentially nothing is the category of finished projects.  but i've gotten my lists updated, and a new planner, a new phone with new scheduling agents and listers.  so today, it's update blog 1 & 2, update my YT channel, and updating my website.  then, tonight, when i get home, it's journal about my past year...because i've also been behind on journaling, and then some writing about what i'd like to have come.  and then an evaluation on my wants and goals....that part in efforts of reducing...or better yet, refining the load to be more streamlined and specific...and then at the end of all of that a new plan.  a few years out, goals, and a proposed way of getting there in good time.  

so.  now onto updating blog 2....telling the man to SUCK IT.  adios!

stay tuned for part II, but for now~

still k.i.t. for those pictures to go along with that nibs and inks post, i hadn't been able to find my camera for a while and while i was packing my backpack to go out and do some work, i'd discovered it at the very, very bottom.  it's been over 3 weeks since i'd seen it!  i looked in every bag i'd taken out, in drawers i thought i might've randomly put it in, and then i figured that it was just lost.  

that triggered me to look for a new camera! lol....i was like, 'eeeh, why not??'  i'd been wanted to be able to create higher-quality videos anyways.  i started looking for SLR's and DSLR's....most i found were waaaaaaaaaay out of my price range.  i only wanted to spend $100 or less, i know, hardly anything, but i only wanted to go up a couple of levels because my vids with what i had weren't too bad, but what pushed me a little closer (away) from still using it is that when i went to edit some recent footage, i noticed that there was a ringing in the audio.  i know i could've cleaned that up at least a bit in editing, but that's just surface buff.  and i'd noticed some streakiness there too.  it could've been from the sunlight coming through the window that i was sitting near, but still.  you know?  these things should be just cool, that's what i was thinking.

so i started looking some more, and i started veering towards point and shoots.  and something that shot in HD.  i saw a couple of things, lots a couple of auctions.  then i added camcorders and video cameras to my hunt.  i'd found a few there, bought a buy it now mini-cam....it came, it didn't work, i sent it back and i'd also put in a best offer bid, but as i did that i found one that i liked even better.  

i was in a work meeting when there was 5 minutes in the auction.  i got the stink eye from my boss when i looked in my phone to check up on it.  i got the look, saw that there were 4 minutes, so i got up from the meeting, went around the corner in the hallway, and started bidding.  first bid, outdone, next, immediately outdone.  one second left, on my phone, delayed reaction, desperation bid, 1 sec goes away immediately as i hit confirm, the auction ended.  i was the high bidder :o)

it's a canon camcorder, FS200.  a little old-school,it came out in 2009, but it has a mic-input jack and it records sound in stereo, and it also has HD capabilities. never mind.  i just learned that it's standard definition.  well, that's a little disappointing. rrr...lol.  nevermind.

i can put it on a tripod, it has nice digital and optical zoom. it was $56 & $10 shipping.  originally it was around $400.  also, i don't have a camcorder now.  so i found my camera.  gonna try to milk that a while longer while i put some good use into this camcorder, and i just got a new (used) phone.  an LG G2x.  

the G2x has an 8mp camera just like the samsung point and shoot that i have (just found), the samsung has 8.1mp.  but the G2x has HD capabilities, 640x something on the samsung, and 1920x1080 on the G2x.  so my phone has the best resolution of them all, haha!  ridiculous, but also very good too, i'm very thankful for that.  and the point and shoot was a gift, and the canon has great sound, and i can use a tripod with it.  and a mic if i wanted.  

so my next videos are going to be a combination of all of these. maybe a few reviews or walk-throughs/demos w/commentary to start out.  and!  those pictures of the inks and nibs.  the (???) is coming along well!  i'm not really sure what to call it.  it's not manga, but manga is what it's closest to being.  it's not an illustrated novel or novella, and it's not a comic.  i guess, maybe illustrated short stories?  well, i guess that's it for now.  it's going well, i'm working through the layouts now.  setting the panels, i just finished rewriting and doing a little reworking to the narration, so now it's the first rough draft of how it's going to be set up.  maybe i'll take some pictures of that too :o)  

stay tuned!  on the way home to pick up the new canon-mail and see how it goes!  take care :o)

jt 

the g-pen is king

since having started on a sort of illustrated novel/american manga/comic type of book, i've concentrated on practicing pencil-work and pen-work. 

with all of them, i've been using everything i have, and buying a little bit of what i didn't have before.  i had all of the basic sizes of milli (multi-liner) pens, and i really wanted some copic ones, so i bought the fine set of those, going down to .005.  i had other brands going up to 1.0 and small brushes.  

i already had some nibs (dip-pen tips) but i had never owned a g-pen before.  really, i never looked into what the manga-norm was, i was using primarily multi-liners and when i did dip, i used a range from mapping to what the japanese would call as seiji.  i think that's how it's spelled.  but it's the one that flares out into a traditional, old-style kind of shape.  when i heard of the g-pen, i was thinking that it couldn't be much better.  especially since i had bought an extension set to go with my already-owned mapping.  but what i found, is that the g-pen is king.  no exaggeration.  

the g-pen has a much sturdier feel, and you can use it in a lot more directions than most pens.  including flipping it over and using the top to make thin lines, the ink still flows pretty easily when you use it this way.  it also holds more ink, and uses the ink more efficiently, without accidents or mistakes.  other nibs tend to run out of ink a lot faster, like a super amount faster.  the g-pen goes on for a really long time!  it's pretty amazing.  you don't get interrupted by having to reline certain areas or dipping so often.  

and with inks...i've used 3 types at the same time for now, to test them out compared to each other.  i'm away from home, so once i get back, i'll take some pictures and go into more detail about them.  also, i'll do the same about the nibs.  

i haven't used manga paper, i've never really concentrated on an illustrated novel the way i am now.  but what i've always liked has been really heavyweight, mixed-media papers.  also, not too smooth on the surface.  my least favorite kind of paper for anything is lightweight, ultrasmooth.  i can't even use that stuff.  except for writing notes ;o)

so, stay tuned for part II a little later on when i get home and can get some pictures up!

the current project equals many of the ideas combined

for the past while i'd been struggling with what to work on.  i get many ideas, but when it comes to concentrating on them, i have an incredibly tough time.  but i feel that if i were to concentrate on one, i'd be in good shape.  especially if i were to continue with that momentum.  

should i even talk about what i'm working on now?  well, i will...i guess it's an american manga.  it's more along the lines of how manga is, being more personable to the characters and the story and a little less dialogue, but it's not in japanese, and i'm not japanese, so i can't really say that it is manga.  and it's not like a traditional american comic, like when a team is working together on different parts of the project en whole, or like how american comics tend to be more about the overall story and everyone involved and having (in general) more dialogue.  

i'm in the coffee shop.  all i can think, and all i've been thinking lately is that people are strange.  am i this strange?  or, at least, do i come off as being this strange?  

but yeah.  i wanted to write a book, and continue sketching, and tell a story.  i was thinking about telling the story really through a short film about atlanta.  and then sketching for practice, and continuing to write the book.  and paint.  but for many years i've been getting lost in my ideas.   think i need to ask one of my painter friends about this.

https://www.facebook.com/merrillfineart

  he and i had this conversation a few years ago, about creative types who have many ideas, usually at once, and getting bombarded by them.  

but now i'm concentrating.  i have an ongoing homework list that i work diligently on, so i figure that if i keep on, that i'll make it through.  

where'd the wagon go?

i fell off so far back ago that i don't even see the wagon anymore.  you know how it's supposed to go, fall off the wagon and then you get back on.  well, i don't even know where the wagon went.

so i hitched a ride on a random-wagon.  maybe it's a new one that i built myself, maybe it's a metaphoric or quantum-physical kind of wagon?  maybe it's imaginary?  it's real enough that i'm on it, i feel that i'm on it, so it has to be real.  a kind-of wise-man told me the day before yesterday that perception is reality.  so this wagon o mine is definitely real, so i'm beyond perceiving it, so it's beyond reality then.  that is so deep.  that's how my waggin rolls.  it's real!

so now that i'm here, i have the same goals as before.  i'm just not moving ahead very well.  focus!  ~on one thing that is.  i have thoughts about a short film, very short 0 budg'.   but it seems really interesting, at least interesting to work on, especially with all these awesome programs that i have!  updating my blogs..err....updating my site...err, don't go there yet.  maybe if i re-pay for my hosting i'll be more prone to updating since my ads will be gone.  i just feel like re-doing the whole thing, but you know there's like 10years of material in there.  i've had that site up since....2001?  man.  maybe 2002.

painting has taken priority seating, but the prob is that most nights i'm worn out!  bad excuse, but setting up and breaking down are a little time-consuming, and by the time family stuff is done, it's about an hour before i have to get up and go do everything again, and really, during that (literal) hour of silence, i wanna lay it horizontal because a preggo person is def a tired person, esp w/a hubs and a 16monther running around.  literally.  running.  around.  running around.  running all around.  seems like he's never, never stopping.  so how to solve this dilema?  crack it one code at a time?  and when does gaming come in?  i just bought this DS and like 10 fresh games ready to be saved up.  and persona is waiting on the PSP and this weekend is COD double XP and the new maps come out next week.  i guess it's priorities.  and chipping away, cracking those codes.

Oil Paint Palette: 2013 JTW

i stopped painting for a while, then i started again, then i moved to SK and then stopped again.  since being back in my family's home city, and being settled back in, i've started again.  but i noticed that the palette that i had, the paints that were in my kit, weren't really going where i needed them to go.  and by a kit, i mean 'my' kit, not a pre-packaged one that i bought somewhere, but this is one that i've developed over the years.  some things have made it through, a couple just came and went.  didn't really need those things.  i'll do another blog on my kit in one of my upcoming posts.  but in my kit, like i was saying, my paints weren't thorough enough.  

i didn't have enough earthiness, and i also didn't have enough contrasts and darks.  lights were easy to achieve, because of white, but it's not quite the same in the other direction by just using black.  i noticed that my paintings had a very common hue throughout all of the colors.  and one other problem with the lights, is that white doesn't necessarily mean 'bright'.  and 'brighteners' like yellow, or something else that you may have that is bright, doesn't always work because it stands a chance of it altering your color.

most likely, a very talented or experienced painter, can overcome color challenges.  and at the very least, someone who's very skilled in color theory.  or, maybe it's impossible without the right colors to begin with.  i'm still working on color theory, but i decided to go for a very good, solid and basic palette to (re)begin with.

i started doing some research, and it wasn't easy to find illustrated and described palettes.  but i did find one that was very helpful, and about two others that were pretty good too.  i don't remember where it was or who it was, but if you've been looking, most likely you've run into his (i think it's a guy) page, meaning the one that was really helpful.  if i run into it again, i'm definitely going to pay homage, because between his site and about 2-3 others, i was able to really narrow down which paints i was looking for (in my mind) and which ones i may have been looking for but needed to avoid or at least find an alternative for because they were toxic.  i had a teacher, a painting teacher in college, who got cancer because of all of her years using paints that were (naturally, or maybe a better word is traditionally?) made with toxic ingredients.  

all of the colors i've listed have at most a moderate toxicity.  only a few.  read the tubes when you get them, the cancer warnings will be there, and research will tell you where on the scale they fall.  and if they're too far up there, you may want to decide against working with them at all.  and a warning, sometimes it's heartbreaking ;o)  at least mildly.  because a couple of the colors that i was looking forward to the most were too toxic for my taste and ultimately i had to decide against them and/or return them.  

and so now, here's the list :o)

I've abbreviated the manufactures names down to: 
DRG, W&N, & G...a paint by Maimeri Puro is also on the list

REDS:
DRG: Naphthol Crimson #512
W&N (AOC): Alizarin Crimson #004
DRG: Cadmium Red Deep (Hue) #504

ORANGES:
DRG: Cadmium Orange (Hue) #619
W&N (WOC): Cadmium Yellow Deep (Hue) #46

YELLOWS:
DRG: Chrome Lemon (Hue) #627
W&N (WOC): Cadmium Yellow Pale (Hue) #8

GREENS:
DRG: Sap Green #375
DRG: Terre Verte (Hue) #379
W&N (WOC): Veridian (Hue) #43

BLUES:
DRG: Prussian Blue #135
G (AOC): Cobalt Blue #P049G
W&N (WOC): French Ultramarine #21, Series 5
W&N (WOC): Cerulean Blue (Hue) #10

EARTHS:
G (AOC): Raw Umber #P172G, Series 1
W&N (AOC): Mars Violet Deep #395, Permanence AA, Series 2
DRG: Burnt Umber #223
W&N (AOC): Burnt Sienna #074
Maimeri Puro: Mars Red #248
G (AOC): Raw Sienna #P171G, Series 1
W&N (AOC): Yellow Ocher #744

PURPLE:
DRG: Cobalt Violet (Hue) #406

WHITE:
DRG: Titanium White #009

BLACK:
DRG: Ivory Black #034

Value is the relative lightness or darkness of a color.  And Hue is the color itself.  Red is a hue, Green, etc....the common theory is that all hues can be generated or mixed from different combinations of the 3 main primaries, Red, Yellow, & Blue.  So, earlier I mentioned that a lot of my paintings had the same hue, but they also had the same value.  I wasn't getting the contrasts that I was looking for in addition to having a lot of the same color scales happening over and over.  A lot of that are my shortcomings as a painter, because masters and really skilled painters can do some pretty awesome things.  But also like I said before, I wanted to make sure that I was at least starting from a point that was a good basic foundation of colors.  

If you notice, in my 'new' palette, I have the warm and cool of every color, and in a few colors, I have a couple more in addition to those.  Not many though.  Since I'd consider myself not so good nowadays, I wanted to hold back on having so many colors that it would be a crutch.  I'm still working on color theory, and being familiar with colors in general has always been very important to me.  

So I hope this helps you!

Please leave a comment if you'd like to talk about some things,

I'm still working with this palette,

so there may be some additions to this post 

in other posts.

And please be on the lookout for 

that post about my kit.

I think it'll be especially helpful for beginners,

but also helpful for anyone with a brush :o)

Take care

:o)

Hello?

I just took a look at my entry dates, and oy!!, it's been a whilllllle...on both blogs. But just like my youtube channel, i'm going renegade style. On my phone, on the train. You could see the footage.

What have I been doing?? Btw, i'm asking myself that. Nevertheless....

I forgot to take a picture before I left home, but coming up in the next post is a pretty cool palette breakdown,i spoke about it before. I have about 22 colors on my plate, oil paints that is, and they're looking like a pretty harmonious set. Good hues, and good saturation.

I have them all laid out and listed, and within each example white is also included. You'd be surprised at how much a color can change once you've added write to it. Stay tuned :o)

In the past two months, i've also scrapped one book and started on two others. One is an illustrated narrative, and the other is just a  (way) better version of the original novel that I was working on. Maybe i'll put a few pages up here? So exposing!
A good friend of mine just sold one of his scripts, for about 80K. He never sold before because of the exposure. I'd been trying for years to just get them printed and at least go for a literary agent, but he's a sensitive guy when it comes to his scripts ;o) but he took the plunge, and now he's gotten a little broken into the exposure ;o) and this script wasn't even his masterpieces. Or, rather, one of his better works. He did it on purpose like that,lol. Funny guy!

now he's about to invest into a married couple of friends of his, and has a little more room to think. I'm really happy for him...  :o)

Maybe one day, i'll get a breakthrough?? It would be nice to get recognized in a good, significant way. But now i'll just concentrate on getting the work done. 

Stay tuned!
:o)