Last day of term

Week 11 at Art School - p.2

Even shorter entry today. It was the last day of term and we spent the day mounting our work while the tutors did the assessments for the fulltimers. It helped put all the work we've done in context - and helped us see what more we needed to do (I'm taking my acrylics on holiday with me!). Then, after a long day of standing and sticking and rearranging and sticking and rearranging again and sticking and packing up, we all went out to the student bar for a well deserved drink with the tutors ... Hurrah!

So, I'm off on holiday from Saturday for 3 weeks - over Christmas and New Years. Will be overseas so will probably not be updating the blog regularly if at all. So until then dear readers and fellow artists... HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!

3D workshop

Week 11 at Art School - p.1

Short entry today - mostly because we didn't actually make much art (and also my hand was being used as a modroc model, which made taking photos difficult!). Today we had an introduction to the foundation 3D workshop, a little room full of tools and materials for making things. Most of the stuff was what you'd find in a woodworking (hammers, chisels, saws and the like) or sculptural (plasters, alginates, clay, tools for manipulating the materials) workshop. We all had a quick go at some soldering, playing with plaster and modroc (bandage impregnated with plaster), playing with alginate (it's the blue stuff that the dentist uses to take impressions of your teeth), and also some liquid latex.

The technician then took us on a tour of the BA Fine Art student studios to show us what we could do if we stayed on to do a BA at our college. It was nice to see what the students were doing.

Art history lecture today was about the 60s. Rather than lecture us, the tutor showed us a video about The Beatles "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", and the summer of love, and all that that era was influenced by (LSD mainly!) and what that era influenced.

It was nice to be back in college - although I was limping and got quite tired by the end. Thank you to everyone who has been leaving me encouraging comments on my last entry.

Ankle

Yup, this is what my ankle looks like at the moment (well last night) - less swollen than Wednesday, but nothing like my right foot. Hmph. All wrapped up in an elasticated bandage. My toes seem to have puffed up as well today - water retention? Who knows ...

Regular readers will realise that there's no "Week 10 at Art School - p.2" - missed another day at college - fortunately no homework as it was "catch up week", but unfortunately I did miss the induction to the big metalwork and woodwork workshops upstairs in college. Oh well, will have to get the tour next term.

Instead of trying to catch up on homework, I've been feeling sorry for myself, so eventually last night I thought I'd get motivated and at least document the injury - and that's what you see here. Initially, Sunshine was carrying me round whenever I needed to get anywhere (bathroom mainly). Then yesterday evening I realised that I could use the single seater sofa like an ad-hoc wheelchair (the yellow thing just outside the bedroom door on the top left) and wheel myself around the house. The cane hanging off the bookshelf is Sunshine's for doing hat and cane tricks - I tried to use it to help me walk, but it was not of much use - need crutches I think.

On the right hand panels are my friends for the week - Ibuprofen tablets, Ibuprofen gel (which ironically I had bought for Sunshine when he did a similar thing to his ankle not too long ago), and the 'Thera Flex' cold pack wrapped up in a tea towel that I've been using as a cold compress (alternating with a pack of frozen peas).

I've had enough of this being immobile - I don't make for a very good invalid! - and am hoping to be on my feet soon. Have started trying to limp about without the aid of the sofa - my ankle is still quite stiff, but fortunately not quite so painful. Fingers crossed I'm up and about soon, and back at college next week for the last week of this term.

Animation

Week 10 at Art School - p.1

I wasn't actually at art school today as I sprained my ankle pretty bad last night and am bed bound for the next few days. Today would have been the second day in IT - animation studies. Fortunately I'd picked up the crib sheet from the tutor last week and realised that I had all the software needed and could get on with the assignment on my own at home. So here goes...

We had to make a simple animation of about 6 frames. Sunshine very cunningly suggested I do an animation of a charleston dancer (to remind myself of my previous life as a swing dancer). First, I had a go at drawing out a storyboard of what I wanted:
Found that it was not enough information - thought maybe I should take photos of myself doing a basic charleston. Sunshine suggested that I just film myself and then take the stills that I wanted - which was a much better idea. So this is what I did: this was yesterday afternoon, BEFORE I had done my ankle in.

From this, and using some reference illustrations of "flappers", I started drawing a template:
From this I traced out 5 frames (some repeat so I didn't have to do all 8 frames), scanned them in, coloured them in Photoshop (as required for the assignment), did some initial animation tests on Adobe Image Maker, a bit more tweaking, and then Voila! My first little animated gif. Enjoy!

Lilies

Sunshine bought me some yellow lilies the other day. What a lovely surprise! I thought I'd do a drawing of them while they were still fresh. Thank you Sunshine!

Contextualizing done!

Finally, another piece of homework done! Original project brief here, update here, and for anyone interested the final pdf document is here. Above is the screenprint that you can see in the exhibition picture of me in the update entry.