Archive for March, 2009
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Fighting Fire with Fission
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Still Rollin'
I realize that I haven’t updated in a while, and this is because I’ve been incredibly busy. So, I figured I’d just leave this here to let you know that I’m alright; things are going well. I’m sorry I haven’t kept in touch. Things have just been so crazy. I’ve been thinking about you though, in the long watches of the night. How are you?
xoxo
Jon
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Rant 01
So, in an effort to take an actual opinionated stand on the worlds of art and design, I’m starting a new trend where at least once a week I’ll rant about something in either of those fields. At the request of a good friend and contemporary, Brian Alexandrowicz (I hope to God I spelled his name right), I am going to start with discussing the issue of Web Standards and browser compatibility.
I think everyone who plans to web develop for a living needs to understand that the web industry is extremely fast paced and constantly evolving and improving upon itself. It’s time we all stop using web practices from the 90’s. I guess what frustrates me most is not that people are still using antiquated methods—such as tables for layouts and <font/> tags—but that there is an infinite number of places to learn all of these new techniques. My friend Brian, that I previously mention, had never used CSS in his life, and under a month, he is reasonably fluent. Case and point, these things are not hard to do! I believe it to be this infectious apathy that’s prevalent especially in the smaller web firms.
The mentality is that if the old ways work just as well, why learn something entirely new? What they fail to realize, is that these technologies aren’t being updated for shits-and-giggles. They are constantly being revised for everyone’s benefit. The web is more than just an industry. The internet has fundamentally changed our culture and modern commerce. Basically, what I’m saying is that the former attitude is fine when you’re in a business making and selling furniture—if you want to stick to tradition than more power to you—but the web industry has standards, and for good reason.
Let’s for a moment analyze the benefits of web standards. To do that I feel that i should briefly stipulate them. I stress that this is a very basic list, and really only scratches the surface:
- The use of XHTML as opposed to HTML
- The use of external CSS to compose a layout, and the lack of inline styling
- Clean semantics, and intuitive markup
Again, that is an abbreviated list. For those of you not immersed in the Web 2.0 movement, that list might seem like semantics to you. I suppose that in the grand scheme of things, it is; after all, they are called web semantics. I’m sure we’ve all learned, though, that sometimes it’s the little things that really make a difference. This is one of those times.
To shorten my argument, let’s all stop being so stubborn and keep up with the times.
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SBS: Day 5
Today was probably the least productive day yet. That’s okay, though, because I’ve been working really freakin’ hard all week, and I feel like I can slack a day.
But since I’d hate to leave you without a picture, here’s some food for thought. If I may use an old cliché, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” Oh the words one might use…
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SBS: Day 3
Today was even less productive than yesterday. This isn’t a good trend… I think I’ve been burning myself out from working too much. Oh well, I’m taking tomorrow off to visit my parents. Here’s what little I’ve accomplished.
I’ve cooled off the background a bit to make the skin tones pop some more.
I’ve added the second part of the diptych. It’s just in the underpainting stage at the moment.
Stay tuned, more to come!
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SBS: Day 2, the Nightwatch
So I went back to the studio around 10:00 because I had nothing better to do, and I was falling asleep watching the Science Channel. I painted until about 1:00. Now I’m about two thirds of the way done with this painting.
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Spring Break in the Studio: Day 2
So today was a slightly less productive day. I finished my self portrait, which is a slightly smaller painting, with slightly less areas that needed work than yesterday’s painting. So though it looks fundamentally different than it did at the beginning of the day, I only spent about three hours fiddling with it. However, I did the math and figured that if keep going at this rate, I’ll finish the paintings that I have to finish by the end of today, and get a good start on those that I have some time for. Anyway, here it is; again, the picture was taken on my cell phone… so… you know…
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Spring Break in the Studio: Day 1
So, due to the massive amount of work I had assigned just before Spring Break, I am forced to spend just about every day in the studio. At first I was extremely perturbed by this, but having completed my first day, I’m actually kind of looking forward to it. It was an absolutely beautiful day, and I had the whole studio to myself. I turned off all the lights, and opened all the windows, and painted by natural light only, with the breeze blowing on my back. now doesn’t that sound nice? It was so serene, in fact, that I didn’t even feel the necessity to listen to any music. Just the sounds of the city, and my paints. What a relaxing day. Anyway, now that I’m done bullshitting, here’s what I actually accomplished. Sorry for the crappy quality; my mom has my camera, and I didn’t want to lug her $700 camera to the studio, where I would most likely break it; so, these are taken on my cell phone.
This is me beginning to stain the canvas to do a rub out, like the portrait I finished last week. I had sketched out the figures in Charcoal and Watercolor pencil. The charcoal will get absorbed for the most part by the oil, but the watercolor pencil will repel the oil and still be visible under the paint.
This is where I decided to stop for the day, It’s a pretty completed underpainting. I’m thinking I’ll go straight from here to the overpainting. On the portrait I did an intermediate step and did I think what’s called a grissais (no idea if I spelled that correctly).
I’m going to keep up the trend of posting my progress every day. So stay tuned.
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Finished Portrait
I guess “finished” is a kind of shaky word to use, because it implies that this piece couldn’t get any better. This is hardly the case. Though I had higher hopes for this painting, I am fairly satisfied with how it turned out, especially considering my prior oil painting travesties. The likeness is a little shaky, though that wasn’t my goal, and I feel like I skimped on some of the detail around his cheeks. All in all, I’m quite a fan of working this way, and I’m probably going to finish my diptych painting this way, and maybe even start doing my illustration work in this manner as well. One complaint though: Venetian Red gets everywhere! My iPod speakers were pink by the end of the session, as were my jeans.
Anyway, for those of you who are actually keeping up with this blog, stay posted, I have a lot of new things that I will be coming up with in the next two weeks or so. It’s official, I will not be having a Spring Break. I have about five paintings to finish that week. Oh well, such is the life an illustrator, right?
