on being a non-apple 'puter artist

I'm starting to get depressed by the loyality my creative friends show to second rate apple'ness on their computers. I really don't like the appl'ific software ..it only appears easy to use because it doesn't let your do very much ...ok ok some really creative types can do ammazing things but they tend to do all that with a lot of work ...manual work ...lots of fiddling .... lots of time wasted ...my feeling is in 75% of the cases just doing it manually with a pencil and paper... or paint or whatever ...would have done a better job probably in less time ...I have come to associate apple software as a time black hole just sucking in the creativity and giving a bland results, if any result can be created in a reasonable time frame. RANT OVER

So Having said all that, I am finding it hard to find the type of artistic software I would like to use to do my art directly on the computer, a much battered but loved toshi notebook running vista. Corel draw & paint are ok but expensive .. the adobe stuff also ok, albeit applish, but even more expensive ...gimp is pretty powerful and free but oh what a learning curve ...where is the middle ground?

Ok back to the rant, Itunes has trashed my music library yet again ...and goobled up most of my free disc space in the process ...bugger ...buggger ...more bugger ...it is time I learnt the lesson I should have realized sooner ...remove itunes and try something else ...so I'm rebuilding with songbird portable (ie it and the library are happy on an external USB drive) and now for my ipod ...hangon Ipod device not supported ...What the?

its too hot to worry about all this now but keep me away from apples tonight! even the edible kind

with a little help from ipernity

This is my first attempt at a blog post images directly from Ipernity ...why? Well Ipernity if a lot like flickr but at least so far doesn't have quite the same shame you, because you post nudity, attitude as Flickr ... maybe thats because it is essentially europian and more grown up ...maybe the trolls that ruined flickr with stolen pornsite images haven't found their way to ipernity yet ...no matter there is a chance I can once more be publically viewed and my links won't be blocked ..so if you are bored with flickr stick around and I will give you an artist opinion of how it find it in some future posts

DON'T PANIC if i have sketched you and posted that only on flickr, it will be safe from me ...I'll keep my flickr presence. If you prefer the image removed, also let me know and better still tell me if you prefer it also posted in ipernity

That wasn't so bad

Its a dull day here ... drizzly rain, which we need badly but not art inspiring I'm afraid ... and after my third coffee of the morning and a twitter read or two ...I got an itch to change my blog template

I was scared this would be a big technical issue, requiring too much patience and text editing ... so I had keep avoiding even looking ... ok I was wrong

I soon founf Deluxe templates, and liked their creative art template as I was seeking a sketchbook look & feel ...i still have to tweak that stuff over on the right but overall I'm please and it was easy to change the template (just read the instructions that come in the zip file with xml when you down load it. the step about backuping your previous template is good advice) :)

The Great Wall ..or Not

I'm not happy I've just deleted a larger number of anonymous comments in Chinese with lots of links to goodness knows where and what, added to MY blog posts ...many just posted in the last day or some in posts as far back as 2004 ... not sure who would spend so muck time doing that, ...AND how have the bypassed the standard google steps to stop anonymous comments ... inscrutable ,, or just childish ...No matter they have been deleted and will keep being deleted ... MOST IMPORTANTLY dear readr do not follow these Chinese links I suspect they is no good to be found behind them

HEY GOOGLE
How do I even reportt this stuff to you?
Do you even care?

iPad

iPad
Originally uploaded by vicequeenmaria

I'm not sure the ipad is really likley to live up to te hype ... but i'm also certain it will be a very popular must have toy for most ...and a tools for a few creative types ...i do see it as the technology that overcomes the resistance of the OLD CENTRALIZED CAPITAL CONTROL of the creative folk among us. ..Magazines and newspapers will struggle but the real battle line is all about intellectual property and copy right or wrongs ...if it just means more blanant stealling of work and plagarism then we will be living in a darker world ...on the other hand if we learn to share and acknowledge creativity, we could be on the verge of a gold era with nifty toys to enjoy it in our pockets

raising the flag

i feel like dancing

Went along to the globe to globe festival of world music today in the semi-official capacity of artist for the brazilian style full body paint for the samba band ...ok just for the girls (no photos sorry) ...massive amounts of fun ...even got to play in a west African drum band workshop ...loved it ...this evil rhythm type dancing is for me ...it was a great day out ...great food ...great music and lots of dancing ..lots of happy faces, multiculturalism does work and is alive in this little corner of this humble globe

View from on Top

“There are many paths to the top of the mountain, but the view is always the same” ... Ancient Chinese Proverb.

Beware I am a promiscuous tweeter

I actually get a lot of flack from my so called friends, because I'm an old guy and I tweet, that almost as perverted as using facebook to them. The really bad news I must hide from them (seriously they will never read my blog ;) ...is I am not choosy where I tweet ... I will tweet from anywhere using anything ...shame on me ...I know this because I have checked with TweetStats.

Happy New Year

Still scannerless, ....but happy :)

Wishing everyone of my friends a happy new year and maybe it be both pleasurable & prosperous

yes ...but the food is great

One thing about having my studio out he back of a french patisserie and cafe, is I get the most wonderful day old cakes for morning & afternoon teas ...just things like a decent coffee morning and afternoon are a great plus in temselves ... not sure it gets anymore art done but it sure is the right way to live ... just in case you are worried i am geting to pampered, I do help out in the cafe from time to time

watercolour sketching

lotta 5 watercolour,
originally uploaded by sigh clone.

It has been a while since i painted something to post in here ... I'm still painting but just not for my blog much ... had a lovely email from a web fiend which included some christmas photo that inspired me to get the brushes out ... problem is I had no watercolour paper .. not too bad i thought, i could handle it ... the washes don't glide on standard printer paper the water sinks in and goes a bit greyish ... the second wash didn't help ... normaly that would starts to bring on the translucency . . it sank in as well and looked even muddier ...damn ... used a few pencils to put a few colour highlights in but I certainly miss that 300gsm archers

why is nudity so misunterstood?

Saw this posted on You Tube by Blunty3000. It does so many things right, starting with acknowledging the other contributors, looks at the human form as beauty, uses the censored blackouts sensibly but most of all it demonstrates that nudity can be treated a perfectly normal form of artistic expression.

Nude
"Consider this video both a love letter to the Human form, and an open letter to any and all either interested in the nude in art, or are confused by it, or have trouble telling what is art and what is porn, or simply want to explore what goes on between model and artist in the creation of artistic studies of the naked human body.

Thank you to all who helped me make this video, It simply would not have been possible without you. Thank you to all the artists who either offered their work directly, or allowed it's use through the Creative Commons copyright license, Your generosity is greatly appreciated. :)" ...Blunty3000

changing scanners

yet another sketch of walkabout,
originally uploaded by sigh clone.

my long suffering scanner died yesterday... in an acrid flash of something electronically amiss it breathed a last vile breath and just stopped .... we never really got along ..she, I called my scanner a she, she always kept me wondering what my image would turn out like ... too dark, too litle, crinkle marks, not eogh contrast ... no matter whoi adjusted the control she would still just always insist on the last word and over tweek something ... ok i found her infuriating ...BUT I had grown accustomed to her face



So soon i have to learn to use another mistress ...just fpr now I'm making do with a multi-function printer that will do some basic scanning, ok scans quiet well and without the fuss

tagging people in flickr

I only just noticed, the new people feature in flickr ... because a few people where identifying themselves within my photo stream. It is super easy to use. Just look for the add people under the people in this photo heading ... its down on the right hand side of the main photo display page ...then type in their flickr name or email address ... suddenly they are famous. You can add people to your photos or they can add themselves to yours

ok famous, is a slight exaggeration ... more precisely tagged in public, and this may have a down side ...a lot of folk including good friends of mine are paranoid at the moment about what the net knows about them ...so I'm probably leaning towards the etiquette that people can tag themselves, rather than me do it ...and on that note I normally ask those i sketch before I post them on the net

the alley cat

I have no idea why I sketch the alley cat sitting on the fence ...i normally throw things at him (or her) ... i'm not a cat fan ...they are vicious killers and torturers of anything smaller than themselves ... they are definitely;y not affectionate pets, they treat their keepers with only contempt ... I can not see why anyone wouls like them ... in fact anyone with a cat as a buddy icon, or post photos of cats in their ablums gets the heave ho from my contacts. So just watch yourself alley cat, i'm bigger than you

something to watch

I started to prepare a post today but my scanner breathed its last breath half way trough and kind of spoilt the flow. So I though i;d give you something from youtube to look as as a reward for stopping by.

what good is a sketch blog without sketches

Some sketches of eyes & ears on normal copy paper using a new type of charcoal stick. Like a conte only oily. Quite like it.

PS It's been so long since I uploaded an pictures blogger asked me to reaccept the terms of service ... maybe I should have read them ... ok nobody every does ;)

some on-line sketches of friends

Opps

sorry about the black box (seems I'm deemed un-safe on flickr again) andits been a while between post ...i'll be back sometime soonish ;)

more dancers

too many web 2.0 places

I have been a sucker for the new social networking place ...like a kid with a new toy ...i pick up and play with each new offere like blogger (here), flickr (i'm considered UNSAFE there so your need to be a member to see my work), last.fm, bebo, tumblr, & twitter ...now I have a small gallery in ipernity...



Ipernity is often refered to as a flickr clone, superficially it is ... but for me the big difference is you can upload video from a FREE account ...all my web 2.0 playing is very definitely based around not paying :)

AND for the record I still resist FaceBook ...not sure why, haven't tried it but those who where so initially enthused just put me off ...had the feeling it was second life without the fantasy avatars

See you on the interwebz, some time

watching paint dry

I must admit I have had a lot of problems with my washes getting way to wet as I develop watercolours ...particularly of naked flesh .. the delicacy & transparencies of watercolour is beautiful ...and a little hard to control... but thin layers of colour ontop of each other give a luminancy to the original work (which is almost impossible to capture in a scan like this) ... the down side is the washes need to be thin and WET ... VERY WET .. which crinkles the paper and any further pigment added will bleed out into the already wet zones ...waiting for the paper to dry takes hours, and the creative urges soon dissipate ...the solution is painfully simple ...use a hair dryer to speed up drying ...and keep the creativity flowing.

dancers

Siren is also the name of Tara Moss's new book

Tara Moss is not only a great looking model, she is an exciting writter ... her latest book is out in australia today. Its called Siren not sirenS ... haven't read it yet but who could resist with a teaser like this -

ENTER A WORLD OF BEAUTY AND DANGER, OF FRENCH CABARET AND TERRIBLE REVENGE

girls drawing back

I don't always get my way, sometimes my subjects get cheeky ...take my pencils and sketchbook and draw themselves or friends ... who am I to argue?

venus reclining

venus reclining,
originally uploaded by sigh clone.

This is another sketching exercise ... my skills at taking the video haven't improved ...not up to YouTube quality just yet ... but hopefully ot lets you see what I do ...how i work the washes ... and my mistakes and errors ...and the feeble attempts to fix them ... but most of all i want you to see feel the image coming together ...it takes about 5 minutes but i have made sure the video is small enough to be low-bandwidth friendly ... sketched from the natural curves group on flickr ...its a private group but if you are nicely you can join

wow ...i'm worth something!

Not sure why I even checked ... but you can even get a quote on the value of your web site ... is it the indepth content that brings the crowd? ... ok maybe its just the boobs :)

My site is worth$2,696.6Your website value?

Wet & Overcast & Sketching

I did ask if anyone wanted to be illustrated on twitter... but only one reply and that was probably a bot ...so I returned to flickr for yet another torso challenge in watercolour.

sirens

The painting "The Crucified Venus" cause a real stir back a long while ago in Australia. Some of the controversy is covered in the film Sirens

Sirens (1994) - The best free videos are right here

This is a good film ...much more to it than just the speculation of seeing elle naked ...have we really progressed very far? ...is good art recognized? ..must nudity be always confused with pornography? ...are religious images sacrosanct? ...or was Norman just a naughty boy?

ear ear (again)

who could not help being a bit distressed at a gory item wrapped in newspaper ...not a gift of love that I think anyone would like to have to accept? poor rachel!

just had a massive argument with some fellow artists about the Kaufmann claim that gaugain cut off van gogh's ear ...it wasn't about the ear abd who did it, over who and why? so much as what was the deeper disturbance between the two artists. Van gogh insisting (quiet rightly) that art needs to be grounded in what we see ...landscapes need to be painted in plein air ...while gaugain insisted (maybe just to rattle van gogh) that it was the artist imagination that made the picture ... the artist just needed to be inspired ...and then his mind could do the rest ...it was me against everyone, the rest of the world maybe ...but i was adamant that your need to have the visual reference ...studies from life ...that what makes for a great nude ... then I was called a hypocrite and deluded ...you see I often sketch from photos or direct from the computer screen ...but isn't that also a visual reference ...ok I know I'm outnumbered, but i still think vincent was onto something.

not getting out of line

I haven't been drawing as much as I'd like ...for a start I don't like the cold and I prefer to sketch & paint on the deck ...but the health fiascoes of the past few months have slowed me down ...but i know i need to get back in the saddle and keep the mark making, marking marks, making lines and making shades .. just making stuff ...keeping the eye hand coordination subliminal not labored ...art is as much about seeing as actually making the lines ...that is why I need to sketch

“People only see what they are prepared to see.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

not seeing eye to eye

its not funny, its art

poor bianca, she doesn't get art ... or is it us ;)

sketching from flickr (again)

circumstance has conspired to restrict the amount of time i have spent sketching ... yet i yearn for the challenge of analyzing the tone and composition ... coordinating my hand and eye ...letting my arm feel the turns and gestures ...have my brain distill the colours and how to build the washes ...watercolour take practise ... and what better way to tune the skill than to paint a delicious tease from flickr ... merci elli

Shut up you are making me hungry

Melbourne has always been a food obsessed place ... not in a bad way, just savy about food, fresh ingredients, rich cultural diversity and tastes, a decent restaurant culture from the simple (eg the age's cheap eats) to the ridiculously opulant (and they get no free advertising from me) but lately the conversations äre becoming very focused ... and its because of a TV show ... masterchef ...everyone is watching ...it eclipsed the michael jackson saga here, more popular than the current sporting draw cards the tour de france and the ashes (that's true cricket to the heathens and we have started poorly I'm afraid) ...something more important than sport is so un-melbourne! ... then tonight little george let the cat out of the bag with two four letter words FOOD PORN ... yes that's what we all need to stop thinking about the global financial crisis, tax and other bad stuff

Don't get me wrong this is not wanton GLUTTONY or depraved use of edible items in exploitative sexual acts, it is the thrill we get about imagining our next meal ...we need to be excited about eating, it is a survival instinct, and you don't just need TV to do that ....I belong to a food porn group on flickr and I have noticed a lot of tweeters post photos of what they eat, MegaNom has a particularly delicious tastes ... the only problem I have with all this is ...damn am I hungry

Beaux Gestes

Most often I get questioned about what is my style and where did it come from. I don't paint like my cartoons and I don't paint like the artists I admire (eg Gauguin) ... so where does my style start ...my theory is it is is not a conscious thing, it is much more physical it comes from the interaction of my eye and hand ... and it very much related to how I hold the brush and flex and bend my arm ... i don't paint in a slow considered way ... it don't even use pencil construction lines any more ... i just pick up the brush .. mix the colour and dab it here and there, my hand just does it guided by my o copy, but I eye but not its slave ... my mind and ego are looking away distracted ...music helps ... ok i do work from photos or a computer screen a lot so that is already resolving the perspective and giving a two dimensional thing to copy, ... but to be honest I look more at the tone than the lines ...confusing isn't it ...I struglle to explain it just love to do it. Four or fire gesture sketches and I'm away in the creative place, time, logic and sensibility vanish, this is a place of colour and emotion and .... and... no one knows until the wash drips of the brush as it flicks this way and that.

Like ideas & words, gestures have a life of their own.
Laurence Wylie

Curves on Curves

Pencil Sketch on normal bond paper

Iranians can longer see the twitterverse

What you will see in Iran when You try to use twitter today!

The story of twitter(so far)

This wonderful illustration is from monolith's article that begins

...Twitter, Twitter, Twitter. Seems every where you turn these days that little blue bird is staring you right in the face

Are you part of the Twitpocalypse?

remember neda

remember neda, originally uploaded by sigh clone.

Remember Neda ...even with an offoicial ban on "public" mourning ...and even if the truth gets "officially" shredded!

Neda ...a needless murder

neda ...a needless murder, originally uploaded by sigh clone.

The murder of a young teenage girls, out watching the crowd with her father (apparently not joining in the protest) is a horrible and callous act. The anguish of a doctor trying desperately to help her. The fact that it was caught on video and posted on YouTube does means now the whole world knows. But will the world remember? Have we forgotten east timor already?

I would like other artist to capture their feeling of this event, and like picasso did for guernica leave some powerful images, and other works so the world can not forget.

We need peace not more bloodshed.

about counting votes

counting my vote, originally uploaded by sigh clone.

My view is that the depth and size of the responses to the elections in Iran, have caught politician on all side out ... well off guard ... with not the slightest idea of how to respond .. which is good. it may mean they listen to the people ... BUT I am worried that peace and truth will be the next casualties.

The movement may not last past friday prays, I worry that we will see east timor all over a gain ...my fear is the Basij & maybe security forces loyal to Ahmadinejad may run amok .. The slogan will change from "Where is my vote?" to "Who can we trust?"

From afar we need to keep public the message that people have a right to see their votes counted, we should not meddle in who the vote is for.

Support Iran Protests! #Iranelection

Support Iran Protests! #Iranelection
Originally uploaded by harrystaab

There are now about 900 entries on flickr, but many duplicates, related to protest and demonstration in support of free elections in Iran

Congratulations to the many, mainly young folk, who are posting so the world can see.

Truth is the first casuality

Things may be already getting very nasty in Iran, these are just kids, and it is worth noting that a lot of mis-information may be already circulating, even on twitter and blogs.



Those still with net access will be working hard to get the truth out.

SO 2) don't dilute the conversations
2) those tweeting could be putting themselves in grave danger
2a) don't post ISP address or twitter names etc
2b) Become an honorary Iranian, this will overwhelm any clandestine attempt to locate tweeters by the Iranian "security" force (& the feared Basij malitia)
3) follow the hasthags like #iranelections or search for "where is my vote"
4) try to source your news from reliable source (eg SBS Australia's assessment of the situation)

return to the two minute torso

I have returned to this simple painting exercise to try and get my washes flowing more freely (... i eneed up letting them get way too wet) and my tonal balance back (I want rich glowing skin tones again) ... it just practice but practice makes perfect doesn't it?

"Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life.” -- Picasso.

its all in there

I have long admired Helmut Newton's delicious black and white photos of sensual and erotic women, what i didn't realize was he was living and moving in the same haunts of Melbourne, he as a refuge, as I have the privilege to inhabit now. better still i have just discovered he was also a follower of the new objectivity, a movement that developed in Germany before world war II out of and in opposition to expressionism. Here was Helmut working away as a fashion photographer developing his skill and style at the same time the angry penguins where ramming expressionism justaposed with surrealism down the establishments through. Who said art was boring?

The point of my photography has always been to challenge myself, to go a little further than my Germanic discipline and Teutonic nature would traditionally permit me to.