Monday, November 14, 2011
Computer Sketching
I've been experimenting with a computer drawing tablet. Lots of fun! (Though I think it'd take years to get really good with it.) Here are today's kid-with-fat-crayon-in-fist results:
Costumes as Design
There's a new exhibit here at Wichta's Art Museum: costumes of the famous musical group The Supremes, from the Mary Wilson collection.
Wilson was a member of the group from its start as a group of Chicago neighborhood girlfriends, who made their first costumes with skills learned at school home-ec classes. (I wish one of those dresses had been part of the exhibit!) The gowns on display come from a bit later in the Supremes' career, including couture by famous designers like Bob Mackie.
Overall, the effect is of fabulous '60s and '70s glamour. "Fabulous" is the word. The lines of the gowns are usually simple, lean, even severe, but the materials are rich and often heavily encrusted with beads or sequins and the colors strong, so that even on a mannequin they seem to want to shimmy and shimmer... These aren't evening gowns - though that's the look - but performance costumes. They want to move! I wish there were video clips to show this fashion in action.
And here's a video clip on You Tube: The Supremes at the Hollywood palace
Wilson was a member of the group from its start as a group of Chicago neighborhood girlfriends, who made their first costumes with skills learned at school home-ec classes. (I wish one of those dresses had been part of the exhibit!) The gowns on display come from a bit later in the Supremes' career, including couture by famous designers like Bob Mackie.
Overall, the effect is of fabulous '60s and '70s glamour. "Fabulous" is the word. The lines of the gowns are usually simple, lean, even severe, but the materials are rich and often heavily encrusted with beads or sequins and the colors strong, so that even on a mannequin they seem to want to shimmy and shimmer... These aren't evening gowns - though that's the look - but performance costumes. They want to move! I wish there were video clips to show this fashion in action.
Photo borrowed from The Supremes Lyrics
And here's a video clip on You Tube: The Supremes at the Hollywood palace
Friday, November 11, 2011
Film Fest - Harry Potter
In honor of the latest and last Harry Potter film coming out on DVD, I'm watching the whole series.
It's rather impressive to watch the films one after the other (one a night) and to feel the cumulative effect of the story. Rather fascinating to see the young actors grow up before your eyes.
Tonight was the third film, The Prisoner of Azkaban. This may be my favorite. It's tone is distinctly darker, marked by the introduction of the Dementors, as well as two of my favorite characters: Professor Lupin and Sirius Black. It also has one of the funniest scenes in the series - the inflation of the visiting Aunt.
I'm a fan of the Harry Potter books and films. Classics, I think. For anyone who hasn't yet read the last book or seen the last film, here's my spoiler free reaction to seeing it back in July.
It's rather impressive to watch the films one after the other (one a night) and to feel the cumulative effect of the story. Rather fascinating to see the young actors grow up before your eyes.
Tonight was the third film, The Prisoner of Azkaban. This may be my favorite. It's tone is distinctly darker, marked by the introduction of the Dementors, as well as two of my favorite characters: Professor Lupin and Sirius Black. It also has one of the funniest scenes in the series - the inflation of the visiting Aunt.
Poster image borrowed from U4posters.com
I'm a fan of the Harry Potter books and films. Classics, I think. For anyone who hasn't yet read the last book or seen the last film, here's my spoiler free reaction to seeing it back in July.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Decaying Film Palaces
Sad and beautiful images of abandoned movie theaters from photographer Matt Lambros in an article at Archdaily.com.
Photo borrowed from Archdaily.com's article about Matt Lambrose's photos.
Books - The Hunger Games
I've been hearing about this Hunger Games book trilogy by Suzanne Collins for a while now, the recommendation generally boiling down to: "Exciting! Page-turning! Can't put it down!"
I've been in exactly the mood for exciting, page-turning, can't-put-it-down. So I read 'em.
Good. VERY e, p-t, c-p-i-d... also engrossing, surprisingly violent and, indeed, cruel. Surprising for what seems to be meant as young adult novels. (Adults have been reading it.) The setup is a future where the ruins of the United States have become Panem, a civilization with a tyrannical central region/government and a series of enslaved provinces. They have this annual game - more or less "Survivor" crossed with gladiatorial combat - played by sacrificial teenagers. The books' main character is a young girl. That female protagonist and the need for this game to look pretty (or horrific) for the cameras takes the story from beauty pageant one minute to carnage the next: instantaneously from Barbie to G.I. Spartacus.
I'm still digesting the implications. But as a page-turning distraction I have to rate these books high: the first book, The Hunger Games, is the most gripping, the succeeding books, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay get, as trilogies tend to, less compelling but since it's cliff-hangers all the way, you'll gobble them all. Fast!
I've been in exactly the mood for exciting, page-turning, can't-put-it-down. So I read 'em.
Cover of The Hunger Games, borrowed from Wikipedia
Good. VERY e, p-t, c-p-i-d... also engrossing, surprisingly violent and, indeed, cruel. Surprising for what seems to be meant as young adult novels. (Adults have been reading it.) The setup is a future where the ruins of the United States have become Panem, a civilization with a tyrannical central region/government and a series of enslaved provinces. They have this annual game - more or less "Survivor" crossed with gladiatorial combat - played by sacrificial teenagers. The books' main character is a young girl. That female protagonist and the need for this game to look pretty (or horrific) for the cameras takes the story from beauty pageant one minute to carnage the next: instantaneously from Barbie to G.I. Spartacus.
I'm still digesting the implications. But as a page-turning distraction I have to rate these books high: the first book, The Hunger Games, is the most gripping, the succeeding books, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay get, as trilogies tend to, less compelling but since it's cliff-hangers all the way, you'll gobble them all. Fast!
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Monday, November 7, 2011
Grammar Nazis and Iconography
I'm fascinated by good writing.
(Occasionally I even attempt it myself. Mixed success. Writing well is just as hard as good grave digging, making every corner "neat and square," as Mike Mulligan's steam shovel would put it.)
So in reading this month's Naked City: Taboo, Wichita's art magazine, I had to laugh out loud at Bart Wilcox's description of being edited by a grammar sensitive, yet poorly informed, writing client:
"A client once told me that I had to rewrite a sentence because 'you can't end a sentence with a verb.' My reply was, 'I can. And I just did.'"
Grammar geeks in the audience: can you parse that joke? For more fun with parts of speech I recommend reading Lynn Truss's Eats, Shoots, and Leaves.
More interesting stuff from this issue: an exhibit of Chris Parks' strongly graphic art work at the Naked City Gallery.
(Occasionally I even attempt it myself. Mixed success. Writing well is just as hard as good grave digging, making every corner "neat and square," as Mike Mulligan's steam shovel would put it.)
So in reading this month's Naked City: Taboo, Wichita's art magazine, I had to laugh out loud at Bart Wilcox's description of being edited by a grammar sensitive, yet poorly informed, writing client:
"A client once told me that I had to rewrite a sentence because 'you can't end a sentence with a verb.' My reply was, 'I can. And I just did.'"
Grammar geeks in the audience: can you parse that joke? For more fun with parts of speech I recommend reading Lynn Truss's Eats, Shoots, and Leaves.
More interesting stuff from this issue: an exhibit of Chris Parks' strongly graphic art work at the Naked City Gallery.
Images of art by Chris Parks at Naked City Gallery, Wichita, Kansas
These are really strong, crisp visuals - no surprise the artist also designs logos and signage - but beyond the first pow! impact of shape and color and wit, there are subtler messages. Iconography. In an earlier age, surely Parks would have been slipping clues into somber paintings of saints or palming memento mori skulls into the innocent shadows of portraits. Here and now his colors are brighter and the jokes and skulls easier to spot.
(Click on the image caption to read the magazine article.)
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Life Interrupts Set Design
Sorry about the few-N-far-between posts here lately. There's been a family medical emergency, so I'm in remote mode and rather... distracted.
Nevertheless set design has been going on in a start and stop kinda way. I completed all the construction drawings for my black & white show The Frequency of Death in a motel room and I'm working on sketches for The Diary of Anne Frank in a guest room.
One professional trick I've learned over the years has come in very handy now: have a "traveling" design and drawing kit!
In my case the traveling kit is a mini drafting board with a parallel bar (I like to work on 8 1/2" x 11"* sheets), plus drafting pencils, pens, colored pencils, mini drafting triangles and scale all fitted into a very small black leather case. The drafting board isn't mandatory but, frankly, I've done all the drawings I ever want to on sticky kitchen tables or - horrors! - tile counter tops.
You never think you're going to need design much while on out of town... but sometimes you do. I've had to create colored renderings in beach-side rental houses, designed shows in motels, and especially re-designed elements of a show in restaurants, coffee shops, and on the phone in the car. Changes strike anywhere! And the designer must be prepared. So, when it became obvious that I'd be here longer and need to do more drawing than first thought, I supplemented this mini-kit with real-sized triangles, my handy electric eraser, and a few other things. But the expanded kit still fits in a smallish cardboard box.
For those who draft on the computer, the Kit could fit in a laptop... but you'd better practice a bit at using your drafting program on that teeny tiny screen. I don't think a smart phone is going to work.
Give it some thought... How would you get your projects finished if you had to leave town in an hour?
* Make that 11"x17" sheets! (Told you I was distracted.)
Nevertheless set design has been going on in a start and stop kinda way. I completed all the construction drawings for my black & white show The Frequency of Death in a motel room and I'm working on sketches for The Diary of Anne Frank in a guest room.
One professional trick I've learned over the years has come in very handy now: have a "traveling" design and drawing kit!
In my case the traveling kit is a mini drafting board with a parallel bar (I like to work on 8 1/2" x 11"* sheets), plus drafting pencils, pens, colored pencils, mini drafting triangles and scale all fitted into a very small black leather case. The drafting board isn't mandatory but, frankly, I've done all the drawings I ever want to on sticky kitchen tables or - horrors! - tile counter tops.
You never think you're going to need design much while on out of town... but sometimes you do. I've had to create colored renderings in beach-side rental houses, designed shows in motels, and especially re-designed elements of a show in restaurants, coffee shops, and on the phone in the car. Changes strike anywhere! And the designer must be prepared. So, when it became obvious that I'd be here longer and need to do more drawing than first thought, I supplemented this mini-kit with real-sized triangles, my handy electric eraser, and a few other things. But the expanded kit still fits in a smallish cardboard box.
For those who draft on the computer, the Kit could fit in a laptop... but you'd better practice a bit at using your drafting program on that teeny tiny screen. I don't think a smart phone is going to work.
Give it some thought... How would you get your projects finished if you had to leave town in an hour?
* Make that 11"x17" sheets! (Told you I was distracted.)
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