Writers and Artist Unite!

im working on an art portfolio and also my music. ive also some poetry and stuff kicking about.

im working on getting recording and new euquipment set up at moment which is money ive not got. of course recording is the easy part to music really.

as far as the portfolio goes its a mix of book based drawing and painting and also photograph and digital manipulation. what i do want to do is some large framed oil work.

 

I go to a studio drawing class once a week. It's the first time i've really had any kind of guidance in drawing. I might post samples if i get round to taking photos of my drawings.

I also like to take photos and while they are probably a load of rubbish it's fun.

 

Congratulations on finishing a book, Emberstone!

I guess I'll be the first one to post... I kind of wrote this for my library's youth magazine. I don't do a lot of writing any more.

There’s a chocolate bar wrapper, pasted flat on the ground. Bubble gum wrappers. A Happy Meal bag. A tired old Cosmo, ripped apart at the seams, its pages still soppy with rain.

The sun is bright and fresh; the ground hot and steamy. Smells of fried meat and chips cling to the inside of your nostrils, watering the linings of your mouth. You can hear the rumblings of the street, the voices of people and the screams of horns and the squeals of breaks against tarmac.

Do you remember the time we came down here? Maybe a year ago. It was winter then; the sidewalks were crusted with salt and the streets were slippery with slush. I remember it was snowing, tiny little dots of white that melted as soon as they hit your skin. The streets were quieter; people stayed inside or trundled along in heavy coats and hats, silent. You had one of those giant Starbucks lattes, which you’d press against my forehead, laughing, hand over mine, and we’d just be happy, going nowhere.

Now the snow is gone and the sun is in the sky and the asphalt is sizzling hot and thick clouds of smog hang in the air, limp and damp. I want to say that I found the cup lying on the ground, pounded into the sidewalk by passing feet, and remembered you – but it’s long gone, a strip of cardboard lying in a landfill with the mark of your lips around the rim.

I miss you a lot.

 

Yes, congrats Emberstone.

If EC has a Creative section to the Forum, I'd love that. To share artwork (sketches), photography, short stories etc.

...so if the mods are listening, I vote yes please!

 

+1

 

+1:eusa_clap

 

well, I've been sketching for 5 years and haven't improved at a rate i would have liked so I've started a schedule where i draw 1 decent sketch a day until i fill this sketchpad i got for Christmas. So far i've been drawing mostly straight from my mind, maybe i should start researching and studying things like anatomy and clothing wrinkles ect.

 

That helps so much, believe me. I like doing one sketch from my head, and then a sketch of something that's just nearby, or something I've never drawn before. So a page in my sketchbook might have a character of mine, next to a yak I looked up on google images because I'd never drawn a yak before. Next page is maybe a weird, Book of Kells inspired monster thing I made up, next to a sketch of a corner of a room. It really helps to have that practice to pull on when you want to create an entire scene just with your imagination. =) (And, hell, even when I do that, I still pull up reference. Reference is good!)

I have an art folder thing! It be here. I haven't uploaded much of my photography (because it's mostly in series and that is a lot of pictures) or my most recent paintings (because they are experiments that I was not overly fond of for the most part).

I'm also currently writing the first draft of a comic script! (Technically, the first draft of the fourth version of the thing, haha.) I've been toying around with the characters for over a year, and actually started work on this particular script itself a couple months ago. I thiiiink I've got roughly 125-140 individual comic pages written so far, depending on whether I split some of the bigger chunks. And I'm nowhere near done, haha. I could be drawing it already, I have enough material, but I don't feel like I'm done editing the first part yet. And having to redo a comic page is such a pain compared to just changing the script before I draw it. =P

It's been a challenge! I've never really sat down and made myself write an entire story before, even as a script. Particularly such a long one, haha. It's really interesting, writing and having to keep in mind the visual space of the panel, how much of it can be done without words, or how much of it needs dialogue.

But as I've said, I've never written anything of this length before. I really hope it doesn't suck. -.-

 

ive written a number of (frankly shite =P) songs in my time, and im taken art as a GCSE ( which is ruining my already pathetic social life lmao) sufferin for my art i guess lol iv also written some short stories - there was one a while back i was really proud of but my comp got wiped and i didnt make a backup (im that good =]) ill try an recreate it but it wont be the same (maybe better who knows lol)

 

wow, that's actually a really good idea, I've been drawing straight from my mind. lol though lately I've been using references for my poses due to my lack of knowledge over the human anatomy which makes my own poses look just slightly impossible or painful. I've had a few characters that I've been playing around with mostly on art tournaments on DeviantART, though none that im willing to make a story out of. most are to cliched to make a decent story :\ but each character makes the next better, each with its own spark of originality that i can put into the next character to make it more original practice makes perfect eh?

 

Knowing how to draw something straight from your head is a good thing to know how to do, but the only way you can learn to draw specific things is by lookin' at them in the first place. =) Even with stuff you do know how to draw, it'll do you good to occasionally revisit it. I've been drawing dogs since I was a wee thing, but I'll occasionally find that they start getting wonky if I've gone too long without studying a real one.

As to characters, well! I suggest reading a bunch, from varied authors. A lot of the characters I have are partly mine, partly bits and pieces I've pillaged from other stories I've read. ;P So long as you don't end up with a carbon copy of someone else's character, or a stock character (like someone who's just the "Wise Old Lady" or "Strong, Silent Hero" and has nothing more interesting going on), you're probably good. Also, as long as you're not too precious about them, and are willing to change something about them if it's just not working, you're already a step ahead. I've had to change some of mine because they seemed too archetypal, or too perfect to seem real, and the story's much better for it!

Also, going through character questionnaires like this one can help develop your character from "that guy with the blonde hair" into someone much more layered and interesting! (You can google 'character questionnaires' and get a bunch of results, if you don't like that one.) Making sure they're not too much of a Mary Sue is probably also a good thing to check occasionally. ;P

You can also come up with a story first, and then the characters. Then you're starting with a blank slate, and your characters don't already have the baggage of having existed for so long, y'know? It's much easier to change The New Guy than, say, some badass warrior dude with the troubled past who is awesome at everything, who you've been drawing since you were twelve (and who would also probably make a poor story character). But, starting with the characters first works, too! It's all about what works for you.

Practice does definitely get you closer to perfect, though. =D Keep at it! I know I had characters way back when that I'd be embarrassed to put in anything now, but knowing what made them embarrassing helped me learn what not to do next time, hehe. =P

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Also, btw, I'd totally be in favor of a forum for artsy fartsy stuff. <3

 

Emberstone thank you for starting this, I'm also a writer, I've written lots of poetry and I've won one competition for it. At the moment I'm working on a plot line for a novel that I've got developing in my head, its funny, anyone who knew me in my childhood the first thing they would say was that I had the most hyperactive imagination of anyone they had met. I would love to get some critic from a fellow writer and I would be happy to critic if you're looking for it.

 

i've gone through many character work sheets i found one that i attached too, it was a good 5 pages long and i swear i printed about *counts*35-40 of them. haha i had trouble answering in a more than generic way. I've usually gone with a basic character idea, then start formatting the plot and flesh out the character as the plot continues.

If i might, can i ask what your current comic is about?

 

Ahh, well, I didn't know. I tend to make suggestions wherever I can in case it helps. =P But I still say reading a lot, and watching the way real people interact can give you a lot to pull from to build characters (and realistic dialogue, for that matter).

My current project is a fantasy kinda deal, set in a sort of colonial era. (I was reading Sharpe's Rifles at the time, so, I think that's where that came from. Also I like fantasy with guns, harhar.)

As to what it's about, basically, a girl and her town get caught up in an attempted invasion by a predominantly religious organization, which isn't actually after land but the inhabitants of the continent itself. But both the townsfolk, who are colonists themselves, and the invading force are unfamiliar with the dangerous territory they're in, and find they're not just in conflict with each other but also the native life (which is, given that this is fantasy, a horrifying grab bag of smart things with sharp teeth).

I'm still working on where the whole thing's going, mind, but that's the basic premise. =P

 

I also vote for the art thread. *raises hand*

 

ahh, that acutally sounds enticing. sounds like something i would read. i have a basic idea as well but it needs alot more thought put into it. so its mostly a tournament organized by an sleezy company using its contestants as a form of entertainment and as lab rats for a new slightly deathly biological experiment

 

At the moment, since I am a serious gamer, I like to write short stories involving whatever game I am currently involved in. It keeps things interesting and gets me more involved in playing my characters by writing background stories for them. So currently I am working on a longer story involving one of my world of warcraft characters.. I've written 11 pages so far..and that is only one chapter.