Video To Iphone: February 2015

Saturday, February 28, 2015

Journal pages Maastricht

Everyone in the Netherlands, including me, is complaining by now about the cold winter weather by now. One advantage of the cold is that you need to warm up every now and then when youre outside. Heres a couple of journal pages I did just as my fingers warmed up again, sitting inside after a walk during my city trip to Maastricht.

Dont forget! The online drawing course JustDrawIt! starts March 11 already! Id love you to join! Click here to enroll.

Amsterdam Sketches

Last Saturday, I met up with my drawing buddy Yvonne. We brought the husbands along - mine played the banjo, hers played with the kids. It was a very warm and humid day, but we sat in the shadows of the trees alongside of a water playground.
It felt like a holiday. In the jungle. An Urban Jungle, that is.

On Saturday 12 July, The World Wide Sketch Crawl took place on... um, yes, as the title implies, many places around the world. In Amsterdam, we gathered with a wonderful group of about 30 people to have a 9 to 6 sketching day.

To kick the morning off I sketched Amsterdams largest Chinese Restaurant, Sea Palace. It is a boat with three floors. They have great dim sum by the way. Not that I had any that morning.

Then we fuelled up with coffee and a bite to eat at a cafe with a great peaceful terrace. On the right there, you can see the concentrated way we all worked in, by just looking at the slightly hunched shoulders of Joke, who is a student in Sketchbook Skool and came over for a few hours of sketching with her husband and their 2-year-old daughter.

Joke and I looking at each others sketchbook pages

We moved to the science Museum, which is in the harbour, and I sat down to draw the historical boats.

Great group of Amsterdam sketchers!

Sketchbook Skool students Frans and Alexa (she came all the way from Cologne, Germany to join us!) are comparing Skool homework

After taking a break to awe at each others sketchbook pages and make a group photo we walked to the park, to join a hippie-like small festival, where everyone was invited to bring their instruments to jam, and their art supplies to make some art. So thats what we did, we made some more art. After a bite to eat, sitting in the grass and chatting to the other sketchcrawlers, I made this last sketch before heading home.

Month of MARVEL Day 13

Mr. Fantastic aka Reed Richards

Heres Reed Richards (and I do love those alliterated comic book names) or as hes also called, Mr. Fantastic. Hes one of the Marvel Universes smartest people...or is he the smartest? Anyway, more Fantastic Four goodness is on the way...

Greeting Cards

Pencil on paper 6B and 8B

Beware the Batman!

Batman (from new "Beware The Batman" show)

The new "Beware The Batman" CGI cartoon premiered this last weekend, and while its certainly a different take on a Batman cartoon, I thought it was kinda cool. Im willing to give it time and see where it goes.

Will Superman Return

Superman (movie), Lex Luthor (movie)

So was Superman Returns as a false start for the franchise? I donno. I thought it had some interesting elements and some cool moments. In retrospect, Im not sure how I feel about the kid though. Did they paint the franchise into a corner?

I dont really have a problem with Brandon Routh, I like him. Hopefully theyll let him throw some punches if hes around for another film.

If they did decide to re-reboot the series I think I could live with that, as long as they find the right director who can do as good a job with Supes as Chris Nolan has with Batman. But you dont need to rush it, WB.

Smallville Week Day 4

Tess Mercer

Man of Steel

Superman (Henry Cavill movie version)

Ive been following any news about this upcoming Man of Steel movie with great interest.

Having seen photos online of Henry Cavill meeting with troops and posing (in costume!) with kids - I really think Cavill "gets" Superman - and that makes me pretty pumped!

Im not worried about whether well get a visually exciting film with Zach Snyder directing, and with the involvement and consultation of the amazing Christopher Nolan, this could turn out to be the right movie at the right time.

Life is getting rough for a lot of people right now. I think that people are ready for a symbol of hope. These days, you can be surrounded by cynicism and deceit. I believe people are ready for a symbol of truth.
People are ready to love Superman again.

Month of MARVEL Day 27

Doctor Octopus

I think Doc Ock was one of my favorite Spidey villains growing up. Moreso than the Green Goblin I think. I just found him (and Mysterio) to be what I latched on to most while watching the old cartoon. A fun, neat looking bad guy with 4 mechanical arms!

I would imagine what I could do with those arms! Gym class would be easier, Climbing trees would be a breeze, and that bully kid at school wouldnt even be able to touch me!

Creative entrepreneurship

One of the benefits of being an entrepreneur, is that you can work whenever, and where ever you want. That can also be a bit tricky, because that may result in not really having a start or an end of the working day. But overall, since I invested in a laptop, I am quite enjoying the freedom. So now I am testing places in Amsterdam for good coffee and/or food, and a good wifi connection - a rare combination.

Progress A lot of it

Argh! I Am so excited I cant even sleep properly anymore. Or I might be on LA time. Or New York. With all the video call meetings Danny and I did I get confused. NewLAmsterdam time zone more likely, if that would exist.

My mind just keeps going! Danny and I have been working on our project frantically and are still going strong. Things are really starting to take shape. Its amazing how easy it is to connect every time through FaceTime or Skype and brainstorm about ideas, solve problems, overcome obstacles and make decisions together. Youd almost forget theres a 10 hour flight between us.
Danny is brilliant with words and he keeps coming up with these great texts and scripts, its amazing. I am putting together the graphics that we and the rest of the team are going to use for classes and everything around it. If I may say so myself, it s starting to look great.

Our amazing team of worlds greatest sketchbook artists are just as excited as we are, and were THIS close to launching! Seriously, this is SO exciting. Im not surprised I cant sleep.

Were about to do something new and its gonna rock your world.

Curious? We will keep you updated as soon as we got news for you, if you fill your name and address below

Psssst... just name dropping and reveiling a tiny bit here:
Jane, Prachant, Tommy and Roz are working on some real good stuff from all of their corners of the world!

Stay tuned, were nearly there and almost ready to finally share the goodness!

People are always asking me if I know Tyler Durden

Tyler Durden & The Narrator (played by Edward Norton)

I hnvat seen "Fihgt Culb" in a lnog tmie, but I tuhgoht it was a good sugtesgion to do Pnux bsaed on it. The mvoie was a rael mnid-benedr (jsut lkie tihs pagrparah) and ptetry cool, so it was fun to do tehse guys. I lkie Edward Norton in prtety mcuh evriethyng I see him in, and Brad Pitt is a tanleted guy as wlel.

Anwyay, I hpoe you can tralnsate tehse wrods. Thnkas for vitsiing and Ill let you all get yuor haeds strigaht now.

Forrest Gump

Heres one I did for someone - the beloved movie character Forrest Gump. Its one that I had help with, as Tom Hanks has appeared on the Simpsons and I was good with what they did for that appearance, so I somewhat worked from that.

Also today I wanted to share some cool work from Cliff, who has put together some Doctor Who stuff in the form of a "Giant Robot K1" to go along with my 4th Doctor, as well as his renditions of Jo Grant! Nice!

Tip on character development:
Make the characteristic features clear. First for yourself, so you can translate it onto paper for the viewer.
Like here: eye patch, glasses, pig tales.

Tip 2:
Add accesories that tell a bit more about the characters personality. In this case: she probably likes to dip that oreo cookie in the milk.

Tip 3:
Join my workshop and learn more tricks! Go to http://goo.gl/tvEohX for info and enrollment

Red light district...sunday salad...what I wore.

Month of MARVEL Day 26

Venom

Heres the fan-favorite Spider-man baddie, Venom. I sure remember all the excitement around the Todd McFarlane run on Spider-man, and also that awesome Eric Larsen illustration work in the booming 90s. Man, those were fun comics to pick up. Brings me back...

Travel Journal 2

I just filled the last pages of the sketchbook in which these pages are. Great memories in this precious book.
The intention of our three week (!) vacation, was to totally relax and shake off any work stress of the past weeks, or well, lets be honest: months.

So, we took the boat to the beautiful Thai island Koh Chang.

This Island has gorgeous beaches, but also a large area of jungle... if you ever watched Lost, some parts of Koh Chang look a bit like the island in the show, only without the creepy stuff.

We found a great place to stay and rented a little bungalow, at a lake. Well, it was more of a big artificial ditch, but the place was gorgeous anyway, and very peaceful. As you can see in the drawing I made of it.

Oh and heres the what we ate today page of that day.

When you take your time, to look around you, you will notice so many details! On Koh Chang in Thailand, my husband and I explored the Island by motorbike and found a beautiful place on the beach where we sat down for a banana-coffee shake (oh my gosh that is such a great combination!), surrounded by hipsters.

I really enjoyed the chatter around me, the smell of fantastic Thai food, and the sound of the waves on the beach. I took my time to make this drawing. Some of the people in the drawing left before I finished drawing them, so I had to make up some bits. Doesnt really matter, as I was concentrating of the interior of the shaded pavilion.

Another lazy day: dozing off at the beach after a jungle hike...

As you can see, I started drawing my husband in the deck chair next to me, but then he went for a stroll along the surf to play his mouth harmonica, so I ended up drawing just part of him, and then the empty chair.

The Dark Knight Begins

Batman (Batman Begins), Scarecrow, Batman (The Dark Knight), The Joker

I thought "Batman Begins" was great. Like many critics said - they got Batman right. Leaving behind the neon campiness, Batman now had an epic and engaging story commited to the silver screen.

At the end of "Batman Begins," they gave us an exciting glimpse of what we could expect for the next movie - which would go on to be "The Dark Knight" featuring the Joker. My questions about Heath Ledger taking on the Joker seem to have been answered, he looks to have put in an amazing performance. Its a shame hes not around to see how much people are buzzing about what hes done here.

Im also excited by the way Christopher Nolan has been approaching these movies and the fact that hes not relying much on CGI. I hope he sticks around for a third one.

Anyway, these Punx were fun to put together, Batman art is some of my favorite stuff to do.

On Day 4, were playing around with our coffee. I used a double espresso to dip my brush in. What coffee are you using to paint a pattern in your Workbook?

tip: espresso coffee is darker than filter coffee - easier to paint with!

If you havent got The Workbook yet,
dont hesitate to download it on koosjekoene.nl

Its free!

Here is a few entries from participants on yesterdays Workbook page:

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