Feeling particulary Melancholy

Writting a children's book

It has always been a dream of mine to illustrate a children's book, and I recently found myself presented with the perfect subject for such a story: my boyfriend's niece. Her head is so full of imaginative adventures and playing with her took me back to the days I ran around in my backyard chased by dreadful monsters and slayed them with sticks. So here's a first glimpse of "The Adventures of Princess GiGi".

Please note that this book is intended for very young readers-- so it's not going to be a very complex story.

My process has been to write the story with quick scribbled pictures and then to sketch it all out on good-old-fashioned paper. Then I made the entire image in photoshop, with the help of my lovely tablet. I'm trying to keep it simple on the first go, that way if I have time before Christmas I can go back and add more details. But for now-- I think it's a pretty good start. :)

Flash mob performances

I realize it's not a new phenomnon, but I find the flash mob performances that have been happening everywhere to be inclredibly inspiring. What would you do if you were sitting in a cafeteria trudding along in your daily routine and suddenly someone starts to sing and dance and then more and more and more people join in until a mob of people are joyously performing out in the open.  Would you stare in amazment? Run away from these unsettlingly happy people? Or maybe even join in...

I love knowing that the people who become unsuspecting audience members are randomly enveloped in a wonderful experience that they will most certainly remember for the rest of their lives. And when you see the faces of these people in the videos I've posted you just might see what I saw. A connection. An experience that is truly felt by people in a society that is not easy to live in right now. We all have our troubles with money and family and mortality, but if moments like this can make us forget for even a moment--- I think that is what art is all about. Relieving a stressed out and angry world for just a moment and letting us feel something good for once.

More Nutcracker photos :)

Waltz of the flowers. Mary and I had the toughest time with this scene. We had to figure out how to make all our 14 flower costumes work for a cast of 16 girls. Which wouldn't have been too difficult if the parts of Sugar Plum, Snow Queen and Clara hadn't been triple cast. We eventually figured out how to make it work for each performance- but it really wasn't easy.

Victorian girls playing during the party scene.

Drosselmeyer wowing the crowd

Some of the mice! I will say that the mice and Rat King turned out to be my favorite costumes in the show-- thanks to my mask builder Ashley Fong.  I love that way masks can transform a performer and the way they move. I'm so glad we were able to make it happen :)

Rat King!!! I promise to put some more detailed pics of the masks up later. Ashley has them at the moment for her end of semester review.

The Prince and Clara #2

Snow Queen!!!! With the crown I showed you the design for  in a previous post

In this performance there were 2 portions to the snow scene, the ballet portion (pics coming later) and the modern scene. The modern scene is were the pants pattern I posted earlier came into play. It worked really well! It was quick to make, fit everyone perfectly, and looked awesome when they spun around! :)

The bon bons were so ridiculously cute! I'm so glad that I found the giant green glitter bows!

Also-- Mother G was not in costume for these pictures. It was a tech rehearsal.

Another splash of cute in the show-- the little sugar plums.

And our Sugar plum Fairy.

The Angels

Tarantella

Thank you Alexander for this epic leap photo!!

Another show whizzes on by! Costumes were designed by myself and Mary Paul. This show was directed by Rachel Roccoberton. Choreographed by Amy Chibeau, Rachel Roccoberton, and Alana Mahdalik. Photos were taken by and used with the permission of Alexander Andriulli. Up next--- writing and illustrating a children's book in a week ;)

Quite simply cool

A video montage of the development of special effects.

http://www.neatorama.com/2009/08/27/100-years-of-special-effects/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Neatorama+%28Neatorama%29

Let's learn about the history of art

One subject I don't think I will ever know enough about is Art history. So I'm scrawling the Internet and reading these wonderful things called books to continue my out of school education. And with no grades looming over me or tests dictating what is important I can study in the nonlinear fashion I tend to.

http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/arcnat/chauvet/img/fond04_x.jpg

If you want to be visually blown away check out this interactive 3D tour of some of the more elaborate cave paintings found in France. This is really quite amazing because they had these caves off-limits to tourists for years because the air and oils from people seeing the paintings were actually destroying them. So now they only open it up to small groups a couple times every year. But this site makes it possible for everyone to see it-- even if none of us are lucky enough to make the spelunking short list. The only down side to this site is if you don't understand french, it's really just a pretty tour.

http://www.lascaux.culture.fr/#/fr/02_02.xml

Another site I found has some nice English information to go with the pretty pictures. 

http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/arcnat/chauvet/en/index.html

And one more less intimate site for good measure.

http://all-history.org/2.html

Horse, cave painting at Lascaux in France. Lower Paleolithic

storyboarding

My next project is story-boarding for a feature film. Unfortunately I can't share as much as I normally do on the specifics, but I will certainly share some of my knowledge on how to storyboard with you.

http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2010/168/e/2/Korean_thug_fight_storyboard_2_by_KrazyMeer.jpg

A great place to start is to learn by studying the work of other storyboard artists.

http://www.adamgoldfine.com/simpsons/images/storyboard.jpg

http://www.fuse-studio.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/storyboard-3.jpg

 

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggWKJY32968IGHMdrXPf3whi4CI1mvL_iroofDfRaC9yS-AQIF5aIYhbypT-U5o-83SuwYOvXFTaQStT3SfpPnKARaAEOElRzBq-gQZHDKI21vAQ7gbDrmKpzdqvm_pwhkS1Aslm2deuY/s1600/Storyboard_Small.jpg

 

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvBdKlAuz95jFdRJ_TuoKyXF6Y5l4tIcHWv7CaJUON5cTF56xMs32-A7ZVWW3qm1t7-zNjxJjHSr1JTllLB1hIVhe1_dUK76zyOsbEa1IncoH-QM_KLL9__yMmXXXv30vIewMM9drQUjEW/s1600/prop+combined+eagle+blog.jpg

I love the full color one, but I understand that storyboarding is the quick and dirty thought process leading up to a final product. So, it doesn't need to be that pretty-- just understandable. Although the prettier is often better :)

The Nutcracker

Hello friends! I have now returned from the depths of tech week tired, triumphant, and ready for the next challenge.

Costume Design by Myself and Mary Paul. Masks were made by Ashley Fong. Photographs taken by Alexander Andriulli.

Here's some Nutcracker photoage to get you started! More coming later :)

Clara

Ballerina Doll

Ballerina Doll

Clown Doll

Battle between the Mice and the toy soldiers

Catch up time! Gallery showing

During my internet absence a lot of good things have happened.

One thing that happened is I now have an exhibit all of my art work up at the Manchester city hall until January 26th or so.

yay art!

Both are costume designs from one of my design classes. These have both been sold.

On the left: is a costume design sketch from a production of West Side story that I designed where all of the gang members were girls in baby pink and leather. :) Pencil on Paper, for sale. On the Right is Sir Louscious O'Trigger from "The Rivals" Gouache on paper. For Sale.

Left: Jungle Columns. Colored ink on watercolor paper, not for sale. Right: Gothic Church scene. Gouache on watercolor paper. For sale.

Left: Egyptian Hieroglyph. Ink, gouache and gold leafing on Watercolor paper. Sold. Right: Neoclassical door frames; colored ink on watercolor paper. For sale.

Left: Circus design print. Photoshop print. For sale. Right: Surreal perspectives. Watercolor and gouache on watercolor paper. For sale.

Left: Mid summer's night dream set design. Photoshop print. Not for sale. Right Portrait of Rachel Levey. Acrylic on Watercolor paper. Not for sale.

If you see anything you would like to own, or have a closer look at, let me know! I would love for these paintings to be on someone's wall rather than packaged up inside my portfolio. :)