Anthony Zierhut

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m reading David Copperfield, a book by Charles Dickens which is partly autobiographical. This morning I came upon this paragraph at the begining of chapter 42. It’s the only time in the book that Dickens speaks directly to the reader, and he’s speaking about attaining success (bold emphasis mine):

…I will only add, to what I have already written of my perseverance at this time of my life, and of a patient and continuous energy which then began to be matured within me, and which I know to be the strong part of my character, if it have any strength at all, that there, on looking back, I find the source of my success. I have been very fortunate in worldly matters; many men have worked much harder, and not succeeded half so well; but I never could have done what I have done, without the habits of punctuality, order, and diligence, without the determination to concentrate myself on one object at a time, no matter how quickly its successor should come upon its heels, which I then formed. Heaven knows I write this, in no spirit of self-laudation. The man who reviews his own life, as I do mine, in going on here, from page to page, had need to have been a good man indeed, if he would be spared the sharp consciousness of many talents neglected, many opportunities wasted, many erratic and perverted feelings con stantly at war within his breast, and defeating him. I do not hold one natural gift, I dare say, that I have not abused. My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest. I have never believed it possible that any natural or improved ability can claim immunity from the companionship of the steady, plain, hard working qualities, and hope to gain its end. There is no such thing as such fulfilment on this earth. Some happy talent, and some fortunate opportunity, may form the two sides of the ladder on which some men mount, but the rounds of that ladder must be made of stuff to stand wear and tear; and there is no substitute for thorough-going, ardent, and sincere earnestness. Never to put one hand to anything, on which I could throw my whole self; and never to affect depreciation of my work, whatever it was; I find, now, to have been my golden rules.

Whoa – I had to read that two or three times. Good stuff.

I just read a wonderful article on the uses of 3d previs techniques “traditionally” used for live action on animation. I put that in quotes because the “tradition” is about five years old at most. It’s an interesting behind-the-scenes read, and is giving me a further incentive to get my previs sample up on this web site ASAP. It’s funny, I spend 10 to 12 hours a day creating previs and story reel animatics, and yet have none to show publicly. (Incidentally it will be a relief when the term previs gets a standardized spelling. Is it previs or previz or pre-viz? Sometimes for clarification I’ve used pre-visualization, but that’s a needless mouthful.) This article reinforces my understanding that 3d animation has a lot in common with live-action, much more than traditional hand-drawn animation ever could, because it deals with solid objects occupying a solid set or location, with lighting and staging exactly the same as a live-action movie. So naturally live action terminology and film techniques would be employed to get the job done.

UPDATE: There’s another good article about the companies out there now who specialize in previs, with brief descriptions and interviews with the concerned parties. It shows who’s doing what, on a small company level, and where they see the industry going. Very interesting.

These are yet more good articles from VFXWORLD, a great resource for this kind of material. It’s free to register with them, too.

Bada Shanren (also known as Zhu Da or Chu Ta) is my favorite fine artist. He lived from the mid to late 17th century in China, but his work always looks to me like it was painted last night. There is something fresh, shocking and balanced about virtually all his ink paintings. He had a strange, tragic life and is sometimes thought of as the Chinese Van Gogh because of it. I first came to know of him while perusing the book shop in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York about 15 years ago. As I flipped through Master of the Lotus Garden every page was like a punch in the stomach – the economy of line, the humor of subject matter, the risk and danger and confidence in his compositions – which defy reason and yet maintain such perfect balance between presence and absence, here and there. I got the impression of the artist running at full speed on top of a very high fence and never falling, in fact skipping and laughing all the way across. Even now, whenever I flip through the book I’m caught off-guard and still amazed by it. I’ve shared this book with other artist friends over the past few years, and none has had the same emotional reaction I had, so maybe I’m nuts; but I cherish this book anyway, almost at times as if it were a joke that only the artist and I understand. There isn’t a whole heck of a lot out there on the Internet about Bada Shanren, and very few books – mostly the two by Wang Fanyu
Some links:
A brief bio
A link to some sample paintings
An image search – some good thumbnails to give an idea of his composition sense.

A friend just emailed me this interesting life drawing example which happens right before your eyes. The figure goes from a skeleton, to flesh, to underclothes, to outer clothes. Really fun. I have no clue as to who did it. If anyone knows the story to this send me an email.

Yesterday I was looking through the magazine racks of my local supermarket and a little book caught my eye – Obi-Wan’s Foe – one of the Star Wars Revenge of the Sith kid’s books put out by Random House. What struck me was the quality of the illustrations: really well-drawn with a strong, fat and decisive line quality, excellent likenesses of the characters and good computer (presumably Photoshop) coloring – here’s an example. The cover (see above) was obviously done by the same artist and is a bit slicker, more finished; but the interior illustrations are rougher, more sketchy and way more interesting, to my eye anyway. The artist credited on the cover is Tommy Lee Edwards. I did a quick look-up of him and found his official web site. There’s a ton of wonderful work to look upon there, as well as a link to theBLVD which features him and other terrific artists as well. His bio section is interesting too. I like this picture: anybody with that many Godzillas on his top shelf is all right with me. And he’s a fellow Art Center film guy as well.

On another, completely unrelated note, this weekend marks the one-year anniversary of the Sketchblog. Twelve months of blogging – and I feel like I’ve only just started. Actually I’m feeling guilty that there should be a lot more drawing up here. Well, more to come!

If you’re in the L.A. area between November 20 and March 12, 2005 check out the Masters of American Comics exhibition. I don’t know if they are showing original artwork, but it would be great to see an original Winsor McCay.

I’ve been crazy busy the last week, as the show I’m on gears up for shooting so it’s been hard to post new stuff. Anyway, I got an email from the CGSociety newsletter that led to this link. It’s a wonderful tutorial on how to create life-like hair in Photoshop, something definitely worth checking out.

When I posted my links below to the artists’ bios it made me think once again about Maxfield Parrish. I hadn’t thought about him in years. His paintings always struck me as otherworldly in their beauty and strangely self-contradictory: His draftsmanship is razor-sharp, photo-real – yet the color and atmosphere is ethereally luminous, like nothing you’d ever actually see in this world; his subject matter seems at first to be remarkably monotonous – landscapes, girls on rocks, more rocks, more girls – and yet each picture is fresh, powerful, occasionally shockingly composed and inviting the viewer to walk into it and look around; the figures are classically chaste and tasteful – and yet there’s an undeniable erotic element bubbling just under the surface. The final contradiction is the fact that these opposing ideas don’t clash with each other, but blend in a harmonious symphony on canvass.

His life was equally interesting. He painted what he wanted to paint, and yet was one of the most successful artists in history. He lived to be 96 years old. His last painting, ominously titled Getting Away From It All, was completed when he was 91. I don’t know about you but I’d like to be doing work of that quality when I’m 91. Another contradiction is that he stayed married to his wife for nearly sixty years – yet for most of that time he seems to have spent with his favorite model, Sue Lewin, in his studio – a separate building on the same property. Whether it was innocent or not, it’s still part of that contradictory phenomena surrounding Mr. Parrish. I only recently learned this last bit of irony while flipping through a book, The Make Believe World of Maxfield Parrish and Sue Lewin, recently at a bookstore. The Author, Alma Gilbert, has written some great essays you can read here that give a fascinating insight into the life of a successful and brilliant American artist.

I also noticed that I just missed an exhibition of his original oil paintings here in Southern California. That same exhibition has moved to the Telfair Museum of Savannah Georgia until November 27, 2005. So if you’re anywhere near there you can do what I didn’t – go check it out.

Some links:
Some original antique posters and biographical information at The Parrish House.
Some more reasonably priced posters, and a chance to look at more of his work for free on-line at AllPosters.com.

I was doing a quick Google search of things related to Andrew Loomis a little earlier today when I came upon this site – loaded with biographies of some of the world’s greatest illustrators of the last 125 years:

http://www.bpib.com/illustra.htm#illustopage

Some of my personal favorites: Winsor McCay, Heinrich Kley, Harvey Dunn, Franklin Booth, Wally Wood, Joseph Leyendecker, Willy Pogany – both pages, Frank Schoonover, Arthur Rackham, Maxfield Parrish, and many many more. These were the guys that knocked the wind out of me as a teen-ager, looking at their work in books at the Richardson Public Library back in Texas. These guys (with the exception of Wally Wood in my list) were superstars of the early days of the last century, back when people read monthly fiction magazines; back when advertising was illustrated not just photographed.

The site is part of Bud Plant’s on-line store. Bud Plant’s booth at the San Diego Comic Con is one of the reasons I go every year. They have a terrific selection of hard-to-find and plain-old-interesting stuff there.