Once again, taking a break from work to get some evening food, storyboard artists sit around and draw each other… Shocking but true!
Actually, it isn’t nearly as serious as it looks from these pictures.
We went to the Hollywood Bowl the other night, and thanks to some good friends who came with us, we were able to sit right up front just below the stage. We ate dinner my wife prepared and relaxed to listen to an evening of Ravel. It was great, and a great opportunity to sketch.
My son Jack and I made the annual pilgrimage to the San Diego Comic-Con via train from Union Station in LA last weekend. It seemed much bigger and more crowded than last year. Jack tends to look for action figures (this year was all about General Grievous), and game cards, whereas I like to get art books and see some original drawing and painting. The Comic-Con is such a great collection of characters, both in costume and presumably not, that I had to draw something. This sketch is from memory — we were walking along and suddenly the foot traffic came to a complete stop. I craned my neck to see what the hubbub was about and caught a fleeting glimpse of a woman in a white bikini and a man shooting video of her. What the heck?? Actually it’s not surprising, considering the male nerd demographic. Note the guy in the foreground with the giant earrings — he had holes in his earlobes as big as poker chips! (I actually saw him a couple hours earlier in a different part of the hall, but thought it would be good to include him in this sketch for color.) There was no shortage of Light Saber-wielding Jedi either. Most had some kind of new type with a fluorescent tube in it. We stayed for the day and returned in the evening. Quite fun. I picked up some great books, too. More on that later.
Jack (age 11) and I saw the latest Miyazaki film the other night, Howl’s Moving Castle. When we got home he asked me what we should do, and I told him I thought it would be good if he drew his favorite characters from the film. I drew Jack while he did this. Note his left hand covering what he’s drawing so I can’t see it until he’s done. I remember using the exact same technique in elementary school during a test so no one would copy from my paper. I got sort of a mini-flashback there…
This is Mushu…
She’s the perfect live subject: she strikes a cool pose, holds it for ten or fifteen minutes, then in the blink of an eye strikes another one. We’ve been using the pronoun “she”, but there’s no way to tell for sure, I’m told, with a water dragon this young. Oh, and she eats 24 small crickets a day!
Today was a great day. Hanging out with the kids and wife, going to a friend’s house in the afternoon to take a swim in their pool (they’re out of town and nice enough to share). There’s something about the smell of sunscreen and chlorinated pool water that reminds me of childhood summers in the North Valley where swimming pools were so ubiquitous that when the Sylmar Quake hit the streets were drenched with water dumped from sloshing pools. Anyway, I made a little sketch after I got out of the water as the kids played – it’s as near as I’ve come to a self-portrait on this site yet (just the feet!). Here’s hoping everyone else had an equally fine three day weekend.
We went back to put some pollywogs back with their brothers and sisters, and collect some more. We forgot the net, so Jack caught about 10 or so more with his hands. As usual he keeps moving, so sketching him is quite the challenge. Kids are all about motion, that’s for sure.
I actually drew this standing up, holding the sketchbook in one hand and a pencil in the other. Easy to goof it up.
Over the weekend we all hiked up the hill behind our neighborhood into the woods. There were several small waterfalls and lots of little streams. The kids caught pollywogs to take to school and watch as they turn into frogs to be set back loose in the woods.
Anthony Zierhut 