Cherry Plum

Wendell bought this from Times. I loooooove it!! It has a sweet, juicy crunch to it that's just perfect.

Homework

Homework for this week was to do a self-portrait. I used one of those photo-booth photos for reference. I spent hours erasing and redrawing until finally I just told myself, "Enough already. Just step away from the drawing pad." 

So this is it. 



And yes, I do have da kine Buddha ears.

Rubik's Cube Costume

Awhile back Geri found this Rubik's Cube costume at the swap meet. She paid $2 for it. 

After lugging it around for a bit, a kid approached her and told her how he thought it was just the coolest costume.

So she gave it to him. 

Line Weight

"Line weight is the visual lightness, darkness, or heaviness of a line within a drawing. By varying the line weight within your drawings, you can add dimension and importance to certain elements. Various materials and the pressure you put behind it will affect the the strength of your lines."

There is a 23(!)-year-old guy, Kesh (for short), in India whose artwork I like, and I think it's because I like the way he varies the line widths in his drawings.





This is the kind of brush that Kesh uses. It was on an Amazon Lightening Deal for $9.04 so I got it . . . 'cause, you know, I like copy Kesh.


The brush is soft and requires a bit of getting used to.


This is Chihiro from Spirited Away. I copied a sketch from an awesome art book that I ordered called The Art of Spirited Away. 


And here's my favorite birthday cake that I like to draw. Not exactly Kesh-looking, but I'll keep practicing.

Artist Trading Card

Artist Trading Cards are 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inch cards which artists and crafts-people create and then trade among themselves. 

Erick gave me a pack of blank precut Strathmore cards to use so I made my first Artist Trading Card for him. After sketching, I inked it with the finest-tipped (0.3) pen I could find and then colored with alcohol markers and colored pencils. 



Inspiration came from this book. I got it for a really good deal on Amazon's Prime Day . . . $16.

Wendell's Lemon Blueberry Scones

Wendell made this the other night, and it was sooo yummy right out of the oven while it was still warm and had a nice crunch on the outside. Uuuuuuuuu!!

The recipe is from Mom on Timeout site and can be found here. Wendell said that it was easy to make.

Ingredients

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp table salt
• 6 tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
• 1 cup blueberries
• 3 tbsp lemon zest
• 3/4 cup cold heavy cream
• 1 egg, large
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tbsp cold heavy cream
• 2 tbsp sanding sugar, optional

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour sugar, baking powder and salt.
3. Using a pastry cutter, cut the butter into the flour mixture until only a handful of small, pea-sized pieces of butter remain.
4. Add blueberries and lemon zest and stir to combine, just until blueberries are coated with flour mixture.
5. In a separate bowl, whisk together the cream, egg, and vanilla extract.
6. Pour cream mixture into flour mixture and stir with a fork until just combined.
7. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and pat into a disc about 6 inches across. 
8. Use a large knife or bench scraper to cut into 6 wedges. Transfer to prepared baking sheet. 
9. Brush the tops of the scones with heavy cream. Sprinkle with sanding sugar if desired.
10. Bake for 16 to 19 minutes or until golden brown and cooked through, rotating baking sheet halfway through.
11. Serve warm or room temperature. Store leftovers in an airtight container. Best enjoyed the day they are baked.

    
    

Capsule Toys

Earlier this month I was at that Shirokiya Food Court place and I noticed these capsule toy machines.  When me and Leslie were in Japan, we (mostly Les) wasted a lot of money trying to get some toys from these machines.

Sketches

We did a few sketches in art class yesterday with fellow students as our models. The instructor asked us to try to do the foundation sketch without lifting our pencil off the paper. After the baseline was done then we could enhance the features, etc.

It was hard at first, and I did cheat in a few spots, but for the most part I really enjoyed the exercise. I liked the loose, easy feel of not having to be perfect.

Rebirth by Manabu Ikeda

Wanted to share this This is Colossal article and video about Manabu Ikeda and the pen and ink drawing that took him 3 1/2 years to complete.

Congratulations Mitakeumi!!

Sumo wrestler Mitakeumi won his first career title yesterday. I cheered him on during his matches, and I cried when he cried during his interview. I'm so happy for him!

From the Asahi Shimbun:

NAGOYA--Sekiwake Mitakeumi clinched his first career title at the Nagoya Grand Sumo Tournament on July 21 as he leads the race with just one loss.

Mitakeumi, 25, defeated Tochiozan, rank-and-file maegashira No. 13, on Day 14 of the 15-day tourney at Dolphins Arena here by shoving him out of the ring.

Afterward, Mitakeumi was so overcome with emotion and wiping back tears that he could not respond to questions about his victory.

He is the first champion to have graduated from Toyo University, where he was a promising wrestler.

Homework

We have two homework assignments this week. This "feng shui" project is actually leftover from last week. I thought I was done, but  looks like I gotta fix the mat behind the fountain.



Here's the photo I found online.


Our second assignment is on "perspective" where we show how objects look bigger up close and smaller in the distance. I started on this last night and is still in progress. The long, distorted-looking fingers are a challenge, but to me it's the focus of this assignment. And if that doesn't work then hopefully the Jim Beam bottle that I purposely brought closer to the foreground will.



The photo I copied is by Travis Okimoto and is in the recent Modern Luxury Hawaii magazine. 

Watercolor Palettes

It's been 8 months already since my art journey started. So fast the time went fly by. It's still hard for me . . . and fun. And I still seem to be accumulating more and more supplies. 

I think I'm done buying watercolor paints at least. I bought mostly tubes because that was the most economical. I totally scored on the QoR and Winsor and Newton paints when Fisher had them on sale at clearance prices.


But when actually painting, I found that I tend to grab the paints that are in tins more frequently because it's faster and easier.


So I bought some empty pans online and searched around for tins so that I could make some ready-to-use palettes from the tube paints.




I attached magnets to the bottom of the pans so that they'd be stable in the tins.


The Hello Kitty Panda tin came from Leslie. The bottom left is the mini Altoids tin and the bottom right is an old cigarette case.


I put a Hello Kitty decal on the cigarette case. Isn't it cuuuuute!


Here's my finished palette collection. I'm a bit worried about mold forming in the moist paint so I set them out in the sun for a few days to dry them out. 

Tio's Tamales

Tio's Tamales is on Nuuanu across from Hosoi Mortuary. I picked up some lunch from there after the Photographer/Model group photo shoot a couple of weeks ago.

The food was really good even though it was kinda soggy by the time I got home.






Large Chorizo Nachos ($11ish?)


Green Chile Cheeseburger ($10.25)


Carne Asada Chimichanga ($12.50)


Cut-open chimichanga.