Art Attempts and Writer Woes

At the dawn of the new year, I decided that I would quite like to get back into the habit of drawing, now here’s a confession, I could sketch the crap out of objects, sure, proportions would be off, but I could get that stuff down on paper even if it had bizarre proportions. Now people... that’s a different matter. I could draw an outline or draw a stupid cartoon, but I can never get people to look... right.

So I spent a few hours just trying to find the basics, I thought I’d start with a woman’s head as that’s generally something that’s nice to look at. Yeah, maybe I need an art guide.

I did find something interesting, so my innate art ability leaves a lot to be desired, but I can copy styles quite well, just not my own. If I try to replicate something twice, the two versions end up about as far apart as Titan and Charon (2.601 billion miles if you were wondering). So I guess I need to focus on the basics. The trouble is, what I have half-way through the process looks weird and wrong. I’m not used to seeing the process, only the finished product, that is sure to be something that I’ll have to look out for or I’ll end up changing the proportions before I even start penciling in the eyes.

Now onto the other track, last year, I wrote a short book, writing characters is something I love to do. Describing the elongated points on a faded white picket fence of a suburban house can go f@#k itself, but characters can be funny, tell jokes better than I and release pent up emotions that I have trouble telling real people. Unfortunately, I have yet to write anything this year. I have a sci-fi epic still in progress, but that has been bubbling for over three years, rewritten four times and the only constant is the characters. It’s my fault, it is ambitious, I just wish I could go back to it without knowing I will re-write most of it again. Here’s an excerpt from thus sci-fi epic anyway.

Time to get to it. Much to the horror of Riley and Kiar, Southport ran forwards, towards the killer robot.Now Rocho didn't know an awful lot about humans, but apparently they did stupid things without reason or logic; this was a prime example. Riley shouted after Southport, but she was already weaving in and out of cover, avoiding the exploding scenery.Several robotic citizens saw this act of incredible bravery and wanted to do their part; so they huddled together and decided that the best use of their energy was to plug themselves into the rail-gun. The power went up, just slightly.Southport finally made contact, swinging her sword full force at the fifty-foot monstrosities’ foot.Clang. Southport panted for breath. Not even a dent. Clang. Nope, just double checking, still not a scratch.

As rough as the sketches above, right? If a picture is worth a thousand words, then I’m telling quite a few pictures without many words. And I'm going to tell these pictures with words and... well, pictures. I'd also like to pick up an instrument again, but one thing at a time. I still want to get through the pile of books I've started making my way through. At the moment, it is American Gods by Neil Gaiman. I started reading it August last year, while travelling, but never picked it up again when I got back. Time for some changes around my brain.