Sketchbook

The Sketchbook Project, which I had written about in several previous posts, finally concluded and had its exhibition on October 27. Over 200 notebooks were returned of the 500 that had been sent out and the exhibition was a great success. I was truly amazed at some of the entries; events like these show me how far I have yet to go to achieve true success in illustration or art in general. I feel like I am only at the very surface of my potential at the moment.

The image I chose to close my posts on The Sketchbook Project represents my fear of deep water. I’m not talking about the mere 10 or 12 foot depth of swimming pools, either. I’m afraid of deep water. The kind you can only find in the ocean, where you can feel the cold currents sweep up from below. Who knows what’s lurking down there, so far beneath you?

To view the rest of the images from my sketchbook, visit my Sketchbook Project portfolio.

Another post for Amateur Illustrator’s weekly sketch contest. This week, the topic was ‘controversy’. I thought of going for something that addressed current events, or perhaps some Bush-bashing, but ultimately decided against it in favor of something sillier.

My controversy is “The Dish Ran Away with the Spoon”, based on the well-known Mother Goose nursery rhyme. Inter-dinnerware relationships are a pretty controversial topic to me.

This sketch was completed with a ball-point pen and then scanned and colored in Paint.NET (it’s what I have installed at work). Given that I had to color the thing with a mouse, I think it turned out pretty well.

This sketch is for a weekly sketchgroup at the Amateur Illustrator forums. This week’s topic is “Costumes”. Each week, a new topic is chosen based on the suggestions of everyone who posted a sketch that week. As a bonus, whoever suggests the topic to be used in the next week’s sketchgroup will win a free T-shirt from Bountee.com.

I completed this sketch with a Sharpee in a notebook that I keep by my desk at work. The notebook is pretty empty because I’m usually busy, but today was a slow day so I doodled away. Once I finished, I scanned the sketch and colored it using Paint.NET (it’s free so I installed it at work). I’m used to my Wacom, so coloring with the mouse was a pain, but I’m rather happy with the result.

This is not an irrational fear. Automobile accidents are the highest cause of accidental death in the United States.

But what scares me isn’t that I die in an auto accident. My biggest fear is that I kill someone with my car. That’s why I drive such a tiny car. It’s about as safe as a mid-sized car but it’s much less likely that I kill someone with it. Large SUVs and trucks, on the other hand, are safer for the driver but much more deadly for everyone else.

Continuing with my fears theme, and a direct opposite of my previous post, this image represents a fear of being left alone. This is the kind of fear that sits in the pit of your stomach and can make you weary for days.

I don’t think this is a very personal fear. Humans are social by nature, so a lonely soul is an incomplete one. However, I had severe self-image issues when I was a kid, so I believed that I would grow up alone. Thankfully, I’ve gotten over most of my self-image doubts and am now happily married, so this particular fear has subsided greatly in me.

This is the second page of my “fears” themed notebook. Contrary to my first post on this theme, this fear is a more personal one. I tend to be very introverted in large crowds. I think this is in response to the fact that I feel very unimportant in overly-large groups; as if no one would notice if I were there at all. I suppose this is a self-image issue.

Large crowds also scare me because the collective mind can often be very stupid, causing violence and hysteria in situations that wouldn’t normally merit it. Plus, people tend to feel more anonymous in large groups, making them act in unusual and often brazen ways.

This month I’m participating in an artistic effort called The Sketchbook Project, run by Art House Shop in Atlanta, GA. They’ve sent 500 sketchbooks out to artists all over the world and the artists have to fill up the books with the theme of the project: fears. Once the sketchbooks are sent back, there is a gallery planned in October to showcase all of the notebooks on the walls of the Art House Shop gallery.

The notebooks are 3.5″ x 5″ Moleskines, so I carry mine around with me all the time to draw out ideas on the spot.

This image shows the front inside cover of my notebook, where I wrote out the theme, and the first page. The fear I’m trying to represent isn’t so much a personal fear as a collective one: the unknown.