I think he's actually getting worse.

     So I just keep sketching stuff, sometimes making slow progress.  As far as just faces go, I'm for sure better than I was, but still below some arbitrary boundary I've set for myself.  I need to get better at other aspects of drawing though, because there's not a terrible amount you can do with just the same faces over and over again. 

     The first thing that kind of pushed me a bit was no less than an artist's challenge; I was dared to draw Slash.  The gauntlet was thrown, the challenge was issued, and the smacked out sloppy-joe was drawn.

     You might gather that I'm slightly critical of Slash.  Well, for the record, Appetite for Destruction is one of the best albums of the 80's, and then none of the members of Guns n' Roses ever did anything worth listening to ever again.  Right after this one I wanted to do one more straight-on shot, before trying to stretch out a little.

     This was an attempt to do a little bit of detail, specifically I wanted to do some more hands.  They're still a little awkward but and freakishly long but it does seem like progress.  Also I was playing a lot of Fallout and figured "Why wouldn't radioactive soldiers of fortune have a little panache?"  After this I decided I needed to try experimenting with perspective.  Not every drawing can be a straight-on shot, no matter how much I want it to.  Unfortunately, since I have no experience with perspective yet, it seems like a giant step backwards in quality.  Check this out;

     So this pretty much turned out looking like a guy who got grazed with a shrink ray.  Maybe Rick Moranis was jealous of his handsome junk and got too drunk to shoot straight.   Actually, call Disney, I think I just came up with a script to pitch.  I bet changing the dimensions of the door would have helped.  I mean, art lessons would help too, but let's be reasonable.  I tried one more perspective shot.

    I don't know why I find gross nerds so funny.  It might be because this could have been me, had a few key things in my life gone wrong.  I also have always enjoyed the idea of people resting their gut on various things.  So, expect more attempts at perspective from me in the future, and honestly, you should also expect a lot of them to be gross nerds.

This update makes no sense at all

     This is a short one, y'all. (who even says y'all anymore? I do, and it's ridiculous.) One of my favourite things about myself is the amount of effort I'm willing to put into a really dumb joke, and a pun at that.  Here's something I thought of the other day and gave myself the dumbass "huh huh" chuckle.

     And that's that! I don't know anything about colouring yet.  Your average five year old has me beaten in this department.

So how long before he gets good at this?

     Well, last time I was pretty much a lazy douchebag, what with my not putting up the final picture in my "how I'm trying to not suck at drawing" manual.  I left you all high and dry, moist and wanting.   I've been focusing on the drawing lately, which I never intended to be the focus of this blog.  Who cares though, right? It's what I've been doing, so it's what you get.  Maybe to start off I'll show you what should have been the final image from my last update.

     I was "pleased" with the final product, but there's lots I want to work on.  For one, I want to expand on what kind of poses and perspectives I can do, along with working on various head-related things.  Things like faces and hair, which you can clearly see have a long way to go.  As far as trying different poses, I suppose I should have maybe looked up some common ways human beings stand, but that's way less fun than just drawing a stick figure and seeing where it takes you.

 

      This is for you Harry Potter superfans.  I know it doesn't really come up in the book, but Harry has a rare condition where the funk causes him to dance until he dies of exhaustion or dehydration.  I guess it never came up because J.K. Rowling had a bad experience with Bootsy Collins and a bottle of Beefeater.  I don't know exactly what dance move Harry is dropping here, but whatever it is must be good for toning the glutes.  I'm not terribly disappointed with this one, but the head is a little bit of a trainwreck.  After this one I wanted to do some drawings with a focus on heads, with varying degrees of success.

     Ok, so the face is pretty horrible here.  I was taking a stab at some Adventure Time facial expressions and really wasn't able to make it work.  I think in that case it's probably because I tried too hard,  the simplicity of the faces in shows like that is what ties the whole thing together.  I straight up need to buckle down and start making some faces that aren't mushy turds.

    
     Ok, now we're talking! It's pretty sad that I'm admitting that this is, so far, one of the best faces I've ever drawn.  I know the shading is a bunch of bullshit but I'm sort of getting used to that too.  One thing is for sure, how the fuck do you draw hats? Jesus.  Anyway, this picture still sidesteps the fact that I don't know how to draw hair either.  I guess I should at least make an attempt at a hairstyle so I don't seem like a total cop-out.

    See, that's way better.  I didn't mean for this to come out manga-style when I started on it, but it's what happened and there's no turning back.  In the immortal words of Robert Tepper, "I'm not asking for another chance, I just want to know why there's no easy way out, there's no shortcut home". 

     So there you have it! As slow as it's been, I can honestly say I've made some semblance of progress.  I guess to end this entry I want to give a shout out to Russia.  I noticed that there's upwards of 2 people from Russia that check this wet fart of a blog out once in a while, and that's kind of mind blowing.  So here's my shout out: HEY RUSSIA, WHAT UP BROSKIS!

Just call me "Pablum Picasso"

     So, as it turns out, when you practice something, you slowly get better at it.  Did you know this? It seems kind of unfair.  Where's the fun in not just being instantly good at everything? Anyway, I've been doodling like crazy lately.  Trying to stick with a more cartoony style, because drawings of real things are boring.  Like, New Brunswick boring (ooooooh burn ooooooh).  If I had to name a style I wanted to shoot towards developing, I guess I would call it modern internet? It's sort of a mish-mash of art styles brought together in one glorious orgy.  Take some Ren and Stimpy, mix in a little manga stuff, maybe garnish with some absurd for the sake of absurd, and have it fart.  Adventure Time is a great example of this style; you get the overly-detailed butt-cheeks of Ren and Stimpy, the huge eyes and weird facial expressions of manga, all dropped into situations that make no sense, with farts.  Kate Beaton is an excellent example of on-the-internet internet style.  Add to that the fact that she's a fucking scream.  She's making one of the smartest, funniest comics on the internet today, and the biased part of me says it's because she's Nova Scotian.  Something about crushing economic depression and alcohol abuse brings out the funny in a culture.  From a different angle there is Will Laren.  This guy totally eschews realism and goes straight for disgusting, and then puts great captions on them.  I'm not as funny as either of them, but maybe someday I'll find a combination of drugs and attitude that will at least make it look like I am.

     I did some more doodling.  Like I said I would.  It's not great, but I'm making myself laugh.  My facebook feed is swimming with people who have been going through proper channels to learn art, and they've been making great progress.  It's a funny contrast to see their ever-improving realism while entropy grips my skills harder and harder.  Whatever, I'm still going to show you my shitty progress because I think I'm a total scream.

    
     So, hey! Those look like actual hands and feet! I've only been at this for a few weeks and I'm already doing better than Rob Liefeld! Even though the face is this weird mask of angry darkness (so about on par with Liefeld).  Take note of the drawstring hoodie, because I've noticed it's the only clothing I can draw.  I assume it's what the young and hip kids are wearing, but I'm so out of touch I'm still wearing straight-leg jeans.

     This is Francis! Or at least a prototype of him.  He's a character from the same project as Billy Hunt, from a previous update.  Want to see a close up of his face? Rhetorical. You have no choice.

     So this is almost on the grossness level of the Will Laren drawings, just with more of an amateur smack.  I'm hoping that if I just keepdrawing this disgusting asshole over and over again I'll land on something I can call a finished product.  Well, at least progress on him has come farther than the next guy;

     So Captain Clubfoot here is Matt; another character from the same project.  I don't even know what I want his face to look like, every time I try to imagine it I come up with David Cross' character from the King of the Hill episode "The Witches of East Arlen".

      I've been trying to come up with a process to maybe make my drawings more consistent, and I've decided that I'm going to subject you to that process, step-by-step (day by day).  Check this shit out:

 

     So, lay down a stick figure skeleton first, right? Pretty simple beginner stuff.  Gesture drawing for a rough outline of the body shape, good good.  Honestly I should start using reference pictures and not drawing this from my mind's eye, but whatever, I do what I want.  Note how the head is in a very uncomfortable looking "oh no you di'int" sort of position, that could probably stand to be changed.  You'll also notice this is nearly the same pose as Fargo from a previous update; this is because I don't know how to art.

     Ok, that's a little better.  The head doesn't look like it's been stuck onto a broken neck, and while the hands aren't great, they sort of look like hands.  Also, boobs! I feel like I'm trying to not go overboard on the boobs, because I really feel they distract from my poop jokes.  The head has a kewpie doll/Betty Boop thing going on that I'm not super pleased with, but this is all part of the sucking less in small increments process. 

    Here we see the return of my beloved drawstring hoodie, and I figured why not toss in a pointless skirt to add a little sauce to it.  Accompanying this look is an s.o.s. pad hairstyle, because holy shit I haven't learned to draw hair yet.  That seems like it would be important.  What is this picture missing, aside from the feet? Probably some kind of stupid caption.

  I think my favourite part of this blog update is how I made it seem like there would be a conclusion picture, and then didn't follow through.  The truth is, there totally is one, but all attempts to put it in this update were stymied.  Maybe I'll get around to putting it up in the next one.   Anyway, I'm going to keep trying with this, and I'm going to clockwork-orange you into observing it.