Computer Problems, Marathon Runners and More Halloween Decor

Oye! I'm having a hard time with my computer lately! My Photoshop CS2 via Parallels/Windows XP is slow as molasses (I say that instead of a turtle because I remember how surprisedly fast my late pet turtle Zack was when he wanted to be) and it was just making a simple sketch cleanup look like a hi-res filter application that take an hour at least to apply.

It may be high time that I start replacing or upgrading my computer studio equipment; though a gift from my brother, this 2012 Mac Mini is getting slower each year and these years old art programs aren't keeping up with the latest technology much now. I started looking into what to buy/get though the funding may take a while to get saved up. Cheap alternatives in the meantime?

And that's my personal rant of the week, now onto my work for this past week.

For sketches, I happen to been just getting off from work when the Scotiabank Waterfront Marathon was going by my workplace (Lake Shore & Leslie).

After grabbing a hot latte to drink, I sat on to watch all the runners going by and thought to sketch them while I could. It definitely a challenge to capture the runners' likeness within a minute before they completely out of view.

What I like drawing them the most was getting each runner's movement down on paper. By confession, I did winged some details by guesswork and memory.

I don't usually sketch real people too often; usually it's my made-up characters. This was one of those rare times that you could sketch a stranger without that person feeling uncomfortable of being stared at while being drawn.

Next is my Halloween Decor progress. I got my Scarecrow Angel all done! I chose to add a plaid cloth (originally dish cloths newly bought) with a couple of old throw pillow cases with the indian ink-dyed burlap dress and sew them together as such in the pictures.

A shawl was added as well including a handkerchief to cover the bamboo neck.

The wings were a hassle to not only clip onto her dress but to also to position accurately parallel to the bamboo shaft as well. I managed to get done though.

Getting her hands back onto the sleeves took some hand cross-stitching. 

After putting her old straw stuffing for her arms back in, I've hot-glued more faux leaves to give the look being "stuffed" with more of those leaves like I did for her head and hat.

Lastly, I've also hot-glued some shimmering maple leaf confetti onto her shawl and sleeve ends. To include a reflective element into her dress as I did for her wings and head.

Overall, I'm happy with how she turned out.  Before, she looked like a generic store-bought or a plain homemade craft. Now she looks like she's ready for a party.

The only other decor I made was decorating this store-bought black cat wreath. Originally a black tube-cleaner wrapped around a plastic frame with plastic yellow eyes and whiskers, I took some glitter berries, faux leaves and maple leaf confetti and hot-glued them onto it as such.  So now I have a Halloween Wreath that should grab attention from nearby treat 'n' treaters.

So that's all I got here for now.  This week, I have a pumpkin to carve into a jack o' lantern and may have some more sketches to show later on. Till next week then.

Fall Market, Inktober sketch and Halloween Decor

For this week's showcase of creativity, I did two sketches and work on a seasonal project that I wanted to be done before Halloween.

Leslieville's Flea Market, Simple Pantry

Due to using every day off that I could on clearing off backlogs of projects, I didn't go out much for day trips to outdoor events, let alone do urban sketching. I kept wanting to see this flea market that's in my workplace's neighbourhood, Leslieville, Toronto all summer so I made the effort to see its' last outdoor date for the year.  There weren't too much there, understandably due to the cooler temperature but it was a nice sunny day. There was one stand I really liked so I did my sketch on it.  I even bought one of the vendor's goods.

Inktober Sketch, Day 11 - Prompt: Cruel

I love the idea of inktober, getting to do small improv ink sketches or grander ones depending your time and creativity.  For taking a breather from house chores, I decided to do at least one ink sketch and that day's prompt was "CRUEL".  My main thought for that word while checking emails were seeing Change.org's petition updates on Tyson's cruelty to their chicken breeding.  So seeing a flock of chicken stuffed into a small cage was the sketch I went with (an earlier idea was having a pig stuffed into a rectangle cage that it was bulging thru the gaps).  There's unfortunately a lot of big name companies or farming practices that treats the animals that we'll be eating eventually more like commodities rather the living creatures that they are and it keeps happening often away from the majority of public awareness.  

Finally is my main focus for the week: my old Scarecrow Angel.  Unfortunately, I didn't think to take any "Before" photos of how it looked like before but it was long overdue for a makeover.  I think I first got it when someone was giving it away (maybe back when I was in the Girl Guides) and had used it for Halloween Decor since.  Rain damage and Ink dye run-off plus a bit on the plain side, I wanted to revitalize it for this Halloween. Starting with the head, lifting and tightening her burlap face (giving her literally a facelift 😉) I've hot-glued the burlap in place then repainted her eyes, nose and mouth in acrylic paints, adding some more head bangs with her straw hat.  Her hat was a bit plain so I've decorated it with raffia strands, dollar store decorations like faux leaves, styrofoam glitter berries with twigs and for the heck of it, a small styrofoam lacquer pumpkin. 

Another feature for me to fix was her torso/bust.  It used to have a plastic bag stuffed with newspaper that got thrown out.  For a replacement, I took an old throw pillow that no one really uses and with thick thread, cross-stitched it around the scarecrow angel's pole and shoulder dowling.  Much more permanent than the cheaper materials used before.

I've made more progress than this on it last week but I'll save that progress report for next week.  I have an early morning work shift next and I'm pushing it as it is with getting enough sleep tonight.  Post to ya then.

Pixel Icons for Desktop Organization.

Hey everyone!  So whenever it is possible, I'll like to post up weekly updates of anything artistic I've done.  Could be a bunch of random stuff or more professional works; in any case, it'll be about restarting my routine of reaching out with my artworks.

Last week while I was organizing my desktop files/folders, I learned that you can customize my icon images, by opening the 'Get Info' window, then selecting the icon image and pasting a new image for the icon. Maybe you can overlay a new image that better associate with the file/folder's content than the generic default icon image. So I ended up spending my whole day off doing pixel icon images to better identify my files/folders by sight.

 Some of them you may see being more blocky than others. I was experimenting with different format sizes (32, 64, 128 Px2). Strangely, when I go to apply (copy & paste) pixel icons in 64 pixels for the new icon image, the image turns blurry. If anyone knows why, could you comment about it?

All of these are enlarged to 512 pixels from their original formats. I've decided to do pixel works because it would be the easiest way to change the icon images. 

Some of them for routine things like my finances, work and some are for ongoing projects. I did them all in my Photoshop CS2 program (I've been meaning to get an upgrade soon for it).

I'll likely make more of these as I need them or I make stock art from them. Though there's probably lots of people who can do this themselves. Still, it's a possible venue to get my artwork out to others.

So, that's it for now.  If I make anything art-wise this current week, I'll post it up.  See you then.

Half-Yearly Update, Hi Again Everyone!

Hey Everyone, It’s been a good while, like 6 months ago.  There’s been a few big changes going on in my life since I’ve posted in April last. First of all, I’m emotionally okay; just been keeping busy with housework and figuring out what to do with my life here on out.

Aside from getting used to not having Dad around the house anymore, we’ve been clearing out some old junk that really don’t mean anything important to us or that we have no real use for.  For my mom, we got a renovation going for our living and dining rooms’ area and that involved moving a lot of old things out of the way. The house was originally built around the 1920s with signs of poorly done DIYs, so a lot of old plastered walls, flooring and wiring to replace/upgrade. Even got my windows replaced to stop leakage above the front 1st floor of the house.

For myself, I’ve been gradually purging away some of my old things or upcycling my years’ of accumulated materials (e.g. fabric, old clothes, crafting items) into new things for a few hours per week.  So far , I've made or tailored a few clothes, a new wallet, repaired a few decorative items to give away, growing transplanted off-shoots from my houseplants to give away too. There’s also buying some new materials to improve or fix what I have at home like my papasian chair’s cushion. It would be faster to just dump it all into the waste bins or donate it all away but I guess I’m too eco-conscious to let materials that are still in decent condition to waste away in a landfill. Plus before my new cashier job, I gotten into the habit of scrounging around for free/discarded things to look reusable again after a little mending. I want to get back to my artwork soon, as soon as I can get over half of the purging of old stuff and these back-burners projects out of the way.

If I have to start anywhere for resuming my artwork, learning better the business side of freelancing would be a good place. Taxes, legal paperwork and simply network/market in different selling venues had never been my strongest area of skills so I want to improve on that.  I also want to get a better handle of my health and diet as I’m getting older and need to have a healthier body soon. For now I’ve made a new routine schedule that’s going to help improve my progress and get things done quicker than in the past few months, hopefully.

Yeah, so lots of clearing out to do as well as planning for the future. At best, I’ll hopefully get many things done due by Christmas or the Holidays (that my PT job will allow). Just got to keep putting in the time for them, one footstep at a time. Maybe for now, I'll work to put any sketches that I can on my spare time.