公公的相機 Grandpa's camera

A few years ago I was watching my aunt digging through her storage closet and I spotted this old camera in it. I asked if I could have it and no one seemed to object. I've never learned how to use this type of camera and I don't think I will, since digital ones are so much more convenient. However I've since found a bunch of really old family photos taken by this camera which I gathered and scanned into computer just in case one day those old photos aren't around anymore. Those old photos are of my mom when she was a teen and grandma when she was my age now. This camera had been there in the last generation for family birthdays, captured the joy of new born children, and witness the loss of loved ones. It is one of the oldest piece of possessions that this family have, and it is so magnificent and respectable looking with such gravitas that none of the modern day digital ones can ever compete. I'll probably do a painting of it later and keep this camera around for as long as I can, perhaps to pass it on to future generations with stories from the past. 

Heavy Lemons

These are lemons from my cousin's lemon tree, which has been producing lemons for at least 20 years I think.

Life Drawing

Life drawing has resumed, and today's model is that really well built male dancer. He has really good muscle definitions. And nice butt.

Cup Study

My one and only lovely cup.

My Gardenia

Last week my dad demanded : "Draw the trees in your garden and show me."
I was like : "Uhh...."
So I'd better draw some this week cause he might forget but he might not.

Also I discovered the secret of gardening. Location is everything. If the plant is in a good spot, you can just let it be and it'll have a wonderful life. If it's in the wrong spot, no matter how you fuss over it, it'll give you more misery than the Plagues of Egypt. So, buy plants from nursery, wait for the gardener, and let he tell you where is a good spot to put them. Yeah.

Bunny took a vacation

Bunny took a vacation to the stars using a piece of flying lawn.

 Bunny took photos of the galaxy,

waved to the astronauts,

and tried to catch the big dipper.

Madam's dressing table render

I'm still not sure if I've finished... It's like running a marathon and after you cross the finish line you're not quite sure how to stop. I guess posting this makes it final.

Life Drawing

This time the model has been here before, and I was flipping through my drawing of her before the session begin, just to see how I did and how I can improve it this time. It turned out that 70% of her poses were exactly the same as the first time I drew here, even down to the angle of the pose. When I realized this I should have switch seats so I can a different view at least, but the workshop was full house that day so I couldn't move. Still there are some different poses I haven't seen before.

Dressing Table Work in Progress

Modelling and UVs are done (love Headus UVLayout!), now prepping the color concept and gathering references for Mari painting. I'm so glad I took so many reference pictures in Versailles, especially in Petit Trianon.    

Tour de France 5

 A girl in a Lebanese restaurant. I was spying on her behind my sunglasses and drew her discreetly. Sometimes I'm glad that I'm not a dude who might look creepy if I got caught staring at people intensely. 

 A girl reading at the beach.

 While drawing this rocky mountain during lunch a few waiters came by and watched my draw. They were a very nice bunch. Either that or they just wanted to clear my table. 

We went to two towns in the south of Provence that has this gorgeous clear green water flowing through, they're my favourite places during this trip. If souls can fly anywhere, mine would go back and stay there, under the water with the fishes, and just feel it flow.

Life Drawing

Today's model is a middle age lady who reminded me of an older version of Mad Men's Betty.

Tour de France 4

 While I was drawing this in the town of Roussillon, a tourist ask me if he could take my picture. Since I'm wearing a broad rim sun hat and dark sunglasses and there's no chance of anyone recognize me I said sure. Also I sat on the edge of a flower box for an hour and my butt got really stiff.

 Had lunch in the town of Bonnieux, it was a mountain top town, the waiter has perfunctorily chippy greetings.

 Dinner while still in Montmartre, it was a very decent restaurant and we came back again. On this trip (or any other time) we seemed to find ourselves in restaurants and tours that populates with senior citizens. I think we are actually a couple of old geezers at heart, we'll fit right in with the 4am crowd at Denny's.  

Bonus post: my darling husband and his many chins.

Life Drawing

Today's model has very interesting figures, she gave birth a year ago so there's some hills and valleys around and it's very interesting to draw. I also bought some brown paper sketch book in France cause I couldn't find them in the States.

Tour de France 3

 The most memorable event of this location near Mt. St. Michel is that I got a mosquito bite on my finger that lasted more than a week for doing this painting. 

This was done inside a very old hotel room. I had two hours to kill and I didn't want to duel on the fact that   the shower is super tiny (when I showered the shower curtain stuck onto my back) and the room smelled like it was built in the 70s, so I made myself busy looking outside the window. Luckily we got a very nice hotel next day, for about the same price too.

Tour de France 2

 Basilica in Montmartre. It was quite a magical sight to see a a structure like that and a playground in the middle of  city. Unfortunately you can smell the PAID public bathroom miles away. Nothing magical about that. 

I loved sitting at the back of Notre Dame in that park where there are benches just for artists to sit and draw this lovely sight. Though there's no public bathroom in this scenic spot, not even a smelly one.

Tour de France 1

We went to France for a month. View of Montmartre while stuck inside the apartment all day waiting for the water heater to get fixed so we can take a shower.

 Same view from the apartment earlier in the morning before we realized it will take them all day to send someone to fix the water heater. 

Three handymen later they finally sent the right person to do the right job and the water heater was fixed. We showered. Sculpture from the Museum d'orsay's restaurant, I titled it "Girl washing left armpit".

WIP Fish

I'm working on this fish on Mudbox these days, it's a main sculpture piece on an antique dressing table I'll be working on next. Have to get this UVed in Headus and painted in Mari, and I just learned I should have exported the lower level mesh and UV that first. We'll see how it goes.  

Life Drawing

Today's model is a middle aged lady with really big round boobs. The whole time I'm drawing I was wondering if they are real. 

Bunny Floats Away

 Bunny woke up on a golden tarp.

 Bunny looked up and saw some Japanese fish kites,

 and butterfly quadracopters,

 with colorful paper airplanes.

An assortments of floating devices lifting a group of elephant balloons, taking bunny away and up up into the sky.

Life Drawing

After painting ballerinas in a myriad of mediums i felt just using pencils could be a bit thin sometimes, so I continued to experiment with different crayons and random pens I have in my miscellaneous pencil bucket. This is a waxy crayon thing that has a completely different look after erasing. I probably went a bit wild with it.