Opus North Vancouver is looking to hire Life drawing models of all genders, shapes and sizes for un-instructed life drawing sessions to be held in 2011.
Clothed and nude models are needed, as well as props and well behaved pets.
The sessions are not instructed so the model would be self directed regarding pose lengths, props, etc. Models would be expected to provide artists with a nice variety of poses and pose lengths (we do have a pre-made schedule if you aren’t comfortable with that).
We would like the classes to be about 3-4 hours long each, and we are looking for weekend and weekday models.
We are offering 20$ per hour and we like to book our models a couple months in advance, if possible.
If you have any questions or need more information please call: 604-904-0447 ext:2110
To speak to the Store Manager Ann, or the Coordinator Jeri
You can also e-mail your portfolio/resume and cover letter to:
In early 2011 I will be starting Online Copic marker classes on the CDAC. I will strive to make them universally applicable to all purposes not just illustration or crafting. They will be entertaining, stimulating and informative, and I think they're a pretty unique angle for markers.
For the most part classes will be affordable, 1 month long, have at least 1 assignment, free digital images, and a give away at the end of the class. you will receive a completion badge for your blog or website as well.
if you think you'll be interested in the classes please feel free to fill out this short form to be informed when enrolment begins.
You will not be emailed for anything but Copic classes hosted by myself.
Please help me by spreading the word to your friends for me, I'd really appreciate it!
I'll be cross posting this to all my blogs, so I apologize if anyone watches more than one blog, you'll be bombarded.
I'm cross posting this from dA, since I thought it would b a good addition to this blog:
As part of Pre -production month on thedevanimationsource, I'm going to be talking about Layout. I've found an old example of a layout I did in school to use as an example, so wherever it says "image example" it should link to an example image of whatever I described.
layout is one of those areas of animation that is barely talked about and it's hard to get real examples of what it actually is! What is Layout: Essentially a layout artists takes the storyboards and translates each scene into a usable set of drawings for the animators. In the old paper and pencil days they would be kept in a folder and passed onto the animators and background artists, now they'd be stored digitally in most cases in shared folders.
Elements of a layout
The field guide and camera guide, dope sheets, The character poses, the cleaned up background, the overlays or underlays, and effects elements. Every element should be labeled - usually on the bottom right corner - with the artists name, the element name (ani1, ol4, fg1 etc) and the scene number. This way if a stack of paper gets dropped...Lets hope that never happens.
Camera Key: Camera Keys are used to show the TV cut off (if applicable) the aspect ratio of the film. It's very similar to the blue lines on comic board, if you're a comic artist. In many cases the poses of characters are indicated on the field guide as well as the order of the various elements in the scene to show which layer overlaps etc. It should also include any camera moves such as a truck in, shake, or pan.
Animation Elements that are added to a layout folder should have a rough and a clean version of each file:
Background: The layout artist draws the background. Of course this varies depending on the production. if the background is being done digitally, the layout artists bg would just be the base drawing of the digital background. In many cases though, it's the full ink drawing of the bg, which then would go to the bg painter.
Animation poses: The poses from the storyboard of the animation - this isn't necessarily the main key frames - just poses to indicate the position of their character or object in the acting, as well as in the frame.
Overlays and underlays: still elements that have to be separated from the background so that objects or animation can pass between them. Things like foreground bushes, or panning objects.
Setting up a layout
Once you have all these elements, you need to put them in order.
The Dope sheet is often attached to the outside of the scene folder along with a mini copy of the storyboard itself - with all the necessary labelling on it. It would also include a list of what's in this folder. Alternatively for a digital layout one could place a txt file in the folder with a list of the items included, then the storyboard could be placed in there. The other elements should be placed in there in Camera order (as outlined in your Camera Key) Clean first, then rough (separate). They could be labeled in whatever way is most comfortable. generally bg1.jpg ol1.jpg is useful enough, but for large productions with many hands a more detailed labelling including scene #'s would be good such as sc3-ol2.jpg (scene 3 overlay 2).
The layout is one of the most crucial steps of any production. It's the first step from translating storyboards into the animation process. It take a high understanding of all aspects of the production process!
I hope this was moderately useful!
Thanks!
I've been a vegetarian for a very very long time now and for the most part I make an effort to buy animal free and cruelty free products, however there is a great lack of information on cruelty free products for artists. I'm going to try to debunk some myths and bring some of my research together here.
There is the obvious - animal hair brushes - No they do not sit and give the weasels a trim then let them romp in fields of clover. Its FUR.. It's part of the FUR industry. Sable brushes are essentially a small mink coat on a stick. You'd be hard pressed to find a brush made from an animal that isn't dead - it's not profitable to cuddle them and love them. They are tormented, then killed, skinned and their fur moves along to it's various applications. Yes, to a manufacturer it does make sense to kill them, not shave or brush them. It all comes down to the dollar. Sable Brushes - not so lovely.
In some cases the brushes are the left overs of other industries (fur and food), and in some cases it is actually brushed off animals like camels and then sold, and put through a sorting machine etc... but this isn't usually the case. Be leary of animal brushes.
Myth: Synthetic brushes are inferior to animal hair brushes. Whoever told you that is a damn fool. Back in the day, when synthetics were new, yes of course they had some major flaws but as synthetics grow in popularity they have some major advantages over the natural hair brushes. For example, synthetic watercolour brushes have superior spring in them over a sable. Synthetics are manufactured with hollows along the shaft of the bristle to simulate the natural hair and increasing the water holding capacity of the brushes.
Solvents will break down any brush, buying natural hair brushes doesn't make you immune to the damage of a solvent. The key word is the product - it is a solvent...
Your best bet is to do away with solvents in your paint all together. It's safer for you, safer for your painting, and safer for the earth. Thin with oil, clean with soap.
As a side note, I use all synthetics in my oil paint, when i used to use solvents, and now when I don't. I've never lost a brush to solvents.
Any brush you buy will last as long as you allow it through proper care and storage.
Pigments are another area for concern for some people. There are some pigments you should avoid.
Bone black and/or Ivory black (can be labelled either way) is made from charred animal bones. avoid. If you're looking on the back, the bone/ivory black pigment code is PBk9. You'd be surprised which paints have black in it (Golden has a list on their website). There is another pigment called Cochinealis a scarlet dye made from ground up female cochineal insects, However, I've not seen this pigment anywhere on any pigments lists so it's possible it's no longer used. If you need some information on pigments this website has some awesome information on pigments specifically used in watercolours, but in general it applies to oil, acrylic and other paints as well.
Myth: Most watercolours have an ox gall binder
Not so! Most companies have switched to using Gum Arabic as a binder, which is a tree based product. Ox gall is a product that is harvested from ox galls (no kidding?!). By the way, Gall is bile. It's pretty gross to think of it in your paint, so I don't know why anyone would use it, but it is still available to purchase, and some companies may still use it or include it as a binder in their paint. Just look on the label.
Some papers, and canvas use animal product sizing. Rabbit skin glue is a traditional sizing for canvas, and is sometimes used in Gesso. Gelatin is often used as a paper sizing. There are alternatives to these of course, as there always is. Polyvinyl acetate or PVA glue is a better sizing because it won't yellow or crack with age. In many (if not all, actually) cases the animal products are going to yellow or crack with age where the synthetic equivalent will not. So it's best to avoid anyway.
In many cases the term "traditional" when applied to gesso, or grounds will mean animal products.
What you can do to find out more information about your products. Find the website for the brand you like - the actual manufacturers website. Often times they will have moderate information on the products, but usually a way of contacting them for asking questions. the good companies will get back to you. Most importantly, if you are contacting them, asking questions about the environmental and humane aspects of the products they manufacture, they will know that people are out there paying attention, caring and thinking about where they spend their money. They will make more efforts to provide this information publicly and to be concious of where they get their ingredients. when leaders of the industry do it, other will follow suit.
Read the labels on your products. Be aware of what you are purchasing and be aware of what those things are. If you don't know what something is on your label Google it! If google gives you half answers email the company directly, download their literature. There's always answers. Here are some websites for some brands I could think of off the top of my head... why not ask them some tough questions ;)
Tuesday June 22 at 12pm PST I'll be colouring an image of Abade live on my live stream. please come check it out if you have time. I'll be leaving the recording up there if I can, so you can watch the recording later if you want to :)
this will be my first time doing a live stream so even if you can't attend, let me know if you're interested in these sort of things. The response I receive now will dictate whether i take the time to do these again.
Feel free to use this time to ask me questions about using markers too.
I will be doing an airbrush demo demonstrating the techniques and tools used to create my piece "Noplan".
I will be focusing on Airbrush Techniques.
Sculpey
Wednesday April 21st 2-2pm
Opus Framing and Art
120 Lonsdale Avenue
North Vancouver
I will be demonstrating techniques for using Super Sculpey. I will cover creating an armature, baking, tools and techniques. I will briefly discuss painting sculptures as well.
These Demo's are always free to attend, and there are many more that come up often, some by more famous people as well! check OpusFraming.com for more!
I've also been changing up my airbrush paint so here are some reviews of Airbrush paint I've used:
Golden Airbrush paint sucks... It claims to be useful for paper and illustration but I did light coats and it seemed like it was just way too watery. It seemed like it took too many layers to get even a moderate colour covereage, even of the opaque colours! I do not recommend it even for paper.
Com*art and Medea is what came with my airbrush. It's good. I wouldn't rave about it, but for what Golden should have been able to do, these ones actually do it.
Createx is a great one. I find I have to thin it a little since its quite thick, but I painted Metal with it and its a dream. They also have decent mediums, top coats and stuff. Recommended for painting with sculpture and metal!
Now, Having said all that, I don't think I'll be using any of those much any more with the exception of Createx for some things because I discovered something far better to all of them.
Golden Fluid Acrylics + Golden Airbrush Medium = WIN
Right now Golden has a promo going on that is if you by 6 1oz or 3 4oz bottles of Golden Fluid Acrylics you get a 4oz bottle of Titanium White for free.
I got mine! got to any Opus Framing Location in B.C., they're participating and also have the Fluids on sale for the month of March. The Price is definitely right! (Friends of mine, I can pick up some for you if you cant get to an Opus, Let me know!)
Okay so this Golden Airbrush Medium is mixed with the Fluid acrylics in a 1:1 Ratio. and I've put them in mixing bottles.
That website I just linked is a great resource with 2 videos on how to use the Fluid Acrylics for airbrush!
I really love this fluid acrylics! I never liked painting with acrylics because it was difficult to get a thin even coverage coat without brush strokes or that sort of globby look, and as mentioned I had trouble with the other paints applying to sculpture before. These are beautiful!
I'm doing a demo on March 17th 2-3pm at Opus framing and Art 120 lonsdale ave in North vancouver on my painting technique for my previous airbrush painting
and I'll be going over my tools and the techniques. I've been preparing some samples :)
see my work station:
There are 3 panels there, the green one being worked on is drying from gold leafing :)
In the picture:
on the box is my airbrush matte topcoat, the box for my airbrush, Opus acrylic polymer medium, a couple of my mix bottles of colour, airbrush cleaner, and my table cleaning station with my airbrush shoved in it. there are also 2 pieces of broken Sculpey wing and a frisket film cut out.
beside the box is a bag with the bits of my Abade sculpture in it XD
on the board I was painting on is my heat gun (my best friend), the green painting has gold leaf on it, and beside that is a package of gold leaf (imitation), up against the back is the 2 other paintings I had going.
all for my demo.
Hope that was interesting to you airbrushers :>
I might try to do an online or video demo of my techniques in the future if there is any interest for it.
Next month I will be doing a Sculpey Demo as well, so stay tuned for some sculpey information soon :)
