Willem van Heemstra: December 2005

"If you need a hand,
just follow your arm."

- Willem van Heemstra

With Christmas in sight and all the streets so delicately decorated, it's time to let go of all occupations and release our hands from daily routines. It is a moment of cheers and celebration!

I'd say, High Fives...

National High Fives Day at http://www.nationalhighfiveday.com

Now let's draw them 'magical wands' ourselves...

Images and text courtesy http://www.polykarbon.com	Seven steps to draw a human hand, hold on!
	The Oval Draw an oval. Much like the one you see to the left. Designate a point on the lower center line of the oval. This is the anchor point we'll use for our fingers.
	Radials Draw 5 lines radiating out from the anchor point. The longest line will be the middle finger... make it just slightly shorter than 2 oval lenghts.
	Knuckle placement The remaining finger lengths fall on an arc from the height of the middle finger. The knuckle closest to the tip of the finger is slightly less than 1/3 the way down from the finger tip. The next knuckle splits the difference between the remaining length to the top of the palm oval. The thumb has 3 knuckles as well but the anchoring is hidden inside the palm.
	Fleshing in Flesh in the fingers as shown here. The fingers start narrow at the base... widen at the first knuckle then taper down again toward the tip. Believability is added by drawing creases in the places the hand bends the most... at the knuckles and along the palms. Look at your own hand for reference. Everybody's hand is slightly different. This hand is definitely mine. (Notice I am Right handed and that's why my hand model is a Left hand)
	The opposable Thumb The thumb kinda has it's own thing going on. It rotates around on its own axis. The thumb swings inward on its Anchor Knuckle and bends down at its second knuckle to point at the base of the Ring finger. The thumbs arc peaks at the middle knuckle of the index finger.
	Finger lengths The Index finger and the Ring finger are nearly the same height... about the halfway point of the middle finger "tip". The Ring finger is just slightly longer. The Pinky finger comes up to the last knuckle line of the Ring finger. Notice how the hand is not Square but Wedge shaped.
	High Fives Put your hand(s) up in the air, like you just don't care... ;o)

The above movie clip is my first attempt to make a figure walk like a human being, see if you like it ;o)

Fun, Friends, and Farewell drinks at the College of Art. Today has been our day of First Year Exhibition. Each First Year student was allowed to put one of his or her pieces of work over the last Term on display.

I had Daniel Cini visiting our exhibition, my flat-mate at the student apartment. He liked in particular the charcoal drawings. As he said; 'My web site has a black & white front page, because I like it so much." Check it out for yourselves at http://www.danielcini.com

=== Side note

In addition, Daniel presented me with a book on the Finding Nemo animation (Disney - Pixar production). A wonderful gift, and my first (no second) birthday (17th December) gift already!

Cover of the book The Art of Finding Nemo

We have also seen Harry Potter at the Movies, whose writer (J.K. Rowling) happens to live in.. Edinburgh! There are many Scottish phrases in the movie I've come to notice.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, a wee bit scary~~~~

Aileen Graham brought me a 'blank' Matroshka (or Russian nested Dolls) from St. Petersburg, for me to paint on... anything.

Painted example

Some inspiration from these Doll:

The Russian Doll Unit modular storage system by designer Paul Johnson.

The Russian Doll Unit as garage door ornament. Source: http://semiskimmed.net

===

The exhibition was a successful event. I received compliments for at least two of the following works I'd presented:

Clock - Deconstruct-reconstruct

Lightbulb - Soft-sharp

Snares or Snail

In addition, here's a compilation of fellow students works, enjoy:

Incredible what all these First Year Students are able to produce, don't you agree.

===

Back to the animation bit, I've delved into the Anatomy of the Human Body.

First, the head (which I so cruel had to cut in two for it to be 'fired' in the College oven).

Head of a split personality

Fellow students Jason, my agent 'Scully', and Malcolm

Images and text courtesy http://www.polykarbon.com	Nine steps to draw a human face, here we go!
Before we jump into drawing masterpieces one must first learn the framework on which all things are built. Above are the four shapes. We can create more shapes as needed by combining two or more of the above. Using these we can design anything from cars and buildings to people and animals. The trick is to know which shape goes where and at what size.
	Here's a really basic human torso. Deliberately copies of the above shapes were used to make this framework so we can see what is meant when I say even the most complex of forms can be broken down into these basic shapes. A ball and cone combined make the oval head. Joints, like shoulders, elbows, and knuckles, are usually represented by Spheres. Appendice, like arms, legs, and fingers, are usually represented by cylinders. Hands are extremely complex, but even so you can see how they can be represented by a combination of basic shapes.
	Use of basic shapes.
	Use of shading.
	Divide the oval in half both vertically and horizontally. This will create the eye and nose line.
	Divide the eye-line in equal halves on each side of the nose line. This helps us determine the location of the eyes and the corners of the mouth.
	Divide the nose-line in half below the eye-line. This will be where the bottom of the nose is. Just below the nose-line (about 1/3 below) is where we'll draw the mouth line.
	Eyes are 4 times smaller than the head is wide. That means eyes are 1 eye width apart and half an eye in from the edge of the head. The center of the eyes should be located on the lines we made in step 3.
	The inside corner of the eye is where we determine the width of the nose. .. for Anime we go a bit smaller. Females have smaller noses and mouths so use these new lines to show the width of the mouth.
	The ears are placed on the edge of the head between the eye and the nose-line. The hair-line is between the eyes and the top of the head.. unless you're me.. then it's much higher ;o)
	You will notice all kinds of different style eyes in Anime. These are the more cat-like ones. Notice the extra line above the upper eyelid. This represents a fold of skin that makes the eye look more naturalin the face.
	This is as basic as it gets. We'll study different Anime artists to find what styles of hair and shading we like the best. Happy Faces!