We went grocery shopping tonight at Food City, the grocery store at the end of our road. We've been going to Arpico, the department store, but because of problems with our trishaw driver (last week, he abandoned us just as we came out with our bags and bags of groceries), we elected to take matters under our own control and walk. So, Food City it is!
While there, we had to find paper and a pencil for Fahim.
If you read this thread, then you already know that Fahim is on the lookout for an artist for his novel that he wants to self-publish.
Well, after looking at some portfolios and some fantastic artwork, Fahim got bit by the art bug. "How hard can it be?" he says. I laugh. I know this man is crazy, and here he is, confirming it one more time. I enquire about the possibility of, oh, I don't know, books or tutorials or classes or something to teach him how to draw. "I don't need no books. All I need is a pencil and paper." Just one. Pencil, that is.
Yes, because he'll be a master by tomorrow.
Whatever. Honey, you're crazy, you're really really really crazy, but yeah, I love you anyway. Sigh.
So, back to the grocery store.
And I think here I'll interject with the reminder that every major business in Sri Lanka employs security guards. It's partially with shoplifting in mind, but also in case of angry mobs. Twenty odd years of civil war with bombs and people dying all over the place will do that to people.
Food City has *thinks back* 2 or 4 on duty.
Anyway, even without the guards, it's pretty crowded, what with it being a Saturday evening and all, so while he's getting the veggies weighed, I'm off in the stationery section. I find a pack of 12 pencils "Great Wall of China" and an artist's drawing pad. We only need one pencil.
We're not sure if the pack is for sale as a whole, or if the pencils are available individually. We take one and hope.
We finish the grocery shopping, and when done, I put the list and my pen back in my purse and nearly put the pencil in with it. I joke about it to Fahim who says, and not joking, mind you, that I should just do it. We're now standing at the meat counter. I refuse. To put the pencil in my purse, that is. We still get one chicken.
So what does Fahim do? He takes the pencil from me and slips it in his pocket.
I can't believe I married a thief. What has this world come to?
We're done shopping, so we head to the checkout counter, and I plead with him, nay, I beg him, to come clean. I don't want him going to jail over a pencil. Okay, in truth, I tell him I wash my hands of it. I can't believe he's actually considering doing this.
He tells me quietly that he only wants to buy one, not the whole load, and it'll be less of a hassle to just take it. But then, he relents. He slyly takes the pencil out of his pocket when no one's looking and asks the checkout girl about the pencil. Yeah, no problem, she says. Rs.4.50 ($0.045 US) gets tacked onto the bill. Posted by Lavalamp (Member # 4337) on :
Hmm...I don't see anything in here about the pencil sharpener, gum eraser, special light bulb, comfy chair, and drafting table that every artist needs. Fahim, if you're reading this, you need to get back to the store right away.
Glad you weren't arrested.
Although a stretch in prison is very good for artists. Or so I'm told.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
A pencil! a pencil! my Empire for a pencil!
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
I'm sure glad he changed his mind (or his conscience bugged him enough) to make him go ahead and pay for it. I know it is a tiny thing, but I'm sure it would have changed the way you (and the rest of us) thought about him a little bit if he had decided to steal it.
Farmgirl
Posted by Uprooted (Member # 8353) on :
*whew* Fahim -- you quit messing w/ quid's mind!
Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
I'm also relieved that he changed his mind. Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
Me, too, believe me!
The only reason he was going to was the hassle factor. He wanted the pencil, but didn't want to have to go through the (almost) inevitable 20 minute wait while management's called over to figre out how to deal with a silly pencil.
I've seen it happen with equally silly things here, and there's just no escape when it starts.
I say wait until we hit a stationery store or buy the whole dang pack if it's that much of a problem.
But yeah, maybe he was just messing with my head. He's good at that. Hmm. Dunno.
Posted by romanylass (Member # 6306) on :
45 cents for a pencil? WE Americans are so spoiled!
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
She said it was 4.5 cents. Is that right, or is it 45 cents?
Posted by dantesparadigm (Member # 8756) on :
according to my currency converter widget, 4.5 sri lankan rupees equals 4.4 cents
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
which is 45 Canadian cents.
Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
But 4.5 US cents. Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
And now he tells me he was pulling my leg. He was never serious about stealing it. He just wanted to torment me. Waaaaaaaaaah! I'm so gullible!!!!
Posted by human_2.0 (Member # 6006) on :
quid, when I asked my brother what I should study to draw, he told me get Christopher Hart's books. I got the anatomy book. Amazon lets you look at the first dozen or so pages. There will be nudity in the book of course. This one isn't so bad though. A lot of anatomy books seem to be by pervert artists IMO. Some books are just pictures of real naked models.
And I don't want to get into all the trouble about nudity being art. I heard OSC say pornagraphy is about arousing people. IMO, perverts don't need smut mags or even naked people to get arousals. I believe a log of artists are perverts (just like I believe a lot of doctors, laywers, engineers, bums, etc are peverts too...). Then again, James Christensen, is an example of an artist who draws lots of nude women that seem to me like they could be hung in church they are so chaste. :ducks:
Edit to add: I read somewhere that it is odd that there are so many anatomy books, but so few books on drawing clothes, which is, of course, much more normal to see than biceps and chests.
Hart is a comic book artist, but I liked it because I don't really care about the names of muscles and bones like other anatomy books. And like I said, I don't think he's a perv even though he draws comic book women, which, well... erm... Yeah. Anyway.
I did these sketches after going through the book. It is an animated gif, so wait for them to rotate. At the time I drew them, I thought the sketches were really good, now I am dreadfully... er... let's just say I removed the gif from my webpage. But left it on the server I guess.
There are a bunch of other good books too:
Lee Hammond writes about tools needed (paper, pencils, blending tortillions, kneaded/vinal/typewriter erasers, brushes, spray fixative, etc. How important lighting is and how it works. And moving into the color pencil space. I found this drawing in my book, which was copies of some book excersizes (copies are always easier than creating something from thin air).
There are other books I was going to write about, but this is so long already...
[ January 01, 2006, 12:10 AM: Message edited by: human_2.0 ]
Posted by beverly (Member # 6246) on :
I am very fond of this book by Jack Hamm. As human said, some nudity, but tastefully done, IMO.
(I just looked through the pages displayed on Amazon and am very disappointed! The illustrations don't show up!)
Posted by human_2.0 (Member # 6006) on :
quote:Originally posted by beverly: (I just looked through the pages displayed on Amazon and am very disappointed! The illustrations don't show up!)
That is odd.
I've got to mention this book: The Artist's Complete Guide to Facial Expression. It is very thick and FULL of everything you could want to know. Amazon's search inside doesn't do it justice at all as the first chapter is basics on how to draw faces.
He discusses emotions displayed by photographs, master artworks, movies, comics, statues, primitive artwork, masks, anything that depicts a face even stuff that is very unrealistic like a piece of wood with round circles for eyes, a notch for a nose, and a mouth that is perfectly round with surprise...
And what is really funny is he will discuss pictures of things like comercials where he says it is obvious the actors are fake because they lack this or that quality in their expression, or a wedding picture where the groom actually looks terified and the bride is in bliss, and a drawing of a couple about to kiss where the girl "appears disgusted because her upper lip shape is too square" and "has a 'sneer pocket' by her nose" and then he draws a corrected version and he is *right*... And a picture of a girl who looked like was crying, but was really in the act of a laugh. And how lighting coming from below the Abraham Memorial statue makes it look startled.
He goes over the different muscles that generate the expressions that control eyebrows, forehead, nose, mouth, eyelid, etc.
He covers the 6 basic epressions: sadness, anger, joy, fear, disgust, and surprise. A chapter for each. And at the end he has a long list of the possible expressions for facial qualities.
It's a great book.
Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
Wow! Those sound like great recommendations! Thanks, human and beverly. I've passed them on to Fahim. Posted by Fahim (Member # 5482) on :
I'm sitting here laughing my guts out (well, I wasn't really ... but I was totally amused) to read quid's first post She thinks that if you put a pencil in your pocket at the store, that I'm stealing it. What am I supposed to do, carry it around in my hand? Ah well, it's always fun to shop with her And notice the comment out of nowhere about getting just the one chicken ... I have no idea how that is relevant
Thanks for the list of books BTW Now you guys have made me actually want to go take a look - and I wasn't actually going to do a cover the way quid thinks I was I simply wanted to put the ideas in my mind on paper and see how far I can take them using the computer. Not to actually do a cover which I will use on the book ... Does that make any sense to anybody? Probably not
I liked your drawings BTW human_2.0 - you might think whatever you want of 'em but I still like 'em Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
I'm in hell. Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on :
quote: Although a stretch in prison is very good for artists. Or so I'm told.
I get very little poetry written in school.
Posted by LadyDove (Member # 3000) on :
quote:or his conscience bugged him enough
Fahim's conscience, thy name is quid!
Seriously though, what's the deal with making the purchase of only "one" pencil such a requirement? It's not like the pencil will go bad or become outdated. Is that just a guy thing or is there some reason that a mere female would be able to understand?
Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
Um, he's cheap.
It's a very Sri Lankan trait. People here are poor, so they tend to buy only what they need.
Example: Some people go buy their food every day. One cup of rice, 1/2 cup of mung beans, 1 onion, a few cloves of garlic, etc.
In all fairness, for those who are paid daily, including those who work intermittent jobs, that may be all the cash they have and they can't afford to buy a bag of rice. But then, if they don't work one day, they might not have food to eat the next. For many, it's very much a hand to mouth existence.
Many people here are, quite reasonably so, skeptical of purchasing more than they need in the immediate term. While Fahim's upbringing wasn't that poor, it's a pervasive attitude. The anti-materialistic, perhaps.
Posted by human_2.0 (Member # 6006) on :
quote:Originally posted by Fahim: I liked your drawings BTW human_2.0 - you might think whatever you want of 'em but I still like 'em
Oh, thanks.
All of em were copies of other artwork (as I said, doing it from thin air is really hard, even James Christensen uses models).
The stuff in this thread was pretty good I thouht too.
And I thought doing stuff on the computer would be easier. But it isn't. If anything, it is harder. I even bought a Wacom tablet and it is still easier for me to draw with a pad of paper.
I know a few artists (like my brother and a coworker) though and they use those things like magic. I was at SIGGRAPH this year and saw this girl drawing on an expensive LCD tablet and it was awesome! (that is me in the top corner).
Posted by Fahim (Member # 5482) on :
Yeah, when I started to think about putting my ideas for the cover down on paper, the first thing I told quid was that I needed to buy a Wacom tablet Of course, she takes me totally seriously and looks up the price and everything and of course, she has to go look up the most expensive one ... or at least one of the most expensive ones It was like $220 and she's like "No way are we buying that!" I found one later for around $90 but seriously, I didn't think it made things any easier I remember the old days when they used to have computer shows (this was in the really old days like back in the 80's or 90's ) and they'd have a tablet and a computer runing what was it ... Harvard Graphics? I don't think it was Harvard Graphics because if I recall correctly, HG was more of a presentation software. But anyway, something like that .. where everybody would come up and try to draw stuff. Never was as easy as it looked
And yeah, I liked all the stuff posted in the thread quid started about cover art I can't do that kind of stuff but I sure can appreciate those who can draw like that
Update: Just looked at the pic of the LCD tablet you'd posted and said "Oooh, it's *only* $2,500" - that's all I said. quid gives me this look and says "You're not getting it!" - now where would she get the idea that I wanted it?
[ January 01, 2006, 06:40 AM: Message edited by: Fahim ]
Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
quote:I can't do that kind of stuff but I sure can appreciate those who can draw like that
If appreciating includes leaving drool pools, then yes, he appreciates.
quote:now where would she get an idea that I wanted it?
See above comment about drool pools. Posted by beverly (Member # 6246) on :
Human, that book on facial expressions looks awesome! I am seriously considering acquiring that at some point.
Quid and Fahim, I totally understand that mindset. Living in the Philippines, I became accustomed to the way the people lived--buying food for *just* the next meal. Buying one packet of single-use shampoo. There was just no knowing if there would be enough money to buy one the next day. It made a lot of sense for people to have their own little markets in front of thier homes, even if that meant there were 5 on one street. They all got business because everyday someone needed to make a purchase, and nearby was just so convenient.
Of course, as missionaries, we had to buy our food for the whole week since we only could shop one day a week. People must have thought we were lavishly rich. And in many ways, it was very much true.
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
![[Cry]](graemlins/cry.gif)
Okay, in truth, I tell him I wash my hands of it. I can't believe he's actually considering doing this.![[Wall Bash]](graemlins/wallbash.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Blushing]](graemlins/blushing.gif)