365 Lil' Guy Portraits: Week 6

My 365 Project Details:

 - Draw a "lil' guy" every day for the next year.

 - Color them when I can.  Ink and travel don't mix well.

 - Write something about each "lil' guy," but not too much.

Daily post can be found at www.scottkrichau.blogspot.com

Scott Krichau, sculptor, resides at Yucca Flats, NM with fellow artist, +Carolyn Curtis and their 3 legged dog named Pabst.  Scott uses steel and paper to create his "lil' guys."  Documenting their continual evolution and trying to understand the idiodyssey they are on.

365 Lil' Guy Portraits: Week 3

My 365 Project Details:

 - Draw a "lil' guy" every day for the next year.

 - Color them when I can.  Ink and travel don't mix well.

 - Write something about each "lil' guy," but not too much.

Daily post can be found at www.scottkrichau.blogspot.com

Scott Krichau, sculptor, resides at Yucca Flats, NM with fellow artist, +Carolyn Curtis and their 3 legged dog named Pabst.  Scott uses steel and paper to create his "lil' guys."  Documenting their continual evolution and trying to understand the idiodyssey they are on.

How to build a cheap panel for painting

3/16" Masonite, Lowe's is the place to get it cheap.  Is it archival, no.  Does it work, yes.  It will yellow over time, but prime the crap out of it, and you'll be fine.  Backed with 3/4" MDF.

Glue is your friend.  The MDF will guzzle the glue, so use plenty.

3/4" MDF ripped to your preference,  the smaller the size, the more risk of bad results.  The MDF is a cheap, and will split very easily.  This cut was not made free hand, that would be bad.  Be safe with a table saw.  

So, you have a masonite top, nailed to a basic box frame on the back.  Glue is your friend in this step.

The MDF gets drunk on glue, so make sure it gets plenty.   Also, make sure you have beer in the shop fridge, you deserve one at this point.

4" x 5" Panels

8" x 10" Panels

Now all you need to do is puddy some flaws, give it a little sanding, prime it, and off to production.  Whether a Scott Krichau character study, or an Original "Wenchkin" Painting, these panels are awesome.

Update 2-11-2012

Carolyn is sanding all the edges of the panels.  The reason one should break the edge is to make the panel more stable.  This task is super boring and taxing, but important.  It helps keep the MDF from chipping and ruining the panel.  The sanding helps ensure the longevity of the panel.

Priming to come this afternoon, pics when the next step happens

Making the lil' guys march

I'm just about finished with the next paper stack, but before I cut it out.  It seemed like a good idea to shoot photos of each layer, then merge them into a GIF file.  Lil' guys actually moving!  

These are the individual sheets used to make the animation.

Now to cut them all out.  41 strips of paper, between 3 and 10 characters per sheet.

It's a barrel of pencil shavings

So what does one do with all the pencil shavings?

 I save them in a barrel. Yep, my goal is to fill the sucker up. Then sell it for $10,000. Makes sense, right?  I filled this soup can with the shavings from the last 4 paper sculptures.

Gone though so many pencils and pencil sharpeners I've decide to start using the electric one.  My fingers need the break.

The only problem is the shavings are finer, meaning it's gonna take a lot of pencils to fill the barrel.

I've gotten the botten completely covered.

So I made a couple drawingeerings today

I'm preparing to build one of many paper sculptures this morning.

taken by Carolyn Curtis, early in the day.  Coffee in tow!

Just some basic tools needed.  Pencils, sharpeners, knife, straight edge or two, paper, and a stencil.  

I'm using a larger sheet of paper to layout the marching orders.

I've been using a stencil to repeat character forms.  Each one gets hand drawn a little differently.  The idea of the herd moving is more important than individual characters. 

Once they get drawn, it's time to cut!  The cutting is the hardest part, but the immediate reward is well worth it.  Tom Petty was wrong!

Now I fold each character into the upright position.  Nobody likes a lazy lil' guy.

The dog likes to play CEO during my stretches.

Stack up the paper and you have a completed paper stack herd.  

One more stack to finish tomorrow.  My hands need beer.  Also needed to show the carnage of pencils for  the three stacks above.

7 pencils, little bit of eraser, one sharpener, and 7 pencils turned into one almost full soup can of shavings.  I might be able to get a little more use out of a couple of them, but not much.  It's beer appreciation evening at Yucca Flats, so go get one, or two.  

Pabst asked me to take a memo.

I now have three desks. One for the computer, one for storage, and one for drawingeering. Pabst likes to dictate.