Skipping Art for Sea Turtles, and Other Nautical Tales

sailor dan in perhaps his truest form, with fellow wayfarer joe mulligan

Hello Bloggerfolk!

I'm back again, fresh from the airport, a bit more tan, a lot more tired, and very glad to be home, or at least some semblance of it. My nomadic summer continues, having spent the most recent stint of it in the bays around the island of St. John! Inspired by our previous trip to the southern seas, my dad and I decided again to go sailing. Only this time, the boat was significantly bigger, the bathrooms were slightly less scary, and the crew was made of old high school friends (both my dad's and one of my own!)  It was my big hurrah to celebrate having finished four years of college and being 99% graduated (I shake my fist angrily at my remaining summer credits). And before you get too jealous, I'll have you know that I was covered in sunscreen most of the time (icky), had a major case of sea legs (wobbly), and got stranded at least once (more on that below). But I'm not gonna lie - it was a great trip and a major blessing. Getting to swim in blue water under jungle hills dotted with pirate-era ruins is pretty much how I’d want to spend any summer ever. Sailing is a lot like camping, in that there's danger and uncomfort which is then traded to experience a beautiful place about as closely as you can. Unless you have a 5-mil+ yacht. But I don't think that will be happening for me anytime soon.

I promised art in my last post, and did my best to deliver. But it wasn't as straightforward as I had hoped. Drawing while on this trip was surprisingly difficult, as my drawing process typically includes two things: lots of reference, and lots of time. And I didn't have much of either on this trip. With limited cell service, I was cut off from the illustrations and art styles I often reference while drawing. All I was left with was the scenery, my natural instincts, and what I could remember. Which perhaps is a good look into where I'm actually at artistically, when I'm not borrowing tools from and measuring myself against other illustrators. But the perfectionist side of me was never really happy with how the pictures were turning out, which made me even more disappointed in the amount of time it was taking to draw them.

me and the pad

Drawing is fairly isolating - working on my iPad meant I was out of the sun and away from the fun for extended periods of time, and I began to feel like I was missing out on the trip in the same way that a tourist misses out on his when he's too focused on taking photos. In fact, drawing often fills that same desire for me as photos do for the tourist: the desire to take some part of the place you're visiting back with you. But in doing so, you miss out on actually experiencing the place firsthand. There was a distinct point on the trip when I was struggling to draw some dang shoreline because I didn't have the time or reference to really nail it, while my friends were out swimming with freaking sea turtles and I thought what am I doing??? is having a nice picture really worth missing out on that?  So I ditched art for the rest of the trip, swam with two sea turtles, and it was wonderful. 

Before I had that "screw it" moment, I did get in two pictures that I liked, both done in a polygonal style based on my memories of Laura Bifano's work, which I recently discovered and really like. It's a novel, very digital approach to landscape painting, but for some reason, it was the only style that really felt natural at the time. I'm also including the shoreline that caused the epiphany because if I can't feel comfortable sharing bad art here, then I won't anywhere. 

golden hour at leinster point and tortola

i just love clouds so. freaking. much.

ugh

Drawing issues aside, the trip was great. The main island we sailed around, St. John, is mostly national park, meaning that the views are relatively unspoiled and it truly felt more wild. I'm not the biggest fan of resort vacations or overdeveloped places... give me ancient ruins and trees any day! This trip had them in spades - we even discovered ruins of a resort house on this quiet beach! 

That tower up behind me is, you guessed it, MORE ruins (pirate-era dutch windmill tower). And while it wasn't on the itinerary, we also got to snorkel over a shipwreck (checks that one off the bucket list) Pardon me while I geek out about ruins for a moment... how have I never talked about this on the blog before??? 

We had a few close shaves, mostly due to the assumption that “we wouldn’t ever run out of gas for the dinghy boat.” (small boat that gets you from the bigger boat to the shore) And that assumption was put most strongly to the test one night when we decided to dinghy 20 minutes across the bay with a more than full passenger load just in the hopes of a seafood dinner. Instead of a seafood dinner, we were greeted with no easy place to park (and for some reason we settled on the smelliest part of the whole harbor to disembark), no seafood (the only place nearby was a hamburger place where we waited literally two hours for food), and barely any gas (as this was the only harbor that had no gas station). By the time we were leaving, the sun had more than set, we were pretty much out of gas, and we still had a 20 minute drive back, against current, in the dark. Dad and I were pounded by the oncoming swells as we pondered what to do in the very real possibility of running out of gas, wrecking on shore, or any number of unsavory outcomes. Thankfully, those outcomes remained hypothetical and were able to make it back. But when the dinghy ran out of gas the next day, stranding us on an entirely different island, we realized just how close we had been to a legitimately dangerous situation. (shoutout to the Alabama guys who got us off that other island). 

And while those dinghy trips made me never want to step foot off of the boat again (for fear of being stranded on yet another island), eventually we did and headed back to the states. It's quite nice to be on the mainland again, and I'm ready to settle into my new place where I'll spend the next couple weeks (this one has a pool! yay!) Hopefully it won't distract me too much from the mountain of Bearpuncher work that needs to be completed but... we'll see ;)

wishing you a great summer of ruin-exploring adventures!

-dh

Music Recommendation: The two songs that were pretty much always in my head the whole trip were Calypso by John Denver and the Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire dive theme. Which are very likely NOT the first two songs that come to most people's minds when it comes to seafaring, but are both incredibly nostalgic for me. (sorry not sorry, beach country music)

Color Keys from the Florida Keys

Hey everyone! 

I just got back from a week-long trip boat trip with my family. Yep, that's right, a boat trip. Do people still do many boating vacations nowadays? Not a cruise ship or anything. I'm talking one-family-two-sails-really-feel-the-waves-underneath-the-hull kind of boating. Anyways, I really enjoyed it. It's a totally different way of of life, and while I'm glad to be back on land, it was fun to try! I now have a much better understanding of what Rat means when he talks about "Simply messing, messing about in boats, or with boats. In or out of em, it doesn't matter" (that's Rat from The Wind in the Willows - though I dearly hope you already knew that). I'm still trying to get all the salt out of my clothes and hair - it's a process. Especially since I won't be going to Ireland this summer, it was nice to have the chance to see a new place, though one of a significantly warmer and more humid nature: the Florida Keys. I've been recently amazed by just how big America is. Even though Florida is still in the states, it definitely feels like a different country compared to Tennessee. The expansive salt marshes, the spanish moss, the decaying rust bridges set over azure salt water - it just all seems so summer-y and adventurous. And this strange nostalgia for the landscape of Florida and the coastal American South (part of the reason why I LOVE Princess and the Frog), was nice to indulge. And indulge I did! Through gazing for hours out of the car window and the boat ... spaces on deck??? Oh and I also did some art. Bet you didn't expect that! ;) 

I brought, as usual, way too many art supplies, most of which I never used. I intended to do watercolor pieces like I did during my Bahamas mission trip last summer, but when I started the first one I kept getting frustrated with the pencil sketch which seemed to predict getting even more frustrated with the watercolor later down the line... so I caved, pulled out the Ipad, and worked almost entirely digitally for the remainder of the trip. The watercolors and gouache were not touched :( I have mixed feelings about the outcome. This was my first big trip with The Pad, by the way. I felt like the digital nature of the art was able to capture the luminosity and vibrancy of the color and water in way that would have been difficult for me to do with traditional media. And the whole process is just so much easier. I feel more comfortable with it as a medium, I feel more free to experiment, depicting light is quick (lookin at u, multiply and overlay layers), I don't have to wait for paint to dry, and I don't have to mix colors unless I want to. So all that means drawings that look prettier (in my opinion) and I have more time to spend on the actual vacation. (which is kinda the point of the thing)

But, on the other hand, I feel like traditional plein air painting in new and inspiring places is what encourages me to still keep traditional media as part of my skillset. I don't want to be a primarily/exclusively digital artist if I can help it, cause I feel like each time I put serious effort into my traditional work, I make breakthroughs on the digital side as well. Remember that Brother Bear poster? Or perhaps any tree I have drawn in the past year? Those were directly influenced by how I plein air paint with gouache.

It's in the simplification of shading and round shapes in the tree

Traditional media is just cool, and becoming increasingly rare in animation art. In other words, the Disney Archives are quickly becoming something you access through a computer, and not something you hold in you hands and think, "Wow. Milt Kahl drew this. And now I am trying not to spill something on it." I know I'm not going to get better at traditional media if I don't actual try it, fail, succeed, and learn. So part of me was a little disappointed that I didn't risk it on this trip. Plus, using traditional media fosters a greater sense of "place." Knowing that I worked on this piece of paper at this place in the universe makes the art a bit more special than a file that just ends up in Google Drive. Anyways, I digress. You probably didn't come here to listen to me ramble about drawing mediums. Maybe you actually wanted to see some art.

So here's some art.

Sombrero Key Lighthouse

Many, if not most, of these were inspired by what's in animation called "color keys." Popularized by Pixar, these are small paintings which are intended to direct the color of a scene rather than the detail and design. I like to do them because they don't take a lot of time, and if the detail is off, eeeeehhhhh, just shrug and say it's a just a color key/sketch. Actually, don't say that. (personal pet peeve: calling something a "sketch" to lower the bar when in fact, the piece is not "a sketch." Just own it, people. The piece is probably good anyways.) I would love to do color keys professionally some day, but combining them all into a harmonious order called a "color script" seems baffling and something that takes guts.

 Snappers

I actually got to pet this manatee, who lived in a marina and was pretty scarred up

Many of these were also inspired by the art of Louie Zong, a man whose work has become increasingly influential to me over the past several months. His art has a lot of texture to it and good color sense all submerged in a childlike simplicity and innocence which I really appreciate. His work often gets very simplistic but somehow still feels professional ... needless to say I'm a fan, and am trying to incorporate some of his sensibilities into my own art. But at the moment, the most immediate thing you'll notice is quite a liberal use of Procreate's "Splatter" and my modified "Flicks" brushes.

Clownfish, Moon Jellies, and Sandbar Shark

I needed to use a pencil after sooo much digital art. Also, baby gators.

Sleeping Hawksbill Sea Turtle

In Key West, they have wild chickens that roam around town, just doin their thing. I've known several friends who kept chickens, but what surprised me most about the Key West chickens was watching the hens run around surrounded their chicks - back at home you usually just see the adults or mail-order chicks by themselves in a pen. So it was delightful to see these little families where everyone was all together! When I got back home I wanted to make a more stylized piece that reflected this memory (drawing on *heh* the art of Annette Marnat, thanks Naomi Bethel). This took a LOT longer than I expected but was a fun exploration into a new, soft, and even-more-texture-y style.

also took some cues from Audubon's Great American Hen and Young

Although I don't try to pressure myself to draw when I'm on vacation, it's nice when art like this spills out naturally! You may have implied from that statement that drawing often feels like work now, which is true. And although it's good work, work that makes me happy and time fly, I realized that I need to recapture that spirit of play, be willing to let pieces suck, and draw without reference... but that's likely a topic for another day. Be sure to check back here on the Roost for that! A lot is going on on my Instagram too - I'll be posting most of these pictures there and celebrating 500 followers! That's a big milestone, and I'm going to try to focus on being grateful for that rather than envious of 1000... let's see how that goes. ;) As usual, feel free to share Roost posts with your friends if you think they would be helpful. People really seemed to like the only "advice" post I have on here, and I plan on posting a few more tutorial kind of stuff here over the summer, so if there's a specific topic you want me to cover, let me know in the comments. 

Thankful for you guys, your readership, and your support! Hope your summer is off to a great start.

-dh


ALSO Music Recommendation for this week: I've been playing the BotW Hyrule Castle theme frequently to make everything seem more epic, maybe you would like a (Triforce of) Courage boost too? I finished BotW the week before the sailing trip and Man Was It Awesome. Storming the castle is so intense, especially when accompanied by this song. And for those Ambrosia fans out there, know that she participated in the final battle against Ganon! Very cool. Thanks Fujibayashi. More BotW art (and Ambrosia art???) to come during Zeldathon this June 13. 

woah that sounded official 

Mammoth Cave

Hey everyone! 
It's officially Spring Break and it's been off to a good start! I had previously agreed to dogsit for my aunt during this week, which although that would provide lots of nice downtime and rest, it also wouldn't leave much room for adventuring and such. And it puts me in a weird spot where I won't be going home, but I won't really be going anywhere new either ... which I kinda see as the two main uses of a college spring break. All that said I'm still super grateful for the opportunity, especially since most of my friends were unavailable to do any big weeklong trip. But I wanted to do a little something special to give this week some spice before I retreat into Breath of the Wild, doughnuts, and dogwalking.

And thankfully the Lord provided some excitement! This Saturday was super packed - I took a friend to the airport in the morning (and she's hopefully in CHINA by now!!!) and then drove to Kentucky with some friends! My friend Parker had invited Aedan, Sam, and I to visit his hometown and Mammoth Cave. (THE Mammoth Cave!) Most of the tours were already fully booked, but we were able to buy a ticket to walk around in an entrance section of the caves, which was fine with me, since I figured that there would not be enough time to paint anything if we were on a formal tour. And paint I did! Sam & Aedan & Parker were very kind and waited for me as I did a few color keys of the caverns. We weren't allowed to see any crazy cave formations, not a single stalagmite OR stalactite, but the caverns were extremely large and warmly lit with comfortably warm-hued lighting. It was kinda difficult to accept it as not man-made - I'm much more used to seeing imitations of these wonders at Disney World and in video games than the actual thing. We saw one solitary bat while we were leaving the caves which caused much more panic in both our group and the general public than one bat ought to have caused...

The Ipad came in handy in the dim lighting, but it was a challenge to find a process that worked well to capture the dramatic darks & lights and the shape of the rock formations. And with the limited time I skewed more towards my Impressionist tendencies. I'm not sure if they clearly "read" to someone who hasn't seen the real thing. However, I'm pretty happy with how they turned out, if only from a "souvenir" perspective. This was how these places felt/looked to me, and the Rafinesque Hall one has a softness that isn't quite there in the real thing, but looked a little like Tryus Wong's Bambi work and made me happy :)

I really pushed the greens on the cedar (not cypress) forest bit - even though it's March it still looked like the middle of winter in Kentucky. Everything was dormant, grey, and just a tad depressing (good thing the main attraction was underground). But in this particular glade there was just enough moss and evergreen branches that if I squinted I could kinda pick up on some extra color.

We finished the day with some time at Parker's house and then some really good pizza. Mine had barbecue, potato chips, and a soda-syrup-reduction on it, and then I drizzled habanero honey on it and dunked it in ranch cause it OBVIOUSLY didn't have enough going for it already... And then we (well, not Parker) drove back to Nashville. A full, adventurous day by most standards! And the good thing is that I'm now so tired from that day that I'm totally ready to sit down and rest for the remainder of the week. I made the leap and finally bought a Switch, which will hopefully arrive today. In college, with classwork and internships applications, it's hard for me to justify playing video games alone. But now that I have a open week with few better things to do, now feels like the right time... of course, I'll probably get myself busy by the end of the week: I want to enter this month's Character Design Challenge, I have a background to paint, and I still have one last studio I need to send an application to (Dreamworks). These internship applications have been time consuming, but I've gotten faster with each one and I always get excited about what future possibilities they may bring! Now I need to get back to the art side of things so I have some new things to show when the next application term comes around. But I'll worry about all that after break! I want to make sure I have a few days of very distinct rest so that I focus better during the remainder of the semester. In the immediate future, I plan on playing some Switch, learning to cook a few things, and maybe writing another blog post or two. Who knows? 

Thanks for reading! I often feel like these posts go out into the empty void, but I think they're helpful for my remembering and hopefully interesting to you! And I did know going into this whole thing that Blogspot "isn't especially hip with the kids nowadays." But I'm ok with that. And I don't want to go back to Tumblr.  

Have an amazing day, and explore some caves!
-dh