Hobbit Day 2015

We all went camping, and one night before bed my wife checked her phone to see what the weather would be like the next day. When she woke up, she couldn't find the phone. She was looking around the sleeping bag saying, 'Where is it? Where IS it?" so insistently that I imagined her following with, "Nasty theiving Hobbitses!"

So I drew the first draft of this cartoon in my sketchbook sitting around the campfire that morning.

It probably helped that the kids watched The Fellowship of the Ring in the car on the way to the campsite!

Happy Hobbit Day everyone!

Prepping for Art Class

I'm teaching an art class starting this Sunday at the Chinese School. And when I was coming up with a subject for the first class, I remembered my first class from art school. We had to draw our initials, in a way that would represent us. It was a way for the professor both to see what we could do, and also learn a little about the students. So I wanted to do it in my class as well!

To kick things up a bit, I'm also having them make this the cover of a sketchbook that they can use. And, so they could see what could be done, and how it would look at the end, I made one myself to show them:

Anyone who reads this blog won't be surprised at the fairy tale reference for the S! And since we just went camping, I wanted to try something different for the V.

It was fun putting it together - never tried stitching a sketchbook together before, and it came together well. I also asked my kids to try the same assignment. They're working on it now - coming up with some interesting work! I'll show it tomorrow as more examples, to help generate ideas.