Monday, September 17, 2007

Two Chests of Drawers

 

 

Full Scale Layout for a Tall Chest of Drawers, 56 1/4″ x 25 1/4″ (143cm x 64cm), pencil on brown paper,

I’m going to build two tall chests of drawers in maple for my wife, Cathy, and myself. The layout above is the one we agreed on after research and tweaking various dimensions and details. There will be a recess around the drawers and at the bottom of the bottom rail and inside the front legs. The drawer heights and the hand cutouts get progressively bigger going down the chest. The bottom drawer face is 8″ high. The drawers are 23″ across. The chest will be 18″ deep. There will be two panels on each side.

As for furniture, I have constructed a dinning room table with a leaf and several built-ins with cabinets, drawers and shelves, but this will be my first free standing case piece.


Posted by Chuck in 03:14:32 | Permalink | Comments (1) »

Saturday, September 15, 2007

Edna and I Do Some more Drawings

 
 
Untitled Drawing, 29″ x 23″ (74cm x 58cm), black pastel on hand toned strathmore 2ply rag Bristol
 
 
 
 
Untitled Drawing, 29″ x 23″ (74cm x 58cm), black pastel on hand toned strathmore 2ply rag Bristol
 
 
 
 
Untitled Drawing, 29″ x 23″ (74cm x 58cm), black pastel on hand toned strathmore 2ply rag Bristol
 
 
 
Last Thursday, September 13, Edna and I got together for another day of drawing. We decided that we liked the way we are toning the ground. We did another small drawing, 14 1/2″ x 11 1/2″ (37cm x 20cm), and the three large ones shown above. For inspiration we leafed through my collection of childrens’ drawings. Small children don’t consider any formal elements when they draw. They just do it. The character of their marks varies with their age and motor control - from scribbles to careful lines. The way we’ve applied the toned ground allows us to erase down to the white of the paper making it possible to produce white lines and areas. We got some good laughs making these drawings.
Posted by Chuck in 05:15:29 | Permalink | Comments (3)

Sunday, September 9, 2007

Absence of Conversation

Hello out there.  I know you are looking. Data shows you are looking. Some of you look regularly. A few of you have looked often for about a year. Why don’t you write something? How can there be a conversation if you don’t introduce yourself and write something? Nothing bad will happen if you do. Your social security number will not be stolen. Your bank accounts will remain untouched. No salesperson will appear at your door. No one will spam you. No one will call. You will not be charged with unseemly behavior. You will not be vilified. No search warrant for your computer will be issued.  A curse will not fall on your family.  Your house will not be broken into.  You will not acquire a strange disease.  Your aunt won’t know if you don’t tell her. However, who knows what illegal monitoring by United States National Security Agency, under the direction of our really dumb and arrogant president, is taking place?
Posted by Chuck in 17:36:42 | Permalink | Comments (6)

Saturday, September 8, 2007

Two New Drawings with Edna

 
 
Untitled Drawing, 14 1/2″ x 11 1/2″ (37cm x 29cm), charcoal pencil & black pastel on pigmented Strathmore 2 ply rag Bristol
 
 
 
Untitled Drawing, 14 1/2″ x 11 1/2″ (37cm x 29cm), charcoal pencil & black pastel on pigmented Strathmore 2 ply rag Bristol
 
 
These two small drawings are the product of last Wednesday’s, September 5, drawing session. One aspect of drawing on the larger paper - four times as large - is that fine lines don’t hold their own with dark or black passages. We were always heavying up the narrow, light lines. After the session in which we drew the following drawing,
 
 
 
 
Untitled Drawing, 29″ x 23″ (74cm x 58cm), black pastel on Strathmore 2 ply rag Bristol
 
I was logging photos of the work on my computer. I usually have to make some adjustments to the photos to get them to accurately as possible represent the drawings. For fun I applied what my photo program calls “equalization.” It produced this.
 
 
 

Humm. I liked this darkened version. I e-mailed a copy to Edna and asked what she thought about it. She liked it to. I instantly knew what to do to create the grayish ground on the paper. For the time being I’m not going to disclose what I did. I will after we have an opportunity to show them. I quartered a sheet of Strathmore 2 ply rag Bristol and toned the paper. Last Wednesday afternoon we did three small drawings on toned paper and one large one without toning. The large one didn’t work. I discarded that one. On the first small toned paper we used our typical marks (not shown.) We noted that the narrower, finer lines worked better better in the smaller format. It’s really not possible to appreciate the difference in the photos reproduced above. In addition the toned ground can be erased down to the white paper, which allows a different appearance of highlights. As you can see, we approached the drawings with an even more light-hearted than usual scribbling mode using charcoal pencils in addition to the black pastel. We’re going to pursue this line for a while.

A digital camera and modestly priced photo program offer the abilitiy to test out ideas very quickly. 

Posted by Chuck in 05:48:10 | Permalink | Comments (1) »

Monday, September 3, 2007

Whirligig #39

 
 
Whirligig #39, 22″ x 16″ x 9″ (56cm x 41cm x 23cm), wood, aluminum, brass, asstd metal parts
 
 
 
Whirligig #39, front view showing offset hub on crankshaft and counter weight in front
 
 
 
Whirligig #39, side showing crankshaft and its free turning hub
 
 
 
Whriligig #39
featuring
Unique Crankshaft Construction for Lots of Action
New Rivited Blade Assembly
Easy Turning Industrial Bearings
and
Zephyr Rated*
*motion in 3 mph breeze
see entries for 08/090/07 and 08/08/07 for plans and crankshaft assembly
 
Check my Youtube site tomorrow for Whirligig #39 in action
Posted by Chuck in 04:22:36 | Permalink | No Comments »

Sunday, September 2, 2007

Figure Drawing

 
 
 
 
Untitled Drawing, 24″ x 18″ (61cm x 46cm), black pastel on paper
 
 
This is a quick drawing of the model stretching between poses at last Friday’s session.
Posted by Chuck in 19:50:54 | Permalink | No Comments »