Pre-Pandemic: Elite Animation Academy

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This sketch is a flash back to teaching Urban Sketching in the classroom at Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32835). In the background you can see the students behind the computers learning the digital software.

My students are in the foreground sketching the classroom setting. This was sketched during the summer camps in 2019. Back then we could sit shoulder to shoulder sketching away.

Since the pandemic began, classes have been virtual and I actually love teaching online. I am able to share my drawing program on Zoom and then the students can follow along. I just finished teaching Foundation Drawing, Character Design, Animation, Drawing People Places and Things and a Portfolio Review class.  I have been getting some amazingly talented students online and they get some very specific one on one instruction thanks to this new means of sharing ideas and information.  The virtual Winter Courses are beginning January 16, 2021 through March 27, 2021.

Yesterday This Was Home: Learning to Walk

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The first scene opens with a close up on the Christmas star in Downtown Orlando. I created the sketch and painting in Procreate. The great this about that program is that you can play back a movie which shows every stroke creating a time lapse replay of the painting as it was created. I tool that movie and panned town to the street level. The sketch is created as the camera move happens and when I got to the street I lap dissolved to the final painting to save some time. A young boy walks across the street with a suit case in hand.

I fully animated this scene to test out thee program I plan to use to do all the animation for the project. The program is called Callipeg and it was designed to be used on the iPad. The program is surprisingly intuitive if you have animated with paper and pencil before. That reminds me, I am writing this entry because my Apple Pencil has run out of battery life and I am waiting for it to recharge. A good old wood and graphite pencil never needs to be recharged and sharpening it takes just a second if yo have an electric sharpener.

I animated my character taking four strides across the street and the scene required 97 drawings. I am learning by trial and error discovering ways to save time each time I animate a scene. Since I decided to keep the head and torso still, I could cut and past those elements from drawing to drawing and just animate the legs and arms. Having him carry a suit case had the added advantage of fewer arm swings to animate. I  used the standard timing I teach most students at Elite Animation Academy. Each stride takes about one second or 24 drawings to animate. I am experimenting quite a bit with timing to see when I can get away with animating on twos and fours when possible. That means each drawing is held for two or four frames of film. It can save on the amount of drawings that need to be done.

In traditional animation you flip the drawings as they are created to watch the motion as you work. In Callipeg, three fingers scrolling up and down the screen accomplish the same effect. For some reason my pencil turns into an eraser unexpectedly while I animate so I have to be very careful with how I touch the screen. Just selecting multiple frames in the timeline was a challenge. You have to touch and tap twice very fast and drag to make the selection. I had to practice most of an evening because the selection would just move the frame I tapped on.  So much of my time is being spent training myself on developing just the right touch so the computer knows what I want.

This scene is part of a short being show at the Orange County Regional History Center for their exhibit on the 1920 Ocoee Massacre. The exhibit is titled, Yesterday This Was Home. This special exhibition is on display October 3, 2020 – February 14, 2021.  The 1920 Ocoee Massacre in Orange County, Florida, remains the largest incident of voting-day violence in United States history

First Day of Summer Camps Elite

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The first day of Elite Animation Academy summer camps began on Monday June 22, 2020. I had three students for a class that focuses on drawing people places and things. It is essentially an Urban Sketching Class with the glitch that I can not, in good conscience, take students out on locations like restaurants to sketch. I brought a six foot stick with me to class to keep a visual reminder of what six feet looks like so I could space out the students. I bring that stick everywhere I go now. It makes me feel a but like Moses parting the viral sea.

Two of my students were sisters. Everyone thankfully was wearing masks. I spoke about the pandemic to my students without focusing too much on the statistics and data of the past week.

Florida is quickly becoming the next epicenter for the spread of this virus. Florida was late to shut down and early to re-open. Governor Ron DeSantis ended all restrictions on youth activities across the state, including camps. “At the end of the day, we trust parents to be able to make decisions in conjunction with physicians.” he said. A 17 year old girl is the youngest to die from Covid-19 in Florida so far. Oh, wait, sorry, I got side tracked, I didn’t discuss any of that with my students. I kept that to myself.

I covered the basics of hand washing, social distancing and keeping the masks on. There was hand sanitizer on each table and disinfecting wipes. I advised students to wipe down every pencil or sharpener they used. My students were troopers keeping their masks on at all times. Talking through a mask was a challenge and I realized I couldn’t dash off quick sketch notes to hand off to each student. Each sketch would be contaminated in theory.

There were a few students taking a computer class and several taking a character design class and my three students. I managed to keep my students six feet apart by taking out all the chairs but four and pushing the two tables in the room to opposite walls. I then seated students at opposite ends of the tables. The tables are just short of six feet long. Most of the morning I was concerned with being sure my students were properly spaced and safe. They were troopers keeping their masks on for the whole class. I was wearing the cloth mask Pam created for me which has three layers of fabric. This was the first day I wore the mask all day and I got used to having it on. I find I breath best through my mouth and then exhale through my nose. It is surprising having to think about every breath.

Before lunch I decided to get the students out of the small classroom. It is safer to be outside rather than in enclosed spaces. We walked down to a small lake to draw. I gave then some basic composition tips with a horizon line and basic tips on how to draw trees and then let them go. I scheduled an hour for them to work but they really didn’t have the attention span yet to focus on the endless details that existed at the scene. One student delighted in drawing the ducks and a family that arrived to feed the ducks. She has the passion and it will be a joy to help her see better so she can get more on the page.

The next day the two sisters did not show up for class leaving me with one student. I may have discussed Covid-19 than was needed. So much of my attention was focused on student safety. The older sister would drop her pencil when done with a sketch as if dropping a mic. She had some talent. It is a shame she didn’t push herself. The phone for now is her world. The younger sister sneezed once. Three cheers for her mask, which did it’s job.

It is much easier to maintain six feet distance from one student rather than three.

Virtual Courses and Summer Camps

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I had never used Zoom prior to the pandemic. I now use it every week to teach students traditional foundation drawings skills and animation for Elite Animation Academy. I like the platform because students can watch me draw live in an intimate online setting. I can take a drawing done by each student and then quickly add a few strokes to show them how their sketch might be improved. As students sketch away on assignments I like to sketch them from my end of the virtual classroom. I honestly feel that students get more from me than when I taught them in the classroom setting, pre-pandemic.

In a news conference Thursday June 18, 2020 Governor Ron DeSantis and Commissioner Richard Corcoran announced that they plan to reopen schools for in-person learning in the fall of 2020. DeSantis said, “We are not going to be instituting a lot of rules, or really any rules.”

  • Step 1 – June – open up campuses for youth activities and summer camps.
  • Step 2 – July – expand campus capacities further for summer recovery instruction.
  • Step 3 – August – open up campuses at full capacity for traditional start of the academic year.

According Florida Today, Florida’s surgeon general has acknowledged that a syndrome that attacks children and is associated with Covid-19 has surfaced in Florida, adding yet another critical layer to diagnosing and treating the disease. Emergency Medicine Physician Rajiv Bahl, MD, said that it’s too soon for children to begin playing together and having play dates.

Starting tomorrow, June 21, 2020, I will be teaching summer camps and classes 7 days a week until August 7, 2020. Summer camps will begin Monday June 22, 2020 at Elite Animation Academy and I will be instructing 5 days a week. I don’t know how many students are in the summer camps, but maintaining 6 feet of distance between students might be a challenge.

Today Sunday June 21, 2020 I will begin teaching a course at Crealde. Last week was the first class but I did not have the course on my calendar since I wasn’t given the course schedule, so I missed it. Six students showed up. I felt bad when I got the call and I was still in bed.

One Crealde student received notice that someone that they had been exposed to on June 11th, 2020 just received a Positive Covid-19 result.   Out of an abundance of caution, they were tested June 20, 2020, and will self isolate until results come back on Tuesday June 23, 2020 or Wednesday June 24, 2020.  They withdrew from class. I was asked to let the other five students know why the student left.  This student was with all of the other students for the entire 75 minutes that they waited on Sunday June 14, 2020 when I was at home.   Most students were wearing masks.  This student was wearing a mask.

The person this student was exposed to had no symptoms. People who are asymptomatic can expose others to the virus. They were both wearing masks, exposure was less than a minute together, the doctor says there is a very slim chance the student contracted Covid-19.  I feel like I dodged a bullet for now.
Tomorrow Sunday June 21, 2020 when I go to teach at Crealde I will of course wear a mask, but if any students decide to show up despite the possible Covid-19 exposure, then I will feel the need to get tested as well. I have been locked down for the past 3 months doing a pandemic themed painting every day. It will be a shock to try and return to “life as normal.”
At President Donald Trump‘s poorly attended Tulsa Rally, he said he had told officials in his administration to slow down coronavirus testing because of the rising number of cases in America. He said that the US has now tested some 25 million people. “Here’s the bad part… when you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people; you’re going to find more cases. So I said to my people, slow the testing down please.”
Florida reported another 4,049 coronavirus cases Saturday June 20, 2020, yet another record-shattering increase as the number of infections statewide approaches 94,000. Every day this week has show exponential growth in the spread through the state with a new record set each day. Florida has “all the markings of the next large epicenter of coronavirus transmission,” and risks being the “worst it has ever been,” according to projections from a model by scientists at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania.
Working 7 days a week, I will not be able to produce a pandemic themed painting each day. I will have to limp by, doing one or two a week. I am about the enter the Wild West of teaching summer camps and courses in the midst of a pandemic.

Elite Animation Academy Watercolor Class

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At Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32835) I am instructing a watercolor class for the first time. These two sketches of City Arts Orlando (39 S Magnolia Ave, Orlando, FL 32801) were done as a lesson in capturing values. My student was instructed to paint the scene using just one or two colors. We only did a few light pencil strokes to fit the building on the page. I used a dis-guarded pallet and painted on sheets of xerox copier paper. The pallet had multiple colors but I just chose based on what value I wanted on the page. My student had quality watercolor paper to  work on. The basic premise is that any object can be painted with just three values, Dark, medium and then pure white of the page for the light value. Rather than paint the sky, the street or the sunny face of the building, they were left pure white.Towards the end of the session we added a few dark strokes that could be considered line work in the shadows of windows or the shadows of the roof overhangs.

With the first watercolor sketch complete, we then recreated the scene using a full choice of colors. We didn’t spend as much time on this painting but it went faster since we had made so man of the creative value choices in the first painting. One thing that often happens with a beginning watercolor painter is that they will start by painting the lighter areas like the sky first. Once blue paint is applied to the sky however it becomes a dark value. The building is green and again the temptation is to paint the light side of the building green first which negates the sunlight since that face then becomes dark. The goal was to repeat what was done with the one color value study by only painting the shadows and darks. On the first painting I repainted the shadow side of the building multiple times. On the color painting the shadow face of the building only has the first wash over it. Details and successive washed would be added if I had time to keep working on the painting. Another thing that happens with watercolor is that once a wash dries, it lightens up a bit. That is another reason I might hit an area of the sketch with a wash again and again.

A major lesson as well is that the watercolor sketches are not precious. There are things to like and dislike about each. The important thing is to keep dashing of studies like this. Each in turn will be better than the last although it might not feel like it at the time. It is good to be critical of your own work, as ling as it doesn’t keep you from creating more work.

Drink and Draw

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Sarah Jane Rozman hosted a Drink and Draw at The Nook on Robinson (2432 E. Robinson St, Orlando, Florida). I host an Orlando Drink and Draw (ODD) once a month as well so I decided to stop in to see how this Drink and Draw differed. The biggest difference was that a winner got $$$ for their bar tab! The artists in attendance all were given a theme so all the at produced tied together. Finished pieces were taped to the wall. Since I was working on this sketch, I didn’t follow the rules.

The good thing about this venue was that the Drink and Draw directly followed Tasty Tuesday which is a food truck event that happens each Tuesday in the parking lot behind The Nook. This guarantees that Tuesday nights are going to be pretty crowded. I knew Sarah since she used to work at Art Systems in the print department. Unfortunately the color printer seldom worked so I started getting my prints at RT Art instead.

In 2019 I let ODD lapse since Orlando Urban Sketchers were hosting so many successful sketch events. Unfortunately those outing were almost all on days I was teaching art at Elite Animation Academy or Crealde School of Art. I still try and sketch every night so my best chance to meet fellow artists is to start hosing ODD events again once a month.

Urban Sketching at Panera

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At Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL) I have a really talented student who is catching on to my sketch a day mantra quickly. Before class she shows me sketches she had done during the week and at the end of class she asks for home work. That is the kind of dedication that is truly needed to gradually grow as an artist. For the last class I took he out of the classroom and introduced her to the challenges of sketching in an American style cafe like Panera Bread.

My first works of advice wasn’t about techniques, or what tools to use while sketching, but to watch to see how much food and or drink remained on peoples tables. She laughed, but realized why I had mentioned it when the woman she had been sketching got up and left the restaurant. She lucked out however because the woman in red that I had been sketching moved to the empty table once again supplying my student with a model.

I ordered a fountain drink and focused most of my attention on the college students plugged in at the corner table. They surfed the web and maybe did some homework. It is hard to explain the joy and challenges of sketching on location to someone who is just stating out but my student this semester is very much up for the challenge. I also let he know that she should pay attention to the art on the walls and let the work inspire her as she develops her sketch. Proportions, composition and setting the stage were all covered as she progresses quickly in this class outside the classroom. When I get a student like this who is exited to explore the work while sketching I realize that I can really make a difference in another artists life.

Gaining Perspective at Elite Animation Academy

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After teaching students to draw simple shapes like circles and squares for several days to create compositions, the big challenge is to get them to draw three dimensions shapes like a cube. The first lesson many of them can quickly master, which consists of drawing two overlapping squares and adding lines that connect the corners. The real challenge comes when the front face of the cube is not squarely facing the student. In this drawing each face has more of a diamond shape with none of the lines being parallel to the edges of the page. Since mastering this form doesn’t happen immediately for most students I find excuses to come back to drawing this basic building block of a form again and again.

In this class, my students are drawing from historic models of what Orlando looked like hundreds of years ago. Each building is of course a cube shape and the challenge becomes to fit several buildings on the page and then add some detail. Most students can master this sketch after I do a step by step tutorial in which they do drawings of cubes using one point and two point perspective. Sometimes I do these exercises on the white board and other times on my tablet which is hooked up to the large TV screen. Some students do amazing drawings from this session while others still stumble trying to draw the basic form. It is rare that I get to do a drawing of my students at work since they often need notes and advice every few minutes, but this class had some real focus and that is a joy to see.

Elite Animation Academy fall classes are beginning this September 10th. Should you know of a talented middle school or High School student who wants to learn some new creative skills have then contact the Academy. Classes are on Saturdays. I will be teaching a Story boarding class which should help anyone who loves to tell stories.

Sketching at Subways

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This summer I have been teaching at Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32835). One of the classes was sketching on location. My main goal was to get students excited about carrying a sketchbook everywhere they go. Students were in the range of 11 to 15 years in age. The challenge with some of the younger students and even the older students was to get them to look up from their digital devices. It is disheartening to see how disinterested most students are in things other than packaged digital entertainment. My mantra became “You have to look to see.” Most students just sit and watch their hand put lines on a page finishing an abbreviated notion of what was in their head.  My uphill battle was to get them to look up and spend time to look at the world around them.

One student was particularly stubborn in that he would turn his back to the subject I had assigned to sketch, and never look up preferring to reproduce a stiff anime character he had drawn many times before. I had to play the part of the bad cop shouting about the wonder of being fully connected with the world when sketching. It was a battle of wills as I fought for his creative soul. I kept at him all morning and just before lunch he relented and started to look up. When I was maybe 11 years old I knew I had a talent, but felt it was never fully utilized. I knew where this student was coming from and sweet kindness was not the remedy.

After lunch my class went to Subway to sketch. he sat off on his own in the one good spot for getting a view of people ordering sandwiches. I explained that he should draw people as they came in to order sandwiches but he would only have a few minutes before each person walked off with their purchase. He was suddenly excited and fully engaged in the process of drawing from life. He recognized the challenges and excitement of trying to catch a moment in time. From across the room I sketched him as he had this awakening. He created an amazing sketch that afternoon with expressive figures
ordering food. He added astounding detail right down to the hair on
their arms. They were angular and fluid in just the right measure and
for the first time perspective tied the scene together.

The next day he relapsed a bit by again falling back on drawing the stiff Anime figure. After lunch we again went out to a restaurant to draw. Again he stepped up his game and focused for the entire two hours. He was drawing a man a table away as he ate his sandwich. That man became curious about the sketch and asked to see it. He then offered my student a $10 gift card. My student was incredibly thankful and cashed in the card for a soda and sweet treat. On the drive back to the studio he was extremely excited about the prospects of drawing on location. It was a joy to see him ablaze with the desire to sketch.

On the next day he again relapsed into sketching the same stiff Anime figure. Now that the class is over he needs to decide for himself if he wants to be excited about the everyday events that happen around him. He also expressed a desire to be a doctor which is a fine ambition. I left him with a quote from Mary Oliver that I hope he takes to heart…

“Instructions for living life, Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”

8th Annual Night of Fire at Crealde School of Art

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Each year, Crealde School of Art (600 Saint Andrews Blvd Winter Park, FL) opens its campus at night for guests to explore during the Night of Fire. Coming straight from teaching at Elite Animation Academy, I arrived late. I quickly wandered around searching for a subject to sketch. The outdoor kiln was glowing hot. In the courtyard there was a Raku and horse hair firing in progress in a much smaller kiln. Outdoor torch cutting and blacksmith demonstrations were going on, but there was a line to get in, so I skipped those options.

From the small foot bridge, I saw the light and fire painting demonstration on the lake. A small row boat was in the middle of the lake and someone stood and twirled a sparkler. It was quickly released and flew off into the water sizzling out. It wasn’t much of a sight but the point was that people could take open exposures and the light would create a pattern on the final shot.

Cats in the House Band was performing on the back patio. I decided to sketch them. Pam was going to meet me there, so I sent a photo her way via messenger so she knew where to find me. Before I got a line on the sketch the band took a break. Rather than hope they might start playing again, I wandered off again and settled on sketching the fire pit. Some people sat here to eat their Peruvian Food truck fair.

A storyteller sat and told tales around the fire. When Pam arrived she sat close and listened. One story was about a magical blank book that was given to a couple which could be used to record each day’s good memories and bad memories. I assumed the blank book might be a sketchbook. The couple recorded their memories diligently at first but then got lazy and started to skip days. Soon, they were skipping weeks at a time letting memories slip by because to the stress of everyday life. At the end of the year they opened the book and relished in seeing their memories relived. The good memories were vibrant and fresh. They wished they had been better about keeping them alive. The bad memories however slipped away on their own, becoming distant and faint.

The fire snapped and crackled with embers floating up into the night sky. Some people recognized me and we joked as I kept sketching. As I worked to finish, I realized that people had left, and the event was winding down. Pam and the storyteller spoke about how oral histories help to keep stories alive. They exchanged cards. Their core missions seemed much aligned. With the fire embers smoldering we walked out to the parking lot and decided to get some groceries at the Publix supermarket next door.