Kat Johnston

Tag: branch

  • Drip, drip, drop.

    Kat Johnston Sketch: drip, drop, drip, drop, a steady constant stream of dripping and dropping….

    Its been a frantic few days with the final reopening of my Sanu store on the Scribble sim – but how perfect is that name? A sim called Scribble! There is just something deliciously right about a name that fits in with me. Not to mention the fact that it compliments my store so well: most of the sim is in glorious shades of monotone, which tends to lend an incredible amount of vibrancy to my corner of it. What is even better, is that the owner and the other residents of the sim are just fantastic and as quirky as I. I think it is a glorious match. Within the next few days I’ll dig out some piccies from the opening party and get them up for you to see.

    Today’s picture is just a simple one – something I was scribbling as I was sitting in front of the media machine, watching some show or another – I think it was Life, to be honest, but it could well have been something else… I watched quite a range of tv today, alongside playing Professor Layton and the Curious Village on my DS Lite.

    I don’t mind Professor Layton, but I do so wish that they would integrate the puzzles into the story-line a touch more to make them ‘relevant’ rather than simply a string of non-related pieces loosely tied together to form a narrative. I adore a well done puzzle game, but this one… well… I can’t help but get the feeling that it could have been done better, you know? As if it just had so much potential, and it just keeps on falling just short of the mark. That said, it is still fairly entertaining, and I’m still playing despite its flaws. Oh, but give me a Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney any day: best DS game ever.

    That’s all for tonight!

  • The Unwise Owl: Escaped once more to grace my page.

    Kat Johnston Art - A book unwritten remains unread. It takes a pen to paper and a risk of failure to make those words take wing. How's that for a bit of philosophical mumbo-jumbo for you? The unwise owl gets a little sense, perhaps?

    Some may remember a previous post I did a little while back: The Unwise Owl, complete with a little story to tell his tale. A friend of mine liked the image rather much and I needed to draw something more substantial than a two minute sketch last night, so I took pen to paper in one of my sketchbooks; an ‘actual’ sketchbook, mind you, not a spiral-bound cheapie. It comes after this page in the same book, in case you were curious. I decided to give the unwise owl a second chance to redeem himself.

    If you click on the picture for today, it should link to a rather larger picture (800px wide rather than 500) because I just wasn’t happy leaving it so small. Generally it links to a 600px wide picture, so slightly larger, but I love the detailing in this one just so much that I had to share it properly. Lins and I have been talking about Atelodemiourgiopapyrophobia (a fear or phobia of messing up a perfectly nice piece of paper) a fair amount recently, as you can probably tell from my posting, since it has been mentioning it so often. So this seemed appropriate.

    A book unwritten remains unread. An artwork which stays in the imagination is only ever partially realized. It takes writing it down or roughing it out for things to truly take form. I can start drawing what is in my mind, but it isn’t until it gets to paper, canvas or whatever other medium I am using for it to really come to life. We all have a vision of perfection in our minds when it comes to what we do, but when it gets to the point of actually being realized, I think it is possible to stun even ourselves.

    I am with this image: I was a little concerned that I couldn’t do something to accentuate the owl properly whilst merging into another level of delicacy with the branches there, but to me, it works. The little books are flapping and floating, they’ve taken flight around him; perhaps he sits in awe of them. I don’t know why he isn’t flying with them… perhaps he is scared? Perhaps if he leaps from his branch he won’t float, but will fall? Who is to know. Perhaps I will write another ‘Unwise Owl’ story to accompany this picture later.

    I did slip up majorly once, although it probably doesn’t seem major to anyone else but me. As I drew my pen away from the page, I slipped and accidentally drew a line in the bottom right of the page. I turned it into the pen of the artist – what better way to transform those mistakes than to make them a part of the image? That’s all for today, hope you like it!