Kat Johnston

Tag: Sketch-Book

  • Sketch: Ahh, Orientation. What could be more fun?

    Kat Johnston Sketch – look what I drew in the orientation lecture for a biomedical degree? Fun!

    So I had to take my sister into the city yesterday – she is such a smart little cookie she got herself accepted to a Bachelor of Biomedical Science and this is her first time at university! As it so happened, I stuck around to check out the introductory lecture covering a little of the course stuff… mainly to show her where the building is, but hey, I got a free baggie out of it too, and a chuppa chup.

    Because I, for one, don’t actually intend to take a degree in biomedical science (lacking the basic skills in anything remotely biomedical), I spent the lecture doing a few sketches of people around the room in a brand new little sketch-book I grabbed the other day at Ikea. Again, I have to say that these packet of 30c pens have just been far too fun for words… they’ve made me bounce over to a style I usually neglect, generally opting instead for a finer, shaded, measured approach. Having but one tone to offer, these pens are fairly unforgiving in the matter of sketch-marks… its go and be damned if you get it wrong, because there’s naught way to fix it once the stroke is made. Its fun!

    And that, my friends, is my final word for the night. Its time for me to head to my slumber, to dream of pixels and prims and other things that make me go ‘ohhhh, pretty things!’

  • Iz happy bunneh!

    Kat Johnston Sketch – this is a happy happy bunny! I like bunnies that are happy, don’t you?

    Ahhh, no horribly late posting for today! Not incredibly early either, but what can you do? Its a weekend and we rearranged the whole lounge-room. Much more open and airy, thank god. I wasn’t 100% happy with the last set-up, and this one is far better. Well, I tihnk so anyway.

    Right this second, I am sitting back and watching Road Trip on the other computer. Of all the movies in all the world, there are some that I simply must watch at least a few times a year: Road Trip is one. Empire Records would have to be another of them. They’re absolute classics of the greatest type.

    I am a complete sucker for a well done comedy. Throw things like ‘Scary Movie’ and the like out the window though… I want some wit, some class, a few lines that will stay with you til the end of your days or at the very least some intelligence behind some of the humour. That’s not to say that I don’t love the basest type of comedy either, but for a whole movie, it needs a little something extra.

    Its even better for me if a movie has some little bits and pieces which only tend to be seen if you actually look for them. Its something that I’ve liked to do every so often with my paintings in the past: hide a little something in it, so that only those who look at it properly, and take it all in will notice. I like the same things in movies – a bear walking in the background of a big extras scene, or an in-joke if you actually read the text on the side of a book in the bookshelf behind the characters… just little things that speak to a sense of thought and playfulness.

    One that I heard about was a group of artists which collaborated with tv show producers to insert little bits and pieces into their shows… such as a bedspread covered with a graphical pattern of condom wrappers in the background of a teen’s room. It wasn’t so over the top that it was immediately noticeable, but when you looked closer, it became apparent. Little things like that just make my day.

  • My first real sketchbook… done.

    Kat Johnston Sketch: This is one of the pictures from my first fully-completed sketchbook… I’m thrilled.

    This morning I did the final few sketches in what is my first real completed cover to cover (though I do only draw on one side of the paper) sketchbook. Yes – good, bad, inbetween, from rough to refined, it goes from cover to cover with sketches by me and I haven’t torn out one single page. How’s that for progress?

    Its funny, you know… I can’t wait to get into the next one. I have another little sketchbook the same size and make as the first, but with green pages… and I have a green pen… it hasn’t had one thing drawn in it yet and I am itching to go. While I have started in other small sketchbooks like the first, I haven’t yet completed them. One has a focus – I have to come back to it. Another I started to draw in, but it hasn’t taken off yet. This little green one though, it hasn’t been touched, and is therefore just full of ready-to-go potential.

    I’m really happy with the little sketchbook… I have to say, some of the pages are just pure ‘bleh’ but going through it as a whole, it has something special. Perhaps it is just because it reflects the meandering trail of my thoughts – I actually find my flittering thought patterns to be interesting to map throughout it. Cherries here, berries there… a rabbit over here, then another further along… one thing fascinates me, then as quick as its come I am onto something else… though believe me when I say that when one thing is dropped away, another is taken up just as quickly and the first never strays all that far.

    When I get a chance, I am going to go through and scan it for you all, and post it up on Flickr. I really have to through and put up all the images that I have put on this blog there as well, scan in some other things, put up photos of dandelions I promised ages back… I will get around to it, I promise.

    In the meantime, enjoy this one extra page from the little sketchbook… I’m sure there will be many yet to follow.

  • Half way there, don’t look back.

    Half way there… half way through an actual sketchbook… I feel special.

    This is the middle pages of the little sketch-book that I have been posting the most pictures of recently. I’ve made it my goal to get it all full of pretty little pictures, and be happy with it just as it is, as a rather random, odd little assortment of somethings flung together by whatever cogs and wheels happen to turn in my silly little head.

    So! This is the half way point… that funny little section where you can go ‘ok… it’s all downhill from here’ or alteratively ‘oh god, the first half doesn’t look that bad.. I’m nearing the end.. what do I do now if I somehow create something horrid in those last few pages?’

    I’m actually feeling good about it. You see, I haven’t thrown up all the images drawn in the first half of this little sketchbook onto the blog – there are one or two in there I probably wouldn’t even show James unless he pointedly asked to see. But for some reason, I’m ok with it – its just one page, here and there… it’s nothing to be worried about because ‘tadaa!’ you can just turn the page and the one after just has to be that much better to make up for the one before.

    Perhaps on a more positive note, I’m actually starting to see this little sketchbook as a place -just- to draw… for me. Screw everyone else – and don’t take that at offence, I just mean to say that it is for me, not anyone else. Don’t get me wrong, I’d like to be able to show something brilliant and worthy of admiration, but, well, it just isn’t that important for this particular sketchbook. Another, that would not be the case – this, however, is different. Perhaps it is a good thing then that I’ve picked up these little cheapies for sketching in – far less pressure.

    Alrighty, that is me over and done with for the night. Over and out!

  • Wolfie? Gargoyle? I’m not entirely sure…

    I’m not entirely sure what this fella is all about… but I like him anyway!

    Started with the eyes and went from there – what he is, I’m not quite sure. I’m thinking perhaps some wolfie-gargoyle-hybrid-thingie. All in all, I think he’s cute. Look at those little fangs, cute I tells ya!

    I must admit, I am almost sad that I didn’t do another little draggie today, but it was just not in me for some reason. I’m not entirely sure why. Perhaps because the next logical step is to do one with an energy saver globe, and that is going to take slightly more attention than I can spare whilst I am sitting here watching Californication.

    Anyway, its a rather short post today – I still have a little bit of work to get done before I get to bed, sooooo… night all!