Petra's sketchblog

Teasers

2012-02-16T22:49:00.002+01:00

Just to let you know, I haven't stopped drawing of course! I'm busy with all sorts of things, but I just can't show you yet, because it's not ready or not the right time yet!

But I wanted to give you some 'teasers' (since these images are too small and useless to be called sneakpeeks). Keep visiting my blog to get to see the whole illustration, somewhere the coming months. Here you go!

Tips 'n Topics

2012-02-13T21:37:00.000+01:00

Inspired by the online precense of some illustrators, I wanted to start to blog about 'being an illustrator' and how that works. This is because, first, it's something I do want to talk about because, well, I'm an illustrator and I find it interesting to think about. Also because I don't know many people I can talk about it with and I'd love to do that more often. Second because I want to share things I find interesting and useful as a young illustrator that just started.

I thought of starting a new blog, but I know how hard it is to get that audience, which I already do have here on my normal blog (though it's not a big number..). I thought I could maybe start a blog-in-a-blog on a new page, but apparently a new page here on Blogger just means only one posts instead of a new page with a new blog.

So instead I'm going to post these 'Tips 'n Topics' posts under a label, which will hopefully show up as a link on the top of the sidebar. I hope that I can share things and help others with this!

Cards for valentine's day

2012-02-11T11:05:00.003+01:00

Didn't post them here yet, but I made some illustrations for valentine's day cards which you can buy at kaartje2go. Hope you have a lovely day..personally Valentine's day isn't really my thing, but it's a good excuse to get in a romantic mood anyway. Enjoy :)!

Handmade things in my Etsy shop

2012-01-30T08:30:00.000+01:00

A short time ago I decided I wanted to be creative in a wider scheme, meaning I just want to get more crafty. Since last September I'm working in a department store, and, well it's not like it's my "dream" (doing this for the necessary money...until I hopefully can earn enough with illustrating), but you know, it would be fun to have my 'own' shop with things made by myself (just like my parents have here). So I started thinking what I wanted to create and then I just started to do it (how easy it may seem..it took some while). It's not a big start, it's not a lot and it's not exaggerating awesome, but at least it is fun! So take a look at my Etsy store: Paperixels

Star Travellers

2012-01-01T18:18:00.003+01:00

This weeks' topic of Illustration Friday is highlight, I thought of working with light and the sky and then somehow these stars came to my mind. Wouldn't this be an awesome way of travelling?

Let it snow...

2011-12-23T07:35:00.000+01:00

I'll be travelling to the North of the Netherlands tonight and I'll have a week off next week (yay, finally time for drawing!!), hopefully I'll be blogging interesting things in 2012 as well. Happy holidays everyone!

Christmas menu cards to print for free!

2011-12-13T17:16:00.000+01:00

What's better than having a really nice dinner during the Christmas days? And you know what would make it even better... Christmas menu cards of course!

Whenever I used to have that special Christmas dinner at my parents' place, we (my five siblings and me..) wanted to make something really fancy and menu cards were definitely a part of that. Now we're celebrating Christmas day at my boyfriend's mother's place I don't have the chance to make those menus. So that's why I made some for my followers and readers to print for free instead. Enjoy!

My christmas cards designs at kaartje2go

2011-11-24T21:51:00.001+01:00

Exciting news everyone!
Kaartje2go, one of the biggest and best known Dutch greeting cards websites will be selling cards with my illustration/design on them! I know for international readers this might be not that exciting, but I might have something coming up for you guys as well!
In the meantime you can see the new christmas cards I made last month here!
Hopefully lots of people will see and want to send my cards to their friends, family and other beloved people.

For now it's mainly christmas cards but in the future I will certainly upload more designs there. Also a nice fact is that people that are new to Kaartje2go can send their first card for free!

Scary

2011-10-30T13:08:00.002+01:00

Isn't it scary how time goes by so fast?

This illustration was submitted to Illustration Friday

Published in Resource

2011-10-13T20:10:00.000+02:00

Resource is the magazine for students and staff from Wageningen University & Research centre. I made an illustration for an article about crowdsourcing science, or as it is called in English: citizen science.
It was my first time to be published in a magazine together with an article, and yes I'm a bit proud.

My boyfriend who works at the (same) university is unfortunately not at home (he's in Japan for a project meeting) so it will take some time until I'll get my hands on the magazine itself, but I promise I'll take a photo if I'll have a copy.
Until then you can see the article here: http://epub01.publitas.com/wageningen_ur/57/?page=20#/spreadview/20/

Buy my prints at Society6

2011-10-12T09:37:00.003+02:00

I decided to start up a print shop at Society6, since I create some amount of personal work and people might be interested in buying prints. So if you like me work, why not buy a print to hang on your wall?
You can buy them here: http://society6.com/petravb
I'll be updating the shop if I have something new to sell!

Draw/sketch apps for iPad review: Procreate vs. SketchBook Pro

2011-10-03T20:17:00.003+02:00

Since ashort time I’m the proud owner of an iPad 2. Not only my boyfriend (who is anerd and gadget lover) did want one for a long time, I was also (and still am)convincedthat the iPad is a worthy addition to my illustration hardware. I use it fordigital sketching and as a digital mobile portfolio, and ofcourse when you’remainly creating illustrations digitally it comes in handy to have a tool thatshows your art just like you made it. You don’t have to print out things, I caneasily connect it to my computer and update my portfolio folder.

The sketchingpart is however even more interesting, because the iPad is a fine piece oftechnology on which you can run applications that are as good as on your normaldesktop computer.

My iPad iseven bigger than my Wacom drawing tablet! But is it as good as a normalsketchbook?

Let’s see!

After doingsome research I discovered there were many apps for the iPad in which you candraw and paint. I also bought myself a stylus (from Boxwave), because drawing withyour fingers is quite awful and totally not natural to me. There are however two apps that both were rated very well:

SketchbBook Pro (link) and Procreate (link), both cost € 3,99 .

Now, these apps are pretty different but you can do the same things with them: sketch, paint or draw with different brushes, use different layers (and blending modes) and the option to undo/redo.

Just like drawing in Photoshop or Painttool SAI, though it's a stripped down version.

About SketchBook Pro

Sketchbook Pro was made by the famous Autodesk, a company who create several designing programs/applications for the computer, like 3DS Max (which I know nothing about, I tried it out once but looked really too complicated..). So many people would probably buy this because of the reliable background of its maker.

Well, they keep true to their name, the application looks professional and gives you a LOT of options. To give you an idea: you'll have 48 standard brushes, 8 slots for custom often-used brushes, many more slots to keep your other custom brushes save, 4 drawing modes (straight lines, circles, square or freehand), 30 colourpalette-places, 4 blending modes, 10 levels of undo/redo and 6 layers.

Yes, you can make custom brushes just like in Photoshop or Painter, you can adjust opacity and radius (size of the brush) and set both of those values minimum and maximum, you can change spacing, rotation angle and jitter and the squish effect.

For choosing color you have multiple options: a colourpallete in the standard menu in which you can save the colors you often use or within the brush options you'll have the well known color wheel or a more simple palette with 30 standard colors.

On top of this Sketchbook Pro offers some more options: putting text into the image or drawing in mirror mode (which is cool for getting symmetry). And for the eraser: you can also change those properties.

If you are a person who likes to spend time on making the perfect brush for your drawing, then this is exactly what you want. They even offer more brushes on their website if you are in need and if you want to you can import a new layer from the photo folder.

But honestly, for me it is too much. I like simple applications I guess, I also like simple interfaces.

Things that really bothered me are the little dot that shows you if you're using/drawing it in landscape or portrait mode. First: what does it matter? I can obviously see that from my drawing. And second: the dot that shows it really bothers my when I work, because it looks just like I made a little circle myself and when I used SketchBook Pro for the first time I tried to erase the dot away. As far as I know there is no option to get rid of it.

The second thing that bothers me is the way they use shortcuts. You have to use THREE fingers, to show the menu. And three fingers-swipe to redo or undo. I understand that one finger you can draw with, and two fingers you can zoom with, but three fingers-menu isn't really the logical next step in my opinion.

You can choose to 'always show' the toolbar, but for the rest: it's really clumsy. You can't draw and use three fingers at the same time you know. I'd always have to stop, then use my fingers, then start again.

To me, that's what makes the usability quite bad.

The results however, the painting itself, look pretty good. I haven't been able to make something good enough to show it though.

About Procreate

Procreate was exclusively made for the iPad and it uses the Silica painting engine. It's interface consists of 9 'buttons' and 2 slides for size and opacity.

It comes with 13 standard brushes which you can see/choose by a flow image instead of the image of what the brush would look like in real life (no pencil points..), you can scroll through the brushes easily and ofcourse you can also create a new one and even import a grain and adjust is to make a new brush.
There are some standard brushes which I really like because they give more of a real painting effect!

Next to the brush button there is the smudge button. Smudging your drawing makes it look painted, because you can blend colors and make it a bit more raw instead of flat and boring ;). To me the smudge/blend brush is really cool

Procreate gives you more blending modes (normal, multiply, screen, add, lighten, exclusion)

It also gives you a colorpalette, a colorpicker (hold the brush still on the screen as a shortcut) and not a wheel but a colorsquare.

The thing I like about Procreate is its intuitive interface and usability. I can undo/redo and change opacity or size with my left hand while I draw with my right hand. I like how easy it is, uncomplicated so I can spend my time on the drawing itself instead of not knowing what brush to choose. I wouldn't call that unprofessional because the options are all there, they are just not all at the surface, but deeper. And since I don't use all those options all the time it is better that way.

About both and the conclusion

Both apps can export the images in .psd png or jpeg file. What I miss though is the option to have a folder within the photo section of the iPad where I can see the drawings and sketches. I can't upload a sketch directly to the internet. What I do know is send it to my e-mail and then download it to the photo section so I can upload it. But maybe that's just a problem of the iPad.

Another problem I had was difference in colour, but that also might have to do with my desktop monitor.

Something that absolutely isn't there is pressure-sensitivity. But I don't really miss it to be honest, I correct edges anyway, so it still can give me that sharp look.

Both apps give fine result, but until now I can't really use it for professional illustrations. The resolution is too low, I can't merge layers (or I don't know how to..), I can't change the hue/saturation/brightness/contrast and the surface is just a bit too small. I don't like zooming in the whole time. BUT I have to consider the fact that I'm still a starter with drawing on the iPad, who knows I might get used to it and make some really good things. I have done some things that I thought of: wow, this is a nice result that I couldn't create that easy on my normal computer.

The iPad proved to be a fine tool to digitally sketch on and I know I am one of those many artist/illustrators who have sometimes better sketches than finished works. I think the iPad is being a bridge between those two: make my sketches better and rendering them directly instead of working on a scanned sketch. At least for a part. (Here are some examples of drawings made on the iPad, not all by these two apps though).
There is a big chance I might use it in the future to make a sketch for a client directly on screen while the client watches, you know. And it might look better than something on paper, because I can add instant color or texture, and that's great!

Featured!

2011-09-19T09:20:00.004+02:00

Hi there!

Last month I sent some illustrations to the magazine Advanced Photoshop (Dutch version), they were quite enthusiastic about it and wanted to feature me in their 'readers featured' section. With a whole spread!
Ofcourse I was superhappy with it, and now the magazine is out and you can buy it!
The featured work is one of the illustrations I made for the first internship project.

Advanced Photoshop has a new look from this issue on. You can also buy it online, here.

Piglets on a journey

2011-09-03T16:07:00.002+02:00

I was asked to make illustrations for a children's book which will be published privately in the UK.

This is my first real children's book I worked on and though the budget was small this was a fun job to do! I won't spoil it too much, but it should be available from November on. I'll keep you posted!

To be honest, I think I still have to improve a lot because I seem to use a lot of 'static' perspective and I want to try to make more interesting illustrations to look at. This also isn't really 'my' style, since I usually use more painterly like strokes and such, but I had fun using textures and playing around with the colors.

Sleeping Squirrel

2011-08-30T18:01:00.000+02:00

September is the month when autumn starts again. I really love autumn, it's my favourite season! Sure you have those cold and rainy days but whenever I see those colourful leaves again, I get this warm feeling. I hope to share that feeling with this illustration, wishing you all a great season!

Birth announcement card

2011-08-19T18:45:00.005+02:00

A couple of months ago I was asked to make an illustration for a birth announcement card.
I thought it was really cool because they wanted to name the babyboy after Jason from Jason and the Argonauts, but with a Dutch 'twist': and extra a in between.
Anyway, they asked for a scene where a boyish child version of Jason would be fighting the dragon to get the golden fleece. The dragon is actually more of a big snake (or serpent?) in the original story. I put his ship, the Argo, in the background too and I honestly like that part of the illustration a lot, but I guess I have a weakness for landscapes of any kind.

Anyway, I was really happy to see the card in our mailbox today. Though the printed illustration is (unfortunately) more saturated than the original, it still looks great I think. I also don't see many people printing a special design instead of something standard from a press/printing company and I really enjoyed to do this and was glad to create something special for them!

This is the result:

Ice adventures!

2011-08-10T09:39:00.000+02:00

Since I had no internet I had some time to experiment with stuff. Like working with oil pastels again!

Some things

2011-07-24T22:03:00.001+02:00

First our 'moving' card:

I will move in a new house, together with my boyfriend, somewhere in a town near the veluwe, Ede and Wageningen, which is somewhere between the big cities Utrecht and Arnhem. I'm so excited and can't wait to live in our new home!

And I doodled this tonight with the crayon tool in Paint tool SAI:

And another sketchy-thing in Corel Painter 12. Hmmm I like painter for their paint, but I think there are actually too much brushes to choose from (I'm not good at making choices :P ) maybe have to figure it out this summer. Or at least it is supposed to be summer. all rain and wind over here, seems autumn really.

Graduation

2011-07-12T10:10:00.002+02:00

I'm a Bachelor of Design now :D ! Last weeks were stressfull but it paid off and I graduated.
Here some pictures of the graduation and the exam show:

And this is a photo from today's newspaper, with me and my mom's arm in it. Unfortunately not next to my own work, but oh well. The caption says that the show is already well visited and popular this year, probably because of the 'new' location (which is the old Groninger museum / nature museum. (the photo of the newspaper was made by my classmate Rommie)

After graduation I will work as an illustrator and I'm looking forward to it, but I probably won't have that much jobs to work fulltime on it and will need to find a parttime job beside it.
But first I'll move to a new house, together with my boyfriend. And I already have three illustration jobs for this summer so after the exam show I'm busy with drawing, yay!

Animalistic

2011-06-12T13:29:00.000+02:00

At the moment I'm still busy with the last things for my exam which I have gotten the 'green light' for so I'm definitely going to take the exam and I'll be graduating in 4 weeks.
The exam exhibition is from 9-14 july at the new department of the academy at Praediniussingel 59, Groningen. Feel free to visit, I'll probably be around the whole week :)!

But yesterday I got a new illustration job, again for making some drawings of animals doing things in several ways. It's for a research of the linguistic department of the university of Groningen, together with Jacolien van Rij and Prof. Petra Hendriks (of Semantics and Cognition).
These illustrations are fun to do even when it's not something commercial. Especially when you don't know the sentences that belong to it (these illustrations are presented to children with these sentences that tell what is happening in the drawing).
Here are some examples:

© Petra van Berkum

Sketchy day

2011-05-04T23:11:00.007+02:00

Today I felt like sketching. I don't know, maybe it's tension because of my grandpa's funeral, or the commemorating event. Certainly I'm tensed and stressed because of exams..haven't heard from my supervisors in some time and have a presentation coming up next week. Guess that everything is allright though, I'm always worrying too much. Well, drawing helps :). Sorry for the bad quality, only have a camera atm...and remember, they're just some sketches.

Lately...

2011-04-28T20:19:00.005+02:00

...I've been drawing a lot I think. I don't know why, maybe it's because I'm so busy with exams all day long that I get cravings for drawing in the evening or in the weekend...
For people that missed it (I already posted them on DeviantArt or Twitter..):

About PaintTool SAI

2011-04-24T16:08:00.005+02:00

I wanted to write for a while about my favourite drawing application. It's Easy PaintTool SAI!
Originally it's a Japanese developed program by Systemax which is translated to English for a reason. It is very easy to use but it can do very awesome things. It doesn't have all the function of Photoshop or Painter, but it has almost all the tools I need. It's like Photoshop 'light'.

Some awesome functions:
- Different kinds of brushes. They look very paint-like, even more than Painter or Photoshop do if you ask me. You can adjust the amount of blending, dilution, persistance and ofcourse density/opacity. But next to it you can also adjust the shape of the brush and the texture of it. change it ALL at the same time.
- You can adjust the softness of the brush very easily, you don't need to make a new brush or use 'airbrush' for it, you can use it for almost EVERY brush. This tool makes it easy to create realistic images because normally the softness of lines differ a lot. There's no need to save it because it uses your last used adjustments. But you can still save your brushes too.
- You can rotate your drawings very easy with a click-and-drag system. Not only by inputting a number of grade or a button. And can also switch back to normal mode with one click! AND there is a mirror function in one click.
- There exists a function to stabilize your lines to a very high level. It is similar to the one in Flash, but there are more levels to choose from, so you have more freedom. It gives you the possibility to make very smooth lines.
- Interface: gives you ofcourse the possibility to switch functions.
I use the colorwheel and HSV (hue saturation value) slide, but there are also the Swatches, scratchpad,RGB slider and colormixer option.
- History goes back like forever, I don't have to be afraid I can't undo something anymore. The shortcuts for it are very easy too, and you can change them anytime.
-Copy from clipboard function, opens your printscreened picture in one click.

Besides that there are the normal functions like layers, pen-tool, blending modes, hue/saturation/brightness/contrast modes, transform, and others. Also can save it as sai/psd/jpeg/png/bmp and such.
Things it doesn't have: more blending modes, effects and filters Photoshop has.
But it's all packaged in LESS than 5 MB and it costs only 45 Euro's.
Unbelievable huh!?

That's why it's my favourite tool. Want to try it? GO HERE and download a trial. You can buy it here.

Cute creepy crawlers

2011-04-11T19:47:00.010+02:00

For my second exam project I wanted to do something fun but I know this is not something of high intelligence or anything. I want(ed) to make creepy insects, spiders and other little creatures look cute. This is probably done a thousand times (although most of the images I can find are only bees or ladybugs) but I don't really care. I like them cute and it's fascinating how people respond to it.
What I exactly am going to do is yet undecided, but I've tried some things.

I've drawn several of these, small on A3 paper and wanted to try to put some happy-color in it :)

And then my main supervising teacher said: why not try to make a bigger version of that paper, with some hundred of these little guys. And thus I bought this big paper this morning and pinned it to my wall. Don't know what the landlord thinks of it but those are just simple pins. I hope you don't see them after removing it. Or else I will hang some new paper over it when I leave here.

These are some photos of the sketches on that paper. I captured a video with my webcam while working on it, hopefully going to be a cool progress-movie afterwards.

And maybe I can make some plush or cute much-bigger-than-life versions of it. Or maybe a flash game of some sorts? Or maybe a 3D landscape to play around with.
Artistic? I don't know. But since this is my second project (why do we have to have two exam projects anyway??) I think I can pull this off :P.
(and yes this reminds you of pokemon with a reason ;) )

EDIT: here's the video of the sketching the big poster thing.

Exam project sketches

2011-03-21T08:38:00.006+01:00

I'm busy with my exam project this last semester.
It's pretty hard, even if we have a lot of time.
It might just be because we have so much time...for research. It never seems to end.
My supervisors recommended to try think visually, and try drawing out ideas.

What I want to do is illustrate (in whatever medium, might even be animation) the life of the universe, from the very beginning to the very end (well for as far as we know it will happen). I thought of ways how to visualize that. One of the reasons that I'm interested in doing this is because I think there is a gap between science and art, not talking medium wise but in the visual department. I mean, look at illustrations about the Big Bang, it's all pretty..boring. It has not much of a feeling/emotion to it, while I think the subject itself is very interesting and beautiful and does emote me. It's because it is made for and by science. But science is not boring, so why would they create boring illustrations?
That's why I want to make something that has a scientific background but has an artistic approach and gets people wondering about it.

Last week I thought of putting the universe in the form of a person or creature, something that looks human and has a birth and a death. Here are the sketches I made while I was thinking of this.

My supervisors were pretty much approving of it and that made me happy, so I'm making an extended but more schematic storyboard. I have the idea to make an animation, that would be cool, but of course I have to be open for other mediums too, since I don't have to decide it for now.

I have to keep an eye on that I try to make the story of our universe look a bit more exciting. But the universe and science give us a lot of material, I mean...the big bang, the creation of the elements, the birth of stars, the birth of our solar system, gravity, black holes and some possible dramatic endings :). I can't wait to make something awesome!

Week 8 & 9

2011-03-07T13:22:00.009+01:00

Sketches from last weeks

Discoland

2011-02-21T16:25:00.003+01:00

I've been experimenting a bit with oil pastels. I really like the bright colors, but I still need a lot of practicing ^^;.

week six

2011-02-13T11:11:00.002+01:00

some sketches from last week

Graphite pencil

2011-02-05T12:44:00.003+01:00

I know this doesn't look like I made it, but it was just a tryout with a woodless graphite pencil ('grafietstift') on heavy (colored) paper. Hmm, not talking about the actual scene or composition, but I like the vague, dark and old feeling it gives, although it doesn't really feel like me. Next time I should try drawing something else, with bigger shapes.

Small

2011-02-02T11:44:00.005+01:00

Suddenly I had this idea of making paintings about how small we humans actually are in the world. Maybe going to use it for an idea for graduation project.

Ah just remembered that spheric perspective goes the other way >_<;

new sketchbook

2011-02-01T16:33:00.005+01:00

I bought a new sketchbook at the Tiger store in Arnhem last week and tried it out with my aquarelpencils today.

Internship report

2011-02-01T10:36:00.004+01:00

I finished my internship a week ago and had to make a report of it for school.
I made some illustrations for it:

Internship ended up being pretty useful, I learned a lot!
At the moment I'm very excited to begin the last semester, my graduation project..we have seminars this thursday to create some useful ideas. Yup. I feel a bit weird doing the graduation project already, it all goes really fast.

Glowing

2011-01-11T12:52:00.002+01:00

Shadow story

2011-01-10T17:48:00.009+01:00

To honor the purpose of this blog, here are some more sketches!
I'm busy with my last project for the internship with Coen Hamelink.
I wanted to do a comic, but it ended up being a sequence, maybe for a picture-book or something alike. The technique I will use is probably a simple one. Simple pencilwork fits here I think :)

I'm still not sure about the 'story' part though. I'm not good at making up stories and the thought of a shadow coming alive as a friend..it appeals to me, but working out the story doesn't really help being that mysterious I want it to be. I think stories have to be very strong if you want it to speak through an image-sequence without words.

From left to right.

here's a finished product. It was my first time really making something with charcoal.

boekieboekie submission

2011-01-06T14:21:00.005+01:00

This was my submission to the Boekie Boekie contest for students illustration or debutating illustrators. I think I'm going to join the contest next year too, it was fun, allthough I didn't win :).
(anyway, I hope I can put this here without consequences, since the poets are in it too..)

free-time-sketches

2010-12-21T10:24:00.003+01:00

and a little speedpaint from last week: http://twitgoo.com/1rvpte
Hahaha, I missed a bit of the manga-ish stuff ^^

Educational illustrations for internship

2010-12-17T17:29:00.003+01:00

Heya, here finally some illustrations I made the last weeks. Since I'm not at home I can't show everything cool but that's something for later!

I'm a bit proud of how I grew into the style I chose, since the the first intern-project was a bit of a chaos stylewise. It was also pretty cool to do, but as usual I still have a lot to learn ;).

Wish everyone happy holidays anyway!

Cala

2010-12-11T14:13:00.002+01:00

I missed 'normal' digital painting I guess. Without thinking of what is required..

Shiny

2010-12-03T12:16:00.002+01:00

This week is the lustrum of my student society and yesterday was a party I organized with the theme 'bubbles'. So I tried to find transparent plastic balls but couldn't find them and then I thought, why not be a little creative and make some myself. I bought polystyrene balls at the hobby-store and painted them and then put some shiny vernish on it. They ended looking really cool!! Maybe it's a great idea to put these in the christmas tree :D

Random drawing

2010-11-22T15:39:00.001+01:00

ok, maybe not so random, since the upper part is what I see now from my window.. .. so cold!

painting with poem

2010-11-19T14:04:00.003+01:00

Yesterday I was in a writing mood..

Weekend doodles

2010-11-08T12:29:00.003+01:00

Minia

2010-10-24T17:16:00.002+02:00

Something to fill up my time with..I found these little post-it-size-papers and made small paintings on them. They ended up quite cute and now they're on the wall next to my mirror.

2010-10-24T14:15:00.002+02:00

Another bunch

2010-10-16T15:58:00.000+02:00

have a bad feeling all my illustrations look like each other because of the main line/direction in it.. :/

some 'finished' stuff

2010-10-08T14:46:00.001+02:00

finished for now that is. Am a bit proud, but also feeling that it has too much weight in it somehow..

Morningface

2010-10-05T21:56:00.000+02:00

last weeks stuff

2010-10-01T20:12:00.001+02:00

more sketches

Sunny fall

2010-09-29T16:45:00.005+02:00

I rediscovered drawing with the mouse in Photoshop. Recently I've downloaded some excellent looking-like-real-paint brushes ( I don't know wherefrom anymore though, I googled them). And they're pretty good.

I made the leaf myself ofcourse. You know, I totally love (cycling in) sunny autumn days. And there are still so many to look forward to!

Internship began

2010-09-17T14:28:00.008+02:00

And I started sketching :)
I'm trying to make a little book with several random questions about life.
It's to point out the importance of questions and to let people imagine things.
But I've just begun so I don't have that much to show you.
And several figure-drawing-exercises..

The latter three are based on these questions:
- what if grass was blue and the sky green
- what if we had eternal life
- what if we could live underwater

2010-08-31T16:50:00.003+02:00

some sketches from last month

DS sketches

2010-08-24T13:44:00.003+02:00

I have an application on my DS so I can draw on it. It's pretty neat because I can actually draw people without them noticing..they think I'm just playing games.
Anyway, I never uploaded them I believe, so here are some old and new DS pics. Yes, they're small , like 5 cm.. it's roughly sketching...

2010-08-19T12:40:00.003+02:00

I can't sketch that much because of stress and a lot of things happening.. I am still busy with the drawing I made earlier though. It goes sloooow, I can't see to find motivation to draw in those little times in between you know. Hope I'll find a bit of peace and balance in the next weeks.

OLD stuff

2010-08-02T09:35:00.008+02:00

My laptop died and I had to recover the data from it. It was an excellent opportunity to recover the data from my old harddisk too. So here are some old things ( I think about 1,5 to two years ago.. not thát old indeed). I remember putting it on the net somewhere earlier, but I don't know where exactly :/

These however are even older

summerstuff

2010-07-16T16:33:00.005+02:00

Some new watercolor sketches

2010-07-05T17:25:00.006+02:00

I have to say, I fell in love with watercolor again. It's so happy in colors, yet fragile and sweet in its texture... so I had to try and color some sketches I made when I traveled to the illustrator who will guide my internship.

And this was some crazy sketch :P Yeah I know its head is that of a cow :/

Vague idea sketch..

2010-06-22T11:45:00.000+02:00

stuff from school..

2010-06-16T17:01:00.006+02:00

Just had my exam and got six's (out of 10) just enough to proceed to the next year! Woohoo!
So here are some things I made..

Interview in Dutch

2010-05-31T12:23:00.005+02:00

I was interviewed by a middleschool student about being an illustrator.
Funny, because I'm not even a beginner, still a student myself. However, it was fun to do! Unfortunately this is only in Dutch, it costs me too much time to translate everything in English. You can always try to translate this with babelfish or google translate of course! Here it is:

1. Hoe heet u?

Petra van Berkum

2. Wilt u uw hele leven dit beroep gaan volgen?

Ja! Ik denk alleen wel dat ik er soms iets naast zou willen doen, niet alleen omdat je niet altijd opdrachten krijgt, maar ook omdat je als illustrator vaak in je eentje bezig bent, en het is ook leuk om samen met anderen te werken... ik houd mijn opties graag open. Verder wil ik natuurlijk nog veel beter worden en veel opdrachten krijgen.

3. Waar volgt u uw studie?

Ik zit op Academie Minerva, dit is (uiteraard) een kunstacademie. Ik volg daar de opleiding communicatie/vormgeving met afstudeerrichting Illustratie

4. Wanneer besefte u dat u illustrator wilde worden?

Ik heb altijd al plezier met tekenen gehad, maar kon het niet altijd zo bijzonder goed. Sinds mijn 14e ben ik geinteresseerd geraakt in anime (japanse tekenfilms). Ik vond dat er zó leuk uit zien en wou dat ik zelf ook zo kon tekenen. Vanaf toen ben ik veel vaker gaan tekenen, dingen natekenen is een goede manier om vormen en kleuren te leren. Op de middelbare school heb ik in mijn vrije ruimte ook tekenen als vak erbij gehad. Ik kreeg goede cijfers en toen ben ik gaan nadenken om er misschien wel mijn werk van te maken later.

5. Hoeveel denkt u ongeveer per maand te gaan verdienen?

Moeilijke vraag. Ik kan niet zo'n goede inschatting hierin geven omdat dit onder illustratoren soms nogal geheimzinnig is. De ene vraagt veel, de ander weinig en bovendien hangt het af van je opdrachten. Ik denk dat ik al tevreden mag zijn als ik bijvoorbeeld 1500 in de maand zou verdienen. Dit klinkt misschien veel, maar is eigenlijk heel weinig in vergelijking met andere beroepen. Als kunstenaar verdien je gewoon minder, maar je hebt wel een ontzettend gaaf beroep. Een leuke link: http://www.ooglijm.nl/verslag/de-illustrator-in-europa-wie-is-dat hierin staat dat in Nederland 41 % van de illustratoren meer dan 24.000 per jaar verdient (2000 per maand). Dat zou ik natuurlijk ook graag willen, maar daar moet je hard voor werken!

6. Kunt u van uw werk als illustrator leven of gaat u er nog een ander baantje bij nemen?

In het begin is het moeilijk om van je illustratie-inkomsten te leven omdat je je dan eerst op de markt bekend moet maken voordat je opdrachten binnensleept. Daarom hoor je best vaak dat mensen een baantje erbij nemen. Ik ben nog student en heb eigenlijk nog nauwelijks opdrachten, omdat je je nog niet als professioneel illustrator kan presenteren aan uitgeverijen e.d. De eerste jaren kan je echter ook als kunstenaar een subsidie krijgen zodat je nog wel normaal kan leven én werken. Je moet wel verplicht opdrachten naast deze subsidie doen om zelf ook geld binnen te krijgen, wat wel een goede regeling/oefening is.

7. Is het mogelijk om meerdere opdrachten van eenzelfde bedrijf/persoon te krijgen?

Dat denk ik wel, alhoewel de kans klein is dat je ze tegelijkertijd krijgt. Vaak is het zo dat als ze tevreden zijn over een eerste opdracht ze je graag nog een andere keer vragen als ze een illustrator nodig hebben, omdat ze weten dat je het kan en ze van goede samenwerking houden.

8. Waar haalt u uw inspiratie vandaan?

Natuur en eigen ervaring. Ik denk dat als je veel doet in je leven je daar al inspiratie uit kan putten. Niks doen op je kamertje, daar leer je weinig van.
De natuur, dat heeft mij eigenlijk altijd al geboeid. Ik ben opgegroeid op het platte land in Drenthe, zat daar tussen bossen, heide en meertjes en ik heb daar altijd al veel van genoten en ben veel er op uit gegaan om dingen te ervaren/beleven. Daarnaast vind ik het ook leuk om mijn fantasie de vrije loop te laten gaan, daarom houdt ik ook veel van fantasy-verhalen en mythologie/legendes/sprookjes en die inspireren mij ook. Als laatste kan ik uiteraard anime weer noemen. De schattigheid en expressie van Japanse tekenfilms en strips spreekt me erg aan.

9. Hoe bereikt u het beste uw klanten?

Naast brieven/e-mails sturen en bellen werkt mond-tot-mond reclame wel het beste. Je kan vooral nieuwe klanten kan bereiken door voor jezelf reclame te maken, ook dingen voor jezelf te tekenen, op internet overal je werk laten zien en ook persoonlijk tegen echt iedereen enthousiast vertellen over je werk helpt. Dat is allemaal een vorm van netwerken. Bij netwerken denk je vaak al aan saaie verplichte gesprekken op borrels o.i.d., maar het kan ook al heel dichtbij: een feestje van vrienden of familie bijvoorbeeld. Zelf ben ik vooral op internet actief, omdat ik een beetje een computer-nerd ben is dat voor mij het makkelijkst.

10. Wat voor dingen illustreert u vooral? (boeken, cd-hoesjes, kaartjes, advertising etc?)

Hier kan ik je helaas niet mee helpen, aangezien ik nog weinig opdrachten heb gehad. Tot nu toe heb ik een gedicht geïllustreerd, wat kaartjes getekend en posters gemaakt voor de verenigingen waar ik bij zit. Het liefst zou ik iets met boeken illustreren doen. Of games, dat lijkt me ook nog heel erg leuk om voor te tekenen!

11. Gebruikt u traditionele of digitale middelen voor uw werk, of allebei? (computer programma's zoals photoshop?)

Ik heb eigenlijk een heleboel uitgeprobeerd, dat leer je ook op de kunstacademie: gewoon van alles doen en kijken wat bij je past. Maar voor die tijd had ik al een voorkeur voor digitaal tekenen. Tegenwoordig schets ik nog gewoon op papier met potlood, scan ik het in en werk het dan uit met een tablet en een tekenprogramma wat lijkt op Photoshop.
Waarom ik digitaal werk is omdat ik vind dat je er veel meer mee kan. Je kan makkelijk iets ongedaan maken of de kleuren aanpassen. M'n leraren hebben misschien een hekel aan het feit dat je kan zien dat het op de computer gemaakt hebt, maar dat heb je met verf ook, dan zie je toch ook de verfstreken? Waarom zou het één beter zijn dan de ander? Bovendien zijn digitale dingen populair, alles gaat steeds meer via de computer, denk maar aan de Iphone en de Ipad, wie weet lezen we later alles op een computerscherm, ik zie er dus wel een toekomst in.

12. Houd u zich volledig aan de wensen van de klant of geeft u ook weleens een eigen draai aan iets?

Ik ben iemand die graag wat meer vrij werkt, dan dat ik me precies houdt aan allerlei eisen. In mijn opdrachten is het tot nu toe is het een beetje half half geweest, wat denk ik wel het fijnst is, want dan ben je zelf en de klant tevreden. Je eigen draai aan iets geven is eigenlijk ook iets wat bij een illustrator zijn hoort, aangezien je toch iets van je eigen stijl moet gebruiken. Bovendien als je iets bijzonders/positiefs maakt wat de opdrachtgever niet verwachtte, dan krijg je altijd blije reacties terug en dat is altijd leuk.

13. Heeft u weleens iets overnieuw moeten tekenen omdat de klant niet tevreden was?

Het is vrij normaal dat je een paar dingen moet verbeteren geloof ik, soms vergeet je gewoon dingen of is er iets wat de klant net wat anders wilt. Je moet goed leren communiceren om te weten te komen wat de klant nou precies wilt, ook dat is een kunst ;)

15. Wat is voor u het makkelijkste middel om met klanten te communiceren?
(bijvoorbeeld e-mail om plaatjes door te sturen, afspraken maken, telefoneren.. etc)

E-mailen is voor mij het makkelijkste middel, omdat je iets direct kan versturen en snel kan communiceren, maar ik moet zeggen dat het ook beperkingen heeft, sommige dingen kun je gewoon niet zo makkelijk vertellen via de computer en dan zit je liever in een stoel tegenover diegene, dat komt meestal vriendelijker over en bovendien weet je dan met wie je te doen hebt.

16. Betalen uw klanten u via internet met een creditcard, of komen ze bij u langs om contant te betalen?

geen van beide, meestal is het overschrijving met een normale bankkaart, of dat online is of niet zou ik niet weten. Wel sta ik open om via Paypal betaald te worden, daar betaal ik zelf ook heel makkelijk mee, het is goed beveiligd en internationaal erkend, zo kan ik ook opdrachten krijgen uit andere landen.

17. Heeft u ooit een prijs gewonnen voor uw illustratief werk? (zoals de Max Velthuijs-prijs?)

Nee, daar ben ik natuurlijk veel te jong en onervaren voor, daar moet je echt heel veel voor gedaan hebben of heel goed voor zijn.

18. Bent u tevreden met uw werk/studie?

Tsja, ik moet eerlijk zijn: eigenlijk niet. Ik merk dat ik, omdat ik veel op de computer en niet-traditioneel werk, niet heel erg gewaardeerd word op mijn school. Misschien ben je dan wel innoverend bezig, maar hoge cijfers en waardering geeft het niet echt. Als leraar op een kunstacademie is het soms ook moeilijk beoordelen, omdat iedereen een andere stijl heeft en je zelf ook voorkeuren hebt. Wat ik de laatste tijd vooral merk is dat de kunstacademie een wereldje opzich is, daar buiten ervaren mensen je werk toch heel anders. Aangezien je maar vier jaar bezig bent op de academie, ga ik mezelf liever richten op de lange termijn en doen waar ik zelf het beste gevoel bij heb i.p.v wat mijn leraren zeggen. Wat dat betreft ben ik gewoon eigenwijs, maar ik doe tenminste wat ik wil en geef dat niet op. Aan de andere kant: zonder de school was ik nooit geworden zoals ik nu was, dus ik ben er wel enigszins dankbaar voor.

19. Is er ooit iets mis gegaan in uw werk of bij uw stage? (zoals: klant wou niet betalen..?)

Nou, ik heb een tijdje geleden gehad dat een bedrijf er mee instemde dat ik voor een bepaald bedrag tekeningen zou maken. Ik ging toen dus aan de slag met schetsen, met het idee dat ik er geld mee zou verdienen. Achteraf vonden ze de prijs toch te hoog. Ik snapte niet helemaal waarom, maar dat kwam omdat dit de eerste keer was dat ze een illustrator inhuurden. De prijzen voor een illustratie lijken hoog, maar dat komt omdat we met minder opdrachten toch moeten kunnen leven. Ook schatten mensen vaak hoe lang je er mee bezig bent verkeerd in. Illustratie is meer dan zomaar tekenen, je moet nadenken over hoe je het beste een boodschap over kan brengen d.m.v. beeld., dat is dus meer dan zomaar even wat krabbelen.
Ik heb toen bedankt voor die opdracht, gezegd hoe ze het de volgende keer beter kon aanpakken. Maar daarnaast heb ik er ook veel van geleerd, bijvoorbeeld dat je beter meteen een contract op kan stellen zodat je weet dat ze zich ook echt aan de prijs houden.

20. Heeft u nog tips voor (andere) beginnende illustratoren?

Omdat ik zelf nog een beginnende illustrator ben weet ik niet precies of ik wel relevante dingen kan vertellen. Ik denk dat wat ik ga zeggen voor studenten van meer vakgebieden bruikbaar kan zijn: Je moet goed luisteren naar wat je gevoel je verteld. Dat klinkt misschien raadselachtig,maar kan toch heel praktisch zijn. Veel studenten weten nog niet wat ze willen in hun leven en dat is heel begrijpbaar, je bent nog jong en wil alles uitproberen (ikzelf ook!). Maar toch heb ik het idee dat veel studenten zich zelf tegenhouden, dat ze niet dingen uit mogen proberen vanwege weinig geld en tijd (denk maar aan de discussie van de laatste tijd over de BSA en dat studenten misschien in de toekomst geen beurs meer zouden krijgen). Ik denk dat het proberen van allerlei dingen, het ontdekken van de wereld om je heen, heel belangrijk is om keuzes te maken die dichtbij je staan en dus beter bij je passen. Dat is heel belangrijk, ook voor illustratie studenten. Je gaat namelijk toch keuzes maken, bewust of onbewust, over hoe je werkt qua stijl en dergelijke, en dat is wel bepalend voor de rest van je leven. Haal dus alles uit je studententijd wat er in zit, zodat je aan het eind kan vertellen wie je (dan) bent en wat je wilt.

WiPs

2010-04-21T17:36:00.003+02:00

Illustrations for a story about a guy who is a bit depressed and takes a trip to the sea to breath in some fresh air :) not finished of course..

More sketches from last months and weeks

2010-03-23T13:35:00.008+01:00

Dumperdedump

2010-03-05T16:32:00.010+01:00

I'm busy with schoolassignments. This semester we have a lot of free projects where you can choose the subject yourself. A good thing I guess. For Hans I do a research about the combinations of music and colors. We also need to keep a blog with drawings about special things from our street, you can see it here. For Cyprian I'm going to illustrate a Dutch folklore story, it's about a new death-angel who accidentally kills the person instead of just picking her up. I've made several sketches for this.This is the order in which I made them. Actually I like the storyboard and the last sketches more than the middle colored one. My sketches are most of the time better than the finished product and I really want to try to keep that, but it's difficult. I've got to try more ways to see if I can keep the strength in the finished drawings, I really hope so!

Besides that, here are some other things:

I really look out to spring and summer.. we really had too much snow (even now it's snowing over here..)

All sorts of stuff

2010-01-22T11:29:00.017+01:00

some for school, some for myself..

Trip to London

2009-12-27T18:21:00.014+01:00

YES! I went to London last week!
I really enjoy exploring places I've never been before. And of course London is one of the most well-known and crowded places in the world. Also, my boyfriend is originally from England so I just had to visit it some day.
London was nice! I mean, it was really really crowded and we were quickly tired because of all the walking, but there were so many things to see,I really enjoyed it :) .

First thing that happened was the snow that fell the night before we had to go. Busses didn't drive, but the trains were, so we walked to the central station, where everything went fine.
It was my second time flying so I was a bit nervous. Also when we were almost at Heathrow I accidentally hit Nick in the eye (I just wanted to cuddle him), his lense was also removed.. but we managed to save it after all.

We had a hotel next to a busy (Cromwell) road. It said to be a 3+star hotel, but it actually wasn't worth a star at all. The room was really small, I didn't have a night table next to my part of the bed, it looked old and you couldn't turn around in the bathroom without hitting the wall or the bin. It was also very cold, there wasn't any central heating we could turn on and the isolation was really bad, that's why we also had a lot of noise coming from the road next to us.
Though it wasn't as comfortable as we paid for, it was acceptable because...this was more than I have at my own room (I just don't need that much). And when we we're 'home', we'd sneak under the blankets to warm ourselves up and I really like snuggling so I actually had no problem with it.
I think the price was probably high because of the great location, facing a supermarket (Sainsbury's) and at the end of the road (5 min. walking) were the most important museums. It was also near Hyde Park, and though we went a lot with the underground (metro), it was fine.

We went to the Natural History Museum and Science museum the first day. I've seen lots of musea, but these were...cool and interesting...these were very nice to be at. And they were free (Dutch musea always have an entrance fee). The designs of the expositions we're really nice made and better than I've ever seen. I guess they really have a better eye when it comes to those things (or just a bigger budget). It was also very interactive, which helps you to actually think about the subjects instead of just observing the information.

After the musea, we went towards the Thames where we planned to take a river cruise. On the way we saw the Big Ben (or just the Clock Tower..) and crossed the Thames ourselves. The London Eye is something we'll save for the next time (actually Nick has a fear of heights, just couldn't risk it). The river cruise was enjoyable, afterwards we went to a game-arcade by Namco. for just 10 pennies you could play several games (a lot cheaper than the normal fair here in the Netherlands).But beside spending time winning and (mainly) losing I had the chance to play a real game of Dance Dance Revolution how it was meant to be, instead of playing it at a soft pad at home. It was way too easy though :/ And we played a game of Silent Hill (killing zombies) which we both lost because of the lack of bullets we got (they probably just want to earn more money with that, you could buy new ones..) We had lots of fun though! We got hungry and went to a nearby restaurant, a noodle bar which was as cheap as it tasted. It really tasted like instant noodles or worse, everything was fried..yuck...
After that we walked towards the west where there was a small christmas market with TOO MUCH cute stuff. I just couldn't choose what to buy and wanted it all but ended up with nothing 'cause it was nothing useful anyway. But I did buy a comic of the Moomins in one of the book stores we we went to. Tired of all the walking, we went back with the underground and went to bed early.

Next day we planned to go on a 'shopping spree' (didn't actually buy something besides food), went to Harrods and Hamleys...to Oxford street which was awesomely crowded, walked to Covent garden towards the water. We then walked alongside the Thames, towards the Tower Bridge..which was a long long walk but a great sight. We arrived at the London Dungeon, a kind of interactive show about the black stories of London (Jack the Ripper, Sweeney Todd...). And I'm not scared easily, but I didn't feel at ease there. It was all pretty realistic...which is of course the point. When it was finished, we went back to Cromwell Road and went to a Garfunkel's Restaurant, got pizza and Irish Stew (the latter wasn't really good..) and went back to the hotel.

Sunday is a perfect day to relax, enjoy a bit-late-breakfast and go to Hyde park, to Winter Wonderland, a big christmas fair German-style. But before that, we went to the IMAX 3D movie theatre (located in the Science Museum), which is the one of the largest ones in the world. We went to a movie about the ocean, it was a great experience! Hyde park was very crowded, but a nice scenery anyway. We wanted to try one of the cheap restaurants near our hotel, went to an Indian, but discovered that the prices only included a piece of meat, without any veggies or potatoes/pasta of any kind. So we went outside again, a bit ashamed but laughing too. Their neighbours were an Italian restaurant which looked like a decent place to eat. We got a table from a very funny Italian waiter, but I just couldn't trust the guy. Second funny thing was that there would come an extra tip on the bill afterwards. Third thing was that a glass of wine costed 7,50 (pounds).. even more expensive than a pizza o.o; Pretty weird huh?! Well we had a dinner with lots of Dutch people around us (which I didn't like very much) and about a hundred of Japanese girls o.o.. well, it was special indeed :P..

We wondered what to do on Monday, we were getting worried for the trip back to the Netherlands because of the weather, but it's a short distant so it probably wouldn't be that difficult. Anyway, we decided to visit Covent Garden again and went to two art museums as well. We did the shopping for some souvenirs and the inevitable Cheddar cheese and Branston pickles, went to bed early because it would be a long day tomorrow.

Tuesday was our trip back, but the flight was planned at 18.15 ...we could take all the time we needed. We were far too early at Heathrow Airport and spent our time drinking tea and playing games. Finally we could check in our baggage and move forward to the shops and such.. Nick bought me earmuffs (actually as a present from his mom), I finally found some I really liked :)
After waiting and waiting and waiting we finally got into the air plane. And the most wonderful thing of all was our sight from the sky: all the lights from London and other cities, that was really beautiful! We arrived exactly on time at Schiphol but from there it went downhill.

Apparently after five days the railways were still kinda down. We thought that maybe we'd get one hour delay, but it was far more. We had to travel to Amsterdam, then take a slow train to Amersfoort. somewhere before Hilversum the motor of the train had a breakdown because it was on fire. It was very silent in the train, kinda scary... we stopped at the next station, had to wait and then take the next train. From Amersfoort we had to go to Zwolle,with again a train that stops at all stations -_-; we were 00.15 at Zwolle and had to wait for the last train of 00.56 which also had delay.. we were very scared that we couldn't get anywhere anymore. But the train eventually came and we were 02.15 in Groningen where there were no busses of course. We didn't want to walk home anymore, tired as we were, so we took a taxi. It was almost six hours from Schiphol to home...which is FAR too long. Stupid NS.

The days after that were also very busy because we had to arrange something else for christmas 'cause we couldn't celebrate with Nicks family.. we decided to stay together at Nicks place. I did the last-minute shopping and such..
Even with the white blanket over our land, it didn't really feel like christmas anymore as I was not with any family but Nick. It was fine, we watched christmas movies, gave eachother presents and the next day we went to his mom and my parents, but still.

About London: It feels familiar.. but the people are more polite, which is a good thing!
Also, it feels like they use far more illustrations than we do in the Netherlands, which I think is a good promise for the future. They do have more of everything anyway..food, drinks, stores..it's pretty cool.

I got a book about sketchbooks from Nick by the way. Pretty interesting how lots of people use it as a visual diary.. I never thought about it that way. Allthough I don't like the idea to make perfect drawings in it. Sketches can be stupid and boring and totally wrong, but it doesn't matter since they're just sketches. I personally don't like to only observe the world around me. I mean.. that already exists..I like to imagine things and draw that..never really understand why people have joy in drawing a bowl of fruits either..

But for now this story is getting far too long. Excuse me if you find any bad English, for it is still my secod language and I still make mistakes.
I hope you had a nice christmas and wish you all a great new-year celebrations and of course an awesome 2010!

Some new sketches

2009-12-12T14:07:00.017+01:00

I've been really busy..but I made some casual sketches in my agenda and dummy..

New sketchdump

2009-10-22T14:07:00.021+02:00

Most of them are tiny doodles in my sketchbook, some are somewhat bigger.

Playgrounds Festival (and stress?)

2009-10-12T11:42:00.003+02:00

I don't know if I have actually time for this or if I should work on assignments but I just feel like posting something about Playgrounds Festival last week.
Playgrounds Festival is two-days-event about digital media art held in Tilburg. Me and some of my classmates thought it would be cool to attend it. And it was pretty cool. We decided to go to both days and sleep at a hostel. the first day we were a bit late due to someone who forgot their ticket and also because we have to travel a lot since Tilburg is 3,5 hours away. The audience were mainly students from art en media institutes and several older people from the digital media business. We arrived, dumped our baggage at the hostel and walked into a big fully packed hall (in the concert building 013). There wasn't any fresh air in there, but the show was quite nice. We saw a lot of great animation/short movies and learned about how big media concerns work. Also, Pixar were there too! In the evening we couldn't decide where to eat so we split up and after that we attended some smaller artists talks.

What was peculiar about the whole thing was that some artists weren't really appreciated by my classmates. I think it's got to do with personal taste but I couldn't see what was wrong with them. It was about the cute drawings, you know, a lot of people get excited by cute japanese stuff (and yes me too) and it's getting more popular in Europe too. And it was the same with papertoys, you know, those little DIY-papercrafts which are pretty cute too. I don't think it will take over the world, but still I think it is something to watch. At least my fingers are itching if I see those cute things. But I guess my classmates are a lot more sophisticated art-academy students who think it isn't artistic at all. I don't care anyway, I had fun watching it.

Fridayafternoon was OK but not amazing or anything. At some point I got really weary of all the short movies and talks and I decided to go home. Then ofcourse the NS had problems, but I was back at 8. Then went with Nick to a party but went to bed early cause.. pfff I was tired.

I really need a short holiday, and luckily I get one next week, so I'll just have to survive this week and then I'll be able to rest for a short while. I just don't know what to do sometimes. You know the Dutch saying 'wikken en wegen' , well for me this means I can't choose between school or my own life. And I had this since the day I attended artcollege. I was hoping for some interesting lessons this year since we are in the third class and this is the last year to learn from our teachers 'cause next year we'll have our internships and exams. But it still dissapoints me. we only get interesting stuff like once in three weeks, which is probably more than last year but still very very little. I'm an illustration student, let me illustrate ($@#*^%)! I know it's probably for a good cause that I have to do all those other things (like making presentations, writing columns, working in big teams on interior/environmental design, talking about pictures and making typography posters (ok, that has actually something to do with illustration but isn't interesting at all to me). SIGH I know, I'm always ranting about this, but there isn't any way to avoid it since this is my all-day-life and I'm stuck with it but I just can't let the feeling go that I actually don't want this and that I KNOW that I'm developing far more/better if I have more time to do the things I want (which is making only illustrations). So why spent 80% of my life if I can't see the function of it? And you know that a lot of succesful artists didn't even finish artcollege, so it isn't really neccesary, while it costs a lot of your money. So I'll probably keep ranting about this until the end of this year, while I hope to finish it so I can start the rest of my life!
Now at this point I'm just doing nothing cause I don't like college and I can't just do whatever I want because I'll feel guilty then. It sucks the energy out of me.... :(

A difficult question

2009-10-03T21:35:00.002+02:00

Last weeks assignment for our illustration class was a rather difficult one. Our teacher asked us what we are in our drawing and what we want later. Now, I could describe it in words, but to envision it on 'paper' is a different thing to do. I thought a lot about it. You know, since I begin drawing more seriously I thought why I wanted to draw anyway. Well.. it may be a silly answer but I just like the beauty of our nature. Nature inspires me a lot and I want to show it to the rest of the world. And rather than just taking pictures, my drawing gives a more personal touch to this. But not all my art is about nature. I also try to draw certain feelings and emotions we encounter in this life. Ofcourse this will always be more things I myself experienced than other things, but I do try to imagine how it would be to do different things, live in a different world than I do. But because I'm not a very outgoing person I don't really know how other people 'feel'. These past months I've been busy with my social-life and met a bunch of new people who, I think, have all a different perspective on life. I just LOVE to know how people feel and think about things..I think that the differences between eachother also makes this world a rich one because we can learn so much.... I wish I could experience all of it and make a piece of art of each feeling...

Rough (nonsense) sketches from last weeks

2009-09-30T20:24:00.005+02:00

Most of them are made during lessons....

Halloween Art

2009-09-27T18:47:00.006+02:00

Van Petra's sketchblog

Happy Halloween :)
I'm quite satisfied with the result, although the background could be a lot more interesting and her left leg is kinda red because of the texture..
Check my DA account for the bigger version!

First Post

2009-09-24T17:20:00.000+02:00

huphuphup
I decided to make a sketchblog :)
I will post here sketches and things I don't post at DeviantArt and such. Or maybe I'll post finished pieces too. purpose is to sketch moooore I guess. And show you. And hopefully someone will comment?