Hola Warlocks! 👋 TBR is a cute abbreviation for To-Be-Read, a fancy one too in the Art of Reading. Are you a book lover? Do you have books in your TBR shelf waiting to be read?
For my summer TBR list, my chosen genre is Fantasy. Well, not only for this summer, it’s my all-time favorite genre along with adventure and thrillers.
1. The Wise Man’s Fear
The Wise Man’s Fear
There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon and the anger of a gentleman.
My name is Kvothe. You may have heard of me.
Kvothe
On the second day of his narrating the story of his life to the Chronicler at the Waystone Inn, Kvothe pursues his education at the University. Because of his high term tuition, a result of a capital crime committed, he follows his friends’ advice to take a term off and chase the Wind. Count Threpe arranges for Kvothe to travel to the city of Severen, to aid Maer Alveron and thereby earn a writ of patronage. Maer gives various tasks to Kvothe, which embarks him on a journey with few mercenaries.
On this adventurous journey, did he complete the task given by the Maer? What are the challenges faced by him? Did he learn anything about the Chandrian who killed his family?
This is part two of The KingKiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss. Part One is called the Name of the Wind. It is day one of the narration of Kvothe’s life story at the Waystone Inn, where he himself begins narrating his adventurous life to the Chronicler, whose job is record life histories. What was considered to be a legend/myth, what had been the subject of songs and rhymes had murdered Kvothe’s entire family and he begins his journey in search of answers.
The Name of the Wind
If you love fantasy, then trust me you shouldn’t miss this trilogy. Well, the third book is not released yet, but you get my point. 😊 It’s called the Doors of Stone and I seriously can’t wait for it! I have already finished reading half of the part two and I’m excited to read further!
2. Fire and Blood
Fire and Blood
The tale begins with the legendary Aegon the Conqueror, creator of the Iron Throne, and goes on to recount the generations of Targaryens who fought to hold that iconic throne, all the way up to the civil war that nearly tore their dynasty apart. In short, this book is a record of the entire history of the house Targaryens.
If you are a die-hard fan of Game of Thrones like me, I know just that name is enough to get you excited! Because we can’t ever get enough of GoT, can we?😄 Also, I saw somewhere that this book is going to be adapted into TV show called House of the Dragon, a prequel to the GoT series! So cool!
3. Dead Witch Walking
Dead Witch Walking
Dead Witch Walking is a story of a world in which witches, vampires, pixies and other creatures exist alongside humans, although not completely in peace. The main character in the story, Rachel Morgan, is a witch who quickly gets pulled into a conspiracy that goes deeper than she realizes. Along with help of her friends, a vampire, pixie and a human, Rachel soon finds that there is more than one person looking to kill her, and it will take all of her will just to stay alive.
What is the conspiracy? Will Rachel be saved? I’m excited to read!😊
4. The Good, the Bad and the Undead
The Good, the Bad and the Undead
The Good, the Bad and the Undead talks about the difficult life of the witch Rachel Morgan, an independent bounty hunter, who hunts down the criminal creatures in downtown Cincinnati.
She can handle the tough vampires and even tangle with a cunning demon or two. But fighting a serial killer who feeds off the experts in the dark magic itself is way beyond her limits. Confronting an ancient evil is more than just child’s play — and this time, Rachel will be lucky to escape with her very soul.
The Hollows series is of urban fantasy genre and has 14 novels. Like a favorite TV show that has many seasons over the course of years, this series of novels too has many parts! I mean, who doesn’t love it when the story is good, right?😊
So, what is your genre of preference and the books in your TBR list? And I recently came across a cool blog called Aniblogshere, that reviews novels in detail.
Until next time. Regards, your fellow art warlock. 💜
So… Science is weird. Sometimes we can’t even understand how something happens, we simply arrive at the conclusion that science is weird. Because it is easier than poking at the mechanics of it. Here’s few things that my brain automatically pushes aside to the ‘weird science’ zone.
Toned Down Time Travel
Time travel is a super cool fascinating thing. We’ve seen movies about it, read stories about it and there must be atleast one time when we imagined how cool it’d be if it’s real. Too bad it’s not invented yet. But the next possible thing to a time machine is treadmill. After one hour on a treadmill, it’d be like, what year is it?🤣 It doesn’t take people to past or future but atleast dabbles with time and slows it down.
Treadmill Walking
Another wierd workout in a science-y way is plank. Whoever invented it must have been a scientist who tried and failed in creating a time machine. He should have been like ‘meh, I’ll settle with planks for now’. Because time literally stops when you do plank.
Hostile Combo
Everything is exciting about going shopping isn’t it? It’s fun, it’s colorful and who doesn’t love to go shopping, right? I for one, would go to get some grocery, see a nice shoe but end up buying a nail polish.😄
Shopping malls must have been designed by husbands who are terrified of their shopaholic wives. Why? Because the most hostile combo to ever exist on this planet must be shopping mall floors and human feet. Walking for two hours outdoor? No problem. But inside a shopping mall? All is great for the first ten minutes. Don’t even imagine wearing shoes with heels. It’s a torture cycle designed in hell. You literally have to drag your feet to the last aisle where your favorite cookie is.
Shopping mall
That’s where your eyesight baffles you! Your eyes automatically works like a 7x sniper scope for the cookie box at the far end of the mall. But it somehome misses an object a few feet away on the floor.
Also, you don’t even have to actually look at the not-so-close, least favorite relative who is few feet away. Your brain already knows before your eyes and you carefully walk the opposite way. Of course, he’d be doing the same too, no doubt about it. Don’t even think about making eye contact with him. Unless you wish for an awkward conversation of the month.
All Work and No Play
Ever been in a situation where you have so many things to do in a short time span but you have no idea where or how to start? A huge list of things to do stays untouched in the post-it note. Household chores, cooking, grocery shopping, all things blogging, and other hundred things. Meh, I’ll just take a nap instead. 😄
All Work and No Play
Thank you for visiting! Which is your ‘weird science’ thing that you’d like to share? 😊 Here is another interesting banter by Dronstad. He writes interesting night time blabbering and short stories. Do check it out if you haven’t already 😊
Here’s a few more interesting topics to check out.👇 If you’ve liked it, do share it with the world!💜 Regards, the Art Warlock.
Hola, my fellow warlocks!👋 Today let’s talk about the 5 basic skills of drawing that are to be learned to become an artist. If you are like me, you would have never thought about the intricate techniques, theories or the actual how-to behind a good drawing. You just draw, try to recreate a beautiful painting you’ve seen somewhere or let your imagination run wild and create something of your own. It’s good. But to make our drawing experience better, let’s get into the rules and details of the required skills.
There are 5 basic skills of drawing which are as follows.
Perception of edges
Perception of spaces
Perception of relationships
Perception of lights and shadows
Perception of the whole or the Gestalt
Pure Contour Drawing
Before we get into the skills, it’s necessary to know what is pure contour drawing. It is nothing but the simplest form of linear expression. For example, take a look at this simple drawing.
Pure Contour Drawing
Here, to draw a fruit, simple and definitive lines are used. In simple words, pure contour drawing is linear drawing, that is, using clear and definitive lines or edges to draw without any shading techniques.
Perception of Edges
After we learn about the pure contour drawing, we can move on to the first basic skill in drawing that is, perception of edges. In the world of drawing, an edge is not just an outline of an object but also a shared boundary between two things. For example, take a look at this drawing.
Perception of edges
Here in this simple line drawing, the edge is the shared boundary between the boat and the surface of the water. Also the horizon line is also a shared boundary between the water and the sky. We don’t have to draw separate lines for these things. It is our understanding of this concept of shared boundary and drawing it and the exact way it is perceived by the viewers, is what it takes to master this skill.
Perception of Spaces
When I say spaces, it’s actually negative spaces. A positive space is the space taken up by the object that we are drawing. Negative space is the space surrounding and in between the space taken up by the object. In a way, the negative spaces are the ones that highlights and gives life to the actual drawing. Let’s take a look at an example.
Perception of spaces
In this example, the positive space is the space taken up by the furniture and negative space is everywhere else.
Perception of spaces
In this negative image, focus on the darker spots. Like an exercise, instead of drawing the chair, try drawing the negative, dark shapes. What you are doing here is, you are not trying to draw the chair but end up drawing a chair! Weird and confusing? Let me make it clear.
Let’s imagine a tougher drawing. For example a scenery in landscape.
Perception of Spaces
In this drawing, take a look at the sky. The negative space here is the sky. Instead of drawing clouds, I’ve shaded the sky black leaving out the clouds part. So in a way, I’ve drawn clouds by not drawing clouds! Sounds cool, right? Also, for the ocean, I’ve drawn random strokes here and there to depict tides. It’s the negative white space, that gives life to the ocean. It is this understanding and incorporating this concept, makes us master this skill which in turn elevates our simple art to an ‘art with capital A’!
Perception of Relationships
Ever seen an artist in a movie or any show, holding out a pencil or thumb in front of them to scale the object they are about to draw? It’s called sighting, a part of perceiving relationships.
Perception of relationships – Sighting
Let’s say you are standing in front of the Eiffel tower and want to draw it in your sketchbook. Now, what you need to figure out here is how to fit that hundreds of meters tall tower into a small paper and make it look convincing. This is where the sighting comes into play.
Perception of relationships – Sighting
Before you begin drawing this tower on your sketchbook, imagine you are looking through an imaginary camera. This is where you need to stop your brain from thinking too realistically, because obviously you can’t draw that tall tower into a paper of equal proportions! Instead to fit it in that tiny paper you’ve got, hold out your pencil or thumb to scale for proportions in length and width. Maintain the same distance between your eyes and thumb (or pencil) to ensure accuracy in the scale. In this case let’s say, the tower is one pencil height and one-third wide at the base.
Perception of relationships – Perspective
Take a look at this giant wheel. If we are standing perpendicular, that is at 90° angle, what we see is a perfect circle. But in this picture, from the point of view, it’s not actually a circle but oval. Note that as angle of view changes (imagine walking around the giant wheel in a circle), the shape we are supposed to draw too changes from circle to oval, then back to circle.
This perspective is very important because if we don’t pay attention to the angle of view, our drawing is a disaster. We can never make convincing drawings ever. It needs practice and imagination because, when we think of an object to draw, our brain automatically brings forward and fixes the default shape of it. (In this case, a wheel which is ‘always supposed to be circle’.) This is where our imaginary camera comes into play again. Imagine you are looking through a camera and with a little practice, it’s a piece of cake!
Perception of Light and Shadow
This is another important topic to be concentrated in drawing. It sounds simple but it’s got the power to make or break a drawing. If your drawing doesn’t look convincing enough, lights and shadows might play a big part in it. Read on to know what it’s all about and how to get it right every single time.
Perception of light and shadow
Let’s look at an example, like these beautiful pumpkins here. Apparently, the light source is at the top left corner. Half of the pumpkins are brighter and the other half in the right side are at a darker tone.
There are two types of shadows : formshadow and cast shadow. The form shadow part is the darker half, that is the half facing away from the light source. The cast shadow is the shadow that is cast on the ground by the object itself.
Perception of light and shadow
In this landscape scenery, I’ve chosen the light source to be at the top right corner. Hence the right side of the house is white, while the left side of the house is darker because of the concept of form shadow. Simply to remember, while drawing every object in a scenery, we need to remember the position of light source and imagine how the shadows will be cast and which portion of the object will be darker.
Perception of the Whole or the Gestalt
The fifth basic skill – the Gestalt is very interesting, fascinating and huge topic. (May be in future I’ll make a detailed post about it.) Gestalt is a German word (pronounced in English as Gesh-tult), meaning unified-whole. It simply means how we perceive a whole drawing or art, the final impact it creates on us.
Our brain is a thing to be marveled about! When we see a group of separate objects, our brain immediately focuses on finding similarity or continuity between them, perceiving it as a whole and understanding the meaning of it. It’s almost as fast as a reflex action.
Perception of the whole/Gestalt
Let’s take a look at this drawing for example. I have drawn dead/dry branches in a way that as a whole what is seen is a human face. This is similarity/closure. It doesn’t have to be a perfect human face for our brain to perceive it. But of course, I can’t draw those branches randomly and expect everyone to see a human face! That’d be ridiculous!😄 There is a grey area between the two ends and that’s where you can dabble and create beautiful art!
There are five laws of gestalt: similarity, continuity, proximity, closure and periodicity, which I’ll talk about in detail in future posts.
So, these are the five basic skills that every artist should remember. It might look simple but it gets as complex as our drawing is. It might look intimidating to the beginners but all it takes is keeping in mind these things while drawing and after a little practice, it will come naturally!
Thank you for visiting! Here’s a few more interesting topics to check out.👇 If you’ve liked it, do share it with the world!💜 Regards, the Art Warlock.
