In London town

     Road buddy and I decided to hit the road for the autumn equinox. We arrived at London's Heathrow Airport on September 5 and were met by the airport pick up service maintained by our serviced apartment in the City. We've been pretty busy getting oriented and acquainted with our neighborhood and seeing some of the sights. I've been taking lots of photos but haven't had time to go over and edit them, so I'll just post a few initial impressions whilst riding into town from the airport and save the big guns for later. I'd be willing to bet the driver was instructed to take the "scenic" route into town. 

Heathrow car park with our airport pickup car

the London eye

Big Ben of course

the ubiquitous red double deckers

Call Me Mr. B. – Eighteen

Grades 4,5,6

Cartoon Drawing [MANGA]

Part 2

     The second day of the cartoon drawing project was devoted to coloring the images the kids had drawn in the previous class.

         Generally, all black lines including outlines of the various drawing elements and line elements in the background design, especially the straight lines frequently used radiating out to the edges of the paper as in the image on the right were executed with black felt tip markers.

         The actual colors were done with water color or poster color paint. Basically this project was an exercise in proportional drawing using a grid to enlarge a small image into a large one and a more sophisticated use of water based paints, especially in tinting and shading. These upper level elementary school students had rather full plates to digest.

          Tinting and shading (lighting and shadow) impart roundness and depth to an otherwise two-dimensional (flat) image. Of course, at this level of age and dexterity, only a rudimentary use of this technique is probable, except for an unusually gifted child (and some were). I would discuss and demonstrate how adding water or reducing it would lighten or darken the colors as in the graphic on the left.

         Basically it was up to the kids themselves what colors they chose to use since many of the original images were in black and white, but I encouraged them to experiment with tinting and shading to whatever extent they could manage it. With the older students I introduced the idea of using only one or two colors and using tinting and shading to obtain more depth and form in their pictures.

         This was, admittedly, a pretty sophisticated and challenging project, but I was surprised at how enthusiastically and energetically most of the kids managed to create some really nice pictures.

Full Color 

Monochrome

Two Colors

Call Me Mr. B. – Seventeen

Grades 4,5,6

Cartoon Drawing [MANGA]
Part 1

Manga [comic books]

     Japanese comic books, known as MANGA (which are nothing like their American cousins) are immensely popular with adults as well as kids. They are also gaining international readers as their popularity spills out beyond Japan's island borders.

typical manga bookshelf

        Just about every child (unless he comes from some other planet) in Japan will have a large collection of the colorful, seductive comic books. I know this because my own son had shelves and shelves of them in his room; many of them still remain and serve as room decoration in what is now my study.

girls' comics

        Young people in Japan, especially the girls are not only addicted to reading them, but not a small number are avid illustrators of their favorite characters as well. I, always in the market for interesting ideas for art lessons, decided to capitalize on this ready made enthusiasm for comics, by developing some lessons built around the world of manga and reversing the drawing process. The cartoon artist draws his or her panels and then reduces them to fit the story format in the comic book. For this lesson, I took panels from the comic book and blew them up to normal drawing size by using a grid ratio (see below) to help students expand the small cartoon image into a full size drawing.

popular manga title

        Of course, the stuffier school authorities frown on students having comic books in school. They are supposed to be immersed in “serious literature”. But what child can resist breaking the school rules—that's what they're made for, after all. So, I, being neither naïve nor stuffy, knew and didn't particularly care that they all had manga in their school bags. On the contrary, I depended on it when I started putting manga drawing lessons into my art curriculum.

about the right complexity for an average student

         The technique was fairly simple. I told the kids to bring their manga to class and we would use them to draw a picture of their favorite characters and/or scenes from the stories. I had a few sample pictures that I had done previously to illustrate the technique as I discussed it with them. First I told them to go through the comic book and look for images that they would like to draw. I cautioned them to think about the complexity of the image and choose one that would have a fairly detailed image of a character and enough background detail so as not to be too busy and difficult to draw and not too spare as to be too empty [we call it sabishii 'lonely' in Japanese] and/or uninteresting but deceptively "easy" to draw. The kids had to clear the chosen image with me to ensure that they would be able to handle it. I even pointedly asked them if they had confidence that they could handle an image I had doubts about. I would then gauge the body language and facial expression of the child's answer.  If he/she didn't hesitate I would OK the choice. If not, it was back to the drawing board until they could choose an acceptable image. After approving their choice I handed them a large sheet of white drawing paper.

too simple and uninteresting

too complex and detailed for most kids

        I explained and demonstrated the use of a simple line grid and told them to divide the small image into quarters with a pencil that could be erased afterward. (Many hated to deface their beloved manga books.) Next I told them to do the same thing with the large drawing paper—divide it into quarters. Then it was a matter of looking carefully at the small image and, using the guidelines for placement, enlarge the original image onto the large sheet of paper. The results, of course, depending on the skill of the individual, were varied, but most were able to reproduce an acceptable semblance (with allowance for creativity and whimsicality) of the original image. When the drawing was finished and approved by me, I had the kids trace the entire image in black felt tip marker to imitate the black line effect of the comic book. That concluded to first day of this lesson. An extra day could be added if necessary.

original [top right] and completed drawing showing the guidelines

Call Me Mr. B. – Sixteen

Grades 5 and 6

Zentangles and Mandalas

a zentangle

Noah's zentangle

    Recently a social networking friend of mine posted some drawings done by her grandson. The young fellow seems to be showing some talent and creativity. One of the pictures she posted was of something called a “Zentangle” (reproduced, on the left), something I hadn't heard of before—or at least so I thought. 

fantasy design

         At her suggestion I Googled “zentangle” and found that it used pattern designs to fill in the picture elements instead of solid colors, and that I had used this concept, unbeknownst to me that it had a name, with my 6^th Grade classes. I used the technique and just called it an "abstract pattern design". I realized that I had used the same technique in another project called ”fantasy design” with the 5th Grade classes. The objective was to get the kids away from the same old, same old boring straightforward coloring à la your standard coloring book and look at different and interesting ways to fill in design elements.

monks making a mandala

Navajo sand painting

        Then I noticed the “zen” (as in Zen Buddhism) part of the word zentangle and that reminded me of the mandalas that are designed by Tibetan Buddhist monks, as well as Navajo sand paintings both of which have symbolic and spiritual connotations. My main interest in them, however, wasn't spiritual, but in their abstract design and how I might be able to adapt the concept to a classroom project for older kids.

        I decided to use an ever popular motif with children, namely animals. I prepared about a half dozen different animals shapes in outline only (such as the gorilla below) and cut them out for use as templates. The students were free to choose any one of the shapes, or, if they were really adventurous, to design their own, which a few did. Then they simply had to trace the shape on white drawing paper in black magic marker. I then instructed them to divide up the animal outline into variously shaped sections at their own discretion.

elephant outline, divided with a couple sections
filled in with repetitive patterns

        I would then discuss and demonstrate on the whiteboard how to fill in the shapes with different repetitive patterns in black and white pencil only. Some possibilities were basic shapes like squares, circles, triangles, stars, etc. Others were lines of different kinds: straight, curved, dotted, etc. Combinations of shapes and lines could also be used in and endless variety of design possibilities. When the design fill was finished I had the kids outline the shape with the flat tips of three colored markers and write the name of the animal in fat letters and fill them in with designs similar to the main drawing.

        The main challenge was in persevering and not getting bored and sidetracked to the point of rushing to finish and ending up with hash. Not a few would get trapped into just that frame of mind, but the ones who were able to persevere turned out some very interesting works of, dare I say, Art!

abstract pattern design...but, is it a zentangle?

Call Me Mr. B. – Fifteen

Grade 5

Exaggeration

eye exaggeration in joshi manga

so-called costume play,
girl with manga eye makeup

      Exaggeration is a technique used by cartoon and comic book artists and caricaturists to highlight certain elements of a drawing to make them stand out for different effects. This technique is used to excess in Japanese “joshi manga” (girls comic books), which are enormously popular with elementary school aged girls, in the treatment of the eyes of the characters. Many aspiring young lady cartoonists can spend hours drawing pictures of girls featuring these eyes. So, without knowing it, many of my students were already familiar with the exaggeration technique.

       Boys are also comic book addicts here in Japan and their favorite comics also use exaggeration in gestures and facial expressions. Although some boys try to draw cartoon characters, they are not as numerous as the girls, who, by and large, tend to be more artistically oriented than the boys at the elementary school age. So, I decided they could all benefit from a lesson in doing exaggerated drawings and most could handle the skill necessary to pull them off.

       Exaggeration is accomplished mostly by contrasting one element of a drawing with another, often by size distortion. For example, you could draw a man with extremely large hands holding a small globe [Atlas holding the world in his hands] as in the Getty image on the left. This image is also an example of foreshortening to bring the hands to the front of the picture plane, another technique of exaggeration.

       To set up the mindset for this project I would have the kids bring their comic books and talk about the techniques the artists used along with some examples of my own. I also set up a model that showed in 3-D exactly how the size contrasting technique works. I had an inflatable model of an All Nippon Airlines (ANA) [All Japan Airlines] jet plane in my Prep. Room. I arranged it with with an umbrella to give the appearance of a jet taking off and crashing into a gigantic umbrella—exaggeration galore. The kids were easily able to grasp the idea; then I left them free to try a drawing on their own using their comic books as a guide, or the model of the airplane and umbrella or just using their own imaginations.