the burroughs folio: 2 penciled...

Kammerer & Mikey Portman are both pretty much done, pencilwise.  Leaving only Ian & Robert Barlow.

Guess that's what's tomorrow's for.  My eyes are very tired, and my perspective's shot.  Time to unplug.

finding the lines

is finding footing for where the ink goes.  that's the essential zen of it:  making the marks on paper is to provide a flightpath, a landing strip, the suggested foreknowledge of where surety lay.  never definite.  simply the surest places to put lines, in the wild mind of the penciler who wishes they were instead inking.  if followed they may not all be Great Lines but they will be True Lines.  not all True lines are Great.  Not all Great lines are True.  this is my general policy.  it leads me, by instinct, by the nose, as i build things.  i'm working on the Kammerer portrait now, and the ticonderoga is the perfect tool for making predictive pencil marks with an eye toward brush.  it's got a wide tip--  a quarter inch, across the head if it's perfectly flat (which mine never is, worn to an ovoid nub)  --and because of the broad body of the pencil it can be held in ways that mimic the deftness of stroking an inked brush across paper.  it's a good pencil.  perhaps my favourite, next to the mechanical drafting pencil i habitually use.  although of late it's been whatever pencil's handiest.  i don't truly have an axe.  i've drawn with chopsticks

the burroughs folio - the secret dreamer (4) [secret 13th apt tapes]

basically finished except for minor noodling & fretting, which always happens

 but fidgets aside i feel like i've got my method with this paper down

 three pieces of paper left.  three portraits done.  three to go

the burroughs folio - the secret dreamer (2)

the burroughs folio - the secret dreamer (1)

 

pencil rough for the final portrait in the burroughs folio series:  'the secret dreamer'

sleeplog - 1o2125

Four hours sleep.  Woke to sensation that I'd been clenching my jaw so hard my teeth felt it.  Three o' bloody clock.  When I'd curled up to rest, had been talking to Sig about supplements that would help memory.  That, and eating properly.  I've developed a terrible habit of skipping breakfast under the pretext that I'd just eat at work, and then skipping that because from the moment of arrival at the bakery, I'm hustling & grinding.

Apparently tossed & turned so much I managed to push my pillow off the bed.  Sig told me yesterday that I've been "sleep-biking" again--  a recurrent thing where I'm either walking or cycling in my dreams.  I never remember doing either.  The sleep-biking had been in remission; the last time he remembered me doing it was three or four months ago.  I know, for myself, that I'm sleeping more soundly & continuously than, say, a year ago.

Dreams?  There were.  None of your business, suffice it to say they weren't anxiety-driven, nor unpleasant.

Right ankle seems to be healing properly.  Fifth day in a row at the bakery.  I'll be glad to train the newbie and be done ASAP.  Guess I'll ride the bike in.  With any luck today I can return to the drawing table.  I've got an idea for the final portrait in the Burroughs folio...

Azure Pantry / the Burroughs Folio - Kiki (3)

chalk is the quick'n'dirty route & i love it.  such a dirty, dirty shortcut.  but it's meditative, working the chalkdust into the weave of the paper.  paper is such a sexy medium.  why do people fuck around with digital when they can learn something tactile?  because it's no-muss, i guess.  less time spent on prep & cleanup.  less inclination to plan with caution?  whatever.  who am i to shit on a shortcut?  i'm using chalk because it doesn't take thirty minutes of fucking around with layers & levels & erase & smudge & burn tools when i can just rub a piece of paper with a piece of chalk, wipe it down with a paper towel, and boom: sky.  i love this shade.  it's going to look fab in Azure Pantry.  i'm not going to lay too much blue on Denizen, though.  this is just for the facing chapter pages

(text for the chapter)

The Lazarus ink--  that's what we're calling it, now; this bottle has been resurrected regularly for a decade  --is too watery for a nice drydown, so dry brush is off the table until this stuff bakes for a bit.  this wasn't how i wanted to ink this piece, but so fucking what.  it's a test piece.  every piece is a test piece until the comix actually happen,  i'll fuck around with the sea in the b/g today, prob'ly...

calling it.  that's as much fuckaround as i feel like today

Azure Pantry / the Burroughs Folio - Kiki (2)

firehose of thoughts commences:

inking now, foundational fine linework.  taking it slow.  i like this face.  as before, i don't know that this is a good likeness of the historical kiki.  but i think he's my version of the character.  he's got the chin.  he's got the hair, the posture.  i think i can see how he carries himself.  been re-reading the kiki chapter and it's going to be a pleasure to draw.  quite pleased w/ how the whole Folio reads, as a unified piece.  i've built three discrete Books that talk to each other but may be read in any order; there is no determining chronology to the way the Burroughs Folio / Azure Pantry / Denizen may be read.  and that's a hell of a thing i hadn't thought of before:  between this & my Tarot, i'm building two comic books that may be read out of order, in any order.  (i've mentioned my crackpot theory about the tarot & comix, right?  that the tarot is just a bunch of comix panels with no chronological order other than that which the Reader imposes?)  anyway, that's what life is like when you're an artfag.  sometimes you don't know that you're doing something new.  i guess it's on to eyes next, then hands, then background

pee ess:  i hate having a fucked up foot.  i am going stir crazy

 

(some lines later)

 

this is a grayscale, so you can't see that the cloudlines are in blue, but anyhoo.  the eyes furned out okay.  the right hand is fine.  i still have to figure out how to make the left work; that's been the problem for days now.  if all goes well, maybe i'll get some inking in today (thursday, now) and that'll firm this whole thing up so i can stop neurotic-ing over things people do not, cannot, perceive

Azure Pantry / the Burroughs Folio - Kiki (1)

in progress.  one of a series of six portraits to be used as chapter stops in the Azure Pantry.  each portrait will precede one of six dreams; the dream sequences from Azure Pantry will have a limited print run, separate from Azure Pantry & Denizen, bound together as the Burroughs Folio

that's the plan, at any rate.  this is the third portrait.  i've already got ian sommerville.  thought i'd posted him already.  guess that goes up tomorrow.  still moving toward finished pencils on this one.  next up is inks & colour.  probably cop out and just colour the background...  that's what i've done with the others

"finished" pencils, a little later...

i no longer am certain whether he looks like the historical Kiki, whose name is not recorded.  i only have one photo to work from.  but he'll do for "my" kiki

(actual final pencils)

i know, i know, the hands look like shit.  i'll figure out how to fix it in the brushwork.  that's how these things always go:  i find the final line in The Doing, wielding pen or brush or whatever the final medium is.  the backgrounds will probably be chalk and graphite with some brush whereas the sky should be a chalk blue with pure cloud, so those regions of paper should go wholly untouched