Day-to-Day: Print Shops

I cannot believe I have forgotten to update my blog until now! But that is what happens when Focus Week (the week Seniors present their final thesis) does. Missing two updates...*sigh*
In the last three weeks I have had more encounters with print shops than I wanted. At the top a few weeks ago we went to Pinball Publishing on a field trip. It was interesting because once we were out there that was when Kristen mentioned the trip was optional. There wasn't much said that interested me as I am not as interested in the printing process.
The following week in Typography 2 some people came from Stumptown Printers to talk with us. It was much the same conversation and another talk that was not within my area of interest. I wish these were spread out so I didn't have to hear very similar talks so close to each oh well.

Day-to-Day: Graffiti Downtown and the Pearl

Here are a few more posts of what I find around town.

There was a dash of Retna Burn downtown...

Here is the cute little star I saw at the galleria max stop. Not sure if it was on purpose but it was cute.

And right across from it was a cute big wonky star! This looks like the work of Retna Burn about Portland. She does love putting stars on everything.

And finally this one I had to take home. It was loosely stuck on a pole and I love it being on the cute little name tag. Hope you enjoyed the little treasures I find around town.

Day-to-Day: Graffiti in Goose Hollow

Ah I love living in the Goose Hollow Apartments...the funky smells in the hallway...the sketchy shaky elevator... and of course the random drawings you find in the stairwells.

This little guy was adorable and I liked the use of the object to create this cute little creature.

Hannah is offended...or maybe she wrote it there. The floor below had sup hoe written with white eraser fluid for quite a while and I suppose someone answered above with something a little more humorous.

Of course there is always the lovely PSU blackboard wall near the mailboxes. I have to say though the Easter Bunny on steroids with a kid freaking out was a a little much. Especially when you add in the beer and wine fest passed out drunk guy.

I love this little guy so adorable. I also love that it's on a postage label. Very cute.

This one just made me chuckle. Rock on!

I love when people have fun with making characters out of boards. I do wish they put expressions on the cars beside it. Maybe one a little scared and the other blushing would have been cute!

Hope you enjoyed all the little things I found.

Day-to-Day: Hair length

Something I surprisingly didn't mention with the wig post is the fact that I had to get a haircut preemptively. While I was working on the wig I discovered that my hair was too thick and almost like wearing a third wig underneath my skullcap. Soo here it is my before and after hair drawn!

I will say that I was a little sad about having to cut it earlier than I wanted. I have been getting tons of compliments over the new cut. One thing that's odd is I forget all the time that I got my haircut because it's still in my face a lot of the time. Hehe.
One thing I do miss is hair swooshing is harder to do. What I mean by that is flipping my hair in the wind, it doesn't weigh as much so it is harder to do and also doesn't look as dramatic when done.
Oh well onwards and upwards to my thesis! One benefit of this hair is that it does look awesome after being under two wigs for hours.

Day-to-Day: Portrait: Myself

These are some last semester portraits I did of myself that I love quite a bit. They were both drawn looking at my reflection on the Mac desktop computers at the school when they're turned off. I love the reflection on the black background of the blank screen.


Obviously this last one was drawn during the time I was putting together my Keynote (for non Mac friends the apple version of Powerpoint) for my proposal of my thesis. Boy has time flown by!

My Art: Marie Antoinette

We got our second art direct each other assignment. I paired up this time with Amanda and gave her the task of making something a little more typography centric. I will either post a link to what she did or put it up here on my blog later.
As for myself she gave me the assignment of doing a bust of Marie Antoinette with more detail in it than some of my other pieces. I of course had to get the likeness of someone and decided to choose her. Hehe she was a little embarrassed when she learned I picked her as my model. Below are my sketches and under that the final. I will spare Amanda the embarrassment and not put up the stock photo I got of her for the final.


I did enjoy all of my sketches but sadly only one had time to go foreword so the hat won out. I did enjoy doing a piece that was more painting than the other art I do. It was relaxing to sit down and get in the zone.

And now the final...the scan is not as good as the original sadly...

Day-to-Day: My Workspace I SPY edition!

This is my art desk that I got for free from my good friend Brett Birdsong. Him and his father Tal who was my Sunday School teacher back in 5th grade made this desk themselves! It is amazing and sturdy! I can adjust the angle and height of the desk. It also has a little holder that I took off that keeps pens from rolling off. I play with it too much when it's attached. And the best feature....it's got wheels!

On the right I have duck taped a power strip so that I can plug in the electronic things on my desk easier. I have also attached a magnifying light that was for doing puzzles in Seaside and now I use for more light when I work on my art.

Now for a little I SPY:
2 boxes of Goldfish (which I love to eat)
1 role of "napkins"
1 X-Acto blade
2 Subtletys
1 little King Kana (external hard drive)
3 tiny sketchbooks
1 Matsu (cellphone)
1 red panda
1 Captain Picard
15 Elmer's Paintastic brush pens
2 orange earplugs
1 PNCA planner (sometimes used)
1 kiwi heart shaped lollipop
1 Mac Book Pro
2 bridesmaid fake flowers
1 pot holder...really it's just a dishtowel
6 pencils
1 hanger
1 wig tag
1 Captain Kirk
2 hearts
2 red items with gold swirls
1 compass
4 brushes
1 TRIMET ticket
1 salt shaker
1 rubber cement
3 kitchen items...one is queen
and 1 Orion slave girl!

Day-to-Day: Glasses Doodle

A while ago I tried to draw myself with my new glasses when I still had my long hair. I liked the little Ariel swoop I'd been doing. I don't think this drawing looks anything like me and the funny expression I made in the mirror didn't draw out as intended. Though I do love the simple coloring I did.

Thesis: The Test Run

Of course Spring Break lead up to the test run at end of that week. We did it at The Landing at my church back home in Washington, Family Life Center in Mukilteo.

This is the flier I made that my mom emailed out the the church and my friends and family. About 13 people showed up which was a good turn out for this first rough run of my thesis.

Here is Blush with her minions from left to right Retna Burn, Blush, Subtlety, and Corporal Conundrum.

Retna Burn is working on creating the perfect weapon for their evil schemes!

And here we have the minions getting ready to go on another eeevil raid! Though I think they've already forgotten the plan Blush has told them....

And here we have my Uncle David who didn't know anything about the thesis acting the part of the vault for the bank. Retna Burn is sweetly asking her question!

Thesis: Spring Break Distractions

Of course while rehearsing we had other distractions during the week or ways to take a refreshing break....

Olivia the original Retna Burn with Chase the current Retna Burn. Olivia is sorting her assorted jug of beads to make bead sprites. Of course Chase and I had a little too much fun obsessively sorting them with her.

Chase by the end of the week had a haircut as did I but we had to figure out what we might want. My dad bought a tablet (not iPad) that we could draw on with our fingers so here is Chase drawing an idea for her hair. We had too much fun drawing on this thing and it got worse when I found sudoku on it! I was obsessively playing that thing for half the week!

Of course as with all the times we are having fun Chase breaks down crying in laughter. None of us can remember why she had her bout of hysteria. She does it every time we play a board game getting waay too over excited and in the moment. Hehe it's one of the delights of when we all play together!

Thesis: Rehearsing at the House

Here is a little more about the rehearsal process at the house.

First here is Corporal Conundrum getting into character hamming up at the camera.

We needed a stand in weapon for the one Retna Burn creates so Subtlety has the blow dryer as a stand in. Funny thing is our poor little dog Wicket was terrified of the thing since he got groomed recently.

And of course I cannot stop talking about the rehearsal process without talking about Shawna and Wicket. Our dog was a funny little random distraction element. And Shawna was amazing! She was there to be our "randomly picked" member of the audience. She had to do the final skit soo many times it must have driven her insane!

Thesis: My Casual Minions

Over Spring Break we had rehersals at my house running through the play. So here they are my casual minions...

Tobi aka Subtlety is pointing out the bells on her ankles proudly. Chase aka Retna Burn is wearing her cute tutu's still not at the full poof they had by the end of the week being a little space cadet. Hannah aka Corporal Conundrum is wearing the boots we found along with the trench coat and shirt she already had.

Corporal is not happy with the happy Retna Burn and playful Subtlety behind him. He hates being the only guy of the group some times.

Thesis: Blush's Wig

It's been a long road to get to this final wig. Lots of stress and pain and trouble with not only building it but also not getting some of the wigs I wanted.
The Blush wig is constructed of two wigs. The top is a Farrah Fawcett wig and curls up nicely. The bottom was suppose to be a straight blonde wig of the same color. I had a problem though, Display and Costume didn't have anymore so I tried to order online a blonde straight one. It was a horrid more plasticky looking one with a yellowy honey color. So I had a dilemma.
I thought I would integrate my own long hair as the bottom but it wasn't working out. I finally remembered that I have a long white wig that I didn't use for an older cosplay I didn't finish. Blush is 200 years old so this worked perfectly.
I ended up cutting off some of the old Blush wig to lengthen the braid in the back and have the white and blonde in the wig mix more. There are also white strands that swirl up through the blonde wig some following the curls others going against it.

This time around making the wig I discovered I could use straighteners, curling irons, and hairspray on it. I of course still used copious amounts of hot glue.
In this picture the top blonde wig has bangs which I later had to take away. At this stage I thought I would be using my own hair for the bottom half so I made the bangs out of this wig.

This is my drawing of what the wig ended up looking like. It shows a little more the swirls on the side of the hair that I've added.

And of course a picture of what the wig looked like on me for the test run. I do need to get more pictures of this wig on the head with a better turn around view. I do like this new wig but it will take a bit longer to forget the stress and fall in love with it.

Day-to-Day: The Car Accident

Over Spring Break my sister and I got in an accident. We're all fine there were no injuries other than a sore neck for a few days. It wasn't our fault, officially declared by the insurance. I was the passenger. The lady who turned in front of us had her airbags go off but ours didn't. Sadly our Puma...the nickname for our Hyndai SantaFe is toast. The damages are more than the repair costs so the Puma is getting totaled.

Day-to-Day: Lady at the Train Station

When I went back for Spring Break waiting at the train station I saw this lady knitting across from me. I decided to draw her. I loved her interesting face and how intent she was in her task.

My Art: Non Portrait of Nicole Cuvin

Two weeks ago in my Illustration class we got the in class assignment of doing a non portrait. That is doing a portrait of someone without drawing their face to show who they are. My good friend Nicole and I decided to do each other and here are the results!


For her I drew the interior of her car a Prius. One time I joked about all the water bottles she had in there so I drew a bunch inside. There is also a bottle of Sweet Leaf Lemonade that she gets a drink during break time. Of course her PNCA portfolio which thankfully with use of the car and having a studio she doesn't have to tote around anymore. There are parking stickers on the window and parking slips for the REI parking near the school on the dash. Her I assume favorite though for certain most used bag that is always full is in the passenger seat. In the side and rear view mirrors are cute little monsters reflecting the topic of her thesis about the monstrous perceptions we have of ourselves when looking in the mirror. And last my favorite touch is the gear shift that shifts into PANIC!


I absolutely loove the portrait she did of me! Having the Diet Coke as the centerpiece. I am hopelessly addicted and in love with my Diet Coke. Of course behind me are the Elmers Paintastic brush pens that I love to use! And to top it off my Lady Blush wig on top of the Diet Coke the symbol of my thesis! So simple and so perfect! I love Nicole's art! It is now my background on my computer!