Hello everyone!
I am so sorry I am late posting. I have had a very exciting week and the days ran away with me.
Yesterday I had my first session of my p/t MA in Children's Book Illustration at Anglia Ruskin University and it was so hard, but also so exciting and cheering and fun. We had to draw moving figures whilst on location, so first we had a brilliant lecture, and then a talk from a second year student, and then we all went off and sat and stood in a nearby shopping centre with our sketchbooks for hours and it was quite daunting, but we all got confidence from each other. The weather was so awful it helped as it distracted us - it kept pouring with rain and the wind blew my hair into my face so I couldn't see, and then it blew my fellow student's pencil case over and all her pens rolled around everywhere and then it blew my tea over and whipped the pages of my sketch book around - but we all kept going for literally hours and hours and our tutors came and give us on the spot tutorials. I learnt that in trying to draw people quickly I keep drawing legs as parallel lines, and my adult heads often have the same proportion to the body as children's, so effectively everyone I draw is a child, and also, the reason why I keep not being able to draw a whole person before they walk out of my sight is that my figures are too big! I honestly thought I was looking very carefully, but I was making mistakes I just didn't notice. However, I found it totally absorbing and challenging and it already feels very good for me emotionally and mentally, never mind staying for hours is better than being crouched over a computer.
So - it will be two and half years before I finish, and I have so much work to go, and so much improvement to make, but also, I feel now, so much fun to look forward to! I am so glad and excited and lucky to be doing this!
I hope everyone has something fun to do every week, something challenging and distracting, as it really is so cheering!
2 comments:
Sounds fabulous - more power to your pencil!
Anne, how lucky you are to be able to do that course. Good wishes - and LOTS of energy! Do let us know more about how this course goes for you and all that happens.
(Whispers: I'm eating chocolate here to stave off my jealousy and admiration.)
Someone I know did that course a while back and she got such a lot out of those years - as well as working harder than she had before, including managing the weekly travel from Yorkshire to Norwich.
nb. For anyone interested in the subject, Martin Salisbury, who was Course Director for the MA, wrote 'Illustrating A Children's Book : Creating Picture for Publications' which is well worth a dip if you can find it. (2004) I'm sure a variety of other books are available.
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