# benfoldsfive dude's Art Thread



## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

Hello everyone. I'm creating this thread in order to share my works, ideas, and inspiration to you. I am going to try to keep this thread consistent, even if some of the artworks are actual works or doodles. Comments/Criticism are appreciated. Enjoy!

I recently bought a new sketchbook in order to record some ideas for the AP art class I am doing this coming year. I tend to draw cars, landscapes, design logos/fonts, color with markers when I draw. For this summer, I am trying to teach myself to draw different concentrations like humans (I like drawing faces compared to bodies). 

Here are some examples of cars that I have drawn in the past few weeks.








*The first one, I was looking at a book of different cars from the 1970s like Oldsmobiles, Toyotas, and VWs. When I drew that picture, I recently bought Prismacolor markers and was experimenting.








*The second picture is another collage of cars that I found from that `70s book such as the Oldsmobile 98, Pontiac Astre (re-badged Chevy Vega), and a loosely based Ford Mustang (mid-right side) along with a car that I mentally thought of. As you see, I was experimenting with humans and Prismacolor markers.








*The third picture is a loosely based 1967 Ford Galaxie in a baby-blue color.








*The fourth photo has two cars. The top car was a doodle (as I was doodling the facade) while the bottom car is an outline drawing of a Citroen DS (1955-1972/3) with my take on a font for Citroen. I wanted the font to have a "French" look to it. 








*The fifth photo contains an unfinished, wheel-less 1979 Dodge Omni; a 2-Door SUV called a Lono Twister--Lono only exists in my head-- that has a somewhat similar 1980s Chevrolet S10 Blazer look to it; a retro-futuristic car platform-based truck (inspired from a Chevy El Camino or Ford Ranchero); and a compact late-1990s futuristic coupe called an Iona, which was inspired from a Saturn Ion.


Because I can only have five thumbnails per post, I hope to make another post soon. I hope you enjoyed it!


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## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

This is an unfinished 18"x24" artwork that I've been working on lately. It's 1 of 3 summer project artworks. It's supposed to be an advertisement for a 1977 Oldsmobile Starfire, a subcompact (for the time) coupe. The Starfire is a badged version of the more known Chevrolet Monza. 
The photograph makes the piece look "unbalanced." I've put a lot of research into the people portraits (like hairstyles, clothes, body types, etc.), the interior design of the gallery (I wanted the room have a seventies look to it with tile floor and wood panel walls), and the type facing in the foreground of the piece (I wanted a funky, "groovy" look). 

I've noticed that advertisements (especially automotive ads) from thirty to sixty years ago always have people around a car in order to entice potential buyers that "people in the ads" only drive that car. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I was interpreting what kind of people would drive a Starfire. With research and assumption, many young people like the "sporty coupe" design of the car.

This piece has been challenging when it came to outlining the people. Going through old photos of my aunts and uncles, not only was it interesting to see their hairstyles and physique 35+ years ago, but it was interesting creating different interpretations of them in the piece itself. 

When doing line drawings like this, I always plan (by outlining) the placement of the main object (i.e. car and people), the distance between the foreground, middleground, and background objects, the line thicknesses, the design that the line thicknesses make (i.e. background wood paneling), and the balance of the overall artwork. Sometimes, I get so engrossed into the detail, that it can jeopardize the overall aesthetic of the concentration; I tried to pay attention to the overall picture, as well as being thorough in detail.

For me, this piece is me saying "thank you" to Oldsmobile for creating the compact Starfire, and giving it that "Oldsmobile" look to it, even if the Starfire is a badge-engineered Chevrolet Monza, Buick Skyhawk, and Pontiac Sunbird.

If you have any comments or suggestions, please say so! Thanks for looking!

*All rights reserved to the piece.


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## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

*Saul Bass Inspirations*

View attachment 19628


> View attachment 18735
> 
> *The third picture is a loosely based 1967 Ford Galaxie in a baby-blue color.


Here are two examples (taken from a cellphone camera, bad quality).














------------------------------------
Anyway, here is an artwork I did several months ago on the computer. I'm really bad at Photoshop, so I'm not a digital artist. However, I did try to digitally design a car from a car I drew, but that's a different story. When I did this artwork several months ago, I was looking at different corporate logo designers, especially Saul Bass (who created many typographies, movie title sequences, movie posters, etc.--basically _the_ graphic designer of the mid/late 20th century). He designed logos for Pan American Airlines, AT&T, United Airlines, Quaker Oats, and many more. From what you can see, Saul Bass's logos were based on simple, trite shapes, but with Modern lines added to create the shape. 

So, here's my interpretation of a Saul Bass logo that I did in MSPaint, because it's such a simple, user-friendly program, and Saul Bass's logos seem to be simple and user-friendly because of the recognizable shapes he used (circles, spheres, etc.).










Here's an off-branch Saul Bass inspiration, with a mix of that kind of loose, funky artwork that was popular in the late eighties and early nineties (another computer MSPaint artwork).









Enjoy and comment!

*All rights reserved to the art pieces.


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## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

I know it's been a while since I've posted anything, but I've been busy creating art for the AP 2D Design class I'm in. Our first project is called the "Word Project." In this project, you choose a word and create ten works of art in a week's time. This tests your ability to make quantitative (and qualitative) artworks within a deadline. I decided to do ten portraits of my favorite musicians, and here's four of the ten I have so far for Tuesday. 

*I had to play around with the brightness and contrast of the photos because my camera didn't pick up the true value of the drawings. Also, I don't own a scanner.

1. Joni Mitchell








2. Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes (from TLC)








3. Donna Summer








4. Ben Folds (background inspired from when he came to Birmingham last Saturday)









Here are the other six that I plan to do by Tuesday, but not necessarily in this order:

5. Crystal Waters (famous for her 1991, House/Dance song, "Gypsy Woman")
6. Annie Lennox (from Eurythmics)
7. Ann Wilson (from Heart)
8. Laura Branigan
9. Kim Wilde
10. Karen Carpenter


Please comment or make suggestions! I would appreciate it, as portraits aren't my absolute forte!

*All rights reserved to these pieces.


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## Danielsearch (May 27, 2011)

I like your portraits. ^.^


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## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

Danielsearch said:


> I like your portraits. ^.^


I will try to post the remaining portraits soon; the sketchbook that the portraits are in is not with me. 
Anyway, here are some doodles.














I love drawing cities with skyscrapers. I did this one (unfinished) of Birmingham using pencil, pen, and--primarily--Prismacolor markers. The buildings in the background are real, but most of the buildings in the foreground are only figments of my imagination. There's a photo I did a year ago to compare. 


I also enjoy drawing interior spaces. Anything with perspective, I love to draw. This, an unfinished one yet again (I started it the other night), is supposed to be a space-age 1980s kitchen. My dad used to have an appliance business, so he kept many GE appliance "Contract Sales" books from 1984 (when he started) to 2008-2009 (when he closed). I'll post a picture of the kitchen that inspired me to create this one, the drawing is basically the same as the photograph. For now, here it is.








When I was 14 or 15, I really got into a Transformers phase. Honestly, even typing this out, that was an embarrassing phase I went through. And even drawing Jazz here took a lot of gall for me to draw because I was really obsessed with the show. I did this when I was working as a spotlight for a Hindu mass ritual this summer. 








And, of course, I have to end this post out with a car. This is supposed to be a Monte Carlo (I love these cars so much), but I put my own ideas designing the front fascia.









I'll post more soon!

*All rights are reserved to these pieces.


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## benfoldsfive dude (Nov 24, 2009)

I know it's been a while, but I've been busy lately--here are the remaining portraits!








Laura Branigan (famous in the 1980s)







Her hair is really bad, but it's Annie Lennox.







Ann Wilson (Heart)







Karen Carpenter, looking back at her grave.







Kim Wilde


I was originally going to do one of Crystal Waters, but I was running out of time, and I decided to use a portrait of me that I did at the beginning of the summer--that one of me is bad, and I don't want to show that one!


With these portraits, I was attempting to capture the emotions I feel that these musicians put into their songs. 
==With Joni Mitchell, I see a woman who is "set-in-stone" with her mind. 
==With Lisa Lopes, I see a woman who's sassy, but has a caring side to her (that's why I put more detail in the eyes than any other part of the portrait). 
==With Donna Summer, I see her as someone who has 'soul' and wants to dance and have fun.
==With Ben Folds, I see him as someone who is laid back, but loves what he does--and loves the piano. That part of him totally came out when I went to his concert. He made the crowd feel like we were a close friend or family member of his by telling us about stories behind his songs.
==I don't know too much about Laura Branigan, except back in 2004, she died from an aneurysm. A couple of her famous songs were "Gloria" and "Self Control" (my favorite by her). She had a great voice, so I did this portrait of her.
==Annie Lennox, to me, is one of the many "voices" of women's rights (especially when she did "Sisters are Doin' It" with Aretha Franklin).
==Ann Wilson's portrait, and the other remaining two, was my attempt at trying to draw in a darker side of the musician's life. Even though the photograph is blurry, I emphasized on the lines of her face to make her look more tired, as well as thin and unhealthy (as she suffered from an eating disorder--bulimia, I think). Anyway, if search her name on the Internet, you'll come up with some results that talk about her struggles, and that was what I was trying to put in her facial expression.
==I think that my top favorite is the one of Karen Carpenter. I saw a picture of her online, sitting down on her drum set, looking off to the left with a worried expression. I wanted to somewhat replicate a worried facial expression. But instead of looking off into nowhere, like how it was in the picture, she's looking at her grave in the background. If you didn't know, she died from heart complications in 1983 after many years of struggling from anorexia, a bad divorce, and her mother's favor for her brother. I find that someone with so much talent and a beautiful alto voice, her voice in some songs sound cheerful. Inside Karen, though, she was miserable and was ill. No one, it seems like, in her network (mother, ex-husband) would take her problems serious and would just degrade her (her ex-husband especially). It's just such a shame that she died twenty-eight years ago; it wasn't her time.
==Last, but not least, Kim Wilde. In her song "Keep Me Hanging On," I feel like she has this "I don't care about you anymore" attitude, that I tried to create that mood in my portrait of her. A look of disgust.

I hope you've enjoyed it! Please comment!



*All rights reserved to these pieces.


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