My current WIP is driving me nuts…. every time I think I’m ready to wrap it up, I see something new that could be added to make it better. There were other things I was supposed to be doing today…like updating mom’s website and cleaning up the apartment… but no, this damm picture insists on being tended to.

My brother would call these rich person problems. :)

Holy shit, I’m getting feedback on DA. From people who don’t *know* me. It’s… nice, but also strange. And hey, I’ve had random strangers love my stuff before…. but it’s always a little disconcerting. (This would be the shy part of me, as opposed to the anti-social part.)

Oh, and it occurs to me that I should actually post a link to the gallery: http://julie-karasik.deviantart.com/

Most folks who know me in RL know my mom’s a sculptor/illustrator. I sometimes mention that most of the rest that family are professional artists of some stripe. Today I thought I’d spotlight my aunt Jenny (photo-realistic acrylics).

Whenever the topic of editing sf comes up, I think of Frank Herbert. Dune is a great book, in part because of all the stuff that (I have heard it said that) John Campbell made him take out of the body of the book and stuff into the appendices where it belongs. (Cf. LotR.) And after its success, FH said, Hey, I’m a great author, I don’t need no steenking editors! And look at how they ramble on and on and on and on and … Worse with each sequel.
-thnidu, commenting in skzbrust’s journal. (link)

Had to quote this here because it’s just so painfully accurate. I picked up Dune when I was 15, and loved it. Went though Dune Messiah and Children of Dune in short order. (Children is still my favorite of them all) Then came God Emporer of Dune, and I started to wonder if the man wasn’t taking too many hits of something mind altering. After stubbornly wading though the last two books, I was convinced of it. The sheer overwrought-ness of Heretics of Dune and Chapterhouse: Dune killed any interest I might have had in the continuation novels. (Though I’ve heard that they don’t actually suck)

Herbert’s not alone here - plenty of authors commit the sin of believing that they’ve “outgrown” the need for editors. (Hey, over in the corner! I’m looking at you, Ann.) It seems to be a professional hazard.

Part of me has always wanted to just chuck everything and be an artist full time, but I’ve never had the courage. So here’s a shout out to someone who does. :)

One of the ways I know I’m really getting my artistic groove on? I’ll randomly stop work to dance around the house for a few minutes, then pick back up where I left off. (I used to do this all the time when I was a kid - don’t know how my grandparents put up with the banging on the ceiling.)

When it comes to graphics apps, Painter has always come in a distant second to Photoshop for me, but now that I’m doing more line art and coloring (as opposed to photomanipulation) I’m finding myself…. constrained by my beloved PS. I’m dicking around with Painter Essentials 3 (came free with my tablet) and damn but it’s fun. Freeing.

I’m not ditching PS by any stretch of the imagination, but another tool in the chest is not a bad thing. :) results of today’s fun will be up soon.

So, after being taken to task (kindly) by a friend for my lack of blogging, I’ve been thinking about why I began blogging and why it’s petered off.

While I’d been posting rants and site updates on a semi-regular basis, I began blogging in a conscious manner the day on 9/11. Suddenly, I felt I had something to say.

I have a a habit of going though multi-year cycles - first expressing myself visually and then then expressing myself via the written word. 2001 though 2003 was absolutely the high end of my last “written” phase. (The one before that ran roughly from 1993-1998). Since then I’ve been heading more and more towards the visual, to the point where I’m trying to make a serious go at being a pro artist.

These days, when I stare at the keyboard, I can think of nothing to write except repetitive, bitchy complaints about my day job, or repetitive, bitchy complaints about the state of politics. Maybe I just don’t have the same fire in my belly that I had five years ago, but I don’t want to rehash the same old stuff. If I’m going to write about something, I want it to be something I’d actually want to read.

Now I do have a number of “in progress” paintings, illustrations, and photos that will eventually see the light of day out here, but until they are actually *finished*, I won’t be posting them. (Feels too much like walking out of the house half naked.)

Customers who see my work at a show sometimes ask if they’re photographs and my answer is always no. A photograph is the final end product for a photographer, but it is only my raw material. Almost all of my pieces begin their “lives” as a photo (sometimes as more than one). I take that photo and import it into my computer. Photoshop is then used extensively to bring that photo or series of photos into line with the image I see in my head.

Some of the flowers that look the least “played with” have actually had more work done to them than some of the simpler portraits. That “perfect shot” I thought I was getting always turns out to be spoiled by poor lighting or greenery that suddenly jumps into the viewfinder, obscuring that brilliant play of petals. I may be many things, but I am not the world’s best photographer. What I see in my mind’s eye is almost never what I get after the shutter clicks.

Pounding the source material into a finished product might mean doing simple things like adjusting the color and light in a shot and then giving it what I call the “painting treatment” - which is done manually with Photoshop’s brushes. Preset filters just don’t give me enough control over the finished product.

More complicated pieces can require the wholesale removal and addition of elements, depending on how much I want to “fix” the original piece. Sometimes I want to add extra petals, remove or simplify an overly complex background, or add body elements not normally found on humans. My eraser takes things away, and I then can paint in what I want to see.

I manually paint in the most detail on my fantasy portraits. Tattoos, hair effects and highlights, outre skin tones, and anything else I think up gets painted on layer by layer in photoshop until I can look at it, squint my eyes and say to myself “nope, doesn’t need anything more.”

So do I make photographs? No - I make digital paintings.

So, what’s a joodle? It’s knotwork, tattoos, art nouveau, medieval illuminations, and many other sundry bits of inspiration all thrown into a pot and simmered for thirty-odd years. At the end of this process you will have an individual (named Julie) who doodles. Constantly.

Sometimes the a Joodle grows up and turns into a full blown illustration. Sometimes it gets an extra special treatment and becomes a tattoo or a painting. However, most joodles live a quiet life in one of several sketchbooks, waiting for the day when they too will get to “grow up” and take their turn in the great big world.