I had the opportunity last week to go to Los Angeles, California on a school trip. It was a fantastic experience and I'm going to tell you all about it and what I learned!
Monday March 5
Most people flew out with the group, but my husband, me, and two others from the group decided to drive out in order to save money. We left at midnight Monday morning and started the long ten-ish hour drive from Provo to LA. I had tried to nap and sleep Sunday afternoon and evening, but was fairly unsuccessful since I was so anxious and excited for the trip.
So! We drove all the way to LA. It was dark pretty much until we hit California. I was awake for most of the way, I dozed off once or twice and only once was even close to an hour. Anyway, we were headed south on I-15 which means we drive through Las Vegas. It's about half way on the drive. The moon had just set, dawn was still an hour or so away, when we came along to Vegas. We come out of the canyon and there was a SEA of LIGHT! It was beautiful! As far as the eye could see there were little lights from horizon to horizon. There really is nothing else like that view of dark rocks and then suddenly, light! We had a great time looking at all the fancy casinos and cool buildings as they were all lit up. It's definitely a sight I recommend experiencing at least once.
We arrived about three hours before everyone else, so we hung out on the California State University Northridge campus for a couple of hours after eating a picnic lunch. I had big plans to do homework, I have a short story to write for class and it's still not done. I set up in the library on a couch, started typing, and couldn't keep my eyes open. I sat there for maybe fifteen minutes half-asleep, unable to open my eyes, with my laptop out on my lap. I decided that wasn't going to work, so I put my laptop back in my backpack, set my backpack on the couch next to me, curled up on it, and promptly fell asleep for a good hour. After that I woke back up and typed away for another hour and pretty much wrote myself into a corner.
After the library we met up with the rest of the group and listened to a presentation by Laurel Long. She talked about the process she goes through to illustrate a book. The key tidbits I picked up from her were that she paints with cheap little craft brushes and a medium eyeshadow brush from Target, publishers look at competitions, and if you give publishers post cards they will keep them if they like them. She gave a lot more advice, but those were the most important and new things to me.
After Laurel Long we went to see Nathan Fowkes at the LA Academy of Fine Art. He talked to us about his work as a lighting designer for Dreamworks. He gave a lot of advice, but focused on how you need to practice and push yourself artistically at least once a week or else you'll go nowhere. You need to do the equivalent of gesture drawings with environments, go plein air painting (I don't know how to spell it) because it's the best way to learn about light and color. It's good to do studies every night. You don't know what a color does until you put it into context with other colors. He was a very nice guy and very good at what he does.
After Nathan we went to visit Joseph Todorovich in his studio/apartment. He had a fantastic set up with plenty of space and working areas. He had three different easels with in progress paintings, and they were beautiful. Sadly I fell asleep on one of his antique couches since I was so exhausted from the long day. I did manage to catch him give the advice of how it's important to be passionate and to always be working before I nodded off. We got back to the hotel after 10:30, and I did a few things before finally falling asleep sometime before midnight. I didn't take any pictures the first day.
This is getting to be a long enough post as it is, so I think I'll post this for now and give you the rest of the week later. I promise there will be pictures! More exciting stories also!
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