Habits…Related to Ruts

Posted on January 8, 2020 by SusanG

Some habits are related to ruts. And some of them are quite easy to fall into. These are not usually the useful or productive type of habits. At least not for me. And I end up falling into them when I’ve had a switch up in things I can do. Like trying not to do certain things while an injury heals. At a certain point though, I get bored with them. And while I am sitting there engaged in whatever it is that I have let take over that time, I’m also thinking, ‘What the heck am I doing? This is really boring.’ or ‘Why am I doing this?’ or even ‘Man I’m just wasting time.’

Just a few days ago I was sitting at my desk, engaged in one of those time sucking habits thinking one of those things. And, thinking that I should just do something else. So I shifted my focus. I have been meaning to get a better grasp on the tools in the latest version of Blender. Most of the basics are the same as what I’ve been using however, I have never put a good effort into really learning the interface and the modeling tools available. Which leaves me a little handicapped when it comes to some of the things I want to create. As part of my trying to figure out what all I need to do to get my big project going, I realized I need to spend some time seriously learning Blender.

It’s going to be a donut

Fortunately the Blender community is pretty huge, and generous. And there is a legendary beginning Blender tutorial out there from Blender Guru. I’m not sure how many times he’s remade the tutorial. I know it’s up to date for the version I’m working in now which makes it awesome. It’s also free. And that’s even more awesome. I have been planning on joining Blender Cloud because of all the cool stuff there and the tutorials. And I started to go ahead and sign up. And then I thought again. If I really want to learn this, I need to do the Blender Guru donut tutorial. I’ve heard quite a bit about it and it seems to have taken on legend status or epic status. I’m not sure. But it’s a thing. I mean, if I’m not willing to go through that, I can’t be serious about wanting to learn this.

And so, for that one moment the cycle of the habit of wasted time was broken. I opened up the tutorial and started watching. I really needed to do this ages ago. I learned two things that solved some frustration I was having. Just in the first, ok second, video. The first one was an introduction. And one of the items that I learned was about something that just last month I had been thinking to myself that I wish I could figure out how to do that in Blender. I know how to do it in the Autocad softwares. And now I know how to do it in Blender. The other item was something I’d come across once or twice and couldn’t remember or figure out how to get back to it. It turns out that it is only available as soon as you create a mesh and if you do anything after you create it except click on the particular box, it goes away completely. Yep. No getting back to it. It’s a configuration box for the mesh you just created. And very handy to get into because it can do a few very useful things. And I’ve needed those things a few times recently.

And then just this evening, I watched the next video in the series. And I’ve learned about yet another tool I was looking for or wanting recently. Oh yeah. Working through this tutorial is an awesome idea. And yes. I’m actually working through it. It won’t stick as well if I just watch it. If I work through it and do all the steps and see what I get for myself, then it will stick. At least better. Which means, my current Blender project is making a donut.

Really. It’s going to be a donut. With icing.

I am still working through the shoulder issue. I’ve had some progress. At least it seems like progress. Not being in constant annoying pain helps. And some of the referring pain is not appearing in the wrist either at all or as much. I’ll take it. I see the Therapist again at the end of the week and depending on what that is like will make a difference as to what I’m able to do at the Blues Jam this weekend. Yes. We’ve got another one planned. In fact it’s the 10th Anniversary so I’d really like to at least go, even if I can only sing. I was looking through our list of good old standards and found a couple that I could learn to sing by then. But hopefully I can play at least one set. I’ll just have to see how that goes.

I was telling Kevin, one of the Jam organizers, the situation with the shoulder, and he seemed pretty cool about the idea of having another person that can sing as fill in. The key will be to learn how to direct things without the guitar in hand and keep things together. So maybe that will be the direction some of the music learning takes this year. Not just learning more on the guitar but learning more as a lead in general. I hadn’t really thought about that approach before. You know my attitude is that I’m a guitar player first. Like breaking the habit of killing time, and crawling out of the ruts I was discussing back in the summer, maybe it’s time to mix this up a little and see what happens.

For now, I’m doing my exercises. Practicing guitar when I can and now trying to find some songs to sing. And learning to make a donut in Blender.

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Looking Back and Looking Ahead

Posted on December 31, 2019 by SusanG

We’re at the point in the year, and decade, where everyone is either looking back at how things have gone or looking ahead trying to guess the future. It seems to be the thing to do.

Amplifier modeled in Blender

I thought about doing that. I figured it would help me understand and explain why I didn’t do all the things I thought I was going to do this year. I know I haven’t been as consistent with my posts this year but you’ve heard about nearly all of it, with the exception of the last few weeks. Which I’ll fill you in on in a moment. I was looking for the why of why I didn’t get some things done that I had hoped to. It seems an occupational carry over that I try to fix the “problem” or at least keep it from happening again.

I’ve come to the conclusion that it was a full year. There were a lot of things happen. And at this point, with few exceptions, it doesn’t really matter why. What matters is how I proceed. Do I still want to do those things? How important are they to me? And then I can move forward.

New art supplies

Some things got a little off track due to my choosing to do some prioritization that was different than what I’ve done in the past. I think I mentioned the big project at the day job. I was off on vacation from the day job the week after Thanksgiving. The first week I was back was the week leading up to the big date. I had been hurting really bad in my back, neck and shoulder, and it was even making it hard to play guitar. So since the vacation hadn’t helped that, I chose to not stress myself out trying to do everything I normally would for that week and instead I focused on whatever we needed for the project. This helped. I didn’t stress about not getting to a class or anything like that. I was able to put in the hours that it took without feeling like I was cheated. Because I made getting through that with the least amount of inner turmoil the priority. Turns out, the week after was also pretty full. And I was still hurting.

What I learned about changing my priority for those two weeks, and why I had done it, helped me decide to not push through all the pain and make myself frustrated and miserable trying to do things I generally enjoy doing but were becoming less and less fun because I hurt. The up shot of that is that I’m rusty on my Taekwondo. However. I also finally went to get some help for the pain.

As I mentioned, the pain was making it uncomfortable to play guitar. Not just playing for long periods of time. I was sore from just one or two songs. I have seen the Doctor and I’m now getting physical therapy for the problem. It turns out I have massive knots in muscles that I didn’t realize were muscles. I’m not far into the process so there are things I’m still not able to do, or not sure I should be doing. But it does help me understand where a bunch of that energy to do the fun stuff I like to do went. It went into me trying to maintain my composure.

Putting the new art supplies to use

I was trying to create a holiday card for this year during all this. The amp I modeled was going to be part of it. And as I got the amp done and started working on the other bits I decided that I would forego the card this year and instead focus on getting back to creating things with some quality and style. A couple of the earlier cards I did I am very happy with. Some of the later ones I think could be better. I want to get back to creating things I’m really happy with. I have an idea that I think will be fun to see come to life and I want to do it in a manner I am really proud of and that doesn’t feel like I just patched it together for now. That was another bit of re-prioritizing that I did in the last few weeks.

In case you wondered what St. Nick does to relax.
He wails on the SAX.
And yes, his name is actually Nick.

There were a few things that I did as usual. I made it to the December Blues Jam. It was a good time, as always. We even had a visit from Saint Nick. Or at least his stand in. I finished up the model of the amplifier and I got the new art supplies. Of course I had to try out the new art supplies. As a result I am nearly finished with a nice size piece of art for my dining room.

This Blue Footed Booby is just about ready to get framed for my wall

As for looking forward and what’s next. I’m still working that out. What I know so far is that I have a few things for the day job that I will be working on. Another certification test specifically and learning some new technology. There is the cool project I’ve mentioned. It’s a bit bigger than anything I’ve tackled in 3D so far. It’s going to require some planning and some training. I still intend to play guitar and sing when we have a Blues Jam. That was looking a little shaky a couple of months ago so I don’t know what that will bring. I’ll still be playing though. I’m also still looking for my forever steel string acoustic guitar and I think it may happen soon. Certainly in the next year. I’ve had a nice break from Taekwondo and find that I do miss it. I look forward to getting back to kicking. Hopefully I can take a more measured approach to it and get even more out of it. I’ve enjoyed the latest art projects with the pastels and I want to do more of that this year. As far as travel, I’m thinking about a couple of small, long weekend, type of jaunts. I’m still deciding on my next international destination. There are a couple that are looking interesting. And who knows with the changes at the day job I may find myself in Germany this year. It’s always a possibility.

To be sure, I’ll try to bring you along on some of the adventures, be those get out and see and do things adventures, adventures it art, adventures in music, adventures in technology, or just the adventure that is life. I’ll try to get back some consistency with my posts, though sometimes with a few less pictures, and sometimes maybe a few more.

Here’s to a 2019 that has just about passed. And to a 2020 ahead of us with a full year of possibilities. May the year be everything you hope for and everything you need.

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Most Productive 20 Minutes

Posted on December 5, 2019 by SusanG

I spent about 20 minutes watching a video on how to paint with acrylics for beginners. It was a two plus hour video and I only watched 20 minutes of it and yet it turned out to be a super productive 20 minutes. It wasn’t what the person was teaching that made it productive. It was what I learned in that time that made it productive.

I’m not like Tommy, this is how I build Amps

I have drawn with pencil for more years than I can really say. I do it in fits and spurts, like I have with my music. Once in a while I would venture to try to add some color to my work. For this I’ve used ink and the stippling process to create something with more color or at least more interesting. I always go back to the pencil because I like the feel of the pencil in hand. I like the control as well as the bits that I can sort of force into other shapes using the shading or smudging techniques. And yet, when it comes to larger scale pieces and things I want to have greater pop, I find a level of frustration. The solution, so I’ve thought, was to learn to paint.

More Amp action

I’ve tried watercolor paints a few times and they just don’t allow me to create the art I want to see. With that in mind, I figured I should try oil or acrylic paints since they would allow the more vibrant colors that are hard to come by with watercolor as well as the broad stroke and better control. So I went looking for a how to video because it would get me started. And I found one. After listening to the person explain about the quality of paints to use, he then started explaining about the tools, the brushes. It was at this point I figured out, painting is not for me. Certainly right now and possibly ever. Something about the blob of paint at the end of the brush and how far away it was from my hand filled me with a dread and despair.

That was the most productive 20 minutes I could spend because for me, it let me finally see that I didn’t need to keep trying to figure out how to paint more than the walls of my house. It let me finally acknowledge that I don’t enjoy making art that way. It let me finally let go of continuing to fight a battle I really didn’t have my heart in. And it let me move on and look at the things I’ve done art in that I enjoyed the process or the outcome. I’ve done one or two things involving soft pastels, and I like colored pencil. Both, put the medium closer to my hand and give me the control I feel I have with a graphite pencil. Both allow me to create vibrantly colored pieces of art.

My books on frogs arrived and I was inspired to draw this without direct reference.

So I will be working on creating art in either soft pastels or colored pencil. I’m actually excited about it. I’ve got a few pieces lined up to work on. And I’ve ordered some fresh supplies since, I found when I was working on my test piece, that my supplies were either incomplete or in a distressed state or both. Those should arrive within the week. I’ll still be working in the graphite. I enjoy it and what I can do with it. And I’m always pleasantly surprised to see the results. I’ll also be continuing work in the computer, particularly with Blender. I find it endlessly fascinating what I can do there and while it is often a struggle as I continue to learn new techniques and tricks. It is another case of being pleasantly surprise with some of the end results.

My pastel test piece.

While I was looking for that video on learning to paint, I came across a talk that Andrew Price, from Blender Guru and Poliigon, gave at the 2016 Blender Conference. ‘The Habits of Effective Artists’, you can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vM39qhXle4g . I found it really interesting and inspiring. And relevant to more that just visual artists. The information and tricks and steps and all are helpful across all forms of art. I even recommended it to my mother who is a writer. She found so much value she recommended it to some of her writer’s lists. In it he mentions the book ‘Steal Like An Artist’ by Austin Kleon. A book I have heard of but never bothered to check out. Because somewhere along the way I bought into some myth about creating art. Well, I’m learning new stuff this week so why not check it out. This is another bit of creative advice with tips and tricks that I would recommend across all creative mediums be it writing, visual art, musical art, you name it. It’s a fast and easy read.

The pictures are some things I’ve been working on in the last couple of weeks or so.

I haven’t been spending much time playing music for the simple fact, I’ve been having some pain issues in my elbow, wrist, and back. I have found some things that help with that and I’m getting a bit more back in the groove. I feel a need to have a bit more practice time this week. We are lucky enough to have another jam coming up this weekend. At this point, every one we get feels to be a gift.

Messy desk while working. You can see my reference for the frog pastel test piece. And a bit of coloring I did to get the juices going.

I do still have the videos from the last jam to get edited. As I am off from the day job this week, I might manage to work that in, in between music practice, drawing, and computer art. Which are all I’m hoping to do this week.

A final note on my productive 20 minutes. We tend to think of productivity as being what we get done. But productive can also be eliminating things we don’t need to do. There are so many possibilities that it can sometimes be a challenge to figure out what is the right thing to be doing for each person. Eliminating those things that are not right is just as productive as doing one of those things that is right. We get to narrow our focus and find the things that are really worth concentrating on for each of us.

Enjoy the pics.

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Always Practice First

Posted on November 17, 2019 by SusanG

I promise this is not a story, lesson, rant, or lament about practice before performing. It’s a good idea and recommended of course. However, it’s actually a comment on the completely different mindset I usually find myself in after I have had some practice and play time on my guitar. I’m in a much better and more upbeat mood and I know it comes out in what I write here.

Getting ready to jam.

Yes. I had some practice and play time on my guitar before I sat down to write this. It was lovely. So much fun. I even played with my pedals a bit which I haven’t really done in a while. You know there is some evidence, somewhere, that playing music is as therapeutic as meditation. I believe it. And the more I learn and better I get at what I know the more fun, less frustrating, and even more therapeutic I find it.

Hey. We had a Blues Jam last weekend. It was great. Honestly, as much fun as it is to get up and play with a group no matter the crowd size, it really is more fun to get up and play when there are a lot of people. And the jams are more fun when we’ve got more musicians as well. We like to talk shop. And unless we have other friends or family that are musicians, most people we talk to don’t really care that we were supposed to start on the five but forgot and then the rhythm guitar was a half step off key. And are those vintage tubes in that amp or newer ones? Don’t you think the original Cry Baby is better than these newer wah pedals? Yeah, you know. They think we are from some distant planet. So it’s great to have more musicians to play with and chat with in between sets. As you might guess that was exactly the case with this jam. And it was so much fun.

What a jam should look like.

We did have a couple of new people show up and that’s always great. It’s fun to have new people join in and bring a fresh take on things. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s not quite what we hope, and sometimes it leaves you thinking maybe not. We had some good and some I’m not so sure. We had some technical glitches too. No one got zapped this time. We had a guitar strap issue and someone finally completely broke in Tommy’s Lucky 13 amp that we’ve been road testing for months. And it all worked out in the end.

I got to play with Tommy for the first set and that was fun. We gave the new song a go, I thought I knew the words much better that I really did so while I did ok playing it, though I got tips on why the turn around didn’t sound right, I had some issues with singing it. I’ll have it down soon though. And we did a few that I do standard. Though, Tommy plays, or has played, a lot of bluegrass. So playing with Tommy is a little like trying to jump on a speeding train from a beach chair. It’s fun though. And it sounded good. And I think I was able to keep up. Though, I still need to turn it up on those solos.

Jammers on stage

I had an odd experience with one of the new jammers. I’d go into it a bit more except, I’m not sure I can without sharing all the details and particulars of what happened. And even then, I’m not sure it would explain what made it such and odd experience. It would probably just sound like I was whining or that I got my proverbial toes stepped on. I didn’t. And it wasn’t like he was overtly rude or that it ruined my night. It did none of that. And in fact, we managed to play a couple of songs, that I haven’t even practiced in months, and they turned out really good. So, we’ll skip the why and what happened to make it odd for me. Though I will say I think a couple of others found playing with him a little on the odd side as well.

The colors were striking. It is Autumn after all.

We are at risk of not being able to continue the Blues Jam. Aside from this weekend, the last few months have seen really low attendance. And that’s not just audience attendance. The numbers of musicians coming out has dwindled considerably as well. When that happens once in a while because of holidays and the like, it’s not a big deal. When it starts to seem like the new status quo at a regular venue, then it becomes an issue. It’s not easy to find places where we can play, or that will let us play. While the Charlotte area does have a live music scene, it needs support. It needs the support of venues that see it as worth the effort to have live music. And, it needs the support of an audience in order to convince the venues to continue to support it. What that means is, if a band, singer, jam, whatever, doesn’t bring more patrons to the venue than they would have with just sports on the television, then it’s not cost effective for the venue to have live music. So the band, the performer, the jam, loses it’s spot on the calendar for that venue. Our low participation numbers over the last several months mean, our regular location is reconsidering having us there. This jam was good. It was a good size. There were lots of people, and a fair number of musicians. And I heard one of the staff say that this one was actually worth it. The big unknown though is if we will be able to sustain that.

Still working on that new Snowman

I know that sounds like a bit of a downer. And it is. It will not, however, keep me from continuing to play guitar and learn new songs. No matter what happens with the jam, I have learned so much, and made so much progress in my singing and playing over the last couple of years and I’m not inclined to let that go. I’m excited to continue to learn new songs. I can actually see the day when I’m picking up songs from listening to them and I’m not hunting around for TAB or sheet music. I’ve already started to hear and begin to try to pick out bits of things. When I’m practicing and take a moment to just noodle around, I’m starting to find bits of different songs. I’ll play something and think, wait, that sounds like… and then I’ll think of what it is and then I purposefully try to find the right riff or key or whatever it is that I’d found. It’s a huge step for me and I’m super excited to be at this point. I’m not interested in going backwards. So I will continue to play and learn and hopefully get better.

Oh. Yes, you did read right. There is video. I’ll work on getting it edited and posted so you can judge for yourself how things went.

Progress being made.

I’m not entirely sure what is up next. I know we have the Thanksgiving holiday coming up in the US and I have the week after that off from the day job. I need to get on to the new art project with the new Snowman. I made some progress on the modeling last week and I need to spend some time in the chair working the last bits of this one part out. Then I think I’ll be pretty comfortable getting to the rest of it. There are quite a few bits to be modeled for what I’m looking to do. And yes, I’m still planning on a Holiday card out of it for this year. Though probably not before the holiday gets here. Hmm. Maybe that will be the what’s next.

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Art, Music, A Desk and Frogs

Posted on November 8, 2019 by SusanG

The last week plus have come and gone without a lot that I really thought was worth writing about. Then I put a little more thought into and found some nice bits of things that I could share.

SQUIRREL!

I might have mentioned that not only did the trip to Australia spur a need to get back to a beach, it also spurred a desire to get back to some art. I’m still working on incorporating this more into my day to day. However, I’ve made some steps. While I was out at the arts and crafts store, where I did buy a big box of colored pencils, I came across a book on Manga that got me to thinking I want to try drawing a frog, or two. Sometimes I source reference pictures off the internet and sometimes I get books. I wanted a book and so went to a local bookstore chain only to find not a single book on amphibians or frogs or lizards. They had dogs, cats, some birds, and horses I think. It was sad and pathetic and sent me to Amazon. I now have two books of some really fabulous photos so all kinds of frogs. Next up, bats. No, I haven’t started the drawing(s) yet.

I have started a sketch of another animal though. I figured that since I was having trouble really getting back into the drawing that the best thing was going to be to just start with something and see how it goes. It’s really like music in that respect. Doing it, even a little of it at a time still gives a chance to learn and improve. And build, or rebuild confidence which I suspect is some of what might be holding me back. Still, I’m moving in the right direction.

Working out what to do

I even got to some of my digital art in this time. I have a project with the Snowman that I’m working on and I need to give him new arms. Well, I’m making a whole new Snowman. But I was having trouble getting started on the arms. I would try something and get just a little ways and then delete it. I finally figured out that I needed to sketch out a bit of reference for what I want or think the hand part should look like, since this is part of what has been giving me trouble. So I did. It’s not at all detailed. Just stick figure sort of stuff. No pun intended at all. I’m glad I did it because when I had time to pull up Blender and give it a go, it was perfect for getting me started. I actually think I know what to do to make it work now. I’m excited. Now if I could just have enough energy to work on it when I have the time.

I haven’t neglected the music and guitar. In fact I’ve been busy learning the blues scale in all five of the positions/shapes that fit in with the pentatonic scales. That’s been fun. I try to get through them at least once a night since I’m still trying to get them to stick. I’ve found one or two songs that I can make use of them so far. Which is cool. I’ve just started learning an eight bar blues song. It’s on our list of stand-bys so hopefully I’ll get to where I can play and sing that one. And I’m going back through some of the other songs I know to see what I can spice up or clean up or enhance.

Getting started finally.

The day job is still there and things that were supposed to happen with our big project have been postponed. There have been additional hiccups as well. It’s not unexpected. All the cool new and exciting stuff is still a bit off in the future. Not until January mostly. That means I’m still working to get through an initial read of the material for the next test I’m going to take. I’m struggling with that a little. It’s not the most riveting stuff to read and I’ve not been getting good rest. Though I have no idea why not.

New desk. Look! Drawers!

I am still at Taekwondo. Enjoying it very much and going regularly. I don’t know if I mentioned that I’d started at a gym and signed up with a trainer. I see the trainer once a week and he has given me a set of exercises to do if I can make it to the gym a second time in the week. I’ve done this three weeks in a row now. I’m working on making that second day a regular thing. I’ve finally gotten past the routine of only going right after work. A couple of times I’ve gone much later in the evening after I’ve finished a few other errands and such and it’s been really nice. So that’s looking pretty positive.

I got a new desk. Sometime ago I realized that part of what I wasn’t liking in my art room was that the desk had no storage. Just a top and legs. That meant there was a lot of stuff all over the surface of the desk no matter how much I tried to tidy up. After looking online at the office stores and not really liking what I found there, I gave up and checked IKEA. Yeah, I know what people like to say or joke about them. Truth is, they had what I wanted and needed. And it’s got nice clean lines and I now have storage. Yay.

There is another Blues Jam coming up this weekend. I need to get some serious practice in, in the next few days. I’m looking forward to it. Hopefully we’ll have more people there, to play as well as listen. It’s really a lot better and more fun the more people that come out. I don’t have a lot of pictures to share this time but here are a few of the desk, and some of what I’ve been working on.

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