Thoughts on Drawing Dinosaurs
First: No Mammoth Cave related blog this week. The book is still coming along, and is more nearly ready than ever before!!! However, I’m working on something really big related to that book. It may become a blog. It may become something different. Either way, stay tuned. Something Mammoth Cave related will appear next week.
Now: What is this about?
Read the title silly!
Colors are only speculative, and fun.
But really!
I learned to do something really cool, an idea I had over a year ago. I have finally learned how to do it, and as a result I may be able to do something I have wanted to do for a long time. You’ll see the early results of my research below. But I am using them here to make another point. Sort of.
I’m not a visual artist. Every now and then—given the right conditions—I will sketch. I like sketching. I like my sketches. Sometimes when I show them to other people, they even know what I have drawn. You can find evidence of my ‘artwork’ strewn about this website. (The only sketches posted at the time of this blog come from an early attempt at Coffee Chronicles.) You can find evidence of other people’s, professional people’s, artwork on this page too.
My logo was made for me, (maybe one day I will even show the ridiculous MS paint logo I used as a design prompt. But probably not.)
The covers of my JRIC books, (and interior illustrations in them) are illustrated by Bailey. Learn more on her website. - Check out her other stuff. It’s all cool.
There’s a marked difference between the professional work, and mine. Some of it is talent. Some of it is time. Some of it is education. I did not choose to study and hone my visual art skills. There’s a variety of reasons. I can tell you a big ones is that I cannot draw a straight line, or a convincing circle, to save my life. My illustrations of people are best used as cautionary drawings shown to children to warn them about the human-shaped things which hunt us all from the shadows. Some of it is patience. I can bloviate in one of these written blogs for words more than I should, but the moment I set down a drawing, I find it nearly impossible to pick up again. Even if I am only halfway finished. And some of it is imposter syndrome. When I write, I am comfortable with the rules, and comfortable abusing them. (Like stretching the use of words like bloviate outside of their comfort zone.) But when I’m drawing, and things don’t seem right, I would rather differ to someone else’s work, than justify my own.
Anyway. Whether you ignored that long paragraph, or got lost halfway through, The summary is that I chose to develop other talents besides art. Talents like writing, running, traveling, and whatever you call posting overly long things on the internet.
What’s my point?
You’ve probably seen some of my drawn ?art? on this site. If you read this when it comes out, check the homepage for a small seasonal Easter egg. (6 of them, at the top.) There are Latteans abounding, my jank logo for Coffee Chronicles on Kindle Vella. (read it now!!!) However, each of these is obviously more than just drawn. You’re reading this on a screen, not a sheet of paper. (unless you printed this off just to prove me wrong.)
If you read my April 1st blog, you will see other examples of my ?art?. Photographs of very real, and not at all imaginary, national parks. I’m a published photographer after all. (In my Father’s book about the Dry Tortugas.) But you might notice that—like my Lattean ?art?—even these photographs have digital enhancements. Those enhancements were done using photoshop.
Most of the park “sketches” you will see on this website are photos I took, and then photoshopped to look like sketches. Why? Because I like the sketch style. How can you tell? Straight lines. Here’s an example(and a Mammoth Cave link for this blog entry):
I took the photo. I do not have the patience to add this much ink to a page, nor the skill to make any railings that long and straight. (photoshop)
The Lattean’s I drew have been turned into png’s and jpg’s so that I can put them on the website. I’ve manipulated their size, sometimes their shape, and even added things in photoshop. I used the software to make changes, to ‘fix’ my mistakes, and even add things which weren’t there.
Otherworld octopus is a borrowed image added later. There was no octopus crawling from the dimensional rift in real life.
It took time to learn how to do all of this, but there are definitely things that the program made easier. It’s a tool, a tool enhanced by algorithmic learning. The smart selector helps me select only the things I want. Smart filters reduce the noise. I transform things to straighten up Lattean’s I drew crooked.
There are times, that these changes make me look like a more talented visual artist than I really am. Are any of these on the level of professional art? You tell me. No seriously, would you like a series of postcards from My Favorite Least Known National Parks? For the right price that can be arranged. But, actually seriously, sure these are fun hobby art. I wouldn’t put any of this work up against skilled, practiced, professional, or studied artist, but I obviously have no compunction sharing it here.
Would I call myself an artist for making it? As much as I would call myself a marketer for trying multiple ways to sell my books: ie: It’s not where my talents are focused, but sometimes I do it anyway. Also, I have fun making it, and sometimes my brain puffs out after too much writing, and I need to do something else.
Summary. I am not a professional visual artist. I am not seeking to be. I enjoy making the art that I make, and share it because a website/blog which is simply a wall of text would be ridiculous to slog through. I will hire out when I need something to look good.
Rocken Rexy celebrates your slog with an air guitar riff!
The point I was driving towards: Yesterday, a cute little stegosaurs appeared in the search bar at the bottom of my screen. Traditionally, this image location has been an indicator of some kind of holiday. I clicked it to see if, just maybe, April 5th—(see I write these ahead of time)—might happen to be Stegosaurus Day. A Day truly worth celebrating! However, what I got instead was an offer from Bing: “Draw your own dinosaur with Bing Image Creator,” and up came myriad renditions of dinosaurs and dinosaur-like things. “Type here to describe the dinosaur picture you want to draw.”
Ahh. That’s what this is. A topical AI art discussion.
There were many shape, size, and styles of saurian and saurian-ish images which appeared on my screen. All of them generated using an algorithm. Produced by people typing out what they wanted to see, and filtered through a program designed to interpret their wordy desire visually. Huh.
A whole world suddenly opened up to me. If you see the navigation bar on this website, you will notice a dropdown menu for online press. One of the choices is this blog, one is Coffee Chronicles, (read it now,) and one is Dino Force Alpha. A comic Idea I’ve had for years, but I’ve never been able to execute how I visualize it. Dinosaurs, drawn my way, and all I would have to do is type out what I wanted… This could go a long way towards making Dino Force Alpha real.
All it would cost was the sacrifice of my core conviction that somewhere along the way, at some point possibly impossible to define, there is a line being crossed. A line between tool made art and empty display. Is that line the, probably, stolen artwork used to feed the algorithm so that it “ ‘knew’ “ - (three quotes necessary) how to make dinosaurs? Is it the vague, slightly uncanniness of some of the images of ‘dinosaurs’ I was shown? Is it simply the ease with which this new route offered me something I haven’t been able to make work yet? Am I Socrates yelling at books?
Another technological tool at my disposal, or a soulless bit of software seeking to supplant artistry?
I’m not going to turn this into a rant about “AI” art, yet. (which isn’t even AI in the ‘traditional’ Sci-fi use of the word. I’m cool with potential future sentient robots, but algorithms aren’t intellegent or sentient. —- I’m not turning this into that rant either.)
What I will do, is tell you how I responded.
I ignored the chance to “draw dinosaurs with my words” (Aka: tell a computer what I wanted and let it spit something out.) And I went and drew my own dinosaurs instead. Then I turned them into digital images I could share to make this weird blog. And in the process, I learned a fun little trick I might be able to use to make Dino Force Alpha work one day. Will it pan out? Will Dinoforce Alpha ever be a thing? Is AI art art?
Two of those cannot be answered yet. (I’m really busy trying to make more JRIC and Coffee Chronicles right now DFA is kinda on the backburner.) The third has an answer, but I will not get into it today.
What I will say is that I am happy Bailey, a cool person, is illustrating my books.* And here are some crudely arted dinosaur illustrations drawn and digitized by hand and photoshop. Are they art? ??? One of them isn’t even a dinosaur. But I had fun making them and I learned in the process.**
*do not blame any real artists for the things I spread across this website. And don’t panic, I will never make my own book covers. (unless I get much much much much much much much much much much much much much much much much yes I’m typing all of these out and not copy pasting much much much much much much much much much better.)
**process… (To Be continued when I feel more like ranting. Is it a rant if it’s in written form? I’d rather leave that as an open question than bothering to look it up. I still have to add the pics.)
Take care and party on!