Attack of the Pollen!

If you couldn't tell I'm having a rough spring with this stupid pollen...

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

Death by Pollen

Yesterday, April 7th.

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

Nude Drawings - NSFW

I am taking a life drawing class on tuesday nights at my old high school as part of the adult education program.  Below are some of my sketches from my first class last night.

To get you started I'll do a tame sketch so you don't have this naked woman popping up on your computer screen before you read my blurb.  I notoriously don't like feet... not at all.  I think they are ugly and weird looking... but I have to say, that all night I was enjoying drawing feet.  The one above was my favorite.

This one is one of my favorites, I had a great angle to work with, BUT I went over my pencil lines w/conte crayon, and lost the whole "this took a lot of time" effect.  The conte crayon makes this 30 min sketch look quick and easy.

I got the worst angle in the house for this one (and i couldn't move to a better seat!)  She was facing me directly and her legs and right arm are foreshortened.  But I have to say I like how the legs turned out.

I really liked this pose too, but it was very easy.  I'm just happy I got a butt drawing in... for some odd reason i really wanted to draw a butt.  I think it goes back to a painting I saw at the MET two years ago... some naked fat guy in a pose similar to this one.

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

Happy Easter!

I started my day off pretty creatively today.  I decorated a lamb shape cake (a family tradition), and then dyed eggs all by my lonesome (my sister fell asleep).  On a hot creative streak I decided to take a few pictures!  These are my favorite two.

I know what you must be thinking, "wow Bernadette, so creative... they are all solid colors..."  well I guess I had the 7 rainbow eggs photo in my head the entire time I was dying them.  And also, the "pink" egg actually fades from pink to red... so yea! Take that! There are two creative ones... haha.

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

april

I have never posted one before, but I do these splash pages before the start of each month.  This one came out particularly well, so I thought I'd share!

PS My favorite part is the Easter grass under the egg

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

In like a Lion

From March 31st.

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010

Do Doodle

I posted an article I found about this about a year ago, but here is another version of the same findings.  It's still cool to me that there are other people out there that have brains that "work" the same way as mine!  And it's even cooler that scientists did a study on doodling!!!

Do Doodle: Doodling Can Help Memory Recall

"ScienceDaily (Mar. 5, 2009) — Doodling while listening can help with remembering details, rather than implying that the mind is wandering as is the common perception. According to a study published today in the journal Applied Cognitive Psychology, subjects given a doodling task while listening to a dull phone message had a 29% improved recall compared to their non-doodling counterparts.

40 members of the research panel of the Medical Research Council's Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge were asked to listen to a two and a half minute tape giving several names of people and places, and were told to write down only the names of people going to a party. 20 of the participants were asked to shade in shapes on a piece of paper at the same time, but paying no attention to neatness. Participants were not asked to doodle naturally so that they would not become self-conscious. None of the participants were told it was a memory test.

After the tape had finished, all participants in the study were asked to recall the eight names of the party-goers which they were asked to write down, as well as eight additional place names which were included as incidental information. The doodlers recalled on average 7.5 names of people and places compared to only 5.8 by the non-doodlers.

"If someone is doing a boring task, like listening to a dull telephone conversation, they may start to daydream," said study researcher Professor Jackie Andrade, Ph.D., of the School of Psychology, University of Plymouth. "Daydreaming distracts them from the task, resulting in poorer performance. A simple task, like doodling, may be sufficient to stop daydreaming without affecting performance on the main task."

"In psychology, tests of memory or attention will often use a second task to selectively block a particular mental process. If that process is important for the main cognitive task then performance will be impaired. My research shows that beneficial effects of secondary tasks, such as doodling, on concentration may offset the effects of selective blockade," added Andrade. "This study suggests that in everyday life doodling may be something we do because it helps to keep us on track with a boring task, rather than being an unnecessary distraction that we should try to resist doing.""

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All images copyright of Bernadette Moke 2010