Arg

Chris mentioned that NYU is offering a course in storyboarding; I’ve been thinking of picking up this skill, since I think I’d be good at it and it seems like a good way to pick up money on a flexible schedule. Unfortunately, being NYU, they’re charging like $900 for it. I figured SVA would charge a lot less, and since we were on 23rd Street anyway, we detoured over to the main SVA building and I picked up the Fall 2002 continuing education course catalog. I’ve looked it over, and discovered a few things:

• The Advertising department has all the best course titles and descriptions. They would, wouldn’t they? They actually offer a classes called “Oooh, Advertising Sounds Like an Interesting Career, I Think I’ll Take This Class”, and “Get Humiliated” and — oh, just look for yourself.
• There doesn’t seem to be a course in just storyboarding.
• The Illustration & Cartooning department offers a whole bunch of interesting courses. (Not surprising, that’s what I majored in.) “Drawing New York City” involves going around the city drawing on location. “Anatomy of a Portrait: All About Faces” also intrigues. Anyway, “Cartooning for Syndication, TV and Comic Books” is probably what I want, despite the missing serial comma; it covers a bunch of stuff including storyboarding, and it’s only $410. First session was today. Oops. I really should have thought of this a few weeks ago, ideally before the summer so I maybe could have taken a course already. I may look into it anyway; it’s a twelve-session course, so I might still be able to profit from the remaining eleven.

Sepia

I haven’t gone to the gym in a bit over a week. I’ve noticed the signs of depression circling around at the edges of my consciousness. There’s probably a causal relationship between these two facts, but which way runs the river-oh?

My weight seems to be under control — 277 today. Getting sick probably took care of my holiday pounds, but I didn’t spring immediately back up again afterwards like last time I was sick. I ought to at least go on the treadmill, even if I can’t face the thought of three hours of weightlifting, just to make sure I don’t gain everything back.

My sleep schedule’s screwed up again. Not much point trying to fix it with Games Club coming up tomorrow, but I should try over the weekend. I also need to get some art done. I found an acrylic manufacturer (Tri-Art, a Canadian company) that makes a sepia paint, and reasonably priced at that, though I only know one store that carries them. So I bought that, and a replacement for the 1mm black Pigma marker that was starting to go dry. I’m currently in the habit of carrying around three Pigma markers (1mm, 03mm, and 005mm, at least I think the sizes refer to millimeters) and a Pitt brush pigment marker in a small plastic pack in my pocket, to go with the Moleskine sketchpad, in case I want to sketch, say, a girl with an interesting profile on the subway. (This one’s from last week.)

I got the Sept/Oct issue of the Graphic Artists Guild newsletter in the mail. The cover article is about surviving the downturn in the market, with a bit about how the illustration market is shrinking. Uh-oh. On the other hand, the market’s growing for “graphic novels”. Still, I’m gonna need a day job. Soon. And a cheaper apartment.