Month: April 2018

Recommended Audio Books

/ Sarah Collins / Leave a comment

During the nice weather months, I am in my car a lot.  Last year, I started listening to audio books while driving.  Below is a list of my favorite.

  1. We Are Legion (We Are Bob), Bobiverse, Book 1 – Dennis Taylor
  2. For We Are Many, Bobiverse, Book 2 – Dennis Taylor
  3. All These Worlds, Bobiverse, Book 3 – Dennis Taylor
  4. 14 – Peter Clines
  5. The Fold – Peter Clines
  6. Paradox Bound – Peter Clines
  7. Hacker, The Outlaw Chronicles – Ted Dekker
  8. The Passage, Book 1 – Justin Cronin
  9. The Twelve (The Passage Trilogy),  Book 2 – Justin Cronin
  10. The City of Mirrors (The Passage Trilogy),  Book 3 – Justin Cronin
  11. The Graveyard – Neil Gaiman
  12. Will Save the Galaxy for Food – Yahtzee Croshaw
  13. The Time Keeper – Mitch Albom
  14. Forbidden, The Book of Mortal, Book 1 – Ted Dekker and Tosca Lee
  15. Mortal, The Book of Mortal, Book 2 – Ted Dekker and Tosca Lee
  16. Sovereign, The Book of Mortal, Book 3 – Ted Dekker and Tosca Lee
  17. Dead Men Can’t Complain and Other Stories – Peter Clines
  18. I Can Only Imagine: A Memior – Bart Millard

This list may change, since I am still listening and driving.  Currently, I listing to Scott Meyer’s book “Off To Be a Wizard”.   If the author keeps up the good work, it will make the list.

Ray Porter has become my favorite narrator, thanks to Bobiverse.  Searching for books narrated by Ray Porter is how I found Peter Clines’ books.

Art of Concentration: Day 14

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Let’s relax, create some beautiful pieces, and work on our concentration skills.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Straight line, squiggly lines, circles, squares, triangles, stars, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section a different color.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.  Typical you will only have a black pen or a pencil, those are fine.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

Today’s line drawing:

AofC circles

The line drawing are create in Corel Draw which is a great tool for creating anything from scratch. I do not use Photoshop for these drawing, because it is not a photo.  After I am happy with the drawing, I export as a Bitmap.  It would be time consuming to create each section for coloring in Corel Draw.  Microsoft Paint is used to color the bitmap. If I wanted a gradient of colors in each section of the drawing, I would do that in Corel Draw.

Example 1:

Aof C circles color 1

Example 2:

Aof C circles color 2

Example 3:

Aof C circles color 3

All of the line drawing, done by hand, were done 14 days ago, and one was colored each day. It provided me time to work on other projects.

20180414_110003.jpg

Art of Circles

Click here for a PDF version on today’s line drawing. You can also download any of my line drawing from the Coloring Page.

Art of Concentration: Day 13

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Today’s line drawing is made up of hearts.

AofC hearts

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Straight line, squiggly lines, circles, squares, triangles, stars, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section a different color.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.  Typical you will only have a black pen, or a pencil, those are fine.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

My first color choice:

AofC hearts color 1

My second color choice:

AofC hearts color 2

Today’s hand drawing:

20180413_155734.jpg

Hearts Apart

You can download a PDF version of the line drawing on the Coloring Page, or click here.

Art of Concentration: Day 12

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Another spiral!  Why?  Because figuring things out, what works and doesn’t work is fun.  I have fun drawing spirals and making something of them.

Below is today’s line drawing:

AofC another spiral

I learned that using two colors with at line drawing was impossible.  Three colors would be difficult, not impossible, but fun. The first approach to coloring the line drawing was to color the individual square (or four point stars) with a different set of colors, but still following the rules.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Straight line, squiggly lines, circles, squares, triangles, stars, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.  Typical you will only have a black pen, or a pencil, those are fine.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

AocC another spiral color 2

You probably did not notice, but I tried to use a pattern for the colors.  Here is the pattern I choose for the second color drawing.  It is easier to show you than explain.

AofC color example one

The vertical and horizontal pattern was: pink, blue, and white.  Picking a pattern, made it easier to color without having the same color sections touching.

The results:

AocC another spiral color 1

With the hand drawing, I used the four colors: pink, blue, purple and gray, and changed to a darker color as it got closer to the center.

20180412_141010.jpg

Around the Spiral

You can download a PDF version of the line drawing from the Coloring Page, or click here.

Art of Concentration: Day 11

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Today’s Art of Concentration experiment did not go well.  Not well at all.  Below is the line drawing.  It is a nice line drawing made up of spirals, or swirls, or curls, whatever you would like to call them.

AofC swirls and curls

It is impossible to use only two colors in the drawing and still follow the rules.  Using three colors is possible, but difficult.  Spiral are meant to be continuous.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Straight line, squiggly lines, circles, squares, triangles, stars, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.  Typical you will only have a black pen, or a pencil, those are fine.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

The colored drawing came out nice, but there were several restarts.  That is what is good with coloring on the computer.

AofC swirls and curls color 1

PDF version of the line drawing created in Corel Draw is available for download on the Coloring Page or you can click here.

Art of Concentration: Day 10

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For today’s Art of Concentration drawing I decided to go with a more traditional approach.  By traditional approach I mean;  it was the way I normally drew and colored these type of drawings.  They contained either straight lines, squiggly lines, or both.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Straight line, squiggly lines, circles, squares, triangles, stars, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.  Typical you will only have a black pen, or a pencil, those are fine.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

The line drawing:

AofC traditional

In a meeting, a classroom, or a waiting room, you will typical only have a pen with one color – below is today’s line drawing colored in black and white.

AofC traditional color 1

You may be part of the special group that has many different colors pens on hand.  The largest box of Crayola Crayon contains 152 different colors.  The largest tin of Prismacolor pencils contains 150 different colors.  And, it is very easy to fine a set of 100 different color gel pens.  Sometimes, I have the urge to use has many different colors a possible in my drawings, like the drawing below.

AofC traditional color 2

I messed up today’s hand drawing, then I messed it up again, and then I messed it up a third time.  I should have been simple enough, but I was listening to water draining and was wondering why it was so loud.  I gave up and turned the tile over and started again.  Since today’s theme was traditional, I decided I would do a sample of my normal typical drawing.

Notice the curvy lines.  There are several lines that look like the cursive letter “L”.  Drawing the cursive letter “L” is a good pattern to repeat on the page.  The letter “S” and the music symbol Treble clef are also good to use.  Just keep the line flowing from edge to edge.

What I learned today with my mess up, coloring a section with a marker and going over it with a white Sakura gel pens, gave it a nice color.

20180410_115201.jpg

Sea of Algae

PDF version of the line drawing created in Corel Draw is available for download on the Coloring Page, or click here.

Art of Concentration: Day 9

/ Sarah Collins / 2 Comments

Today’s Art of Concentration drawing is more typical of the drawing I used to do in meetings and classes.  It wasn’t anything too complicated, just some lines and occasionally other objects.

Remember you can do these types of drawing on any size of paper from “Post-It” note size to letter size, or larger.  If you create them using ruled paper, you already have some lines premade.

The line drawing:

AofC flower mess

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Circles, squares, squiggly lines, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

The first object created was the flower and than squiggly lines added.  Notice the top left of the circle in the middle of the page.  There are more than two section that are touching.  The rule “Section of the same color can not touch” will not work here.  To solve that dilemma, I used multiple colors.

AofC flower mess color 1 The flower petals were done in a deep red and white.  The center and background was done in black and white.   It doesn’t even look like a circle.  That is why I named today’s hand drawing “Squid”.  Looking at if after is was done, it looked more like a squid then a flower.

20180409_135311.jpg

Squid

Squid was done on a black Studio Series Artist tile using Sakura gel pens.

The line drawing was done in Corel Draw and exported as a bitmap to color using Microsoft Paint.  I decided to use three colors and black on the second drawing with white line.

AofC flower mess color 2

Click here to download a PDF version of the line drawing.  All of the line drawing are available on the Coloring Page.

Art of Concentration: Day 8

/ Sarah Collins / 2 Comments

I must be crazy for drawing so many lines on a page and than coloring them.  And, on top of it all, doing two drawings.  I must be crazy.  However, they were so much fun.

That is probably another rule of Art of Concentration – have fun.  Enjoy what you are doing.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Circles, squares, squiggly lines, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

The first drawing was a small drawing.  It has a simple flower in the middle with a bunch of lines going through it.

AofC flower x-treme

There are some many colors that could be added to this line drawing.  The first example started out as a simple black and white, but I could not leave it as that.  The gray background the flower jump off the page.

flower x-treme color 1

The colored version is very busy, it draws your eye all around the drawing.  It reminds me of a out country kitchen pattern.

flower x-treme color 2

Below is the hand drawing of the x-treme flower.  It was done on a Studio Series Artist tile with Faber Castell Pitt Pens and Crayola markers.

20180408_085910.jpg

Boxed Flower

Even though this Mandala started out as a sketch, I thought I could not do it justice on paper, so I put it in Corel Draw, increase the size to 8.5″ squared, and drew circles to the extreme.

AofC Mandala

From the center, a beautiful flower appeared.  There are so many way this could be colored, so many possibilities.  After creating a bitmap and using Microsoft Paint to color it, below is the results at my first attempt to color the Mandala.  The black background made the color more vibrant.

AofC Mandala color 1

AofC Mandala

PDF versions of the today’s line drawings are available on the Coloring Page for downloading.  Starting with today, I will put the newest drawings at the top of the page.

Art of Concentration: Day 7

/ Sarah Collins / Leave a comment

Sometimes, with art, you need to break the rules to create amazing pieces.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Circles, squares, squiggly lines, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

The extreme line drawing.

AofC x-treme

Rule three does not work for black and white drawings.  If  you follow the line from the bottom right corner to the center, there are occurrences of one section touching two sections.    It may be more obvious on the black and white example below.  Even though the rule is broken, you still can get lost in the drawing, or dizzy.

AofC x-treme color 1

To follow the rule, I used multiple colors on the one below.

AofC x-treme color 2

This is the original had drawing done on a black Studio Series Artist Tile with Sakura pens.

20180407_091855.jpg

The X Divides

Click here for a PDF version of the line drawing.   It is also available on the Coloring Page.

Art of Concentration: Day 6

/ Sarah Collins / 2 Comments

The ability to create something beautiful is a wonderful experience.

The Art of Concentration rules are:

  1. Draw lines on a page.  Circles, squares, squiggly lines, it does not matter.
  2. Color every other section.  Start anywhere.  Use any color.
  3. If you desire, use multiple colors.  Sections of the same color can not touch.

What started out as a page with a mess of lines, can turn into something beautiful.  Here is the line drawing from today.  If you look closely, you will see some circles.

AofC circle mess

First, the line drawing was colored using just black.

circle mess color 1

Next, I colored the line drawing using four colors.  Remember the rule, the same color can not touch each other.  If the colors were placed differently, it could had a completely different look.  See how different it looks from the black and white version.

circle mess color 2

Here is the hand drawn version:

20180406_091009.jpg

Circle Mess

Sometimes, when the black lines gets close, you will need to assume the blank space between the lines, e.g. lower right corner.

Click here for to download a PDF version of the line drawing.  PDF copies of the line drawings are available on the Coloring Page.