thinkfetti

One very helpful strategy I’ve learned in my Drawing I course is to spend enough time up front doing two things: getting the proportions and general angles right, and getting the large-scale values (relative lights and darks) close to their actual appearance in the subject.

By focusing on the general qualities of the drawing before addressing any specifics, such as edges or details, I find the drawing mostly continues to improve as I work. Earlier, when I started in on specifics too soon in the process, I would “draw myself into a hole”: I would reach a point where something was wrong, and there was no easy way to remedy it.

I read on David Weinberger’s blog that there is a site offering a graphical, interactive tracker of poll trackers for the 2008 presidential election.

In other words:

Polls collect data, and the poll trackers consolidate the data from numerous polls. The tracker tracker website compares the results that the various poll trackers report.

Two very successful concerts with the Albuquerque Philharmonic Orchestra this weekend. I guest conducted the program of Gershwin’s Piano Concerto and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4.

My dear friend Hao Huang was the soloist, and he played with his characteristic brilliance and superb musicality. The orchestra did an excellent job both performances, and I believe everyone involved deserves a relaxing Sunday evening after the successful weekend!

I’m taking a Drawing I class this semester. We cover a variety of non-color media. Here’s the score this week:

Charcoal: 7
Doug: 0

Practicing can be fulfilling for its own sake; it can also be the most efficient way to get better at something, if you happen to be practicing correctly. And therein, as the poet wrote, lies the rub.

If we imagine the world of techniques as a two-dimensional landscape, and the success of a particular technique as the elevation above the corresponding spot in the two-dimensional world, we’ll have a version of what is called a “fitness landscape.”

If there’s one best way to do something, then the elevation above the spot corresponding to that best technique will be the highest of the whole terrain, the “top of the mountain,” if you will.

If you imagine yourself as on this fitness terrain, improving means heading uphill. Sometimes, it’s obvious which way is uphill, and sometimes it isn’t. Or the direction that’s uphill where you are now might not be the direction to the top of the mountain.

This metaphor supports a lot more nuance, but even at this level of broad strokes, it should be clear:

To improve, practice may be necessary, but it isn’t (necessarily!) sufficient.

We voted today at the University of New Mexico Student Union Building. A long line, and a festive atmosphere!

I know I don’t have a choice per se, but it feels good to have a vote.