The Drooly Dog Blog

Seattle - Science Fiction Museum

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:27:00 +0000

I have a confession to make. Earlier this year when we were in San Diego, we actually skipped the zoo and actually went to an exhibit at the Space center on Star Trek. We even had our picture taken as a family on the bridge of the Enterprise.

So, these are geeks we're talking about here.

But, I have to say that the Science Fiction Museum in Seattle, which is in the same building as the Experience Music Project (near the Space Needle), is well worth a visit.

What they did really well was to mix together the work of many different science fiction creators, and show how their ideas influenced one another. And, they had really cool artifacts like a model of the Death Star used in the movies and the plastic raincoat from "Blade Runner" (which appeared in a pretty gnarly scene, so it's a grownup thing, but just hanging there it's no big deal).

Science fiction is like one big thought experiment, where people try on various realities and decide what happens. Star Trek was a huge breakthrough when it put people of multiple races and genders on the bridge together. And there are so many other examples.

Anyway, if you are a sci fi nerd like me, it's totally worth it to see such a massive number of artifacts and props and stories and personalities so well presented.

Seattle - Experience Music Project

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:18:00 +0000

As I mentioned in my previous post, we're just back from Seattle. While there we got to the Experience Music Project and the Science Fiction Museum. The EMP was both nostalgic and interactive simultaneously, with tons of artifacts from Seattle-area artists and bands arranged chonologically. There was also, of course, a memorial to Michael Jackson outside and a small case containing his sequined jacket and glove from when he first performed the "moonwalk." And, a really big room with Michael's music playing where people could just dance around and watch the back wall light up. What a great space.

But the coolest part, especially for kids, were the soundproof rooms where you could take ten minutes and jam. There were keyboards, drums, guitars, and computerized lessons on how to play them. There was even a room for vocals, although we didn't get into that one. But I did manage the bass line from "Smoke on the Water." Thank you, I knew you would be amazed.

Anyway, these exhibits really showed people of all ages the basic structures of music on lots of different instruments. And the way they did it, with exhibits and with soundproof rooms, meant people with little or no exposure to making music could goof around in a way that made them comfortable.

We have a spinnet piano in our house, and I'm observing as my daughter makes progressively more structured sounds with it. She doesn't take any formal lessons, but you can really hear her thinking as she noodles around. I wish all kids had something like that. I think you could accomplish a lot by just providing some boxes or upside-down buckets and a paper towel roll to use as drums and drumsticks.

I really recommend those exhibits and rooms for anyone of any age. If you're near there, go. It's right near the Space Needle.

Seattle - Jim Henson Exhibit at the EMP

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:11:00 +0000

We're just back from a visit to Seattle, where we got to go to the Experience Music Project and Science Fiction Museum. I highly recommend both, although we are bigger geeks than your average bear...

They currently also have an exhibit on Jim Henson's work, including Muppets and a lot of storyboards and sketches. It's fascinating to look at proposal covers for the Muppet Show, done by hand with ink pens and whiteout. This stuff was put together waaaay before desktop publishing.

I also really enjoyed seeing storyboards and sketches for what were called "counting films," which you may remember from Sesame Street as the bright animated shorts in which they counted up to some number using fabulous shapes or characters and music. I love seeing the thought process, and for kids it's cool to show them all the thinking that takes place before anything ever shows up on a screen.

In fact, it was really striking how low-tech most of the productions were. And, as an added bonus, there was a sketch showing exactly how the puppeteer gets inside of and operates Big Bird.

And, as a nice touch, they had a notebook out with a pen where you could sketch out a character just the way Henson used to do it. I loved how that made the exhibit about inspiring people, not just showing them what someone else did.

Anyway, if you're in Seattle before August 16th it's well worth seeing both for the nostalgia and for the peek at the ideas taking shape.

Where Do They Get This Stuff?

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 23:40:00 +0000

If you've ever watched "Star Wars: The Clone Wars," you'll recognize these fellows as the not-so-smart droids that are everywhere. But look closer - these droids have their own disco ball. And, they are dancing on one of those light-up disco dance floors. I have no idea how this particular combination occurred - perhaps the artist saw part of "Saturday Night Fever" in the last week? But I was impressed by how thorough this is. Go droids!

Drawing Over Time

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 23:36:00 +0000

This drawing, on a white board, looks like there's a ton going on - and there is. The space-invader-like creatures are battling the black rocket things, everyone is shooting at each other, and there's even a lot of yelling of "Zowee momma!"

But what's also interesting here is that this drawing was made over about 45 minutes. It started as one alien, then another one attacked, then someone's friend showed up, then people started yelling "Zowee momma," and things went from there. Along the way, a lot got erased also as the story developed. So this was not just a single drawing at all - it was a whole movie. Zowee momma!

Drawing in Reverse

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 23:29:00 +0000

I just spent a week at my son's school teaching a drawing camp - we used white boards, and paper, and drew from books and from our imagination. We even took the white boards out to a park one day and drew under the trees (no paper, since that would have gotten all over the place).

Since we had shiny new dry erase markers, there was a lot of ink (good thing these were the non-stinky kind). This meant the kids could color in the entire board and then erase to make their drawing. As you can see here, that's especially good for making space scenes. If you look closely, there's a rocket leaving earth to go visit some distant planet.

Studying the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 20:19:00 +0000

On Thursday, NASA will launch the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, and the LCROSS or Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satelllite. So we've set about studying the LRO first, to see what it looks like, what its payload will be, and how long its mission will take. The kids then took some clay and made their own LRO displays. The second one is a little more free-form, sine my 5-year-old mainly wanted to make a Lunar landscape, but you get the idea. The LRO is kind of a blunt-looking vehicle, and that's the moon over on the right. We used clay and then colored it in with paint and markers. You can see more about it on the NASA site.

This is gonna be some cool stuff and tell us a whole lot more about the moon. They're going to study radiation, craters, resources, and more. I'm hoping we can see the launch on Thursday!

On another note, I heard that there's actually astronaut poop on the moon. I'm not kidding. I mean it makes sense, given the *ahem* in's and out's of those space suits, but that's certainly not something I had considered. I've said enough - if you want to know more, you can go here.

Things You Can Make with a Box - Robot Head!

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 20:24:00 +0000

Some robots come with enormous numbers of puffballs on top. External brain perhaps? Exo-brain?

Ideally, what I'd like to do is now attach some big robot arms that are controlled with sticks that the wearer holds in each hand - but first we've got to figure out what materials to use. A good start though, eh?

It's an Abacus! It's a Soroban! It's....

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:40:00 +0000

So, my kids and I have created a school for the summer, which they have named "The Cherry Lane School of Craziness." Each day we decide what we're going to do, like field trips and projects and such. Yesterday, we made an Abacus out of beads, bamboo skewers, and popsicle sticks. And glue. Lots of glue. Here is where we got the instructions.

It kind of took all day to do this because of waiting for the aforementioned glue to dry, but the results looked pretty good. We started out making an Abacus, which has two beads up top and five in the bottom. Then I went out and looked for pointers on how to use the Abacus to do calculations, at which point I learned that the second and fifth beads in the top and bottom, respectively, are used to do hexidecimal stuff like calculate pounds and ounces and things like that. I was looking for a simpler calculation device so now we are starting in on a Soroban, the Japanese version which has just one bead up top ("heavenly bead") and four in the bottom ("earthly beads").

On an Abacus or Soroban, the decimal places get bigger from right to left just like written numbers. We did a simple one with just three decimal places - ones on the right, tens in the middle, and hundreds on the left.

This is a pretty nice demo on how to use an Abacus, and why those extra beads complicate things - We are still trying to get the hang of it, but I think it will be a cool way to visualize numbers. Plus, there's pretty beads. What's not to like?

Here, Kitty Kitty

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:38:00 +0000

There is a ton of cool street art in the Mission District of San Francisco - however, this one is closer to the Financial District. I saw it on my way to dinner the other night. I think someone had better get this kitty a bowl of milk before it eats a car or something.

And Furthermore...

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 17:31:00 +0000

A follow-on to my last post about Creativity and Careers...

Okay I read the Harvard Paper, found here.

While interesting, it is missing a big ol' Chunk out of it - the basic Function of art. It talks a lot about art's Value, and sort of its role in society, but not its Function.

The Function of art is to communicate something.

That Something could be communicated to one person, or lots of people, or differently to everyone in the world, or only between the artist and him or herself. But art communicates.

Sometimes art doesn't communicate anything to one person, but volumes to another.

Here are some examples of what art can communicate:

1. What it was like today inside someone's head (Van Gogh)
2. What God is like (Michaelangelo, oh and a whole lot of other people)
3. A good story about a hunt or other event (Caves)
4. What emotions feel like on a deeper level - anger, sadness, joy (Beethoven)
5. How the paint is behaving today
6. Who we love
7. What a place felt like at a particular day and time
8. A historical event (Goya)
9. How light works
10. How dark works
11. Things that scare us
12. Things that make us laugh
13. Things we remember
14. How we wish the world was
15. How we wish the world wasn't
16. Ideas about space and time
... and on and on...
... in short, what it is like to be human, communicated in deep, varied ways.

That's art.

Creative + Career = ?

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 16:38:00 +0000

Alright here we go again with the Ongoing Theme of how Stupid it is to think of Creativity as a. A luxury b. A rarity c. Not "useful" or d. Not the makings of a career.

As I've mentioned before, I've encountered many cues in our society that creativity and art are somehow these exotic, fluffy things that you do only if you have the time or if you aren't smart enough to do other "real" things (i.e. accounting, medicine, etc.)

I was at dinner at someone's house once when the husband stated that art had no value except economic... if it did not have economic value, there was no reason for it to exist. I don't really keep in touch with those guys.

This isn't a discussion about the value of art, it's about the values of our society. A society that is one-dimensional is unhealthy. Our one dimension is capitalism.

Oh, and have you noticed how capitalism rewards creativity? I mean, everyone who has ever invented or innovated anything Important or figured out how to do something New that People Want has done really, really well. Like, mansion- on-the-hill well. The evidence is all around you right this minute, in people's pockets and cars and ears and homes and stores and doctors' offices and movie theatres and, well, Everywhere.

Here's a paper from Harvard that looks interesting on the topic: "It Is Okay for Artists to Make Money…No, Really, It's Okay".

Anyway, I'm not going to go on about "art is valuable, really, let me spell out various reasons why," because that's not the issue. The issue is examining how we get out of a mental rat-hole about how we value things and how we remind ourselves that sometimes, money isn't part of the equation. No, really.

Oh and then when we put our Capitalist hat back on, we can look around and notice how creativity and innovation have a whole stinkin' lot of money associated with them.

The Lost Art of Puttering

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 22:04:00 +0000

When I was a kid, sometimes I went to stay with my grandmother.

There was no Nintendo or anything remotely like it -- in fact, I don't even think the TV was ever on when I was there. Except maybe for the evening news. Maybe. There was no such thing as passive entertainment.

This is because my grandmother was a Master Putterer.

She lived by herself when I knew her, my grandfather had died rather early leaving her a widow in her 60's.

We'd get up and make our beds, then we'd make breakfast and clean that up. Then we'd go out in the vegetable garden and pull some weeds, or plant things, depending on the time of year. Then we'd rake, or sweep.

Then we'd go get groceries, often on foot. Or if Easter was coming up we'd go to the department store ("Bullocks, I don't trade at Weinstocks") to get me an Easter sweater.

Later we'd go to a convalescent home and she would putter from one resident to the next, visiting and straightening lap robes and trimming hair and such.

Then we might go home and make cookies, or butter cream eggs, or some such thing. This involved licking of bowls and eating anything remotely "extra." "That's what it's for," she would say.

The days were filled with these sorts of things. There was never "nothing to do." There was a front porch to paint, or a lawn to mow, or someone to visit - like Nellie Goodenough, who was 101 when I met her. She took a long time to get to the front door after we knocked, but once she made it, the visit was a lot of fun.

And, I always had some art supplies handy and could draw whenever there was a break in the puttering action.

Puttering is an activity most people assign to elderly people in their front yards. But I think it's an important skill to cultivate. The fact is, there is never "nothing to do," we just expect to be entertained all the time.

I think I got the puttering habit from my grandmother -- I'm always cruising around doing random things, to the amusement of my family. I will go out and fuss with the pool equipment in a rainstorm. I like to see things from the roof. Not in a rainstorm.

Here's what puttering is: It's engaging with your environment. You cruise around, you interact with things and people, and you keep your environment alive. You don't just occupy one couch or chair or room, you circulate.

Kids do this naturally. In fact, they "engage" with the environment even when you'd really rather they didn't.

Here are my tips for Good Puttering:

1. Don't have a Big Goal. This is not about finishing something, it's about keeping things moving forward. A little of this, a little of that, and pretty soon the garage looks better or the car is clean or your books are organized.

2. Don't think in terms of Chores. That's the wrong attitude. If you see something to do, just do it. Enjoy the satisfaction of of just being present and taking care of things.

3. Don't putter fast. The whole point is to be methodical, not speedy. The clock is the enemy of puttering.

4. Find someone nice to putter around with you.

There. Maybe you know a Master Putterer yourself, who can give you some more tips. Or better yet, you can just go putter together.

Living Squiggle-ly

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 23:56:00 +0000

Federico Fellini said, "You have to live spherically--in many directions. To accept yourself for what you are without inhibitions, to be open." I ran across this after I had been thinking for several days about how life does not follow a straight line. I also saw this clip by Carol Bartz talking about how careers take shape in a pyramid, not a ladder (okay it's kind of a corporate talk, but you get the idea).

Thing is, our education system does seem to be in a straight line. Everything seems to be on a continuum. You are in a grade, with people behind you and people in front of you. You score a number on a test, there are numbers below it and numbers above it. Even the school day is kind of linear - you do this, then you do this, there's 1st Period, then 2nd - and on and on.

But the really cool classrooms and learning environments do kind of feel like spheres, because they associate everything with everything else. The only thing that changes is the focus. So maybe you're doing math problems, but there are shapes and drawings on the walls. Or you are reading, but there are graphs and maybe a terrarium or a view of the playground.

My career has been more of a plate of spaghetti than a line. I've moved all around, done different things, and had lots of times when I felt like I had no focus and why couldn't I be the kid who discovered his genius at age 12 and went on to excel in something and have movies made about her and all of this.

But, for everything that I am doing now, which I love, by the way, I can point directly back and say, there is something in that muddle of pasta noodles that I call a career that has made this possible. Everything from being able to upload my cartoons onto a server, to negotiating contracts, to drawing. All of it. Every bit.

So, here's to wiggly scribbly careers, and living spherically, and hoping that we can encourage kids to make scribbly wiggles too.

Oh My Gosh. Maker Faire.

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sun, 31 May 2009 03:05:00 +0000

The Maker Faire is this weekend, in San Mateo, California. It is a gigantic event. In fact, I'm not sure it's possible to take in all of it even if you were there for all of the hours it is open.

But here's what we mostly saw:

- Met the people of RAFT, or Resource Area For Teachers - they were teaching cool Japanese braiding and other things. They gather up materials for fabulous projects and then get them to teachers. You can even sponsor a teacher's membership. As the guy there said, "My wife is a teacher. She gets a million Peet's Coffee gift cards each year - then she turns around and uses her own money to get supplies for projects." So consider these guys next time you want to help a teacher, or hey, it's a fabulous end-of-year gift!!

- Made an Ewok sock puppet, and learned that Fabri-Tak is the best stuff for making puppets and gluing fabrics together - it's cold to the touch until it dries, and it dries fast and cleans up easily.

- Checked out cool moving sculptures by Applied Kinetic Arts - a lot of which was just beautiful. There were these robots with heads lit from inside and one sculpture with a whole scene that played out inside of it. I was really taken with those.

- Stood inside a soda bottle wave by Reuben Margolin while the steampunk lady reminded people not to touch it

- Hung out with the Electric Giraffe

- There were also tons of Legos, a guy who made both instruments and sculptures out of piano parts, a paper airplane that flew by being pushed along through the air with a piece of cardboard, and many people riding around on various configurations of bicycles. Oh, and the world's most confused concessions-stand employee.

This is just the smallest cross-section. If you are in the area, go! I think our summer is going to involve a lot of Fabri-Tak, photovoltaic cells, Legos, and found objects. Just a feeling.

The Case for Working with Your Hands

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sat, 23 May 2009 18:16:00 +0000

A fascinating article in the New York Times today.

You know, Leonardo and Galileo and Marie Curie didn't have computers. They figured things out in the "dirt world." Love computers. But screens aren't everything.

Sure Kid, I'll Draw Ya a Bunny.

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Sat, 23 May 2009 01:36:00 +0000

When you're a cartoonist and you work with kids, here is a phrase you hear a lot:

"Could you draw me a....?" (Bunny, Elephant, Princess, Spider-Man, Robot, Horse...)

Used to be, I would try to get out of this. Not a good pattern, I thought. I'm here to help them draw and learn from drawing, not be a drawing service.

I'd even heard various art teachers say things like, "Never draw for them," "Never show them how to draw something..." so I figured this was going to short-circuit their creative little brains and turn them into un-creative non-drawing potatoes. Or something.

So I tried saying, "I'll draw you something if you'll draw me something," or, "I'm sure you can draw an aircraft carrier really well," or the classic, "Nope."

But see, I've realized something. Kids know what they need to learn something. Their curiosity tells them. Then they tell me. I should listen.

Seriously. Kids are hard-wired to learn things. It's what they do for a living. They learn how to swim by jumping off the step in the pool a hundred million times. They learn what different foods do by mixing them together. In this way, they master things like talking. This is no small thing.

So who am I to tell them that the thing they are curious about, they can't have?

And, it turns out, they have a plan. Sometimes it involves coloring whatever I've drawn. Often it's tracing the lines, then adding their own details. And they'll even take it away and then draw their own version. See? They've taken what I did, and interpreted it in all sorts of ways.

And, you can't overestimate how many brain cells are firing off when they are sitting, or standing, or half-sitting on my lap (try holding a pencil with all this!) and watching every line I make. You can practically see things zapping around behind their eyes.

They say that stories are a flight-simulator for the brain, that when someone hears a story the same parts of their brain light up as if they were having the actual experience. Actually I read this in "Made to Stick" by Chip and Dan Heath.

Watching someone draw I think has a similar effect. The drawing part of the brain is following that pen around, trying out the lines.

Then, kids have this great ability to go do something that fits their own abilities, which is why tracing and coloring are so great. They engage with the drawing in a way that makes sense to them. I'm not there to make them all draw a perfect monkey freehand. But they know what they are ready for. We don't need no stinkin' overbaked curriculum hoo-ha.

So, I should just shut up and draw the unicorn. Or Storm Trooper. Or whatever.

Yet again, I'm the one who's learning here.

Mural Sketches - Color!

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Thu, 21 May 2009 17:11:00 +0000

Our first idea had to do with seasons, so I did some tests to see how color changes could make the same scene look like it was changing seasons. Which was cool, but then we got into the "Powers of Ten" idea, zooming out from DNA to the Solar System.

So, here's a sketch of what that might look like -- starting on the left with DNA and plant cells, and working our way across five panels until we've got Earth in the Solar System. It's more like "Powers of Eighty-Three and a Half" but that's okay. We're also including the California hills in there, which are visible behind the Science Lab. Kind of cool.

Also with five panels we can have each of grades 1 through 5 paint one of the panels, which is very cool.

We're going to use primed plywood, and hopefully re-use paint. So colors will be interesting!

Looks like we'll try and paint it in the Fall - end-of-school-year craziness is happening, but we've made some good progress thinking this through. So many things to cover before you loose a bunch of kids with brushes on the wall...

Bueller.... Bueller?

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Tue, 19 May 2009 18:58:00 +0000

I went and talked at Career Day at a local high school this morning, and by that I do mean, "talked." As in, I did pretty much all the talking. The only time I got any glimmer of participation was when I asked the students what they get nagged about the most -- and all of their answers were exactly the same... grades, college, get a job, money, the economy is bad, and the favorite, "You need to take responsibility for yourself!!"

Now, I've worked with lots of high school students, and you sometimes just have to take it on faith that some of what you say might stick somewhere. You're just outputting. I get that. But based on what I've been reading about brains and how they learn, I couldn't help pondering some things as I biked home.

I was thinking, Career Day is an adult approach to a teen problem -- namely, giving them the chance to think about what they are going to do after high school. Sounds great, right? So we get some well-meaning adults to come in and talk about what they do. The kids file into various rooms and sit down and there they are. Now what?

I felt like a person who was trying to play a piano by stomping on the floor instead of hitting the keys. No contact with the keyboard at all.

With little kids, we talk alot about "developmentally appropriate" -- which means, you don't hit a kid with stuff that they aren't ready for yet. 5-year-olds, for the most part, are not reading chapter books. So you give them materials they can handle. This helps them be successful and get to the next thing. You also mix it in with things 5-year-olds like, like moving around often and having time outside.

I felt like my presentation there today wasn't developmentally appropriate. These students' brains were not prepared for what I had to say. Or how I said it. In so many ways. They're thinking about the other students in the room, good or bad. They're thinking about when they can eat lunch. They're thinking about sleeping. And they're thinking, here's another grownup telling me stuff I need to do and think about -- just leave me alone.

It's not that they don't need to think about college and jobs and all of that, it's just that it needs to be presented in a way that they can relate to.

I've got some work to do.

Art + Science, Episode 512

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Mon, 18 May 2009 22:10:00 +0000

Okay okay, here's yet another great post by Garr Reynolds about how foolish it is to separate our thinking into subject boxes like art, math, etc. Featuring astronaut Mae Jemison, who knows whereof she speaks.

I also just finished reading Brain Rules by John Medina, all about the many different ways our brains take information and glue it together and store it places and then go find it and glue it together again. Fascinating stuff.

One of the most interesting things in Brain Rules has to do with how we learn and remember things. It turns out that the more senses and ideas you use when you learn something, the better you remember it. I've been trying this with people's names, because I am dreadful at remembering names. And you know, it works pretty well! I'm now slightly less dreadful with names. I think.

This morning I was at 826 Valencia in San Francisco, where we helped a class of 3rd graders write, edit, illustrate and publish their own story. In two hours. Let's see... they used their eyes to catch spelling errors, their inner eye to visualize what the characters looked like, their ears to listen to all the different ideas, their speech entirely too much, their hands to draw and write with, and they got all wiggly when they had ideas. Seems pretty all-inclusive to me.

One of the biggest problems with putting subjects into boxes is that it is human nature to say, "I'm good at this, so I must not be good at this other thing." If you're good at math you must not be able to draw. If you draw you must not be good at math. That sort of thing.

How many people have decided, based on this process, that they are not good at something they haven't even tried??? Did this happen to you? Argh! Argh, I say!

There, I've said it for the 512th time.

Tools Are Not Talent

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Fri, 15 May 2009 19:08:00 +0000

This was one of my favorite quotes when I had offices and cubicles - I had a little piece of paper with this on, and I stuck it up wherever I happened to be working. I still have the paper somewhere.

Interesting realization lately, though - for all the time I've spent using computers to do neato things like communicate with people and sell stuff and make websites and distribute cartoons and email and tweet and all of it, I don't create anything good on the computer.

No, really. I used to think that I could make just the cutest, most fabulous, airbrushed, drop-shadowed, icon-ey, tasty characters on the computer. Just look at all that software! It can do anything! It can make stuff 3-D! It can animate! I mean, what's not to love?

What's not to love is any art I make on there. Bleh. My brain just doesn't work the same way with a screen as it does with paper.

When I am drawing, I should be nowhere near the mouse. There must be a pencil, or a Sharpie, or a brush. No pixels. I just don't make good work with pixels.

Oh, I've re-drawn cartoons before so they could be blown up to a big size or put in a particular format, but that's it. I must draw first, then scan stuff in. This the way things are.

Drawing tablet? Got one. Doesn't help.

So, the moral of this story is, computers don't solve everything. And if you are trying to create, even if you are writing, maybe you need to spend some time with a pad of paper, or some chalk, or something that engages your mind differently than pixels. It really is different. Just because computers can replicate things like typing, doesn't mean your brain thinks it's the same. Think about it.

Find the right tools for your talent.

Make a Deck of Creature Cards!

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Mon, 11 May 2009 19:29:00 +0000

The other day, I took some index cards and started drawing heads on them. Then I held them up and said, "Who wants to add a body to this one?" Several hands would go up, I would hand it off and bodies would get drawn on new cards.

Pretty soon other kids started drawing heads and then offering them up - "Who wants this one?" - the other kids would go, "Me, me!!" Cards were flying across the table. Parts got added. They got combined every which way.

Now we have a deck of creature cards. Someone even gathered them up in a neat stack and put them in a box. I think next we'll either color them, or mix them around and add more. Or both. And, I just know there's a game in here somewhere.

Collaborative Art

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Mon, 11 May 2009 19:25:00 +0000

This is a conversation in white board form. I think there were 4 or 5 girls involved here, and they were talking, and writing, and drawing - and dividing the big board into various little sections.

Many kids love to talk while they are drawing, as if the two things are part of each other. Kindergarteners will often make sound effects to go with their lines.

I also like the way they had to negotiate to figure out who was going to write where - that had to be interesting...

In school we always tell kids not to copy off each other's paper, but artists and thinkers from Picasso to Einstein point out that great creations come from great inspirations and sources. So I love when the kids are bouncing ideas off one another like this. You can just see the synapses firing off.

Quick! What's a Llama look like?

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Mon, 04 May 2009 22:54:00 +0000

At 826 Valencia in San Francisco this morning, I had a great time making the world's fastest illustrations for a book entitled "The Crazy Llama Sisters and the Creepy Dragon," created by the first-graders at Leonard R. Flynn Elementary School.

At 826 Valencia books get written, illustrated, and published in a matter of a couple of hours. No kidding! Plus, they've got a Pirate supply store. So you can be prepared for anything.

How do you get twenty first-graders to write a story in such a short time, you ask? Well, the main tool for this is the Story Skeleton, which means you have a small set of building blocks that you use to construct your story. These are: Characters, Descriptions, Setting, Problem, Solution, and a few other such items. Once you fill in what these things are, you can get the basics of a story going. I plan to use Story Skeletons in my cartooning classes this summer as well - for example, to create a superhero you need a Superpower, Weakness, Mortal Enemy, Sidekick, and Problem (usually the Evil Plot of the Mortal Enemy). See?

I'm looking forward to the next book already! There's something really special about helping a group of kids make something that didn't exist before and that is all theirs.

What I Learned by Majoring In Art

mail@betsystreeter.com (Betsy Streeter) — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 18:14:00 +0000

So, I was an art major in college.

Actually, I got what was called a "dual Bachelor's," where you did the units for two Bachelor's degrees at once. My other degree was in Communication (which was mostly about film and media). Interestingly, at my school Film Studies is in the Art Department now.

This was the late 1980s. A time when, particularly at the school I attended, if you weren't studying engineering or medicine or computers, people wondered what you thought you were going to do with your degree. There was still a very strong "have the right degree, get job" mentality. Maybe you were a trust fund baby and could dabble in these nice majors because you didn't really need a job. Maybe you just weren't good enough to do those other majors.

There I was. My friends were doing problem sets and calculus, and I was covered in oil paint.

I think about four of us graduated together in Studio Art my year. Maybe five; I'd have to look.

Here's what I learned studying Studio Art:

1. How to show up for class and get assignments done

2. How to relate to the faculty and make sure I was on track to get the right units

3. How to collaborate with other students

4. How to listen and accept feedback

5. How to speak about my ideas

6. How to organize, budget for and take care of my materials

7. How to learn from other people's work

8. How to solve problems when there is no clear answer

9. Oh, and how to stretch canvas, edit film by hand, mix colors, draw nudes, etc. etc.

And, by "learned," I mean to say, I did not know these things beforehand. Anyone who went to school with me will attest that I was not a shining example of professionalism at the time. Like, that #1 "show up for class" one. I didn't start out doing that one very well.

Hm. If you look back over that list, it's got lots of useful things on it! Things that are about thinking, and problem solving, and dealing with people, and dealing with the world. Isn't that interesting? I thought this was just a flaky art degree.

My point? When you go to school, choose your major because it is something that gives you energy and inspiration. Because you will need that energy and inspiration to do the hard work of learning how to think and problem solve and deal with people and departments.

And, even in everyday life, play to your strengths. You will learn a lot about yourself this way (maybe even what you should major in). If you read better standing up, do so. If you do math better by drawing pictures of the problems, have at it. But pay attention to your strengths, those things you do when you aren't doing anything else. In my case, it was drawing. For you it might be dancing, making up number problems, writing stories, shooting baskets.

DON'T play to your strengths purely because you think that shooting baskets leads to a basketball career. Or singing leads to a career at the Met. That's way too linear.

Instead, think of your strengths as your center, and from there you can branch out into just about anything. If you make your brain comfy, it works better. Period.

I've been reading and listening a lot lately to the notion that dividing our education system into discrete subject areas runs counter to the way our mind actually works and grows. See, Ken Robinson. See, Brain Rules. I couldn't agree more.

So take it from a person who went to school on the 'wrong' side of the brain... you can spend your time banging your head (and brain) against the wall trying to be the way the system says you should be, or you can pay attention to what makes you go, and in the process actually do better at everything you put your mind to.