Total Art Soul - for artists

i have at least 40 things i want to learn, and learn well/be excellent at.  

i want to get back into blender, and make 3d meshes/models.  i want to do them well enough to make them for a game i play, called sims 3. I played sims 2, and made decent meshes for the game, but i had trouble importing them into the game properly with the programs i was using, so i settled for retexturing (also known as recoloring) the meshes others had made, and gave up on making meshes of my own for awhile. so i need to open up blender--its been so long it will probably need updating--and play. making custom content for sims 3 has a few more steps/is a bit more complicated than making cc for sims 2, so i'll have a few new skills to learn in order to properly do that; most notably the program for importing/exporting ingame package files into other programs for editing, has changed.  which means a whole new program to learn the nuances of,  but im up for the challenge.  :)  it already takes knowledge of at least blender or milkshape, photoshop or GIMP, a seperate uv mapping program or the knowledge of uv mapping using blender or milkshape, and the program which puts on the final touches, which was simpe for sims 2,  but is now the workshop, a completely different program, for sims 3. believe me, its serious cool to have the ability make a 3d object, import it into a video game, open up said game, find the object you've made and actually use it in the game.

then theres this jewelry thing. i realize there are many people who make jewelry, and there are as many unique jewelry styles as there are people who make it.  ive discovered a love for bending wire around into pretty shapes using tools from pliers to spool knitters to crochet hooks. i also want to use other tools, such as a dremel and a soldering iron-- i have a dremel, which was my husbands; ive commandeered it, and ive cleaned it up and bought a few new attachments for it, though i have yet to really use it. i also bought a cheap, low wattage soldering iron which i hope to learn to use as well. i read somewhere recently that us women can be tool junkies as much as men, and i know i resemble that remark.  :) i have over a dozen plier type tools, half a dozen wire cutter type tools, and a myriad assortment of hammers,files, picks, clamps, and other *doohickeys*. not to mention all the wire, beads, stones, and etc ive collected for the intention of turning it into something beautiful.

i seem to be all talk and no action, however. im surrounded by all these tools, my mind is filled with inspiration, yet i do more talking about it than actually working on it. probably because ive overwhelmed myself with it. i really want to have i pile of stuff ive done, not piles of stuff i plan to do something with. i want to have mastered already every tool i have, every technique i want to learn instead still having that ahead of me.  oh, come on now, kattz, lets get with the program, enough stalling already--just do it.

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i havent written in my blog lately,  though throughout the day many things run through my mind and i think:  i should make a blog post about that.

i know a LOT of people make jewelry -- there are as many styles, genres, mediums, as there are people who create the the jewelry in the first place. i would love to get further in to the fabrication aspect of jewelry--manipulating the metal more than just with pliers and a few other tools--but right now i dont have means to invest in some of the equipment i want-- such as a soldering iron and essentials one needs, such as pickling solutions, etc.  i do have a few hammers, and a piece of sheet metal, maybe even an anvil--those tools belong to my husband, but i can commandeer them if i want.  :)   so i could at least add some texture to my wire.  i am considering it, but havent yet taken that plunge.

when shopping at any store that sells inexpensive, everyday jewelry, ive found myself examining many of the pieces; studying how they were made, the skills involved, the techniques,  the workmanship. in one particular intricately woven wire piece, i noticed the artist left many bits of wire unfinished--just sticking out where it would poke and scratch the wearer, and possibly ruin clothing as well. i do make sure my pieces have no rough edges-- i run my fingers over them, and if i find a rough edge, i file and file until im satisfied there is nothing there to catch on clothing or scratch skin.  i even wear my own "home made" jewelry long enough and often enough to know its not going to fall apart--as well as scratch skin or tear clothing, in case i've missed a spot. :)

i've taught myself a new technique, too, that i am incorporating into a pendant im working on.  how it turns out will determine whether i will use that technique on other pendants. there are a few more techniques  i want to practice and become adept at as well. i am pretty much new to making jewelry, though i have played around with it since 2007, i've made only a few pieces. the rest of that time was spent studying basic techniques, and also foraying into a bit of digital art--specifically 3d.

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I have NOT had a chance to play with my new beads.  One of my friends "accosted" me earlier today, because she wanted to give me "meshing lessons" in a couple of new programs I'm not used to working in.  She and I are Sims players, and we used to enjoy doing some "tandem creating" for Sims 2 -- mostly recoloring meshes--since we neither one were very gifted at meshing.  She worked in Milkshape 3D, and I worked in Blender3D.  I could make some decent object meshes, get them uvmapped, but Blender was incompatible with the program SimPE-- SimPE was the program we used to get the meshes exported our of the game and imported into a program, such as Blender and then Photoshop to be edited, and then exported back into the game, so my meshes never showed up right in the game. ("wonky" being the correct term :D )

Now that Sims3 is out, there is a new program for working with the meshes, known as the TSRWorkShop.  TSR being The Sims Resource, our favorite Sims Custom Content site.  So she spent nearly all day walking me through the process of opening a package file, and cloning it to import into Milkshape, so we could turn it into a totally new 3D object for the game. I'm not nearly as familiar with how to work in Milkshape as I am in Blender, so we had some fun moments when I screwed up! But she's a patient teacher, and I learned a lot more about navigating around in Milkshape than I ever knew before. We got to the point where she was going to show me how to do the uvmapping in Milkshape, but I had to go cook dinner, and after dinner I just wanted to chill out and not get back into something "worky".  :D  So tomorrow--I am going to accost her first--and tell her I'm ready for lesson, part 2! She made it seem pretty easy so far--well, since I already knew enough about working in 3D she didnt have to teach me that from the ground up, that made it smoother going, anyway.  So--I may not get to my beads tomorrow either! Thats ok, they'll be there when I'm ready for them.  :)

I also was going to get into a story writing contest for a virtual pet site/forum I enjoy. They are asking for little short 100 word adventure stories describing the exploring of the different areas of the "world" with your pets. I have one story finished--and havent done any more--yet ^^ I have till about March 7, I think, to write whatever I'm going to on that.  I'm hoping I'll manage to at least write another story or two before deadline    :)

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