Waking Up in Galveston- Question Mark
I could hear the waves as the cool morning air came through the open door leading out to the patio from the room where I slept. I awoke several times at night. I had my blinds open, wanting desperately to watch the sun rise through my bedroom window in this wonderful birthday retreat.
This morning my girls and I gathered in my room 15 floors up on the beach in Galveston, Texas. Ann peeked in first.
“Are you awake?”
I had already turned around upside down on my bed and covered my legs, grabbing my camera, not wanting to miss the sunrise. “Come in” I replied, “ This is incredible”
“I didn’t want you to miss it.” She said.
Wrapped in a red flannel blanket and walking in slowly, reverently Ann knelt down before the large picture window and balanced her elbows on the ledge as if she were going to pray. Perhaps she did in her own way. Sunny showed up next, climbing up onto the large bed. It is a task getting into it, but I’m happy for it’s height, for there is a purpose. It raises me so that I can sit in bed, and watch the surf, the horizon, the many ships passing in the shipping lane so far out, and the little tiny dogs running and sniffing on the beach.
The waves come into shore in scallops, coming and coming and coming again. Four lines of white foam are constant, never moved by the scalloped edges. Farther out white caps peek up and down again as if they are in their own private game of hide-go seek.
What made the morning complete was a cup of hot tea. Started by my friend. “Let me make you your first cup of tea that you drink in your 50’s” she said.
As we three girls sat and watched and waited, a small single little cloud in the shape of a tiny question mark glistened brightly just above where the sun was going to rise. “ Happy birthday. What do I have in store for you?” God seemed to be saying. It was not an ominous question but a playful question, one that you can’t wait to unwrap, to figure, and to explore. We wait a good 45 minutes watching the sky go from mauve to pink to a hint of red and then applauded a simple rising of a sun. Something that happens every day, but this morning it was an event. Our faces shone a bright red as the ceremony reflected upon our own countenance. Once it was over, the three of us retreated into our own rooms They to sleep, me to write. The dust flecks glistening like stars on my computer screen with a sun that is now fully awake.
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Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com. She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Google— A Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing?
I know that the digital world is changing how we read and how we distribute books. I have a few problems with this. The first one is… my general mistrust of Google. Why should this lovable company who changes their artwork every day to make my searching enjoyable, be mistrusted?
I think they are getting too big for their britches.
belong to them. Artists and writers beware.
Left and right, artists are making waves about what Google is trying to do. According to my research they are infringing on the rights of artists and photographers.
“Artists Sue Google Over Copyright Infringement.” They are also the backers behind the Orphans Work Act. If you do not know about this and are an artist, you absolutely must learn. I mean it. Stop what you are doing and research this. What happens with this will change your income for the rest of your life. I have written about it before in an article for Best of Artists and Artisans, and there are links in the article for further information. If we are not careful, Google will become the God and keeper of all.
In a nutshell, Google wants to take the books that are out of print and make them available. Sounds real sweet, but watch out for that wolves teeth. As my southern friend says, “Katy bar the door.”
First of all, if I write a book, and it is out of print, what gives them the rights to reproduce that book without permission? They are also proposing that this be done with artwork, have a depository of artwork that people can come and browse and use. If artists do not claim their artwork and step up and say, “No, you can not use it, or this belongs to me,” then well tough poop for you. This puts the burden of copyright ownership on the artists. As it stands right now, artwork is copyrighted the moment it is created. I don’t have to search for my artwork all over the place. I don’t have to go to a Goggle provided website and pay to have my work protected and say it is mine. It is mine. PERIOD! For more information on this please read the article that I wrote for Best of Artists and Artisans 2008.
I may be lulled to enter blindly into the idea of digital books lovingly created and made affordable and accessible through Google, but I have a genuine mistrust of them. And what is sad is that I feel like they are my own child. I nurtured them. I still do. They are a part of my everyday life. Yet, they have too much control.
I am never one to spread discontent. However, in this case, I will stand on my soap box, behind my artists table and computer. I’ll give a very suspicious glance at Google as the writer/artist in me speaks, no shouts loudly. “ARTISTS AND WRITERS BEWARE! There is a wolf in sheep’s clothing!”
So what are your thoughts?
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Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com. She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Using Zbrush For Design And Presentation of Traditional Sculpture
This was a simple little piece, an award for a client. But I could not get it done and created in bronze in time for their presentation. No problem with Zbrush. I just created it digitally, worked out the details with my client and then created this video for them to present. Now it is on to the traditional sculpture in the studio. I loved using Zbrush timeline to create the animation.
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Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com. She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Thinking About Illustrating
Many years ago, before I was a sculptor, I painted.
Yes, it is true. The commissions I received, way back then, were for watercolor or pastel portraits. That was so long ago that the picture I am showing here is my daughter and I. My daughter is now headed toward 26!
I think it is curious that I have been away from two dimensional work for so long that it now feels difficult to visualize in 2d. That is why I have taken so well to 3d sculpting in programs like Mudbox or Zbrush. Not only can I create in the computer but I can color these 3d sculptures and drop them to canvas creating illustrations.
Why is this important to me now in my life? Because I have about 5 or 6 children’s books that I have written and I would really like to have them published. But, because I am an artist I have a hard time giving them over to an illustrator to do the illustrations. Unless of course that illustrator was my husband, I am considering this. This is one area of my art that I feel I need to pull together.
It is funny, this gap in my creativity was really the jumping board this past year for writing the young adult novel. I figured if I wrote a young adult novel I would not have to illustrate it.
My other old favorite was pen and ink. Ah if I could do that then I could have a blast with some of my poetry writing for kids.
Don’t be surprised if my creative endeavors in the future consist of doing 2d illustration.
Not to fear. I am not giving up sculpting, just expanding things a bit.
As I stated in another post-
If I was asked, who I’d like to have been.
I’d aspire to be Shel Silverstein.…
Mixed with another I could deduce
A helping smidgen of Dr. Seuss
Educating children would be sweet
I wish I’d created Sesame Street.
So truly if asked who I’d like to have been
My reply would then be seussyhensstein.
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Sculptor, Writer and Speaker
Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com. She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Marketing Information For Artists/Writers with Blogs
I have been very busy with my other blog on my collectibles website. For those interested in marketing and the Internet here is a little crash course in what I have learned.
For several years now my God’s Word Collectible series has been at Network Solutions server. However this is a shopping cart, and according to Network Solutions having a blog on a shopping cart is not a good idea, therefore they don’t offer it. ( I think this is the way they are coding, but a different article entirely)
This has been extremely frustrating for me. I know from this Creative Sculpture website that often more traffic comes through my blog than through my front page. We also have a podcast that we created and is sponsored by the God’s Word Collectible series.
So how can we direct people to listen to the podcast and also direct traffic to our site?
To remedy this situation I have a list of the podcasts on what I call the Host Bio’s page. This resides at http://www.godsword.net. I really like this page and it serves a purpose that no other page does. It shows all of our podcast all the way back to 2008 with a description and a link so that you can listen to them. It also has short bios about our hosts.
However ,a blog with my podcast offers so much more. I can post information, news, ideas, and thoughts. I can also post pictures of my guests and their books, videos of their work and a variety of other material, so a blog was necessary. Well my only recourse was to put a blog on Blogger and link to it from the godsword.net website.
Years ago I hired someone to make the blogger header look like the website. The idea behind that is that people would not know they left the site and they could still do such things as “return to shopping cart.” Which if they clicked on that link in blogger just sent them back to the God’s Word Website. Are you following me?
I did feel like my hands were tied with the rest of the “look” of the blogger blog and was really too embarrassed to post anything else there. Or to advertise it. The good thing about having the blog is that I linked that blog to God’s Word Collectibles Facebook Fans page and therefore, when I would post the new podcast on the blog the God’s Word Collectibles Facebook Fans page would automatically be updated. I loved this, and I love that people can listen to the podcast from Facebook. The bad part of having my blog on Blogger is that if I did get any traffic to the blog the godsword.net website was not getting the Search Engine Optimization Blogger was!
I had to have a blog connected to http://www.godsword.net!
I have wanted to switch my shopping cart to something else entirely, but that is something I am researching right now. For the time being it will stay at network solutions as a shopping cart. Tto resolve the blog problem I am adding a blog with this domain name http://www.blog.godsword.net This will actually be housed at an entirely different server than the shopping cart. It will be hosted on Host Gator. We consolidated all of our websites into one resellers package at Hostgator. It is a lot cheaper in the long run. Eventually- somehow once I figure it out God’s Word Collectibles Shopping cart it will also be switched to Hostgator. But I’m still looking for the appropriate shopping cart system.
HERE IS MY ENLIGHTENMENT!
I had not known that I cold have the same web address, URL or really something similar that would reside on two different servers. Note http://www.blog.godsword.net and http://www.godsword.net are a bit different.
I have put a Word Press blog on my host gator server at http://www.blog.godsword.net. Host Gator has done some magic in the background so the blog will not go live until I am ready and I can work on it. I imported the 3 years of posts from my blogger account. This was quite simple to do and was really just a click of the button. I have spent about 2 weeks finding a theme ( the look of the blog there are so many “skins” to choose from), arranging items, and presently, I’m fixing all of the posts to look better. Yes, 3 years of posts.
I’m also trying to work with optimization of the blog. What does that mean? Well I’m simply making use of all of the wonderful things Word Press has to offer to make my website come up first in search engines. That means making sure all of my photographs have everything they need behind them, in the code, to get searched. This sounds a lot more complicated than it is. Word Press offers you ways of doing this quite simply.
For further explanation here is an article by Krista Kopetsky at Interent Marketing Tips & Tricks on SEO For Word Press Image ALT Tags.
How about optimizing each blog post? Well here is a great resource Black Hat Source on How to Improve SEO of your WordPress
So just tweaking each post to make it look pretty is not all I’m trying to do. There are a lot of things on the back end.
I have also not used categories or tags for my posts before this. I will be working on that and posting some hints and helps on the best way to use those for optimization. This is a huge task, but not as big as changing this present Creative Sculpture site of 108 pages and 300 images over to a WordPress website. That is what I will tackle next year. A HUGE undertaking.
Hope someone finds this article helpful. Yes, marketing and spending time marketing is important in the arts. I look at my time in the last week and think, boy, it would be great to get back to the art. This time will pay off. Time well spent.
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Bridgette Mongeon is a sculptor, writer and educator as well as a public speaker. Her blog can be found at https://creativesculpture.com. She is also the owner and creator of the God’s Word Collectible Sculpture series Follow the artists on twitter twitter.com/Sculptorwriter twitter.com/creategodsword Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bridgette.mongeon Listen to The Creative Christian Podcast or the Inspiration/Generation Podcast Click on Podcast Host Bios for a listing of all podcasts Listen to the Art and Technology Podcast
Wow, Timeline In ZBrush 4 Is A Blast
I have a client who needs an award. Unfortunately he needs it ASAP. Well you just can’t rush creating a bronze. A 2 week turnaround on a bronze is physically impossible as it will need to go to the foundry. And so, I have used this opportunity to create the design first in ZBrush before going down stairs into the studio and sculpting it. It was great having Zbrush as part of my toolset As I could work out design details and send it back and forth to him to approve, via e mail. They needed something to show as they are going to present this to the CEO on Wednesday It is quite easy to make the Zbrush art into a video format using timeline. Oh, I can see myself having a lot of fun with this in the future. I’ll post mine later, but here are some examples of what timeline can do.
A cool video showing an animation of a heart using Zbrush 4 R Timeline
Here is a videos from Pixologic discussing the possibilities of Timeline.
Great Article About Art Student’s Mental Health
I like this article posted on the Chronicle of Higher education called Art Students’ Mental Health: A Complicated Picture by Daniel Grant. I applaud the writer for bringing some of these things to our attention. Though I want to encourage all the readers to brows down to the middle/end of the article to see why there is so much stress on artists. It is not because, as stereotype indicates, we are temperamental. But this short description taken from the article does get to the heart of things.
“They have to be creative on demand,” says Patricia Farrell, director of the counseling center at the Maryland Institute College of Art, “and they then have to handle a public critique.” Critiques are assessments, in-class but sometimes open to anyone in the college, of student work. They can be quite harsh, far different from the experience of being handed back an assignment with a grade on it.)
I encourage individuals who are entering art college to read this article and think about some of the things that you may not have thought about up until this point.
Ahhh Such A Sweet Post About Me on Someone’s Blog
I often take time out of the monthly schedule to post messages to others about desiring an interview for my Inspirational podcast. We are on number 80 something now. Have committed to three coming out a year. But while returning to a website and an interview from an incredibly interesting man who represents a wonderful lot of talent I found this post on his blog. He states, “I recently did a radio interview with a very interesting lady who is a world class sculptor.” So nice of him to comment. and you can listen to the podcast if you are intersted. Great insight into marketing and bringing God into your business. Thanks for the plug Michael Smith. Ah, maybe some day this man will represent me and all of my creative endeavors! First, I must continue to build my platform and pray.
Show-Don’t Tell
An aspiring writer asked me if I could jot down examples or tell her more about “Show Don’t Tell”
I thought I would put some things here to help her to learn the process. Lord knows I have to practice it quite a bit in my own writing. According to Wikipedia “Show, don’t tell is an admonition to fiction writers to write in a manner that allows the reader to experience the story through a character’s action, words, thoughts, senses, and feelings rather than through the narrator’s exposition, summarization, and description.”
So don’t just tell me your mother is an invalid and sick in a nursing home, show me. Describe it so it makes the reader “feel.” So, how do you get the reader to feel? I like Tara K Harper’s article on the subject- Show, Don’t Tell, the Story.
In Daily WritingTips Erin gives 4 tips on how to show not tell, including 1. Dialogue, 2. Sensory language 3. Be descriptive 4. Be specific, not vague. Be sure to check out the details in this article.
If you love Grammar Girl, and who does not love Grammar Girl, you can hear Mignon Fogarty talks about Show, Don’t tell. So check out the October 2010 podcast.
Of course “showing” often takes more words, and a lot more time. Frankly I think I have written non-fiction for so long that putting my hands to the typewriter “telling” comes much easier than showing. Which brings up a point. Is Showing only important in Fiction? Many believe a certain amount of showing is good in nonfiction as well. In this article 5 Non-Fiction book Writing Mistakes and Solutions Judy Cullins offers some suggestions for nonfiction writers.
Now on to writing and rewriting to show not tell.
I Need To Look At This More Seriously
I have been floating around the web looking for a shopping cart for another website that I have. Our God’s Word Collectible website is housed at network solutions and I need to get it out of there. So I am thinking of making the site all WordPress. But shopping for a shopping cart is a lot of work. I did find this good article by Dainis called Open Source E-Commerce shoping Carts- Best of. The list also has some paid shopping carts. It does not however list shopperspress which I am looking at as well. Here is the article link should anyone else need to investigate this process.