It’s hard to believe that the Christmas Holidays are upon us and I haven’t shared with you my profound “How to Detail a Snowman” knowledge … mostly because I don’t have any since I live in Texas. Since I have a can-do attitude, I am going to share with you a little side project I was working on last week that involves the drawing of a snowman.
I received an email from the office that asked me if I would prepare the drawing to be used in the video for my company’s Christmas card. In the history of the company, they have only had 4 people prepare these drawings in the past (and all of them have their names on the door) so I took being asked as a really big deal. Since I am a believer in saying “yes” to things, of course I was going to do it, but I will admit that some nerves kicked in because I have seen the previous videos that had been prepared and I was worried that I couldn’t draw + model as expertly as the previous folks.
…what to do?
I know what you are thinking:
“Bob … this is a technical design landscape retaining wall idea sketch, it has nothing to do with Christmas or a snowman“
And you would be right … however … as I spent my Sunday evening thinking about what I had agreed to do, I thought about this sketch (it was the most recent one I had published) and it occurred to me that I needed to focus on the types of drawings that I do, not some Thomas Kinkade-like image of what should go on a Christmas card. I draw technically-minded design sketches that focus on using line weight and hatching. So as I was looking at this landscape retaining wall sketch, I knew exactly what I needed to do.
Enter in a technical design Snowman idea sketch!
For those of you that are curious – especially as you see how this thing evolves over the next few images – this is what my sketches look like as I work through them. I needed to see if this was an idea that would have any legs to it (but not in an ironic way since snowmen don’t have legs …). This was the sketch that I showed the partners to get approval for what I was proposing.
There are actually things about the initial concept snowman sketch that I prefer over the finished product – some things just didn’t make it all the way to the end product.
Once the idea was worked through and approved, the next thing I needed to do was come up with a snowman. I will confess that I chose a “snowman” because they are easy to draw and I had limited time to pull everything together – maybe a couple of hours at best. (Yes, writing this post took longer than actually working through this entire process). Drawing a snowman isn’t particularly difficult I will concede, but it does require what I do best …
Line weight and hatching.
So here is the final version, complete with a handful of “architectural” jokes (I am particularly proud of the “Jack Frost” line …). I am quite sure that there are detailing issues with my snowman but given the spirit in which it was created, I’m not overly concerned about it (and neither should you, thank you very much). I ended up drawing about 5 versions/ evolutions of this snowman when it was all said and done. There is always something that you see that isn’t as it should be and since it doesn’t really take me all that long to sketch these things out, I would go back in and fix it. As you might recall, this detail sketch was created for the purpose of sending out a Christmas card to friends and family … and since maybe 3 or 4 of the people reading this post fall into the “family” category, the rest of you would be considered friends. Why else would you still be reading this post?
Here is the video:
An Architect’s Snowman from BOKA Powell on Vimeo.
I did not put this video together, that is the handiwork of Brooks Powell, who leads business development and marketing activities at my office. I’m pretty sure it was Brooks who tapped me to do this year’s video card. I prepared all the images and Brooks set up a camera by my desk and took care of recording everything and assembling the final cut of the video.
We’ve even turned it into a coloring book page for those folks with kids! Although, coloring a snowman might be a little boring since it is white (no yellow snow allowed). I think you’ll need to add your own embellishments like scarves, top hat, corn cob pipe … tattoos?
It won’t come as a surprise to anyone that this year has been hard – everyone has lost something, whether it was a job, a loved one, or even a piece of yourself. Dealing with loss brings an opportunity for gratitude and being grateful for the positives we do have is extremely important. I don’t do this very often on this site but I am grateful to my family and friends for being there for me, even if it is just to listen to me complain for a few minutes because that really helps. I am grateful for having an amazing job and for working with people that I genuinely like and care for, and I am extremely grateful that there are still enough people who visit this site that motivates me to continue creating, searching for ways to share knowledge, and continually inspiring me to improve myself (even when I don’t want to) after doing this for almost 11 years.
Thank you, my friends – and cheers to you and the people you care about.
