Coffee Sketch Podcast

107 - New Tech Old Dogs!

January 27, 2023 Kurt Neiswender/Jamie Crawley Season 5 Episode 107
Coffee Sketch Podcast
107 - New Tech Old Dogs!
Coffee Sketch Podcast +
Get a shoutout in an upcoming episode!
Starting at $3/month
Support
Show Notes Transcript

Thank you for listening. We both hope that you enjoyed this episode of Coffee Sketch Podcast. Our Theme music is provided by my brother who goes by @c_0ldfashioned on Instagram and Twitter. Our podcast is hosted at coffeesketchpodcast.com find more show notes and information from this episode. And finally, if you liked this episode please rate us on iTunes and share us with your friends! Thank you!


Buy us a Coffee! Support the Show!


https://www.buymeacoffee.com/coffeesketch


Music on the Show


CNEIS - https://cneis.bandcamp.com/

c_0ldfashioned - https://www.instagram.com/c_0ldfashioned/ 

Compilation - https://triplicaterecords.bandcamp.com/track/cneis-more-or-less 


Our Links


Follow Jamie on Instagram  - https://www.instagram.com/falloutstudio/ 

Follow Kurt on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/kurtneiswender/ 

Kurt’s Practice - https://www.instagram.com/urbancolabarchitecture/ 


Coffee Sketch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/coffeesketch 

Jamie on Twitter - https://twitter.com/falloutstudio 

Kurt on Twitter - https://twitter.com/kurtneiswender 


On the Web


Website - www.coffeesketchpodcast.com

Kurt’s Practice - www.urbancolab.design 

Contact Me - info@urbancolab.design 

NFT Artwork - https://hic.af/urbancolab 


Coffee Sketch Podcast is on YouTube for extended cuts and more visual content of Jamie’s beautiful sketches. Please consider subscribing!


https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_lQkY3-OqmHaTl_jdOgtvw 


Kurt’s Practice Urban Colab Architecture, shares about the practice of architecture and is also on YouTube. Please Subscribe to: 


https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuMXvvQXgrQIVE1uJ8QHxsw 

Support the show

Buy some Coffee! Support the Show!
https://ko-fi.com/coffeesketchpodcast/shop

Our Links

Follow Jamie on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/falloutstudio/

Follow Kurt on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/kurtneiswender/

Kurt’s Practice - https://www.instagram.com/urbancolabarchitecture/

Coffee Sketch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/coffeesketch

Jamie on Twitter - https://twitter.com/falloutstudio

Kurt on Twitter - https://twitter.com/kurtneiswender

Kurt:

I don't know, was there any other curve balls I've thrown at you getting,

Jamie:

Not today, no. Not that I'm, not, that I'm currently aware of. There is no cryptocurrency involved in this. Is there please? No.

Kurt:

Okay, good. No, I'm on the fence with that sort of stuff. the, I mean, I'm in on technology, but I'm not all, all the way in Right. Right,

Jamie:

right, right. Yeah, we're not minting NFTs today while we're live streaming on the podcast, so, oh geez. There you go.

Kurt:

Quit. Gibber, jabbering. Oh, you jumped, you did jump right into it. Well, thanks Jamie.

Jamie:

Yeah. See this is the delegation part.

Kurt:

It's fantastic. And you jumped right into this sketch.

Jamie:

Yeah, mastermind. Mastermind.

Kurt:

I'll never live that down. I'll never live it down. No, I'm, I'm getting a little hungry, so gotta gotta hurry this one along. So thanks. So Jamie and Jamie and. As we mentioned in the, the last segment, the last episode, is that we are pushing right into the new year with all kinds of new technology. And, and I'll, I gotta, I gotta say it now to now that it's all being recorded. So it's, it's, it's co, recorded Forever is I, I, we started using mural and today is like Jamie's first day in mural. And what does he do as he, he sketched something, and I can't tell you how happy I am that I brought Jamie into a piece of technology. As we know, there are varying degrees of success in that for both of us. and the instinct kicks in and Jamie draws a beautiful sketch with his fingertip, I believe. Or maybe a little bit of both mouse and fingertip. But anyway, so so this is a great way I think, I mean, this couldn't, couldn't have turned out any better to start off this season. We, we we do our, our, our historical resolutions episode, and then we move into some, some sketches, brand new, fresh. I mean, this couldn't be any fresher than, than the sketch you're seeing that happened. Well, at this point, maybe about a half hour ago. Yeah. It's one of the, I mean, My screen is still, just emanating the, the, the newness of the sketch anyway, so.

Jamie:

Wow. You, you really built that one up. Yeah. I mean, it it is, it is a crappy, it is a crappy sketch, but I

Kurt:

don't think so. Although I, I think this is this little squiggly line. Is that an accident line? That was an accident line, yes. Or is it, is it the cloud?

Jamie:

Move it over here. I can, I can see if I can do the clouds. Let's see if I can do the clouds. So

Kurt:

but, so you drew a, a little shed building with a nice little meandering path. The perspective is what I'm impressed with the most. You have this little pathway approaching, approaching the, the, the building that you designed and see now it's even getting richer with the, the backdrop, So but I, I. I'm not, I'm not trying to encourage Jamie to f to forget old trustee sketchbook and pilot pen, un, unless, we may threaten pilot pen to to sponsor us if and we'll just use mural if they don't send us some pilot pens.

Jamie:

Yeah. I gotta, gotta resupply.

Kurt:

But while you're drawing that, I wanted to shout out my, my, my friend also a family. It's my wife's cousin, Sam. Sam is a, a devote and, and, and devoted listener of the Coffee Sketch podcast. And he's currently a student at Michigan State University. And he, he's told me and we, we just saw him over the holiday and he said, he, he's missed us and he loves listening to the podcast as he's walking to class and maybe in class, but I don't condone that. But, right? So and then we've, we, I think I've gave Sam a shout out here and now he also is a big time soccer fan, football fan, which I think we've talked about that, Jamie. Yes, we have. Yeah. I believe he's a, a fan of your nemesis team. Yes.

Jamie:

But that's okay. I think he's a city fan. And just about a week ago it was the Manchester Darby, and so Manchester United versus Man City and Manchester's Red cause, so, oh. I think, I think he's a city fan, isn't he?

Kurt:

I, I think. Okay. I, I, I, I, I'll admit, I, I don't know all the names, isn't there like a team in Liverpool? Yeah, there's, there's

Jamie:

known, there's more than one in Liverpool. Yes.

Kurt:

I think I learned the most while watching Ted Lasso, so that that's,

Jamie:

that, that's not real.

Kurt:

Right? Wait, what, what? Really? Yeah. So well, now I gotta start over. I gotta, I gotta reassess my whole life. Now you've deflated the Ted Lasso. Have you not watched Ted Lasso? I have not. Are you gonna, are you gonna boycott? It's actually a very

Jamie:

good show. No, no, I, it's, it. I've heard it's very and so no, it's, it was one of those things, it's like I just was like, I, I didn't have Apple TV and yeah. And then, or Apple Plus or whatever the hell. And it just wasn't on my radar. And then it came out and everybody started raving about it. And it's one of those ones where, when a series like, people found it, it started to get hyped and then you realize like, oh, I might be interested in that. And you look and it's like, they are so many episodes in, do I really want to binge? And yeah. So I didn't but it's, it's there, it's still waiting there for me. So

Kurt:

oh yeah, it's not going anywhere actually the third season, then final season is coming out

Jamie:

in spring. See what, see now you just ruined it for me again cuz it's like you've, now you've added a whole, I didn't realize that they were already up to three, so.

Kurt:

Well that's not out yet, but Okay. So I've got two seasons to catch up. I'll tell you this much. I know. We, we actually, it's been, I've been dying to talk to you about it and, and have this complete tangent from our sketch, but it's so good. And Danielle is a avid and voracious reader. She loves books, right? Yes. So she spends a lot of time, a lot more time than I do reading, reading and reading for pleasure. And then we get together after, at, at the end of the day and we'll watch a couple episodes of things and stuff like that. So Ted Lasso the show is so good that we watched both seasons twice and Danielle, Danielle never watches anything twice. Yeah,

Jamie:

yeah,

Kurt:

that's true. She would probably even watch it a third time in pre, I mean, it's that good.

Jamie:

That's a different level of endorsement for you, I have to say from, from you both. So I, I will, I will take that to heart and I will I will try and report back that I have watched a couple episodes, so

Kurt:

anyway. Yeah. So anyway, that was a, a fun kind of, I have

Jamie:

watched, I have, I have watched welcome to Rex some though. Oh,

Kurt:

I, I wanna watch. I haven't yet, we haven't watched

Jamie:

that. I, I did, I did complete that and have tried to encourage others to watch it.

Kurt:

So it is now that one is, isn't that formatted more, is that a documentary kind of? Yeah, it's based, so Ryan Reynolds and, and Mack from Sunny in Philadelphia. Rob McEnany. Yep. Right. So they co-own a, a soccer team, a football club, right? Yes. Yeah. So it is, it's not like dramatized. It's.

Jamie:

I mean, it, it is dramatized. Oh, there's a little bit of, well, I mean, it's the two of them. I mean, I think dramatize anything, so Yeah, they ham it up, of course. But, but no, it is, it is a it, I mean it is a documentary in, style format real, real short episodes. So there's themes of course, with it. So it's, it's fun. I mean, and they're a, it's a historic club in Wales. And then and then their pitch, their, their field, their stadium is one of the oldest active stadiums in the world. Oh. And so but it's in like complete disrepair and all these other things. So, there's some elements of infrastructure and the team dynamic and the coach and the fans and the supporters and, the bar next door and the American owners and, all this kind of stuff. But they're trying to get trying to get the team on track and also get them out of the lowest, one of the lowest divisions of soccer or football in England. Cuz they, the English system has a promotion relegation, so you can move up from one. I

Kurt:

know about relegation because Ted Lasso

Jamie:

taught me Ted Lasso taught you Yes. How relegation works. Yeah. So this, so this docudrama is,

Kurt:

All about that. Wow. That's, that's really cool. That's cool. Yeah.

Jamie:

Yeah. It's, I mean, it, it's good. I mean, it's I, I think for the, kind of the casual fan, it, it's got a, a bunch of different ways to kind of get into it. But I, I, I've enjoyed it. So,

Kurt:

so, so does different, do all football clubs have a bar next door? Is that like a, a just a thing, like a re a requisite? I, I

Jamie:

think, I think they all want a bar next door. Yeah. But I,

Kurt:

I don't, again, Ted Lassos team has that local pub. Yeah.

Jamie:

Yeah. I think that was the funny thing about where, like, here in Austin, with Austin fc, we've talked about them, is that, they, they was, that was sort of the big question, okay, where are you gonna build this brand new stadium? And then what's it gonna be near? And, The semi-pro team or kind of division two or three that used to be in Austin years before they played in a historic art deco stadium actually a landmark historic landmark in, in the city of Austin. football stadium. And conveniently, right next door was a, was a bar. So, you would oftentimes, find the coach or, whatever, kind of in the bar afterwards. And but yeah, and I mean, literally around the corner that's a completely different part of it downtown from where the current stadium is. But in, fast forward to today. So Austin FC has a bunch of breweries. So there's a, there's a big craft brewing scene here in Austin. Mm-hmm. And so the march to the match is from the. from one of the breweries over to the stadium. Mm-hmm. by the supporter group, so Of course.

Kurt:

Yeah. That's cool. We they do that here in, in Flint too. Yes, they have. It's not very far from a couple of favorite spots in. Yes. There you go. The Flint Flint City Bucks. Flint Bucks. City books. They're, they're actually pretty good. Like still they remain good. So anyway, so yeah, I think so I've been to the bar. There's two bars that people kind of converge from and they got their drums and they're, it's pretty, it's fun. It's fun to see that locally here in Michigan, it's not really a, I don't, I don't think it's a well-known soccer state. But actually to segue, let's do a hamfisted segue that Kurt likes to do is Chris asked if either of us have tried sketching on an iPad. Chris says he has not, but have has been hearing good things since the last generation of Apple pencil came out. And so I know I know I, I haven't done it since a long time. I think I had an iPad two or three ways back, and a more simple, like, there, there was no Apple pencil back then, so I had like a stylist that had that really didn't have much, technology in it. Actually was inspired by our friend Laura Teagarden to give it a try. She was, her all her a r e sketches, like she does with an iPad, and so I iPad Yeah. Put book and all that. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so I tried it. And then we eventually, as the iPad got older, we kind of sold it and I, so I don't have one anymore. But I am kind of intrigued by some of the new, I don't know if Jamie's followed any of the, the tools or the hardware that Apple's been creating, but I'm kind of interested in giving it a go. I have a lot of students, and I can say this to Chris, is I do have a lot of students that have, I, the nice iPads with the Apple pencil, and they do seem pretty adept with, it actually does seem to encourage them to sketch. I mean, as, as much as it pains me to not see them use trace and pencils and pens to sketch on, they are using their iPads to to do things with the pencils. So, I'll take what I can get Yeah. But I don't gonna, have you tried

Jamie:

any? I I haven't used the, to answer the question, I haven't used the apple pen or stylists on the, on the iPad. I, I did notice that they had a new generation come out. And, and I did notice because I'm actually trying to figure out if I'm gonna get trying to maybe a separate tablet. And where it's, it's less about I might not do like an Apple iPad tablet. For that, I think kind of, it's sort of redundant to, to my laptop in a sense. But I like the idea of a tablet and so I've been looking at different tablet formats and and then stylist's or stylists is St. St. anyhow. Yeah. Grammar vocabulary. Yes. Slists stylists. I have u I mean, I had I've worked with a Microsoft Surface tablet before and tried a bunch of different stylists for with that. And I think the thing that, that I, it, it's, I have not. And if someone has a great recommendation for it that's, that would be helpful. And I don't know if it's, it's more of a personal thing, but it's the combination, like the stylist never feels the right weight to me compared to like a pen or a pencil. And so and a lot of them, at least earlier generations that I fiddled with, they didn't like when I would not hold the pen or the stylist correctly. Mm. And so, Kurt, who has seen me sketch in person, knows that I don't always hold the pen. Right. And so cuz I'm always trying to force it to do some other things, And so what, when I do that, it, I wouldn't necessarily get the effects that I wanted and I get a little bit frustrated with it. I know a lot of that has changed cuz I've been, been toying with a couple different models. It might be something that I end up treating myself to here in the spring. Because I, I do, I do like the idea of having something that is, I, I don't think I would ever give up a, a physical sketchbook. But I like the idea having something that can, you're sort of skipping the step of taking the photo, skipping the step of scanning something, kind of integrating, the technology with, with the process. But I, like, I wanna have the convenience of it. And I want, I don't wanna lose sort of that tactical kind of quality mm-hmm. But then on the flip side, I like the idea of, wouldn't it be great to have a stylist, which, that has multiple brushes and where, you're sort of taking Photoshop and bringing it into a stylus on the tablet and not having to do that sort of post-production work. Purposely later you can almost kind of flip the process, start to bring it in at the very beginning. And I like that. I like that a lot. So that's cuz part of the things that I will do kind of in these kind of hybrid sketches is sort of flip back and forth. And oftentimes I'll if I'm doing like the sketch on the left that's in here was was done on, on trace photocopied out several times because I wanted to do a bunch of color studies. And so what I would, what I basically did was sort of block in the image quickly and trace and then I knew that I wanted to do several color studies of it, so I didn't want to draw it. 50 times not, I didn't do 50 color studies. But, and when I say block it in, I'm not drawing the whole image. I'm, I'm drawing, pieces and parts of the image. I'm sort of, blocking it in. If anyone uses modeling tools, you sort of set up your camera shot you block in and block in your objects, and then you come back in and kind of layer on information, to it, same technique, but doing it from a sketch point of view using a copier mm-hmm. So and really because it was, it's, it's process driven for me. And, but at that point there is sort of a switch from sketch to multiple copies to color study. And then realizing at that point that that color study is narrowing itself down to here's two or three versions of reality that I like. And so at that point then I will come back with the pen and start to add in a lot more detail to it. And then it becomes this sort of back and forth between mediums that I think that a digital tablet kind of situation would really align with in terms of

Kurt:

process. Yeah, that's that, that, that, that makes sense. Actually, that's probably one of our best segues to the sketches that we've ever done. Yes. Only what actually I should say, Jamie's always good at segway. Kurt is not good at Segway. But

Jamie:

the but don't put me on a segue, cuz those things like Terri, like, like seeing those people and just, it terrifies me. Just it, it, and not, because like, I'm, I don't wanna ride on one, but so I work in downtown Austin and. There's a couple different, like tourist locations kind of in downtown and there's one where people do Segway tours and like, so I'm going to get coffee. And you always see like the people who have just literally gotten on the Segway and they're like, the, their instructor is like, okay, so we're gonna tour around, but I wanna make sure everyone can start and stop and lean forward. And it's like, oh my God, someone's gonna die. And yeah. Anyhow, that's my my

Kurt:

worry for other people. Yeah. I've never ridden one, but yeah, so this is so that's the, the process of the scale. It's kind of, I don't know if we've ever discussed that actual process before or maybe not in so much detail, but that's, that's a pretty interesting and, and, and a great kind of how do I put it? Demonstration, I, I suppose, of, of how these sketches were pr per prepared. And I, and I was, at the same time, I was kind of thinking about like, the, the concept of the tools and technology of can it be done on iPad? And I've seen a lot of pretty pretty good artwork because there's apps like procreate, which is unfortunate name in my opinion, but it's apparently one of the better and more feature rich apps for like an iPad in order to draw and then layer and then switch brushes. And, and I think you can even create your own custom brushes, which, maybe Jamie will develop the coffee. Brush pack

Jamie:

Well, no, I mean yeah. Them and then more Folio and there's a couple others that, that you can do sort of custom brushes. And I, I think it's, I think it's really interesting. I mean, I, I follow a lot of digital artists on Instagram and on Twitter. And what's, what's nice and sort of seeing how some of them either generate their work or what they're usually, typically posting is not their professional work, but their sort of side projects. And so in their side projects, they'll sort of discuss process a little bit and, or you see them, post things progressing over time and, with a careful eye you kind of figure out how they're doing it. And kind of the different techniques that they might be employing. I mean, like the sketch on the right. That is, that's all one shot. That that's not, multiple images. That's kind of working through a discussion with a particular client and like admittedly existing building, actually both of these would be existing buildings, but the one on the left is actually existing building that a, that, that needed a whole lot of work. The one on the right, fortunately a lot of those design features were already there. But it was, it kind of explaining the concept of how to properly put a sign on this building, how to put, where it should go how a canopy should work and kind of a, a contemporized context. This one was a, an old market building in one of our historic downtowns here in Texas. And it actually had an operable fabric awning. For the market. It was like a meat market. And then and then a, a, a larger market later on. And so it had an opera, operable, fabric, awning. All of that equipment and, and mechanics were all gone. But the transoms were there. They had been boarded up. And, but all the decorative features at the top of the building, all those who existed some of'em had to be repaired and we had to come talk them through that. But it wasn't really kind of appropriate to come back in with a, a fabric awning per se in their case. But to create a new awning low slung, low slope metal awning canopy space to protect some of those transom windows. But do it in, in a form, in a shape, in a style and a scale that is appropriate for the district. And then, At the same time, they had one small opening on that side of the building, and not the building's not big enough to be, they were converting into a restaurant. So they had all the back of house storage, bar, kitchen small dining space. And they needed more patio dining to really make that restaurant work on, from a pro proforma standpoint, from a business standpoint. And so we worked with the city to figure out how to do patios. Cause th this particular downtown didn't have any outdoor dining spaces. And then how do you, how do you work through a historic wall to create the appropriate size door? Part opportunity, mural opportunity on the side of the building. And, and so this, this was intended to illustrate this both for property owner building officials development office where it touched on a variety of different things. And, and really worked, I mean, this is, this, this restaurant is open now. Was able to go to the, the grand opening. They had soft open before and then they had a big grand opening in December. So I was able to go to the, the grand opening for it. So I was pretty excited.

Kurt:

That's great. It's yeah, thanks for the detail. I, I was kind of scanning around the two different sketches as you were talking and like with the middle awning, I like the idea of new, with the old and, and mixing, mixing those, sensible. And compatible materials, but with a new, a new component. Right. And so, we've talked a lot about historic conditions, historic districts and, and how to adapt buildings and, and especially like on the right where you're, it has to be pretty c conscious of when you're cutting a hole in the existing wall for a new door, where to make that cut. But then at as it, it basically gives this building plus patio this new life that it didn't have before, which creates the, the, the viability and the feasibility as you were saying. Like, this is really interesting to hear all the various. parties at the table that you're trying to appease. Right? The ownership and, and developer and, and Citi and, and having, making sure that all kind of agree. And so it's, it's, yeah, it's great. Thanks for, and well, congratulations,

Jamie:

Well, thank you. Well, I mean, and it's, and it's something that, it, it's not to make light of it, but it's, literally it's, this is, this is our superpower is, is coming up, taking all those different facets of a project and coming up with an image or multiple images or diagrams or, something visual to really speak to a variety of audiences, help them feel more comfortable about what you're discussing and or what you're propos. And, and at the same time eliciting more questions. if, if they do have more concerns, now they can see it, and now they can, they can talk to it, in a very, in a, in a more comfortable way. So it's not about having the right answer. And, sometimes the sketch just, leads to the better leads to the better answer. And so that's, that's, in this particular case, what was interesting was their, their contractor and fabricator was having a hell of a time figuring out that awning. And so even with this sketch, they, the, what was what was nice was the city and the historic preservation officer kept coming back to the sketch and saying, something's not right about what you're, you're proposing for the building. Look at this sketch. And, even though it was sort of two different things, they knew it wasn't right. And then, and then fortunately they were able to kind of bring me back into the discussion. I was like, oh, well you, your, your slope is wrong. your fabricator is, is working with this slope and it really should be this slope. And then suddenly that shop drawing that I'm looking at, I'm able to, to, to mark up the shop drawing and kind of help them understand why they instinctively know that it's not like the sketch that they all liked to begin with. And it, it, it's, it's not about, like I said, not about having the answer, but it's about kind of creating the, the opportunity for the conversation to happen. And I, I've always seen sketches, doing that, doing that work for us. Mm-hmm.

Kurt:

Yeah. Yeah. It's a good, I like that. And actually it is in the role of being a teacher of architecture to students right now, I mean, that's, that's kind of the key. You some, sometimes, there is a tendency to kind of, one and done is, is, is a way to put it, with the students. Like they'll create one iteration from the, the, the assignment, right? And say, here's my design, versus understanding the iterative process as you were describing how even, the sketch is a piece of a continuum from idea to grand opening, and there's a lot of other steps in the way along the way that then, take the sketch, adapt the sketch, you talked about. Shop drawings and f and it takes multiple versions of this, not to mention the 50 color, copies that you made to like test And so, yeah, I hope my, if any of my students are listening or when I tell them to listen they and kind of think about that part of it too, and, and that it's not wasted effort. I think sometimes the pushback is that they think it's a wasted effort when, when the interim sketch is not then the final product and, and it just stays, so it not necessarily gets tossed aside, but, you don't want to, it should be kept but the, in the interim, the, the unused sketches aren't necessarily wasted product is, is I guess the, the idea there. So, yeah. Great. That's a, that's a, a great. Detailed, deep dive in, into those sketches, really. So thanks again, Jamie.

Jamie:

Yeah, this is great. I, I, I enjoyed talking through those. Thanks.