No more boring drawings!
Many drawing tutorials show us how to draw things. Why are these drawings so boring?
Ralph Ammer
Latest posts
Thomas Aquinas — The world is divine!
A large part of our civilisation rests on the shoulders of one medieval monk: Thomas Aquinas. Amid the turmoil of life, riddled with wickedness and pain, he would insist that our world is good. And all our success is built on this belief. Note: Before we start, let’s get one thing out of the way: […]
Xunzi vs. Mengzi – Are People (No) Good?
About 2300 years ago, the great Chinese thinker Xunzi 荀⼦ wrote: “Human nature is bad“. But he wasn’t just having a bad day. The question—Are humans fundamentally good or bad?—is a major fork in the road. How you answer this question profoundly impacts your morals and how you live your life. Previous to Xunzi, another […]
Henri Bergson — Why we live in the past
Should we just live in the moment? In “Matter and Memory” the French philosopher Henri Bergson claims that this is not even possible. 1. Perception is physical First of all: How do we perceive the “current moment” anyway? Bergson suggests that the whole point of perception is action. For example, when some single-cell organism touches […]
A quick beginner’s guide to animation
To “animate” means to breathe life into things. In these 5 exercises we make stones come alive. Preparation To get started I suggest this simple setup for you to try at home: Ready? Let’s go! Thinking in time Stop-motion is simple: Take a picture, move the object, take the next picture, move the object, etc. […]
Edmund Husserl — Consciousness
You are awake. You think and you feel. But what is it that is doing all this thinking and feeling? We call it “consciousness” and over 100 years ago the philosopher Edmund Husserl made a bold attempt to uncover its secrets. Subjective experience is private The thing is: Consciousness is not “out there”, it is […]
How infographics work
Why do we like images? Because they help us understand things. But what does that mean? Understanding Well, the world is complicated. And in order to make good decisions we need to know what is going on. Language can help us structure the world. So one way to understand things is to find the right […]
Aristotle — How to live a good life
2400 years ago Aristotle found out how to be happy. His Nicomachean Ethics is an operating manual for a good life: What is good? First of all, what makes a thing a good thing? A good thing fulfils its unique function. A good knife is a knife that is good at cutting. A good eye is […]
Immanuel Kant — What is Beauty?
Why is beauty so important? It leads us to truth and goodness, says Immanuel Kant. How? Beauty To uncover the secret of beauty, let us first examine how we usually view the world. This is what happens when we see something: 1. Our senses receive a lot of raw data from the outside world. 2. […]
The Creative Playground
How do I even begin my drawing? The secret to jumpstart our creativity is fun. But how does that work? We need to play Whenever I pass a public basketball court I am always struck by how the people who are literally stuck inside a cage are having more fun than those outside. The reason […]