Wee Hours

Been working odd hours lately. It's nice and quiet and I get to see what things look like at sunrise. This is what things look like from my roof:

Horrorwood Recap

First of all, thanks to everyone who made it out to the show! It was great to see everyone, and get a chance to catch up a bit with the people I hadn't seen in a while. There was a bunch of good work, including a really well-rendered Hellraiser piece and an awesome piece of the clown from It that looked like he was in a TV... lights and glass and things... sort of hard to put into words. But, that's why if you have a chance you should head down to WWA to see it all for yourself!

Rainbow Bloblin with Jelly Girl and Bignose Taffypants Esq.

My sister sent me a painting her kid made, and I added black and white over the top of it. Even though he's probably not thinking about it, he's grouping the colors and keeping them from getting too muddy (except in the middle). It's nice painting exclusively for fun sometimes, and all too easy to forget to do.

Good Evening

Here's a mid-progress shot of my piece for the Horrorwood show, coming up on the 16th @ WWA Gallery:

Cannibal Flower Wrap Up

Here I am at the Cannibal Flower this past Friday in front of my piece. If you'd like a chance to see any of the work, it should be up until this Friday. The space this time was really great. Lots of room, plenty of light and ventilation. On top of that there was an abundance of great artwork, performances, music, and people. Looking forward to the next show!

Here's another photo of the painting in better light and without any dummies in the foreground.

Cannibal Flower Tomorrow!!!

Cannibal Flower 13th Anniversary Show

317 N. Westmoreland Ave. 90066

Friday, Sept. 27 8pm-2am
$13 w/o RSVP
$10 w/ RSVP @  http://www.artdontsleep.com/2013/09/13cannibalflower/
$8 w/ RSVP and food donation to L.A. Food Bank
$6 w/ RSVP and costume

Here's a little slice of the painting I'll have in the show:

Horrorwood 2013

I'll be participating in the Horrorwood show again. For some reason the gallery decided to move the date away from Halloween, but if any of you are looking for some residual spookiness as a reprieve from the Christmas cultural onslaught, come on down.

Gas Mask Study

Here's a study of a gas mask I did after reading about the reported chemical attacks the Syrian government is directing at its own people.

Chestnut-tailed Minla Study

This study was based on today's Wikimedia Commons pic of the day.

FOR THE SWARM!!!

Here's a Shepard Fairey style poster a buddy of mine asked me to put together for him. He's deep into this game called Eve Online. The game is full of growth upgrade strategy, complex multifaceted space flight combat tactics, and cross-reality espionage. The best part is that all of this is user-generated. The software creates another world, and the players collectively create the story by deciding their part in it. It's one of those games that I'm afraid to dip my toe into, lest I be sucked in completely.

Cat Nap

Here's a piece I recently made for a show called Sound and Vision in Venice. While I was varnishing and snapping photos my cat, Hobo, decided to check out the space behind the painting. That's his butt.

Monstrous Manual 005: Arcane WIP

This week I thought I'd show a bit of the mid-process artwork for the Monstrous Manual Project. The next monster I'm working on is called an Arcane, which are slender blue giants that roam around selling magical items.

I've started by creating a silhouette of the creature, gradually pushing and pulling at the edges until the shape looks right, flipping it horizontally from time to time to make sure it looks good both ways. I then start to block in different elements of the creature into separate layers: it's body, robes, bag, and cloak. This allows me to begin organizing the tonal structure while continuously making adjustments to the major shapes. I also usually put some extra time into the head, as I've found that allowing the focal points to be a bit more developed than the surrounding areas tends to help keep my creative momentum.

Once everything's blocked in and I like how the shapes are looking, I lock the transparent pixels on each layer so I don't 'color outside the lines' and start modeling the form. I usually try to travel around the piece evenly, working on adding details and pulling things into focus here and there. If I find myself focusing too much on one area, it's time to move on to the least developed area, or any other element that is calling for attention.

This technique has its drawbacks, but it is a quick way to play with ideas and start to get a sense of whatever it is you're creating. As for this artwork, I'll probably try to approach this monster from a different angle, but experimenting with this idea establishes a landmark from which I can determine a direction to move towards with the final artwork.

Practice

Here's a figure study of a random cute girl for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Monstrous Manual 004: Ankheg

This monster is like a big, nasty cousin of the things from Tremors.

Figure Drawing Warm Up

Before I start working for the day I usually warm up with some figure drawing sketches. Here are some two minute poses I did the other day.

Monstrous Manual 003: Aboleth

I haven't done one of these in a while. This creature's an odd one. It's got psycho-mind manipulation powers that turn adventurers into pwn-drones.

Figure Friday

A Light in the Darkness

This piece was entered into WWA Gallery's I Belive in Unicorns II group show in February of this year. It recently sold to a mysterious buyer whom the gallery informed me wished to remain anonymous. Anyone who knows me and my work might question why I would enter a group show about happiness, rainbows, sunshine and horny equines. When WWA initially contacted me about submitting a piece it wasn't actually planned as another Unicorns show. Originally it was slated as a tribute to Bob Ross; a landscape painter, philosopher, and unofficial Jedi master. Unfortunately this show would have stepped on the toes of another gallery with the same idea to use that theme, so WWA had to switch things up. Although this piece is thematically a departure from my greater body of work, I still had some fun trying to represent happiness within a world of darkness.

Tank Girl

This is a recent collaboration with Ken Flewellyn. It is based off of a Tank Girl cover, but the accessories have been modified to relate to a mutual friend.