"Whats Mine Is Mine" finished!

OK, finally finished this one, and just in time too! This piece will be appearing in a local art exhibit called "VS." which features 13 other Baltimore-based game artists and illustrators. More info on that coming soon!

Weekend Sketches

Flesher!

A couple new guys from lunch today. The first guy is ripping open his flesh and revealing his strange innards... that is why he is called the "flesher", get it? The other guy is less exciting, but he IS smoking. For shame.

Sacred Horn Blower

Protector of the phlame.

Sketch-o-topia

More pages from the tome of sketchery. I'm totally psyched to turn the image of the lady looking in the eagle-headed mirror into a full piece.

Wow! Finally a new POST!

Well, whaddya know?!?! I am finally posting something new! Sorry folks. I am going to try to get back on track. I will have to do several posts to catch up.

First, some news: I am going to be a father! My wife, Kathleen, is due in November, and I can hardly wait! I will be sure to post any drawings the child-to-be does on this blog.



Now, some art! So, I have been doing a little bit of freelance work for Privateer Press (just a few pieces here and there), and the latest one is featured on the cover of "No Quarter", their magazine. Check it out!



















The original:



















Also, I got into Spectrum again, yay! The piece they chose was the acrylic painting of the Witch and her "pet", check it out:

What's Mine is MINE!

Finished drawing for a piece I am thinking about doing in watercolor and pen and ink. My plan is to print out the drawing on watercolor paper, apply color, then do line-work overtop with pen and ink.

I am really happy with the drawing, I just hope I can do it justice in color....
Let me know what you think....

Ich habe ein Vogel im meine Kopf!

I hope I got that right... German speakers, please correct me if not.

Anyways, here are some more sketches. Sorry about the ever widening gaps in my posts.... stupid-busy what with work, teaching, freelancing, and now organizing an art exhibit at a local gallery. Phew!

A bizarre encounter in the alleyway

Finished this piece in color, finally. Don't bother asking me to explain, I have no idea what it means either, but I invite you to write a short story and post it here..... only if you have a bunch of time on your hands, but it might be fun, no?

I started teaching my class today at MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art). I am teaching a course on Fantasy Art. I think it is going OK, but I also think I may have come across as totally insane to the students... which is better than coming across as a jerk.... but the semester is still young!

Sketchbucks

A page of sketches from a recent visit to the ol' Starbucks.

Quick airport sketchpage

Boredom breeds sketch.

Happy New Year!

Here are some new scans from the old sketchbook to ring in 2009!

Blasto from El Pasto!

OK, so this is a piece I did in 2000, but which I still have in my portfolio. It's maybe one of my more successful pieces I think. Problem is, I have had a very bad scan of it for many years (it was done in pen and ink and water color). So I decided to take it out of the frame and re-scan it. This time I scanned it at a very high resolution, and I did not photoshop it at all, because I think it stands on it's own merits pretty well.

Looking closely at this piece reminded me of what I really love about drawing. I think I often have to remind myself of these things because I know that I can sometimes stray from the essential joy of drawing in favor of some percieved aesthetic expectations. I can't allow that to happen. I like getting back to my pen and ink roots.....

Enjoy!

What's this? Real paint?!?!?

Yep! It's an acrylic painting by yours truly. Currently sitting on my Bob Ross brand table easel. Can you believe it? I actually started this some time ago, as a personal challenge to break out the "natural media" paints again. I am pretty happy with the results, but have some issues with it as well. But this could be the start of a whole new series of analog paintings, what do you think?

I have updated the image. I re-took the photo and adjusted it to be more accurate to the actual colors of the piece....

PEN & INK MADNESS!!!!

So, I went to IlluXCon last weekend and met some of my favorite artists and got to hang out with a few of em too! Highest on my list was my absolute favorite illustrator of all time, IAN MILLER!!! You really should check out his work, it's amazing... I mean, look at THIS!


Unfortunately, the picture I had someone take of me with Ian Miller somehow got erased from my stupid iPhone, so I have no hard proof, EXCEPT for the Ian Miller original I bought and have in my posession..... my first of (hopefully) many Ian Miller originals. Here it is... with my cat....



















Coolest thing of all is that he seemed to really dig my work too, which is awesome, seeing as how his work has been a huge inspiration to me since seeing it in the pages of Warhammer books back in High School.

Anyways, one of the things I showed him was the piece below, which I just finished inking. Next will be to start painting it up in Photoshop. Once again I think I want to try to retain as much of the linework in the final image as possible.

Spectrum Errors, Hector the Kitty, and Screaming Bunny Monsters.

So, Spectrum 15 came out this weekend! There's yours truly's piece on page 173, and fellow BHG'ers Sang Han and McLean Kendree are in there too! It's really awesome to finally have a piece grace the hallowed pages of Spectrum. A minor gripe though: They got the name of the piece wrong.... d'oh! The name they have it listed as is "Skullneck", which is the OTHER piece I entered but did not get in. Oh well, not a biggie. Now I just have to get into Spectrum 16 so that people don't think it was just a fluke.

Anyways, my friend Unkie Dev and I have been collecting art found in the trash for many years. We have built up quite a collection, which includes pieces with such amazing names as "Boob Cave", and "Nature's Bounty". Now, my wife Kathleen has gotten into the act... she rescued this gem from certain oblivion... enjoy:

Finally, this is what is on my drawing table at the moment.... I have no idea what it is, or why it is, but let me know what you think of it so far....

Skull-Totems!

Took this piece from my sketchbook. I used micron pens over the pencil drawing. Originally I was going to paint over the lines, but then I decided I liked the linework enough to keep it. I also changed the color scheme since the last time i posted this as a WIP. i think I like this better. What say you?

Why I Have Been a Deliquent Blogger

OK, ok, so I know a real "blogger" doesn't let things stand in his/her way of blogging once every few days, but walk a mile in my shoes.... and you can keep the shoes..... I don't know what that means. Basically, for the past month or so, Kathleen and I have been moving into our new house in downtown Baltimore and unpacking and settling in. My studio still has a long way to go (pictures need to go on the wall, and more shelving must be built for additional books, etc.) But i figured I would show you what my new setup looks like anyways, plus a pic of the front of the house too. Below that is the skull-totem island piece again, this time I am thinking of going with a new color scheme, and keeping the colorization fairly simple.... I almost started going in there and painting in details and such, but i think i need to let the drawing really sing in this case and just use color to back up the mood. Anyways.... more stuff soon.

Done at last!

At long last this one is finished. I am fairly happy with it. What say YOU?

Flight Delay = Sketch-o-rama! Part 2

More airport scribbles.

Flight Delay = Sketch-o-rama! Part 1

On my way back from Syracuse, my connecting flight from Philadelphia to Baltimore was delayed by a couple of hours, so that's prime sketch-time! I also met a couple of guys coming back from the Ron Paul anti-convention in Minneapolis. They liked my art.... maybe Ron Paul would too?

Crushing Dreams

Ten years after I left the hallowed halls of that institution known as Syracuse University, they had me back to talk to the media arts (illustration, design, etc) students about life as a video game concept artist. I went there with the intention of warning them about the difficulty of breaking into the business, the long hours you have to work, the lack of recognition....

But as I stared at the students' faces, and thought back to how only a little over a decade ago I too sat in those chairs praying for some glimmer of hope for my future, I softened.... a little.

In all seriousness, it was a blast. I enjoyed talking to the students, and I was happy to see that they are very eager to learn everything they can about concept art, digital illustration, etc. I told them they need to fight to have the best equipment if they want to be prepared for the reality of the business, which is that digital illustration is basically industry standard.

I also did a quick painting demo of a creature from my sketchbook, which unfortunately was very low res, so I don't think I will be keeping him.

Hopefully they will invite me back some day... even though I did an impression of one of my professors, Roger DeMuth (that's him all blurry in the nosebleed section with the blue shirt).

Light at the end of the Digital Easel

Progress on these pieces. My wife thinks they have a similar color scheme, and I think she is right. She thinks maybe there is some deep inner meaning behind the color choices.... I think she's a loon-bat! These colors mean nothing to me....NOTHING! I HATE these colors.... they beat me as a child.

Anyways. The Smoking guy is almost done except for the background and some other small details, but I was thinking about adding some wallpaper back there... what do you think?

Some news - I will be teaching a Fantasy Art class at Maryland Institute College of Art starting in the Spring semester of 09. I am excited about it, but nervous too... this will be my first real class that I have taught on my own... but what an exciting thing to teach! There is so much to think about! Let me know if you have any ideas about how I should approach it.. I want it to be an intelligent class that encourages the students to break new ground with Fantasy Art, and not just tread the same old tired ground....

Other news - I just finished 4 freelance pieces for Wizards of the Coast. When I am able to post them, I will.