Young Doctors In Love CD

I don't normally use this space to promote my freelance work but this is a special case.

My buddy Clay, one of my oldest friends, will be releasing a CD next month with his band Young Doctors In Love. I had the pleasure to work on the design with him so I though I'd share it and give people a chance to visit their MySpace page to hear a few tracks. They've got a fantastic pop-rock sound... very catchy stuff!

Merlin

Clumsy

Based on recent art news.

In progress

How did 10 days lapse since the last post?

I started this piece the other night. It's not finished, but it's close. It's a 40" x 32" acrylic -- the biggest painting I've tackled so far.

I needed a break from oils. Oils are a whole different game. I tend to work very slowly with them. When I'm working with acrylic I feel like I can have more fun. I suppose it's the quick drying time.

Anyway, this piece is an exercise in fun... cracking open the paints, slathering them on by the knife-full, throwing them, smearing them with rags, fingers, etc. I needed to let loose and not worry about composition and subject matter so much. I think when this piece is done, I'm going to try some smaller pieces with simple subjects so I can sign off on them within a couple of hours. It's too easy to lose your groove when a piece takes weeks to finish.

Gotta get my groove back.

* * *

On a related note, I was disappointed to learn that Karin Jurick is taking an extended break from hosting the Different Strokes challenge. She's got a show in the spring and needs a few months to concentrate on her work.

Although I did discover she's got new painting videos available. Check'em out if you're so inclined.

And if you haven't already seen it, watch Newfoundland artist Helen Gregory making a piece for her latest show in this time-lapse video.

Illustration Friday

Fueled by the wild applause at the Johnston birthday party, Eugene allowed those imaginary walls to get a little too close.

NL Blogroll

I wasn't going to even mention this (my blog isn't exactly a high-traffic zone) but I'm in the running for a "People's Choice" award at the Newfoundland and Labrador Blogroll. Host Stephen Harris was kind enough to make me a blog-o-the-week earlier last year which automatically qualified me with 23 other blogs for the 1st annual competition.

Is it really a competition though? Aren't we all winners? I reinforce that point because I expect to be dead last. Hehe.

But that's okay. I've been having a great blogging experience so far. My blog's a little over a year old now and this is my 100th post. I didn't really believe I'd last that long... a lot of blogs don't. My traffic is not at all heavy but I find fascinating to see it steadily grow. And I love getting immediate feedback on my work.

I've already decided to focus more on art creation this year. My goal is to cut back on freelance design work and use that spare time for painting. I'd also like to submit more regularly to Illustration Friday and get back into painting for Different Strokes.

Anyway, the competition has definitely spiked my traffic so I thought the least I could do is say thanks to Stephen for keeping the NL Blogroll in motion this past year and hope that some of the people who check out my blog will go cast a vote. If you cast a vote via comment, it's worth two votes. Count 'em. Two. And apparently you can vote once a day (although didn't see that on Stephen's blog).

There are some great blogs in the list.

Some of my regular haunts include:

• Townie Bastard
• John Gushue
• Illustrated Life
• Rock Recipes

So go poke through the Tickle Trunk and discover some great bloggers!

Gone Wilde

Jack of all puppets...

About 20 years ago, I was sifting through the bargain bin of a local bookstore and found a book on making puppets. Something struck a chord as I leafed through the pages so I bought it. Out of the blue, I started making puppets.

I remember loving the process: sculpting the heads, torsos, hands. I spent a few months bumbling my way through their creation. The Count was the only one I finished. The Ogre and the Sullen Clown never made it to the end.

It dawned on me that although I enjoyed making them that I would never use them for anything. I'm not an entertainer -- more of a behind-the-scenes guy. And I didn't know any puppeteers so the endeavor seemed fruitless.

So, as suddenly as I started, I stopped. Everything went in a box and I'd pretty much forgotten about them until my parents brought them over from their house a few weeks ago.

Evil shortbread

Most of these shortbread cookies were made with love.

But some were made with evil.

Bliss?

Something I did recently for my second cousin to accompany an article she wrote on why Democrats should love Republicans.

Hatch

If I were an astronaut, this would be me.

Illustration Friday's theme-o-the-week: "Hatch".

(Patent idea: "Key in a Comet". Much like the spare key in a fake rock concept, but for astronauts. Genius.)

This one very nearly never came about. As I was inking the chin, the nib of my pen decided to belch out the entire load of ink. I either had to find a creative solution or start again. Being the lazy man that I am, he now has a beard.

The Optimist

This for Illustration Friday's "Entangled" challenge. It's an older cartoon cleaned-up and snazzified with Technicolor. Here's the original pen/ink drawing.

Swine flu

I have no doubt that getting the swine flu is bad, but I find it hard to believe that we are in the midst of a pandemic any more than any other year with any other flu. There. I said it.

Remembrance Day

I was poking around the net today, doing a little remembering, and came across quite a collection of Newfoundland Regiment photos. It's nice to see such a vast collection is available.

More chicken pixels

I've been fooling around with Painter IX today, trying to figure out if it's worth learning to use. I probably should have cracked open the paints and used one of the many blank canvases I've got lying around but I can't resist multiple undos. I enjoyed the process. Being able to backtrack is great but navigating the controls seems to really limit spontaneity. But I'm sure it'll get easier with practice.

Skinny Party

Here's a doodle for Illustration Friday, a site that posts a theme every Friday for doodlers of all skill levels to make something and submit it. This week's theme is "skinny".

Last of the crop

I meant to post this a few weeks ago: the last haul from the garden. We ate much of it during Thanksgiving dinner. The tomatoes have gone through the salsafication process.

Fallen Pine

So the month of October has been nothing but cold, wet and windy. I normally love the fall but this month's just been rotten. Last weekend we lost a nice pine tree to the heavy winds.

Now it's stacked neatly near my fire pit (thanks Mark!)... just need a nice a nice evening to give it a proper send-off.

Marker doodle

Bargain bin

Not much happening in the art making arena these past few weeks but I'm not doing too bad with the art reading. Found a couple of great steals at Chapters. Or so I thought.

I just finished Peepshow: The Cartoon Diary of Joe Matt. It's an autobiographical collection of mostly one-page strips. Highly entertaining, but sometimes Joe shares a little too much about his life. It was great read but the book literally fell apart as I was reading it: the cover and it's "contents" are in a loose pile on my night-stand. No wonder it was $3.99. Note to publishers: yes, it's cheaper to print in China but you will get what you pay for.

In The Studio: Visits With Contemporary Cartoonists is just that. The first section is on Robert Crumb so I couldn't resist. He writes a great piece on his soon-to-be-released Genesis which I'm also anxious to pick up. At $14.95 I thought I was getting quite a steal but while poking around Google just now, I realize it's available for free at Google Books. Yeesh.

In retrospect, the bargain bin didn't really pan out.

Finally, The Beats, (mostly) written by Harvey Pekar and (mostly) illustrated by Ed Piskor, was the only full price book I purchased. I haven't read it yet but I'm looking forward to it. Like Joe Matt, Pekar is (usually) a self-deprecating, autobiographical writer. If you haven't seen the movie American Splendor yet, check it out: it's based on his long-running comic book series of the same title. He's also had a few entertaining appearances on Letterman which usually end badly.