Auld Lang Syne

In about 7 hours here in Loveland, we'll be ringing in the new year. And we finally got some real snow on the ground too. In honor of the coming new year, I pieced together a meme from good ol' deviant art that summarizes my art through this past year. It was fun to think about. I did more traditional work than ever before I think because I was so technologically cut off, and have horrible representations of it because of my lack of scanner for awhile. Two pieces are lost to the world somewhere. I hope someone kept them, or found them so they can be enjoyed and aren't getting mashed into nothing in a landfill somewhere.

My resolutions for the year are to eat better, lose weight (like everyone on earth except my boyfriend with his freak metabolism), run the Boulder Boulder and the Philadelphia 8K in the fall, and be an established tattoo artist by next year as well as a more established freelance illustrator. And finish my murder mystery comic. It's going to be good if I ever finish beyond the first page -.-;

I hope all of you have great new year's resolutions with the intentions on keeping them, high hopes for improvement across the U.S, especially economically, and for a better state of the world in every coming year. Enjoy your parties, I'll be drinking some homemade martinis and hot chocolate, enjoying the snow and evening with my family.

Happy New Year!

Oh Stomach, You Cruel Master

Hello Blogger,

I can't sleep. I have a lot on my mind. Nothing bad just lots of things. I'm a thinker, plus my stomach decided to really really hate me. So i figured rather than lying around being sick and awake, I should sip a fizzy steaz energy, get some pep and get things done.

I just picked up some new tattoo mags and I've been flipping through them. My favorite bartender from philly was featured in Skin and Ink this month so I wanted to check out her pictures from the NYC convention. They look awesome Faith! That got me browsing artists so for the last hour I've been finding internet-y ways of following a few. Tara McPherson was featured in Skin and Ink as well and I have to say she's one of my new favorite artists. She's not a tattoo artist but is still an extremely talented illustrator and a pretty savy business woman it appears. I'm pretty sure I want to be her to like a T. Not in artistic style but she basically has all the things I want save the successful tattoo artist part in addition to being a kick ass illustrator.

I finally bought a tablet today. It's the new bamboo pen. It's alright but I prefer the former gen, especially since I can't flip the pen and get an eraser. Though I'm thankful to FINALLY have a tablet again at all. I'm pumped to get some work done. I'll make this upset stomach pay off if it's the last thing I do! I hope to post new art soon.

Today was a day of lots of thinking. I laid out my plans and goals to my boyfriend (over drinks, it was our miniversary today). He already knows them all but its good to talk about it. I'm really driven right now. I need to make it happen, i don't think I can settle for less or even almost. It's good to feel that motivation though I'm scared of self sabatoge. Being human can really kick you in the ass with all the complication of having a huge brain.

Here's to being unable to sleep causing me to work harder

Passing Time

Well happy new year all. I hope your holidays were great. Mine were pretty good aside from a very major event. I am an animal lover as many know, I've been a vegetarian for 12 years and an off an on vegan for about 5 now I guess. But I love pets as well. Summer of 2008 I adopted two kittens, Bullet and her brother Joshua. I was really attached to both of them very quickly. The following winter I was homeless trying to finish my last semester of school, living in secret under a desk in one of the illustration major studios. I sent my cats to my parents until I worked things out. The day before I found a place to stay Bullet was hit by a car. My parents house is a big farm and my cats loved the outdoors, loved it. I never let them out in the city but my parents couldn't keep them inside because they would wreck up the place until they got their way. We've had pets my whole life and the road the house is on is extremely dangerous. I felt awful about losing her. I felt like a bad person for losing my house and income and all these things that I had to send them there. Plus Joshua had never been without his sister and didn't comprehend death so he was off about it for a long long while. I haven't really gotten over it myself. But as some of you know I had to go through a loss of residence yet again when I was hit by a car in October, which put me out of work and income. This time I moved back with my parents, my little cat in tow. I didn't want to let him outside but he loved the outdoors so much. He would chase the wild turkeys in the back field and climb up all the trees. I thought that if I had children I couldn't keep them from the playground or something because they might get hurt and he was always running around the back field. A two days after christmas I let him outside, when I went to call him, he didn't come for hours and hours into the night so I went out to look for him. I walked to the edge of the driveway and looked down the street but all I saw were white snow drifts in the grass, but one looked kind of odd. I then realized it wasn't a snow drift after all, it was my cat stretched out in the grass. My friend and boss, Ed had been at the house to pick up the key to the production studio and he was walking to his car behind me. He said all he heard was me scream and when he turned he said my legs gave out and I was clutching the telephone pole. I don't remember it that specifically. I went to touch my cat, hoping he was still there, that we could take him to the vet but he was cold and ed starting dragging me back toward the house. By that time my parents heard me and woke up. My boyfriend was over and he came running out with them and I was a mess. I could only think about him being all alone, waiting for someone to come find him, to save him and I left him there. Just like his sister waited for me. I never came for them, I didn't save them. I didn't get to hold him one last time, I didn't go to bury him. My dad took him early in the morning and buried him alone next to his sister in the back under some trees past the horse pasture. I guess he was right to go without me, I couldn't bear to put him in the ground. It was just one minute he was there, then gone. For some people, they don't understand the pet thing. I don't either I guess. but someone might as well carve out the middle of me and expect me to live. I'm still pretty much devestated. I've been bouncing around between my parents, to my old house in philadelphia and my boyfriend's for months and now I'm ever more restless between them all. I'm not sure what to do with my grief but as I've been living out of the living room in my old house with my old roommates I decided I wanted to paint him. I don't do a lot of traditional paintings let alone classic style traditional paintings. I actually swore off oil paints entirely as the devil after my class with Tom Leonard showed me the power the paints have to ruin my life. But I'm sitting there in the living room with a piece of canvas paper (which is a brilliant thing I just found out about), and I started doing a charcoal sketch like in anatomy class, i traced it with a crayola black crayon since i had no watercolor pencils, I then did a version of a traditional oil wipe out but with acrylics with more of a watercolor painting technique. Then a purple acrylic under painting. Then I got my old roommate's oil paints out, those terrible terrible things, and her old brushes, used and abused, left in water for days and I painted. My pallet was my sketch book which I had wrapped in saran wrap. This was as ghetto and spur of the moment as you can get with painting I think. The whole thing took me about three days. I think my second experience with oils proved much better. Is it a spectacular oil painting? probably not. I think it looks like him and I do think it's a well done piece of art. I don't know if it helps my grief. I have a lot of pictures of him but this one seems to have his spirit in it, so maybe that helps. It's still drying. because it's oil and will never stop drying.

I have photos on my twitter of all the stages except the under painting, so it jumps from the "wipe out" stage to the final. http://twitter.com/paintedgrenades

My next creative endevour ended up being a hairstylist to all my old roommates. I'm apparently really good at cutting hair. I mean I just started cutting my own because the salon is a rip off. but I gave my roommates Angela a pretty great hair cut as well as one to Boss Ed though he hates it because guys never actually like good haircuts unless they're metro. I also did everybody's make-up. It was 14 year old's slumber party up in south philly.

I also did two little character sketches for my latest comic idea. I need to grab a scanner but I'll post them because I'm found of them as well as my costume ideas. I did "Morgan" the 14 yr old sister of character "Aaron" and "Missy DeWalt" the 17 yr old sister of character "Mark." I plan on doing some more today, as well as do a refined sketch for The Bakery website my old roommates are putting together. I'm much more productive when I'm in philadelphia.


I also did a lot of knitting and crocheting over this holiday. I made a really cute stuffed bear for my niece, a shaw for my mom, a bikini for my sister and an owl hat for my roommate. She, her new hair cut I gave her and the hat are also pictured here. Keep in mind my phone pictures are not great.

one day I suppose I'll get a real camera. For now though I have some food to eat and some art to make.

For Great Justice

Well I'm fianlly done coloring the Koni Waves Demonslayer crossover. Hopefully its second release will prove better that the first especially with my hand in the pot this time around. This is one of my favorite panels I colored, its one I actually went beyond flat color with, which was all I was suppose to do. I dig it. Steve said he might have some future projects for me which is exciting because I, like everyone else, am broke. I heart color. seriously.

I have some other projects on the stove right now as well. I need to design the main page of an artist community website. It's layer cake themed. I can't seem to escape baked goods. I'm pretty hyped on it, i have to lay some sketches down though. I'm also hoping to get to work on two celebrity portraits I've been meaning to get to. Ellen and Kelly Osbourne to be specific. Don't ask why, it just is. Then I have the scenery to finish designing for a philly based web series about local music and start work on my comic about the anti christ to be turned into a web series all while job hunting and editing wedding videos. You'd think i'd be getting some cash flow with all that but times are not fat. Most of my projects are part of larger ideas that take longer to actually see a turn over from, but hopefully it will pay off. I'll try to post some sketches soon.

Happy Solstice everyone! I think it was pretty sweet the Solstice rolled in with all that snow here in Philly. I know its a pain but I enjoy it. I haven't finished all my gifts for everyone yet but I'm hoping people don't mind waiting a bit. I did some pretty sweet things with yarn this year.Its about to get even busier though as I scurry to finish and attend all the holiday festivities. I can't believe how time flew by. I feel like it was just august.

I hope everyone is enjoying the winter and keeping as busy as I am. Lean times can't last forever, just start thinking out of the box.

http://www.koniwaves.com/roughsketchstudio/Home.html
http://www.enceles.com

The things I pay attention to

well as a comic book artist, I of course saw the watchman on opening night. I highly recommend it. They didn't include some subplots but you have to pick your battles when making something so long. they handled the designs and costumes really well and the integrity of the storytelling was really on point. but seriously, the comedian is robert downey jr. doppleganger.  Billy Crudup did an amazing job as Dr Manhattan. The characters were really really spot on all the way, but he really had that nailed down, he was just as moving as he was in the pages when i first read it. and kudos for actually showing the male anatomy. i was really surprised they did it, but it was so tasteful, it didn't feel like a shock value thing but something that added to the idea of who dr. manhattan was. i'm shocked to say this but i like how they handled the ending better than in the graphic novel. that may be blasphemy but i think it was just so much more powerful, less contrived and less "wtf?" overall A+ and a good time.

I also played Resident Evil: 5 this weekend upon its release. well more accurately, i watched it be played. I love video games but i need someone to explain it to me while i play it because i'm typically bad at them. As far as zombie games go, the R.E genre is not really my deal because they don't really seem like zombies. People were giving me a hard time about being a zombie enthusiast and not being into R.E. It's just a little too alien esq to me. As far as the game play goes it takes a minute to get used to as the controls are different than RE4 but i didn't have as much trouble with the analog as some avid gamers, but then again i'm not really used to a particular control set up. I think i had my typical troubles when it comes to anything with duel analogs. Also the world is very much 4D, you can go anywhere. It's easy to get lost if you're not careful. The hordes aren't as huge as left 4 dead but they definitely are relentless, you don't really reach an end to them, plus they yeild some serious weapons. As far as the "racist" aspect goes the game programers diversified the zombies very well, their is an equal mix of black, muslim and white zombies to fight that don't fit a "stereotype" that i can see. It depicts a good sense of an african village i think if you combined multiple regions. Now for what i'm really interested in is the overall concept design. The skin on the people is amazing, digital rendering is getting really impressive, you can see all the pores and stuff, hair is still a little stiff but rome wasn't built in a day. The detailing in the main characters, Chris and Sheva, is also really nice. Their clothes are definitely uniquely theirs and there's nice little touches. some of the zombies you see are really nicely designed as well. The Executioner zombie you see early on is one of my favorite and hard to beat. He has spikes coming out of his skin which reminds me a little bit of Return of the living Dead 3 which was a nice little easter egg for me. The backgrounds are very very nice. It's a very concrete location. considering i've been doing a lot of work with slum towns i really appreciated the little details. nothing looks repeated which i really appreciate, aside from things you're suppose to destroy to get items. overall i give the game as solid B.

I was also introduced to WoW. I'm not really into high fantasy, i'm more into things that look like they can occur now and I'm not a pc gamer at all. give me a console any day, i don't care what anyone says about it being better. plus the MMO concept is not all that enticing. But i was shown some designs and all i can say is: come on blizzard...you're laziness is showing. from an artistic stand point you never want to feel cheated and there's some moments for feeling cheated. i think i  should do some redesigns for them and send them a sample and be like "hey...you know who you should give a job to?" 

also in with  my other interests, I don't know how many of you know of a band called Carcass, but they've been disbanded for some 17 odd years. out of that came the stellar band Arch Enemy, which i think all should give some props to for having such a sick female vocalist who can do things i just don't understand. but they played a show this weekend and that is like this huge thing in metal i feel and it just went completely unnoticed....come on guys.....look away from the crap on the radio and behold true metal gods and rejoice in the second coming of carcass. hey guys...releasing an album? i do gore....give me a call.

Also on the art front, my revisions on my comic are coming nicely, i should have them up shortly....and hopefully a more functional site as a whole. I need to call my host and figure out exactly the problem and fix some design problems on my end, like my blog loading without a scroll bar. But i have a new long term idea for a graphic novel i think a long the line of "Blankets" so a little more autobiographical and a little more girly that my typical stuff, but i think i have some good stories to tell. But to my guy fans, sorry for the flowers and melodrama that may be coming, but don't fret there will always be more zombies and carnage and awesome along the way as well.

Big Fat Octopus

Right now i'm currently working on a lot of personal projects, and i'm looking for more things to be inspired by. I'm very into music and i go through phases with what i actually like a lot at them moment. I like the femme rock bands and the riot grrl scene especially right now. it's what is in with me at the moment. i know it's twenty years too late but i just got really into Jack off Jill, i never even heard a song by them before! But i just got inspired. I found this band called The Gossip, and i recommend everyone listen to "standing in the way of control" its about the gay community losing the right to marry. But the lead singer is outrageous in every way. Her name is Beth Ditto and she is a person that exemplifies living out loud and for herself.

The other night i was working on a personal piece about the the octuplet mother Nadya Suleman, who's been coined "octo-mom" so the piece is her as a scary octopus monster that's releasing eggs into the sea. I have my photo ref on my studio desk, lots of octopi and me a little more shirtless trying to look scary to get a good upper body pose. Well it's no secret that i need to lose a couple pounds but a guard who does the overnight shift in my building comes up every night to do a safety check in the studios. He didn't know i was in the room and chose to peruse my affairs upon the desk, commenting on how i looked in the photos, he used the term "nasty" and i mean, good i was going for scary octopus monster. but still ouch, you know? what was that guy even doing perusing my things? But after that i think i found Beth Ditto at just the right time. She's 210lbs and is naked all the time. She loves herself and is having a great time. No one could make that girl not feel beautiful. 

I also thought about mama cass after skimming though some google pictures, for Ms Ditto did a pose reminiscent of a nude mama cass shot in flowers. I love the mama's and the papa and so does my dad and he LOVES Mama Cass, because he thought she was an amazing talent and he said she had a beautiful soul so she was the most beautiful woman in the world to him when he was younger. How awesome is my dad? but all this just inspired me to work on a likeness piece. 

I always struggle with them and i can't find one that really fits my style and i think all the large head tiny body stuff has horrified me out of the genre. But I was just too awe struck by Beth and what she is doing in life. There's the part about health, like we don't tolerate drug addicts why tolerate a similarly unhealthy habit of over eating? But some people's bodies are a lot different chemically and if she's healthy enough to be on stage doing a whole set, which is a lot of exercise i'm sure she is just fine other wise. If she has no serious health problems i think she can be as fat as she wants. especially if she's happy with it. I don't have a clear idea but maybe i'll post some sketches when i get to it, but i'm pretty excited.