Christmas is over...

and it was good.

Here's a li'l Link.

O Tannenbaum

O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Wie grün sind deine Blätter!
Du grünst nicht nur zur Sommerzeit,
Nein auch im Winter, wenn es schneit.
O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Wie grün sind deine Blätter!

O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Du kannst mir sehr gefallen!
Wie oft hat schon zur Winterszeit
Ein Baum von dir mich hoch erfreut!
O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Du kannst mir sehr gefallen!

O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Dein Kleid will mich was lehre:
Die Hoffnung und Beständigkieit
Gibt Mut und Kraft zu jeder Zeit!
O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum,
Dein Kleid will mich was lehren!

Nobody does Christmas like 19th century Germans. Nobody.

Illustration Friday: Excess!

TOO MANY FINGERS!!!

I imagine that if you were born with seven fingers on one hand, you'd get used to it pretty quickly. You might even find ways to put the extra digits to good use.

But just waking up one morning to find a couple of new fingers just happened to sprout while you were sleeping?

"Gah!" indeed.

Dr. Animal, Animal Doctor

The world's greatest veterinarian.

This morning, my son lined up a bunch of stuffed animals and got out his toy doctor kit and said he was going to take care of his patients, because afterall, he was Dr. Animal, Animal Doctor.

The minute he said it, I began rolling that name around in my brain.

Here's a rough idea of what I was thinking. I think I'm going to keep messing with him. More to come later.

Kids are an inspiration or I'm such a hack I'm stealing ideas from my kids.

You decide!

Chicken Fingers

The Ever-present Ninja Menace

They're everywhere.

Illustration Friday: Hats!

I saw that the topic was hats, and I drew this. That's all I have to say about that.

M is for Moses

I really tried to capture the colors from Cecil B. DeMille's Ten Commandments, especially in the sky. I think it works. What say you?

I Heart the Lakewood Library Book Sale

I just got back from the Friends of Lakewood Library book sale and I'm free-burrito-for-lunch excited about it! Check out the cool finds:

Look at thie sweet joke book I found

It was published in 1963. Isn't that a great cover? Dig these endpapers:

and these from the interior:


I also found this old cookbook for kids, published in 1950:




I also picked up Marvel's Essential Amazing Spider-Man vol. 3 and Essential Thor vol. 1, a copy of Jumanji (the book, not the movie) and a vhs tape of a stop-motion movie called Willy McBean and his Magic Machine, which is reminiscient of the old Rankin Bass stuff. It might even be theirs, but the box doesn't say. The best part of all this, I picked this stuff up for like 3 bucks! Nearly all the books go for 50 cents each. There was only one room with more expensive books, but I didn't find anything in there. I can't believe it. For a poor dude like me, 50 cent books are the way to go. Especially those Essentials volumes, which retail for like 15 bucks. Sure, they're a little beat up from years of library use, but I can't complain for 50 cents.

Now if I could somehow wrangle an actual free burrito for lunch, my day would be complete.

Illustration Friday: Trick or Treat!

This is what my kids looked like last night. Their heads really are that huge. For serious.

New Work

Here's a new soon-to-be published piece I finished over the weekend. I'm rather happy with it. In the final printed version, the flag is different, because the weird skull flag didn't fit the story but I like it better with the skull.

Sass!

Consider yourself sassed.

Jonny Quest

I have always been intrigued by Jonny Quest, though I must admit I don't know that I've ever watched a full episode. Not because I was avoiding it or anything, it's just something that I almost never managed to catch. I have to say that I love the look of the show, especially the opening. The music, the visuals... the whole thing comes together so well. It's a classic. I almost can't believe that I never sat down to watch it as a kid. I think I may need to invest in the dvd collection.

These characters are really fun to draw too. I think I'm going to have to take a whack at Race Bannon and Dr. Quest some time in the future.

Weird Spider-Man

I haven't been drawing enough over the last week and a half or so, so I busted this out the other day whilst eating lunch. I don't know why I drew this weird Spidey. Chalk it up to me just needing to goof off, I guess. There are more problems in this drawing than there are lines, so I'm not posting this to show off any great skill. I just realized that I usually wait to post finnished art on this hear blog and I figured I should post some more sketch book-type work.

Some work-related work I did at work.

Actually I did 90% of it at home, but I really had a need to fit the word "work" in the title three times.

In our loverly Rocktober issue we have a Best of Northeast Ohio feature, and I was asked to do this illustration as the "cover" to the section. I think the fact that I see dogs driving around on scooters everywhere that I go is actually the very best thing about Northeast Ohio. And also black squirrels. I love those little guys.

I have been neglecting the blog again a little bit, but I wanna get more stuff up here, so feel free to check back soon. Maybe even tomorrow.

P.S. I did not design the cool Best of NEO logo, that was our creative director Ricki Urban, who is a wicked designer and a really great boss.

Illustration Friday: Momentum

Whew, I didn't think I was ever going to get this done!

I figure the Hulk has quite a bit of momentum as he's coming down from one of his giant leaps, ready to smash. Why won't puny men leave Hulk alone?

My posting has been more sporadic than usuaI because I've had a lot on my plate lately. Hopefully I can post some new stuff again soon.

In the meantime, I did redesign my website. Check it out here!

Excelsior!

Illustration Friday: Captain

Captain Nebuchadnezzar Crunch, 1631 - 1695. Captain N. Crunch was a brilliant seaman and military strategist, as well as a cullinary mastermind. He combined all of these skills in what is perhaps his best known strategy, attacking the enemy at dawn, before they have had the opportunity to eat a breakfast rich in 10 essential vitamins and minerals. In the eyes of the Captain, "The malnourished shall find a quick death upon the end of my rapier, and those who have tasted the bounty of the earth at the wee hours of the morning shall win the day." So as to avoid this stragey being used upon his crew, the Captain developed a cold cereal which consisted of small bundles of corn, oats, wheat grass and roofing nails along with some crunchy, dried berries which was served 3 times daily on his ship. Though some of the crew sustained minor injuries to the roof of their mouths, they were generally a hearty, healthy lot. Captain N. Crunch served in the royal navy of King Vitamin for two score and five until his untimely, and rather shocking, death by mauling at the hands of the usually docile Sugar Bear of the Netherlands.

Do over!

I think there's something to this whole watercolor thing, though I don't think this one was quite as successful ass the last couple. No colored pencil this time, plus the pallette was pretty muted, which is rare for me. I think I need to keep working like this though.

I do like this version better than the old one.

Return of Spelling Bee

Three posts in one day, holy smokes!

So I finally got around to revisiting this character, initially blogged about here.

This is the composition I was going to put him in way back when I first drew him, so I'm happy to have it all together now.

I tried a more mixed-media type approach on this one (as well as the Illustration Friday piece below) by doing a watercolor/colored pencil illustration and then photoshopping the heck out of it to get it where I want it. I think it works pretty well, mixing the handmade look with the digital trickery.

I also started another blog.

I hope you love it.

Illustration Friday: Emergency!

I would consider that an emergency.

I just wanted to say. "Hi."

Hi.

Girl with suspicious look

She doesn't trust you.

I need help.

Can anybody tell me why this image sucks? Seriously, I don't care who you are, even if you're just messin' around, reading the internet, and somehow you managed to stumble on to my humble corner of it, just tell me why it sucks. I've been staring at it for hours and I can't figure out why. I just know that it does. Hard.

So please, tell me why.

Illustration Friday: Moon

An old sentimental favorite. And it has a moon in it. I actually have a number of images with the moon in it. I like the moon.

Y'know, I thought I'd do better...

38%

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Gee Whiz

Mr. Blue returns to the zoo.

Ahhhh. Finally back to his own bed...er, rock.

Illustration Friday: Discovery

No telling what you'll find for lunch in a dumpster. Time to head back to the zoo Mr. Blue.

Heads!

Some heads from the last couple of days. All done with a brush pen and microns, except the creepy guy at the end, he was brush pen and prismacolor markers.

And the silver medal goes to....

Me!

This image was posted waaaay back in December when it was completed and today I received a little, framed award thing for it. It won a second place Ohio Excellence in Journalism award in the category of "Print Visuals Single Illustration, All Other Publications," (which is a mouthful). It's pretty cool to be recognized in that way.

Our magazine also won first place in the category of "General Photo, Multiple Images," for a story from May 2006. Also very cool.

Illustration Friday: Camouflage

When I saw the topic this week, "camouflage", This was the first thing that came to mind. Well, ok that's not true. Initially I thought of something more menacing, like the tree was going to eat the child, but I thought better of it. Then I started to develop this idea of a monster that looked like a tree and was friends with an otherwise friendless boy. It's really rough, and so is this image. I have no idea how far I'll go to develop it, so stay tuned. There may be more of these guys around soon.

Awwww nuts...

Here's my latest illustration for work. It accompanies an essay about a stay-at-home dad (the writer) whose wife discovers a giant black bra in his diaper bag. Hilarity ensues.

I'm happy how this turned out, though this is the second version. I did a watercolor version first to change things up a bit and get away from the clean, digital stuff. I really loved it too, until I scanned it and placed the file on the page and it looked awful with the story. My scan was really bad, and no matter how many times I scanned it (different settings each time) it still turned out crappy. So I did a clean, digital version and It looks alright.

I'm also happy that I'm able to do this once in a while for the magazine. It helps keep things interesting. If you wanna see it in print, with the text all wrapped around it and awesome, look for the July issue of Northern Ohio Live on stands...now I think. I just got a copy today, so I think it'll be out today, or maybe Monday.

P.S. If you need a t-shirt click on the cool Bountee flash thing over there in the sidebar. I'm working on new designs all the time.

Yeti Hugs Are Forever or Buy My T-Shirts!

Don't ask why, just buy! buy! buy!

Check out my first t-shirt that I uploaded to Bountee! Do you like it? If you do, and you're a female, you can buy it here.

Sorry, no dude versions available right now.

Bountee is a pretty cool site where people come together and make t-shirts and then other people (hopefully you) buy them.

If you're an artist (I'm lookin' at you Crider) and you wanna make a cool t-shirt store, sign up at bountee.com today and just start waiting for the checks to come rollin' in.

Wee Lassie

Now that I have a daughter, I've been drawing more cute things. This is one of them.

Illustration Friday: Cars

Or only one car, in the case of this image. This is an old one, from a Disney Adventures job a few years ago. It accompanied a little sidebar about an old-timey race care driver who had a pet money be drove around with. I think the Monkey's name was Jocko Flocko.

The hiatus is back off, again.

Ok, there really wasn't a hiatus, but it sure has been a while since I posted anything here. Over a month. Sheesh. I intend to get better about that. Work and life outside of work hase been pretty all-consuming lately so my production is waaaay down.This isn't even a very good drawing, but it's just about the only thing I've drawn in weeks. I have been working on a script though, so I haven't been totally slacking.

We just finished a massive issue at work and I drew this while I was waiting to approve our pages online. Tools of the trade: ball point pen and a sharpie.

Then a little photoshoppin', to give it a touch of class.

D is for David

You know the story.

Mr. Blue at the Natural History Museum

Another Mr. Blue image. I don't know if I like this one, but I'm sick of fooling with it. Hopefully more soon.

Mr. Blue Escapes from the Zoo

Another image from my Blue Bear book project. Chronologically this page would precede the page I posted the other day for the illustration friday topic "hide".

Bill in a Bear Suit™ vs. Skull of Lincoln

Not a particularly inspired composition, but I'll tell you what... at three in the a.m., it is making me laugh.

Illustration Friday: Hide

This is another children's book piece for the refocused portfolio. See the blue bear? He's hiding.

My Hiro

Okay, he's not really my hero. I'm not even into the show, which is odd because growing up I was a big superhero freak. My wife is into it though, so I kind of know what's going on in the show. I watched my first full episode last night and it was pretty good. Must resist geting sucked in.

On the other hand, I want to see this dude get his sword.

Because nobody demanded it

A million little dancing Mega Men.

The blarg is one year and four days old

So I missed the exact one year anniversary by a few days, but who's counting, really? Not I. It's hard to believe that it has been a year since I started this thing. I really need to post stuff more often, because there certainly isn't a year's worth of work up here.

It's funny, because I've read all these articles about how having kids can kill your creativity. That was a scary notion to me after our first was born. I discovered that there is some truth to it, but it isn't entirely the case. My brain definitely works differently, and not exactly better, but I've decided that it is working more efficiently. At least as far as creativity is concerned. Before we had the kids, I was constantly sketching and creating characters and story ideas on nearly a daily basis. It all just came very naturally to me. The only problem was 90% of it was crap. Sure, I was excited about them as I threw them down on the paper, but when I looked them over a little later on, I could see how awful they were.

Now, because I'm living the sleep and free-time deprived life of a Dad™, I don't have the luxury of creating 9 turds for every one good idea that I have. I have to have characters that interest me, that really justify the building of a whole world around them, and that have a decent story attached to them. And I have to say, it's been working pretty well lately. The time I do have to work has been alot more productive than it used to be. And I thnk I'm enjoying the process more. I'm certainly not trying to say that every concept that comes along is gold, but I've got a much higher ratio of good to bad.

Kids are a huge blessing, but if you're an artist thinking about having them, be prepared to spend a fair amount of time figuring out how to work in your new situation. It took me about a year to figure it out the first time around. The addition of our second has added a new dimension, but it would be alot harderif I hadn't learned some valuable lessons before.