What I do for fun....

Slave away.

During "reading week" I've been teaching and moonlighting in the studio. Tonight, I teach an animation class, afterward I intend on crossing the snowy street to my studio to do some more work on my dragon painting.......... it could be a late night. They will be showing this Saturday at Motion Gallery at the show below:

Hey, I didn't know this was a ticketed event?!

Regardless if you come in before 6 or on Sunday you can be one of the first to see and experience the new and improved dragon paintings in person.

Plus: There is a story in this weeks FFWD about Motion Gallery check it out in print or online here.

Count your Lucky dragon

I am still feeling some residuals from disappointment not being part of the cream of the crop in the last grant I applied for. I woke up to write about it in my daily morning pages. I have observed, it is just when I finally let it go that I get back on track and things begin to roll forward again.

I awoke to find an email from the U of C, thanking me once again for my  talk and studio visits. They were so grateful they found an extra bit of cash to toss my way. I am so thankful that they appreciated my time enough to source out additional funds for me. That makes my day, it is so thoughtful and I am so appreciative.

"Remember that everything can change -- on a day like today, anything is possible!"  

I began working on some facial and hair elements. I created a stencil out of water-colour paper and cut out the flame shapes for the eye brows.  I blocked them in with red as a base colour. I made a dark purple for the hair element and added a mid tone, later, I will add a lighter purple highlight.

 I also created a stencil for the finger nails. This adds uniformity to the bunch. I filled them in with red, which will eventually be covered in orange and yellow to match the flames.  I did a light wash over each of the squirmy bits that come out of the face and knee/elbows with a neutral grey then wiped it away on the white highlight. I may still revisit this with a lighter highlight.

In this angle shot you can see the surprise the sparkles give when light is reflected on the piece. It would be ideal to have a light closer and above the painting (Angle of incidence = angle of reflection) so that the sparkles hit your eye when you walk by and catch your attention.

Before I left the studio since it had struck midnight and my truck may turn into a pumpkin, I made a list of all the things I hope to accomplish next time I'm in. By doing this,  I will be focused in order to get this piece completed and varnished before the Saturday unveiling at Motion Gallery. I am still a very busy bunny, time management is key. I teach tonight, I have a B-day party to attend afterward, I teach animation at QAS Thursday evening and had a many other things on the go....... so I can't afford to lose my focus or direction.

Oh yeah, I got an email form the Taoist Tai Chi Society, they are very interested in using my image for their T-shirt design. (Fist Pump!)

Re-visiting the first dragon

I spent the day off (family day here in cow town, presidents in the U.S.A.) In my audio adding sparkles to the dragons scales. I tok this painting back front he gallery in order to add some of the process I learned by working on the second one and in order to help them match each other better. I al also doing some work on the hair, face, hands and nails. Then I will give it a sign and a good dose of varnish. Let it dry for a day, then deliver it back to Motion Gallery for the unveiling of the pair on February 25th!

This picture can't do it justice, see my latest piece in person.
Here: Motion Gallery on Facebook.

I got some news today that I didn't receive a grant I applied for back in November:( However, rather than let it get me down...
I gave the granting officer a call to enlighten myself with some feedback.  They said I had very high marks and that it was extremely competitive. They thought my support material was fantastic, and my artistic merit scored high.  This was reassuring.

The feedback that I received will help me to apply for the next grant. They thought that since I was doing a lot of experimentation that I needed more time to do the things I am going to do. I can say that I will address this in the next grant, but I know I will be able to do it in time stated because I have no choice, my Show is in October. Professional peer artists think I should take more time to experiment. I really appreciate that sentiment, it is reassuring! So not getting a grant has turned into an empowering feeling that I'm going to kick ass and definitely get the next one- boo yeah! Plus as I continue to work on stuff my portfolio and support material get even better!

Dragon Done!

I completed the second dragon painting last night.
The feeling of relief accompanies the satisfaction of achievement.

 I outlined in paynes grey all the dangly bits. Then I rubbed in a neutral very and removed some from the centre with a damp piece of paper towel.

 I mixed each individual colour of sparkles into GAC 100 in this shot cup. I applied it to each scale, respective of their colour. The green andy blue ones had two colours of sparkles each.

 The full piece in the studio to give an idea of the overall effect of the piece. I pained the claws and each finger nail. I added purple and magenta sparkles over the hair and flaming areas.

 I put a lot more work into the dragons facial features, and added purple strands of crazy hair. I added teeth made up of greys and white highlights. I added spots and blended hairs across the face and put in more work on all these details to make it pop.

I add my signature to signify completion. Then it became time to put a protective coat of varnish.

Its hard to tell in this photo, but the room is filled with a toxic cloud.  I did a crystal clear spray varnish application, unfortunately there is not adequate ventilation to do coatings. I had to escape the room immediately. Luckily, I won't be in the studio for at least a full day. I have to teach all day at the Alberta College of Art and Design. This is why I am so happy I finished the piece, good timing to allow it to dry. I will be delivering the piece to Motion Gallery this Wednesday.

Still Dragin' on this Dragon

I spent a full day of work doing a little bit of tidying and moving some stuff around before getting a good crack at this Dragon piece again.

I started off with colours that reminded me of Fruit Loops. Pinky red, orange and yellow and painted the tufts on the tops of the claws. Happy with how that turned out, I took another step forward. I took a iridescent copper and added a highlight to the stomach ribbing. This in turn advanced me to take out the Payns grey and add some depth and shadow on the stomach areas.

THis new shelf came in handy tonight. Here are the selection of pigments I used and all the tools fr tonight, including my sketchbook where I made the initial drawing.

Heres my impromptu little set up. I put a chair on the floor pads, it made it really comfortable. I got them, might as well put them to good use, right?! The shelving unit was the perfect heigh. So much so, I am tempted to buy another one tomorrow! I outlined the entire dragon with white focusing on the belly areas and the base of the spine. I also blocked in the knuckles and fingers with white and then added accents with the paynes grey. I rubbed a burnt umber into the corners to add to the aged feel and vignetting.

I put in more time in the face. This is where things got exciting. I had a stencil laying around that prompted the flame work around the eyes and muzzle.  Step by step it began to get flushed out, from the greens to the yellows. I added a beard and teeth. I created a magenta and did all sorts of stuff in the purple flames around his extremities.

This closer up snap shot from my iphone gives a better view of all the little details mentioned and then some. I am looking forward to taking another stab at the piece with a fresh new look at it and eventually add my signature and be able to deliver it to the gallery all shiny and varnished.

The belly of the beast

Tee double dragons are winding down after far too many distractions slowed my progress. However, in-between jobs, photo shoots, and creating other works for an upcoming show of Pin ups at Untitled......I managed to get a bit of time in on the belly of the beast.

First I used a burnt umber to mark in the belly folds with a flat brush to contrast the other patenting where I did this in white.  I followed it up by painting in white outlines which really helps it to vibrate.

I felt the belly needed more punch so I dry-brushed black gesso from the bottom of the belly upward to express more dimension to the form. Now it is starting to make me happy, I can see the end in sight, and good ting, I plan on putting at least one of these in Motion Gallery!

Golden Dragon....

Its not a restaurant, its art.

I took part in the OYR/Green Fools +15 Chinese New Year parade in honour of the Dragon.  It all began when I turned the corner after parking my truck at Bankers Hall. Inside were bands, a choir, he mayor, a bunch of weirdos and a long red dragon. Luckily I was in my pirate duds, I was  planning a wee mutiny. I'm glad I wore red, it seemed to be the colour of choice. During the festivities I tried as I might to coax office workers to join our merry parade.

On with the show they say....

After the parade ended, I hit the studio. The lunar New Year quickly approaches and I need to get these two pieces done in honour of the celebration.  Today I applied the Gold.

What a difference this makes. I really am happy with the slightly translucent but highly reflective Golden brand Fluid Acrylic Deep Gold pigment. As suspected I used nearly the entire bottle on the backgrounds. I criss crossed brush strokes in my application.

In the right light you can see the shine this paint has. It really helps to set off the dragons and make them pop. Depending on how you look at them or how they are lit, you get a very different impression from the pieces. I ended up leaving the sides the colour of the underpainting, which shows thru when you look at it, so all those beautiful drips and colours are not completely covered.

After application of the nit ail layer of Gold, I gave each piece a light sand to allow the texture to show thru and reveal some of the coloured underpainting.

Here are the two pieces photoed on my studio wall before I left for the night. Being at this stage is going to help me further develop the works, now that I have a better idea of the figure ground relationship. I feel like I will go into the left piece and use darks on the belly and put some time into the face and claws.  I also need to test various varnishes to ensure I maintain the reflectivity after the application of the protective layer.

Still more to come.....

These will kick your ass.......

Double Dragons

Wednesday evening.
With the inspirational beats provided by DJ LurkN in my studio, I worked for 6 hrs. from 6pm until 12 am on purples.

The bold purple really pops like the oranges do on the sister painting.

Here you can see the fire I mentioned that pops. Also the hair painted on the back of the hands in two tomes of purple and some details on the tail.

Here I am at work on the two pieces, photo by Cosmic.

Double your pleasure, double your fun....

Double Dragons.

The Chinese New Year quickly approaches. A lot has been happening in my world to keep me away from the studio. I began my Monday ACAD class- Motion Graphics 1. That's right, I got into the sessional pool, and with little time to prepare so it's been a real haul, all hours focused on this one task creating 15 weeks of teaching materials and an outline. After the first class I am very excited about having a full  class and a studious bunch of 2nd year creative designers, illustrators and BFA chasers.

Here I began work on the rainbow scales of the male dragon. Since he started out as black I applied the rainbow of coloured scales in the opposite direction. Red near the belly moving in ROYGBIV toward the spine to blue. Each scale is painted in a light hue and then a darker one of the same colour is applied over top along the outer edge and as a central line for each and every scale. Yes, it takes time to do this sort of thing. You may notice I spent some time blocking in the antlers too, I did them on both paintings, on this one I modelled them after coral, the other (not pictured) is more natural colours. Here I discovered a tube of unbleached titanium white, what a beautiful ivory colour.

To get  a better idea what step would be next when I visit the studio again, I made a watered down Raw Umber and applied it over the blue background to make the dragon pop. Over this background I plan to apply Gold. But first, I will give it a sand to reveal the textural layers by revealing the bright blue hues underneath. I went down to Inglewood Art Supply and picked up a $28 bottle of Golden brand fluid acrylic. I am hoping this amount of paint can cover both backgrounds. after its applied, I will probably give it a  good sanding to age it and reveal more of the background texture.

More to come ......... =;D

Sōsetsuken (双截拳) Its not a real martial art....

Its a reference to the classic beat 'em up video game series initially developed by Technos Japan Corporation, Double Dragon.


Speaking of kicking ass...............I found out this morning via text that Motion Gallery sold my Purple & gold Rhinoceros painting =;) Yay!!!!


OK. Back to the double dragons painting process....

I used some sharpies to position the iris's. I used yellow on the green part of the claws near the knuckles and a light blue on the cobalt.  I outlined the spikes on the back with crimson and used a bright red to shade in the base of each one.  I added in gums and tear ducts and some graduation between the rainbow hues in the face.

I take all those photos with my iPhone so there are for reference and tend to be less than perfect but they give a good idea what I am up too. Here I've added colour to the eyes and done some detail work which tends to be a bit lost on such a large canvas, remember it is about 4 ft. square.  

I didn't do any work on the blue piece, feeling a bit blocked at the moment. The bright red background can be obnoxious up close burning out my retina. Before leaving the studio for the night, with a sore back and neck from all tight painting I rocked out, I scrubbed in a watered down raw umber to help pop the dragon out and to feel like I have a fresh view to work on next session.  


Next visit I will be working on the blue background piece for sure ;)

Keep on keeping on....

it's really dragon on and on... =;)

 The next stage was a big one, I spent some time on the blue dragon adding the spine in a frosty aquamarine tone.

 For the red one (below), I filled in the claws and did a dry rub over the tentacles.  I added the flames around the legs and arms and shaded them with orange and red.

I also spent about 4 hours, meticulously highlighting each an every scale with their respective hue family. I made the colours in glass baby food jars so I could store them longer and use them on the other piece. 

I addition I used a sharpie to add a dark line to each and every rainbow scale.  It took tremendous focus and concentration but I am really happy with how the scales turned out on this piece. 

I also used a filbert full of zinc white to score in a rounded edge on act belly fold. Zinc white is on the cool side and more translucent than titanium white but it still works to pop the scales without being to hard like a highlight,

I am still contemplating how to proceed with the other ones scales, something similar I think, but working over black presents some challenges.

Bring in the New Year

I  have been hiding under a rock lately.........

Actually, I haven't! The reason there are no posts lately or why I haven't used any social media this holiday, it is very refreshing to take a break. My laptop is still on the fritz and I took down the borrowed system to create room for a phenomenal boxing day feast I prepared.  I just haven't set it back up until today. In fact I didn't touch a computer for 2 weeks. Instead, I've been hard at work, painting and drawing and living up to my expectations, drawing daily and hoping to finish a book a month. I got spoiled this Christmas by Dunia and am reading the Steve Jobs Biography she got me. Every morning I continue my morning pages as I have done for well over a dozen years. Here is the update on the double dragons piece, though it is further as of tonight than what I am shown here. In due time I will catch up with myself ;)

I finally have the joy of adding bright colours to my paintings after all the drawing, underpainting and blocking in of the background. Above are the tubes I used to give you an idea. All the paints are canadian made Stevenson acrylics bought at Inglewood Art Supply, when you spend $200 you get 30% off, thats the kind of shopper I am ;)

Here are the colors I will be using in this session:
Quinacridone Red/Yellow, Hansa Orange, Hansa Yellow Middle, Cadmium Green, Phthalo Turquoise, Cobalt Blue (Golden brand)

Here is the male dragon on the blue background.  An array of rainbow colours have been splashed about on his skin and over his tentacles.  I dripped yellow ochre from the bottom of the canvas to the top and indian red from the top down to create more layering at the end of this session.

As you can see I have spent a lot more time on the repainting, it is where my ideas are more solid to work from, the second painting is more of an experiment from what I learn on the first painting. I had planned from the start to paint rainbow of scales that follows the shape of the body. I have also boldly blocked in features of the face and added red serrated fins to her back. They are outlined in crimson and are bright red despite the difficulty in reading it against a similar color background.  I dripped yellow ochre from the bottom of the canvas to the top and indian red from the top down to create more layering as in the other painting.

Double Dragons --> X-mas eve

I spent the afternoon adding some line work to my latest pieces. I like the holidays. It is quiet, the roads are bare, nobody is out,  (save the last minute men, hoping todo some last minute shopping and find a gift to save their ass tomorrow). Other than that, it is quiet and there aren't much in the way of societies regular expectations. Instead are dinners etc.

A perfect day to let the creative juices flow. I did the line work on both pieces, the red piece got black gesso line treatment and the blue background piece was given some line work with white paint.

A bit more work has been done in blocking in some of the facial features. I tackled the claws by creating a make-shift stencil out of a scrap of graph paper. I added the squirmy bits to the elbows and some white ribbing along the stomach. I also used a silver sharpie to draw in the scales. 

The red piece is more developed than the blue piece I like how it is progressing so far. At this point I began using the dryness of the white paint to lighten some of the hairy bits, I also added an extra finger to each claw. Next time I visit the studio, I will be able to play with color. I am fairly certain I will outline the pieces to give them a glow and to further separate them from the background.

So there you have it, the development from todays painting session ;)

Double Dragons

Chinese new year quickly approaches and this year is the year of the Dragon.

I decided to make two large paintings of dragons.First, I hope one gets selected as a design for this years Taoist Tai Chi society T-shirt.  I have done their shirts for the past two years and hope that they use an image created by me again this year.  Second, I plan on exhibiting these new pieces at Motion Gallery in the New Year, and if I'm lucky they will sell quickly.

This is a dragon slayer! Dj LurkN spinning tracks in my studio. 

 I created an original drawing to base them off of. This is the first of many in my newest Frosst Books sketchbook. I stretched two approximately 4 foot square canvases after my canvas building workshop. I acquired the frames for free and bought the 10 oz. canvas on the roll, way back.  I stretched them  and I gave them three coats of Chromacryl Gesso (the thick stuff) and sanded in-between each layer. It took about 5 hrs. total to create the surfaces in which to work. I sketched out the design in charcoal and gave it a light spray of workable fixative.

I worked in white gesso to blend in the charcoal and create some initial tone to work with.  I decided to do something a little different than I normally do, and work with a palette knife. I applied a red hue and blocked in the background. I applied it heavy and had fun doing it.  I even applied the paint around the edge of the canvas since I didn't think I'll be able to afford a frame for a work this large any time soon. Meanwhile, Cosmic and I were having an awesome time jamming out to his tunes.

I flipped over the original drawing and broke in my new animation light table for the first time. I loosely traced onto the back the initial drawing so that it would face the other way. Once this planning sketch was done, I was still on a roll...... I sketched in the second dragons body onto my other canvas.  Instead of blocking it in with the white gesso as I had done with the previous canvas, I just sprayed it down with fixative. My studio was too stinky to continue working so I left for the evening.

I blocked in a blue background on the second piece in with a palette knife. It wasn't my intention to be his and hers (Blue and Pink) but it was my intention to do a yin and yang thing.  The second dragon was painted in black with black Gesso made by Golden. I used a 2 inch brush to do it, it went very smoothly.

At this point it was getting late and I was loosing my edge. I painted in the claws but they looked so bad I had to paint over them.  Painting is largely experimentation and discovery. I don't even know where it will take me, I just show up and allow the process to unfold.  I decided to get into it and end the night off with some splatters and drips and blow off a little excess steam so that when I return I'll have new challenges to deal with in the creative process.

The red piece got the same treatment, I also used the black gesso as an underpainting for the fiery elements around the limbs and  the tentacle bits. I also sprayed some fluorescent pink marking paint to break up the space ad ant a little crazy with the splatters. A huge glob of red hit the eye and spilled down. Nothing to worry about. I spritzed the whole surface with water to soften it and allow for greater transparency of the dripping hues.

I am excited to see how these pieces develop into the new year, keep posted to see my progression =;)

Can't rest on your laurels

Just 'cause I finished a painting and seemed to not be drawing on here for a week........
I know that you "can't rest on your laurels", you have to keep moving forward even if your new stuff isn't always as good as the stuff you just completed.

Another good saying that illustrates the point.........

"NO REST FOR THE WICKED!!!"

Sister Wendy Beckett, super hilarious an inspirational  art history host on PBS. I totally have a crushg on this particular nun!

This little surfer due was sketched from a toy that was less than an inch tall. I used Prismacolor to color it.

This piece was inspired by a Japanese Shunga print I saw. The girl is pink the boy is blue, unfortunately the scanner  have access to didn't pick it up.

Fire breathing dragon and a jack-ass. All the line work done with Copic a 0.5 multiliner.