primogenito

Christmas gifting is so much easier when you have a knack for art.  It's cheaper and it means a lot more.  This past holiday season, I made a few digital portrait paintings of "first born" children in my family.

Lily is the first born child of my brother Tag and his wife Tracy (family blog).  She was the guinea pig of this little series of projects.  It's one thing to mess around with art in the privacy of your own home, and it's another thing completely to try finishing something that needs to be somewhat presentable to others.

Next up is Charlie.  He is the first of my sister Shelly and her husband Dave (family blog).  He came a little bit easier after everything I learned from painting Lily.  I wasn't quite sure how to do the background.  I kind of faked my way through that.  I probably should have looked at some reference paintings to get a feel for it. 

And last was my sister Shelly who is the oldest of us three, presented as a gift to my mom.  

I completed these in mid-December and looking at them now I can already see tons of things I would have altered or done differently if I would have spent a little more time. They all could probably do for a few more hours of touch work and a quick cleaning of a few edges.  The recipients, however, were very grateful.  

And speaking of primogenitors, I mustered up one of my own this weekend.

Clara Giles, my new best friend and daughter.

a fellow "tom"

The following individual was drawn just as soon as I received my refurbished wacom drawing tablet in the mail.  Mine is a more primitive model, but boy is it different than drawing with a mouse. This man is an actor named Tom Wilkinson.  It's easier to draw well known faces, cause you get a better idea if you captured the likeness or not.  You might remember Tom from Batman Begins or maybe if you caught Valkyrie.  He was nominated for best supporting actor for his role in Michael Clayton, which I was totally floored by (or 'by which I was totally floored').

In the process of sketching out his face, the computer froze up on me.  This was before I was in the habit of saving my work as I go. The whole thing would have been lost, however, turns out I'm crafty. I took a picture of the sketch on the frozen screen with my nifty camera phone, reset the computer, then re-uploaded it back into photoshop via advanced bluetooth technology.

After a few filtering tricks and some slight un-skewing of the image, I was back in business, sort of.
Then I decided to ruin the drawing by trying my hand at painting it.
It turned out kind of flat and waxy looking.  I think I like the un-painted drawing better.

handful of aimless gnomes

Some time ago back in December of '08 I received an email from my mother which included an intricate plot to take over the world. This plot involved writing a book about a gnome. And since she didn't want to share the weight of such accountability, I was invited to do the illustrations.

Well, back in December of '08 I was still convinced that my art career was just the ideation of an oblivious, day-dreaming adolescent. So I have my mother to partially thank for giving me a reason to rekindle my childhood aspirations.

The progress of this book is only known by Marilyn, but I was able to widdle up a few simple ideas for gnomes just to help subdue my thoughts that this book might not ever even happen.

Here they are in order of genesis.

They author has already chosen her favorite but if you'd like to make suggestions to sway her one way or the other, you may visit her blog.

I'm cruisin' now

Here are a few early ones.

Humberto is this guy's name.

He enjoys sipping cocoa, building model boats, and discussing agriculture. I think he was forced into retirement and spends his nights in front of a computer looking for odd jobs. Anyone hiring?

This one was done just for fun. My wife and I recently read The BFG by Roald Dahl.

If they ever made a movie, the late Mr. Knotts would have been prime.

whoops

I accidentally started a weblog today. I figure it will be a worthwhile accident. Most of my accidents are. I always thought I had something significant to tell the world and it turns out that I also have something to show.

So, for your consideration...

In my efforts to come out of artistic obscurity I'm gonna post a few items here and there to build up an unofficial portfolio for my adoring fan(s).

The above piece was my foray into Adobe Photoshop. Before this I thought the only form of painting on the computer was Microsoft Paint (which I still swear by). Turns out I was pretty naive. This was done before I had a digital tablet so it was drawn by mouse.

For those of you who aren't aware, I'm attending The Art Institute of Salt Lake City pursuing another bachelor's degree, but this time in Animation. So I already have plenty of works to post until we catch up to the present. This will also be a good way for me to chronicle my progress and skills as an artist.

Tell me what you think. It's okay to be brutal. I have a pretty high tolerance for negative criticism.