EliPhant

This will be the last sketch I will sign in 2011.

For all you people thinking this will be the last year on this planet, I hope you live your life like it is. As far as the Mayan calendar countdown, read this, please. Oh, and stop it, you’re frightening the kids.

Here’s a good website from NASA.

I shot a forty four magnum Desert Eagle today. One round shattered a frozen milk jug (filled with ice, not milk) into a million pieces. Pretty cool if I do say so myself. I have taught my children that a gun is meant for one thing and one thing only, and that is to destroy. They both have a deep respect for firearms and know how to handle them. Shooting this hand cannon renewed my respect fairly quickly.

It’s been a while since I’ve written much about my technique, so I will now. I love shiny objects and materials, and I have been really wanting to develop textures that I can reuse. This is an experiment in textures as well.

Possum

What is the strangest meat you’ve ever eaten?

I’ve eaten gator tail before. In some cultures, they eat cat

I knew a guy once who stuffed skinned and gutted squirrels in potatoes and threw them on the grill.

My son, Stephen and I ate worms from the back yard. He fried them in a pan over an open flame.

Before the Take II

This is my gift to myself.

Not this specific sketch, but all of them combined. Every day, I give myself the time and resources to interpret my deepest creative thoughts onto paper. I do this every day because that is when I’m truly at my best, when I am alive, when I am at peace.

This is also my gift to the world.

This specific sketch and everyone before it. I do it because I am able, by the grace of God. This vision I possess is a great gift given to me to borrow for a short time. I truly believe it is my calling and my purpose in life to share it with the world. I believe it is an obligation that all artists share.

In this sketch, I have discovered a new technique, blending highlight direction (I have GOT to come up with a better name for it). By accident, I forgot to blend the features at the bottom of the sketch. Instead, I get an entirely new type of texture to explore. Thank God for mistakes.

Happy almost-birthday, Jesus.

SantaBot

This is for Mrs. Grady.

When I was in grade school at Maine Memorial Elementary, I did a lot of custom holiday decorations for certain teachers. I don’t think I ever did one for Mrs. Grady. So, here it is…about thirty five years after the fact, but here just the same.

The writing above is my “hand” at cursive writing. This is one pass and no erasing. I wanted to see what it would look like. I thought it appropriate, since I think that’s the age I learned how. I’m sure if I were being graded on it, I would get about a seventy five percent. I made the paper look old to give it an aged look, as if it lives at the bottom of a cardboard box that holds the family tree ornaments.

By the way, when is the correct time to start wishing people a Merry Christmas? I officially started yesterday.