Ex Nihilo

A happy painting.

Purgatory Afterglow

Hex Omega

Birdy 002

When Santa stopped believing in himself.

Ghost 1

Since it's that time of year again, I'm going to force myself to do some kind of spooky drawing every day until Halloween.  And I'm going to do each and every one of them on my iPhone!  So if anyone has any suggestions on what I should draw, scream it out!

Mobile Paintings Part 1

So here are some paintings I did on some mobile devices, namely the Nintendo DSi and iPhone!

I did this one using "Colors" on the DSi. I think I prefer painting using a DSi and its stylus, plus it is kind of pressure sensitive, allowing thick to thin lines. Although it definitely is not as sensitive as a Cintiq or Wacom tablet. The negatives are the DSi's small screen and the resolution of the final paint isn't that great (512 x 384).Here is a painting of my rabbit Frida I did on the iPhone. I've been fooling around with pretty much every paint program released on the iPhone. I first started out with "Brushes", then moved on to "Layers", since it supported, well, LAYERS. Then I found out about Autodesk Sketchbook Mobile and of the three, I feel it fits my needs pretty well. It supports layers, undo and more importantly, the customization of brushes. Pretty intuitive interface as well.

My main gripe with painting on the iPhone is that it feels too much like finger painting. And it doesn't help that I have big fingers that cover up most of the screen. I've kind of alleviated problem by using the Pogo Stylus. It's small enough to stow away in my wallet, but it has a really spongy tip and I feel that I have to press down pretty hard to make a brush stroke. Another negative against the iPhone is the lack of pressure sensitivity, so sometimes I find myself faking thin to thick brush strokes.

Of the two devices, I'll most likely end up using the iPhone the most since I carry that around with me at all times. I figure that I'll get used to painting on it and maybe bust out something I'm totally happy with. I just found out that they released "Colors" for the iPhone as well, so I'm going to give that a shot and post my thoughts on it later.

Crew Meeting Sketches Part 1

Here's some doodled I diddled during our last crew meeting at WB.
These could be paintings in the near future!

Not From Concentrate

Here it is, all done! Truthfully, I'm not totally sure what it means and if it has to do anything with Los Angeles myth. I think it's going to be one of those paintings that I look at again months later and finally figure out what it mean to me. But if anyone has any idea what it means to them (especially in regards to Los Angeles!), I'll gladly use your story to explain this to anyone that asks!

Unicorn of Death

Here's the tribute painting I did for the Gary Gygax show that's being held at Titmouse Studios this coming Saturday! For those who don't know, Gary Gygax was the father of "Dungeons & Dragons", and without him, I wouldn't have created so much horrible fantasy art in high school. REALLY HORRIBLE fantasy art. Maybe I'll post some samples later... I was laughing at a lot of it when I was at my parents' house this past weekend. Anyways, one of my favorite monsters from D&D were Beholders, floating sphere monsters with eyes all over the place which shoot out death rays and freeze rays and all kinds of rays to screw up your party. Okay!!!

Bird of Paradise

Here's a painting I just finished up in Photoshop for the L.A. Myth show happening at Meltdown Comics on Sunset this Saturday. I was really trying to do a traditional painting, but I'm so short on time nowadays I started choking and wasn't happy with what I was turning out. So I went digital, yay! I try as hard as possible to go through similar steps as if I was painting traditionally, it's just that it's A LOT faster doing it on the computer. It's no wonder why I only do 1-2 traditional paintings a year!

La Dolorosa

Hey gang...sorry I've been quiet the past couple of weeks. I had a really good excuse though! Finishing this painting! It's been a looooong time since I've painted something in my "old school" style, but I really loved how it turned out. I used to say to myself, "When things get rough in life, that's when my best paintings would come out." Well here's the fruit of one those times! I also included the sketch I worked off of as well as the detail of the face (which took FOREVER to do. I think about at least 10-12 hours of work alone, including screw ups). The photo doesn't really do it justice because it totally obliterated a lot of the subtle, transparent overlays. Sooo...if you want to see it in person, you can check it out at the following exhibit: Tigers & Jaguars: LA's Asian-Latino Art Phenomenon .

Kitsune: Fox

Alright, here's my first acrylic-based painting in a hundred years. It was pretty weird getting back into them...the last full on acrylic painting I pulled off was back in 2003 (here). So this piece was pretty much a confidence builder to get back into the flow of it. I'll start easing back into the more crazier shit later, hehe.