A scratchboard commission for the holidays...

I got the opportunity to do a few commissions for the Christmas season. It never feels bad when someone pays you to create a gift for someone else. Just think- that money could be in Wal-Mart or Sear's hands already, but instead they decided to waste... spend it on a personal commission. This is where the NBC 'More You Know' sound byte chimes in. Would've had another, but hopefully that one returns later down the road.

My three commissions this year were a Captain Kirk...

...A family portrait...

...And a quick gag gift.

Hey wait a minute....... this stuff.... is fun to do!

-dirkus

PS... NOW I'm going Christmas shopping.

Between Conventions...

One of the couple sketches I did at Pittsburgh Comicon...

... it's Batman.

Pittsburgh went well, not the sales I hoped for, but not too disappointing either. At this moment, I expect each con, each year to get better. All attention is on Baltimore. I need to work on my con sketching. One, bettering them, and two, getting more requests. Should do some pinups before next year's cons and put them in a port. My anatomy knowledge is fading a little, and we know what that means.

Sold an oldie to a con-goer. Gentleman emailed and asked to purchase my Vlad Putin piece, which I did back in college. Def feels good to get rid of old stuff. At least I still had it. For all I knew I might've used it as a doormat when funds were low. But its good. Ans I framed it. And I matted it.. cutting a mat took about 6 tries.

Alright. This blog screams of stream of consciousness. I must a read a comic, and nap, and get back to work on the webcomic. ROCK!

Convention Season Is Forever, forever, (forever)

Im in the middle of some fun times, as always when I give my mind something to latch on. Problem is, my sometimes lack of discipline means I often neglect important things to hunker down on.

Take for example- preparing for conventions.

My convention season is solely the fall this year- Pittsburgh is September 11-13, Baltimore is October 10-11. I look forward to these very, very, very, very, very much. Each year, I become a more professional voice and visual presence- from my first time, where I pretty much played 'special guest artist' and assistant set-up kid who signed books as they were sold, progressing to this year, my 4th, and 1st with my own table at both cons.

It's not a stretch to say I have a lust for custom building, and there's a reason. Such a great feeling when you can build something to your own liking out of whatever material you can find or deem essential, hopefully doing it for less or at least making it fit your exact needs... and hell. sometimes, what you make actually works!

I'm using this DIY ethic to make myself some modular display racks which I can change the size of depending on the table space I've allotted for it/ them. This takes time, from brainstorming, sketches, and thinking of the proper material, to goin out and buying all the supplies, to cutting, grinding, painting, and playing the fiddle to celebrate. All this time means dedication yes, but I lose the desire to actually do art when I go headfirst into projects like that.

In other words... Busy. But Lazy.

The Origin Of The Unicorn...

Discussed over the phone with Frankalicious...

We were discussing how some religious zealots believed in dragons, and that all dinos were herbivores, and lived during man. I said that even the unicorn existed once...

Upon creating Adam, God said unto him, 'IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE YOU WANT?" Adam pondered...

God stopped Adam in his thought, "I KNOW WHAT YOU'LL LIKE". So He made a horse, and slapped a rhino horn on its head. Adam said 'YAY!!'

God, delighted that he had pleased Adam so much, ordered the mass production of Unicorns.

Upon production he released them all into the sea at once.

Never being a good businessman, GOD watched as every Unicorn drowned, for he hadn't realize that the hoofed Unicorn could only swim for 15 minutes.

And that's why, if you ever take a submarine tour of the bottom of the ocean, you'll find THOUSANDS of unicorn corpses...

Adam, upon watching this manufacturing blunder, advised to Him,

"Maybe you should've put flippers on them..."

...And God, still angry that he didn't play it safe by testing one Unicorn out first, AND for the fact that he hadn't yet created CHINA to ease the cost...

... needed to vent, so he turned to Adam & punished him by ripping out a rib & creating Eve to be a pain in his side forever.

God then took the original Unicorn prototype...

...Yanked off the hooves...
...threw on some flippers...
...tested one out...
...created CHINA...
...and began mass production on the new animal...
...and called it the Narwhal without anyone's consent.

And Adam never told God that he thought the name was goofy and not marketable.

AND NOW YOU KNOW why in the movie LEGEND the unicorns sounded like WHALES.

The End

I am my own audience

Star Trek Sketch

This was done for Bob Ostrom's and Chris Wilson's CI Sketchbook.ning.com. Month of May's topic is Star Trek. I should've drawn Anonymous Trek Guy #53 tumbling down in the background. Or an alien vomiting.

What I can always resort to...

When I go through periods of slacking off from personal drawing time, three things get me out of my funk- Wolverine, Spider-Man, but most of all- the one and only RAPHAEL.

Good lil' exercise to something I want to keep up with more often. Also made me realize I need to enjoy playing with my negative spacing a bit more, as well as making slightly more careful lines.

Train's a' rollin'

I'm halfway through sketches with this super neat project. 18 illustrations in total I'll be doing, and I can't wait to get feedback. At the same time, there's always that little extra heartbeat that worries about the quality of each illustration at final production. Love that confidence.

I ran 7 miles last weekend in one hour, and 3.5 yesterday. I an officially part cheetah. (Note to anyone who runs more and wants to put me in my place- give me my moment, please. I was never a runner; in fact I was the chubby baseball player who hit home runs for the sole purpose of not having to worry about being on a base.)

Official Entrydom

Had to do this to make it official- This be where my blogs now reside. iWeb tires mine eyes some, so the more I stays away from it I do, the more I likes to post 'em I may.

What?

Go to bed, Dirk.