Malibu Pier

Gouache on Illustration board 9.25" x 7.75"

I recently went landscape painting with my dad and uncle. This is my attempt. Weird how my dad's painting of the same beach has a crowd of people and mine only has a lone surfer.

Film Noir Kid

This is a concept painting for a children's book project I was working on recently. It was done in Photoshop.

Watching Jen watching AFV while looking @ bills

My wife and I love to watch America's Funniest Home Videos together after the kids have gone to bed. I must admit that as a skinny tween I watched and loved the show when it first aired in the late 80's, but gave it up in the early 90's as I realized a person could only watch so much footage of unwary fathers getting hit in the crotch by innocent little leaguers. I'm not sure when we started watching the show again, but I'm certain it was after we had our first son. One of the most appealing things about the show to me now is watching my wife literally laugh her self to tears when some tiny, unsuspecting kid gets bounced off a trampoline like a rag doll or tossed off screen by a speeding beach ball. Her all time favorite on-screen misfortune involves an often slightly overweight person who naively stands ashore, strapped into a parasailing harness only to be dragged through the water seconds later like some sports fisherman’s dream catch. I think I enjoy watching her watch the show more than the show itself.

Photoshop Class

I'm very fortunate to have been invited by Rich Tuzon to attend an intermediate Photoshop painting class that is being taught at work by one of my favorite teachers from school, Bob Kato. Basically Bob adapted his traditional painting technique as a way to paint digitally in Photoshop. This is a 2 hour master copy (caricatured a bit) of a one of Sargent's self portraits that I painted in tonight's class.

Landscape Painting with Dad

I go painting with my dad quite often. This last weekend we went to Paramount Ranch. If you haven't been there to paint plein air, you're crazy! It has an old ghost town-looking set that was the backdrop for Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman and many other western sets from 1927 until present day. Here are my gouache efforts. The smaller two are 1.5" x 2.5" done in my moleskine sketchbook and the larger painting is on about 5" x 7" piece of illustration board. If you want to see my dad's he'll post it soon at his blog: http://sketchpainting.blogspot.com/

Some Sketchbook Sketches

I'm still alive and here are the sketches to prove it!

Art Center Graduation Show - Friday, 08-17-2007

Hey, art blog friends! I am graduating this weekend from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. For all you people around the L.A. Area, this coming Friday on August 17th from 7:00PM until 10:00 PM, is the Art Center Graduation Show. Come check out the show and say "Hi" if you happen to recognize me standing next to the artwork you've seen posted on this blog over the last few years. www.artcenter.edu

Little Red Robin Hood and The Naughty Sheriff of Ham

I decided to use the animation background I posted earlier to create a fun Robin Hood story using animals in the place of people for my Advanced Sketching for Illustration final painting. Wait, ...Robin Hood...animals in the place of people...that's so original!

Digital Self Portrait

Another Dang Painting

Acrylic on Illustration Board

Hot Pink Lady and Cool Blue Girl

More acrylic paintings on illustration board from Gary Meyer's Advanced Sketching for Illustration class.

Some More Props

Here are some digitally painted props for my independent study project with Ricardo Delgado.

Animal Prop Studies

Here are some prop ideas I came up with for the story I made up about animals that go to high school.

More Characters

These are more character ideas for my Independent Study with Ricardo Delgado. Sketched in pencil and colored in Photoshop.

More Paintings

Acrylic on Illustration Board 15" x 20"

Background Concept for Animation

I was exploring animation styles and did this quickie Photoshop painting on the fly.

Peacock Feather Hat

Acrylic on Illustration Board 15" x 20"

Clown Man and Cropped Face Girl

I'm getting back into traditional painting and I have to say I love it. This is an acrylic painting. I didn't finish working on the clown man's hands, obviously. I probably spent more time than I should have working on his head. I only show the girl's cropped face for the same reason. Hopefully I'll get a full painting in next time.

Evil Warrior

Another character concept for my independent study with Ricardo Delgado.

The Dream of Flying

This is a color comp for a painting I'm going to do for Gary Meyer's Advanced Sketching for Illustration class. The topic is the dream of flying and the text on the bottom right says, "Look, Daddy! A bird!"

Some New Rough Sketches

I'm currently working with Ricardo Delgado on an Independent Study project where he is art directing me on a fantasy story he devised where I will create characters, props, environments, and finally a painting of a moment including all the elements together. Lots of new work for my final semester at Art Center! These sketches, including the slightly painted top image, are stylized towards more of an animation look. The unfinished painting at the bottom is more realistic looking in its proportions and design.

On the Steps

This is a Naked Mole Rat being interviewed on the steps of his high school. This was done last term in Photoshop.

Goldon Lion-Headed Tamarin Skater

Another from the animal high-schoolerwork I've been posting. Drawn with pencil on Strathmore 500 board and colored in Photoshop.

Gerenuk Girl in Color

This is the same exploration for the gernuk cheerleader character in my Ark project I already posted but this time it has been digitally painted in Photoshop. The purse is updated.

More Sketches

Sketches from my larger Molskine. The first is an ode to Bobby Chiu. I love when he uses up all the negative space. The second is just a composite of various sketches with some Photoshop.

Searchers Color Script

This color script corresponds with the first two pages of the graphite value studies for The Searchers. Acrylic on Illustration board.

Randomness Exercise

In this exercise for my Background Painting class I made a series of abstract acrylic paintings and scanned them into Photoshop and cropped in on a random area. After doing that I digitaly painted a made up scene on top of the scanned image using the basic elements of the composition that existed in the cropped area. The top image is of course the acrylic painting croped and the second image shows 3 color variations on the digital painting.