NM99 Sketching

I started this piece not too long ago, and put some more work into it while we were recording the 99th Ninja Mountain Episode. I'm interested in seeing how it turns out.

Eowyn and the Nazgul

Last month Jon Schindehette and the guys at the Muddy Colors blog put together a challenge. The topic was Eowyn and the Nazgul, from the Lord of the Rings. It wasn't until I was waiting at the airport, trying to fly to the Austin Kotei, that I found the approach I wanted to take.

There's been a lot of focus on the end fight, but I decided to look at what lead up to that. I settled on when the Witch-king takes to the field of the battle. Eowyn's horse Windfola panicked, and she and Merry were thrown (and since there's no specific reference to when her helmet came off, I decided it would be a fine time for that, too). I stretched things a bit having her bumped by the fell beast, but I wanted to show her resisting them. The Witch-king and fell beast, however, are cropped out of the picture to show they don't regard her at all.

Here are some of the steps I went through. The last is a photo of the painting as it stood last night. It's oil on paper on panel, about 15" x 21".

Art Order Blog
Muddy Colors

April 2011 Kotei Apperances

I just wanted to post a quick note about the three L5R tournaments I'll be attending in April. On the 2nd I'll be in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. On the 16th I'll be in Austin, Texas. On the 30th I'll be in Louisville, Kentucky. I've included links to more specific information for those interested, and here are the thumbnails for a couple of new pieces I'll be showing at the tournaments. Come say hi!

Ottawa Kotei details: here
Austin Kotei details: here
Louisville Kotei details: here

"...Twenty To Thirty Minutes a Day."

Alonso remarked on my Mark Kistler reference during the latest Ninja Mountain episode. I used to love watching Secret City on PBS, and was always trying to catch up with my older brother's skill whilst contributing to the family mural. I hadn't thought about it in years, but not too long ago we found his site and subscribed for my daughter. Here are sketches from a couple of episodes we watched together.

Mark Kistler -- http://www.draw3d.com/
Alonso -- http://monotremedreams.blogspot.com/
Ninja Mountain Scrolls -- http://ninjamountain.blogspot.com/

Talking about myself. What could be easier?

Two things:

1: Next weekend, January 21-23, 2011, I will be a guest at Running Gagg at SUNY Geneseo. I'll be giving a couple of seminars late Friday and Saturday afternoons. The organizers have asked for the standard fare -- starting out,experiences, process, painting demo, those sorts of things. I was wondering if anyone had any questions they'd like answered, or topics that they'd like me to cover. What gets missed or glazed over in convention talks like this? If you're an illustrator, what do you wish you had heard starting out?

2: When I started my blog the plan was to only talk about work I did on my own, for myself. From my sporadic updates it would seem I'm not really doing a lot on my own, so I think I'll open things up to more work-work. I'm hoping that will make it easier for me to find interesting things to say -- or at least show.

Acrylics, Even.

I'd been forewarned by some of my friends that Magic players like to get cards altered at tournaments. Rather than make a mess of things with a Sharpie I took some acrylics to October's Toronto GP, so I could make little paintings like these:

A few people were surprised I'd only been using acrylics for a few hours, but they trusted me with their cards anyway. Back home I decided to try them at a slightly larger scale -- and to compare my M. Graham acrylics with the newer Winsor & Newton Artists' Acrylics. Both boast longer open time than older acrylics, and WN's claim of minimizing color shift during drying was interesting. So during an evening at Tom's studio with Greg, Ben, Allen, and Chris, I did.

I think the M. Graham paints' longer open time was more important to me than the lack of color shift in the Winsor & Newton paints. In the end, though, I was glad I could go back to oils.

In conclusion, napkin doodles:

Painting in Feeding Hills

A couple of weeks ago I was at the L5R charity tournament organized by Team Whiplash -- Eric, Ralph, Kevin, and... a couple of other guys I haven't talked with as much -- in Feeding Hills, Massachusetts. I go nearly every year (and nearly every spring, for the Massachusetts Kotei they organize), and this time decided to do some painting at the event. I brought along my oil paints and the tired ronin from July, in a convenient 5"x7" travel size. It was a leisurely day of chatting and painting, and ended with a nice visit with my older brother and his family. I don't see them often enough.  Thanks for a fine day, everyone.

Here's a quick scan of where the painting left off: