leaving

Emily and I are leaving for Europe tomorrow, so I thought I'd post this drawing before I left. This was supposed to be a flier for an Emily Peal show, but I took too long with it. It's not perfect, but I like it all the same. The shadows are getting better, but my perspective is all wacky,


This is my last day with a computer until July 1, so if you want to get in touch with me electronically, here's your last chance. Otherwise, I'll see you when I see you!

work in progress

This is almost done, but I was getting impatient. This little guy is an accompaniment to a haiku I wrote, the one sitting in the cloud of smoke. It goes:

there is nothing left
for this creature to eat here
but rubble and mud

bunnies

Here's the finished drawing of my bunny.

You can see the change from the original post. I don't mind it. I think the textures are decent, and the shadows are decent, and its a pretty nice looking bunny. The stuffing poking out is fairly unrealistic looking, and I had some trouble making the walls look the way I wanted them to.

Here's a bunny with a pancake on its head:

I'm sure most everyone has seen that by now, but I still like to look at that picture every once in awhile. It reminds me of the good old days, when I'd give all my pets hats made out of food. The fashions were incredible: the pancake sombrero, the tortilla tricorn, the pot roast stovepipe. The list goes on.

Yet I digress; something adorable that I found when image searching "bunny"

SO CUTE. So cute. So cute I might pass out if I look at it for too long. It looks like a little anime bunny, with that big poppy-outy eyeball. I hope he has a matching one on the other side. Or an eye-patch.

more arts and crafts

Here's a little draring I did last night. I was going for speed and goodlookingness rather than perfection, and I used a photo as a guide. It took me a little less than an hour (fifty minutes or so), and despite the obvious flaws, I think its not too bad.


Also, here is the box that I'm using to display my CDs in at my show tonight. I'm really looking forward to this show, because it is my first rock and roll show of my own music. The band I have is AMAZING and LOUD and all the things a band should be. I can't wait.

easter scavenger hunt!

I forgot to put these pictures up! Emily and I did a scavenger hunt on Easter, and it was awesome! We made a list and checked things off as we found them. Some were incredibly fortuitous, seeing as how strange the list was.

People who are people-watching (I had to feign taking a picture of Emily so it wouldn't look like I was so blatantly photographing those people on the bench.

Hole in a tree for secrets

Rollerbladers

A horse

Duck with an entirely green head

A dog who looked like its owner

Twins


A man with a pipe (We kept it ambiguous in case we saw a plumber or something)


These weren't in the scavenger hunt, but really? Segways? Happy Easter everyone, we're a waaacky Segway gang coming to knock your ice cream out of your hands and ruffle your hair! Beware!

On an unrelated note, I found a curved noodle in my box of spaghetti the other day.
Oh my god! I've never seen anything like this before!

dwawing

I finished this one today. It started out as some strange creature, and turned into this incredulous duck. What's he looking at? I don't know, but he is having trouble looking away. I feel like my shading is getting better, but I don't really capture realistic light sources. Also, I'm utilizing a very conservative contrast scale. I think this picture would have so much more depth if the darks were darker and the lights were used more sparingly. Just a thought.

This little guy isn't quite done yet, but I thought I'd go ahead and scan him too, since I was using the scanner. Started him today. I used to draw all sorts of forgotten little toys, and I thought that maybe I should revisit that idea with my new tools and techniques to see what happens. I think this one has the potential to be really special, so I'm going to take my time with it and get the lighting just right.

It turns out that I'm actually pretty terrible at coming up with things to draw (that are easy enough for me to draw (not much detail, lots of room for shading)), so any suggestions would be very welcome and very appreciated.

ruining the shot

I got this video from Joe:


And similarly this picture, sent to me by Rupa, might just be the most fantastic picture I've ever seen (though Emily doubts its credibility):


I don't know whether or not I think this is real, but I like this one too:

please come down

I've got a show on Wednesday. With an actual band! This is something that I've been looking forward to for a long time. Actually, I got tonsilitis a few days ago, and that pretty much scared the shit out of me. However, after a rousing acupuncture session it seems to be resigned to its fate, and my voice is almost back where it needs to be. Woohoo.

Anywho, I made packaging for Please Come Down, and I'm going to sell it at the show. You can get it (or Icicle Island, Crickets Instead, or The Dust Didn't Clear for Days) at the show for $3! I don't charge much, because I make it all by myself (with Emily's help, of course), so my overhead is pretty low. Here's what the cover looks like:

So my band is Annie Hoffman, Adam Hand, and Emily Peal (and myself). It is going to be loud, and crazy, and loud, and dancy (which is new for me).

Looooooooove it

mushrooms

Here are some mushrooms. Did the shading with these new blending stumps. I got them mainly because of the name, to be honest. I like the way they look, even though the lighting is unrealistic. I'll try to do one of these sketches a day, using photos for reference.

slugs

I've been reading about slugs recently. It turns out, they are absolutely incredible. This one is Glaucus Atlanticus. Its a type of sea slug that floats on the surface of the ocean. Because of the location of the air sac that provides the floatation, it swims belly up. The silver stripe is its belly. Woo! And it has "six appendages which branch out into rayed cerata" [Wikipedia]. Look at this thing.


Similarly, I found this video of a nudibranch eating a tube anemone. It takes him [for sake of confusion. nudibranchs are hermaphroditic] a while to get going, but once he gets close... POW! He just dives right down the anemone's tube and gorges on delicious anthozoan flesh (well... tentacles).


I got some new drawring stuff yesterday. I'll upload some new pictures once I get motivated and finish them.

Oh no! Garden slug attack!!!

some birds

So here's something that I drew last night. The idea is going to be incorporated into a comic hopefully in the next few days. I'm just posting this because I like the picture, and because I haven't put anything up here in a while. I hope you like it. I'm still getting used to doing any sort of drawing with pencil, particularly shading. It just takes so long to do. I guess it proves that I don't have a future as an illustrator, since I don't have the patience to spend more than a few minutes on a drawing. Maybe that's the point of pencil drawings though...



This is one of my favorite animals. The lyrebird is unique in its ability to reproduce sounds it hears to incorporate into its mating call. For the lyrebird, the more exotic the sound, the more attractive the mate. This video is of the Albert's lyrebird, which lives in a specific part of the Southern Queensland rainforest in Australia. The end of the video is pretty devastating, as this lyrebird heard some very peculiar sounds for its environment.



Finally, some art for a record Emily and I did last summer. The record isn't finished yet, but its about birds, and I thought it was appropriate to post. I'll probably try to finish that up in the next few weeks so that it can be finished and posted before Europe happens.

the very first unicorn

I've been thinking recently (surprise, surprise) and determined how the first unicorn ever came into existence. Obviously, at the hands (or forehead, rather) of some malicious flying narwhal. This is why most unicorns are seen in the forest, rather than the vast mongolian plains in which they originated. They've had a staggering aversion to open spaces since the beginning. Coincidentally, though not nearly as interestingly, the particular scene depicted in this cartoon also depicts the very first beluga whale.


Also, I've been doing a lot of research on octopuses. Everything I read about them makes me so much more amazed. Watch this video. The extent of their camouflage ability absolutely blows my mind.

new greenpeace ad

Just found this new advertisement from Greenpeace accusing Nestle of using palm oil (which the use in just about every single product of theirs) from manufacturers who produce it using nonsustainable methods. I don't agree with all of Greenpeace's ways of changing the world, but I find this video particularly wonderful. Sustainability is one of my biggest concerns with the environment, since not practicing it will obviously lead to... duh... no environment, so I'm glad that Greenpeace took the initiative to make this advertisement (or anti-advertisement, I guess). I love how it keeps you guessing what this poor man is actually enjoying until the bitter end. Yum!

header!!

Hey everybody! Look at my awesome new header graphic! I made that!

weekend worrier

First, I want to express my complete dismay regarding the loss of Mark Linkous, and consequently, the end of Sparklehorse. I was blindsided the first time I heard Its a Wonderful Life. It was so dark, so lonely, so magical that I couldn't put it down. The songs and production really spoke to me, and were really helped light the way for The Dust Didn't Clear for Days when I was still in the dark about my sound. I regret that I didn't get a chance to see Sparklehorse in concert, as his shows were few and far between.

On a slightly more positive note, things in my world have been getting done. I finally got all the parts I needed to finish my bass, and although there is still a little more work to do on the electronics, cosmetically my bass is finished. It looks like this:



If you had seen what this thing looked like originally (regretfully, many people did), you'd be a lot more impressed with the end result. I promise. This bass also sounds much better than it originally did. I replaced the pickups with DiMarzio BlaBlaBla-YadaYadas, and they sound really wonderful. I'm having some grounding issues currently, but there are quite a few things I could change to fix that.

Friday, I baked my best apple pie thus far in my life. I'm still experimenting with my apple types and ratios, and this one was pretty wonderful. Six granny smith and two pink ladies did the trick. Here's a picture of the final thing:



And here's the inside after the first slice was removed:



De-lic-ious. Seriously this thing was a monster. A monster that was devoured in two days. If you want a real treat (and enjoy cooked apples), come over when I bake apple pie, and spend the night. The next morning I make pancakes from scratch with a syrupy, sugary topping from the leftover pie apples. This will probably kill you with how good it is.

That's it for now. I'm working up the courage to let people know about this thing. Soon you can read it!

paintings, senryu

I've been excavating in one of my old harddrives, and came across a bunch of my old paintings. Because I'm a complete loser, I photographed them, rather than scanning them in, so what I'm posting are the ones that turned out the best. Lookie:







That's all this blog will let me post for now, but more will come later, I hope.

Something else exciting, is that Senryu's release show for their new record Inkling is tonight. If you happen to be in Knoxville, more specifically the Pilot Light in the Old City, there's a good chance you'll get to see them (assuming you're there at the right time and have paid the $5 cover) I won't be there, because its sort of a long drive for me, but I'm on the guest list in spirit. There's a really great article about it at The Daily Times for you to check out. Here's the art for the title track:



You can find this song, and the other single Obsess Much on bandcamp. Its good, I promise.

new record, old record

I have a new record out today! Yay, I guess. The entire thing has been floating around on the internet for quite awhile, but now its all mastered and artworked and finished. Its funny how much my emotions have been swinging about this record... I loved it when we did it, and listened to and played the songs all the time. Then I hated it when there were band issues, and I threw it in a box and all but forgot about it until a few months ago, when I took it back out and remembered all the wonderful things. It sure is interesting how important the bad things are while they're happening, but its usually the good things that you tend to remember after the embers have cooled.

Anyway, here's the cover:



The record is currently free for download or casual listen on mybandcamp site, though I may affix a price to it fairly soon. So get it while you can! Or something...

Aaaaaaanyyyyywaaaaaaaaaay,

That's it.

north, east, west, south

That's what news is an acronym for. Go figure. Here's the scoop of my life at present.

Stars Regardless is looking for shows in Boston and New York. I don't have a band, though I think I want one pretty soon. Soon I'm hoping to start working on some new additions to my public performance abilities to make my shows a little cooler and representative of my recorded music.

Stars Regardless is also getting pretty close to finished with the first full-length record Whispering Earth. I'm pretty excited about sharing that. It has been such a long time coming, so I can't wait until it is a reality.

Emily and I have been working on a children's book. I'm not going to say too much about it yet, except that its about a vampire boy.

I'm currently working with Zoe of Little Red Lung, lending some production assistance on a few tracks of her upcoming record. You need to check this girl out. Her music is terrifyingly good. Hopefully she'll be touring this record once its finished, so keep on the lookout for that.

What else is there?

Oh yeah, I've made posters for two Emily Peal shows now. They look like this:

And I'm allowed to take pictures of their band now, which I very much enjoy, but am terribly slow at getting those edited. Hopefully in the next few days they'll be somewhere that I can link to. Until then, you don't know that this blog exists, so it doesn't really matter now, does it?

Newtonville is pretty awesome. So many places to see, and there are actual stars at night! So close to Boston, but its almost as if there is nature here. That is the one thing I'm dreading about being in New York, the lack of trees, except for in designated areas. Its wonderful because being here I am far enough away to have an excuse not to go into the city if I don't want to, and can get whatever work I need finished.

I'm tired of thinking about this while I should be doing other things.

so many so many so many things

Hello. I thought this might be a fun thing to do, since eventually I'll get famous and everyone can see that I've already had a blog for a long time. How wonderful! Here is a kitty, to start with. I hope it!