Feral children

This past Sunday afternoon, just before dusk settled in, Heather and I are in our bedroom talking... when it begins to dawn on us that the house has gone quiet.
I open our bedroom door to utter silence. No sounds echoing down the hallway and bouncing off the walls and our heads. No screaming. No banging. No off-key singing. No arguments. Where'd those little monsters go?

Eventually, through expert sleuthing, I detect muffled noises coming from behind the kitchen garage door. I swing it open and find…

The normal gloom of a typical garage. A poorly set-up step ladder. And, a swirled pattern of light… cast from the spinning air vent I'd installed in the roof last summer. The light dances over the crouched forms of my five children. They're huddled over a clear, plastic storage box of stuffed animals that they had ILLEGALLY dragged down out of the rafters from above. How on earth had they managed that without hurting themselves? It would have required cunning, planning, and a level of cooperation that I had previously never suspected of them.

Crouched over the box and it's contents like that. They looked… for all the world… like a pack of coyotes quarreling over the remains of a dear carcass. Arguing and muttering to one another as they tore into the dear…er… box. Occasional scuffles breaking out over a particularly choice..er..toy.

And backed into a corner is Holly, the baby. A stuffed dog cradled in her left arm and a purple, stuffed "My little pony" clutched by it's rainbow-hewed mane in her right fist. She glares and shrieks at her siblings whenever any of them turn to see what she might have claimed for herself out of the carcass…er…box.

I swear, at this point, she'd gone completely feral.

"WHAT ARE YOU ALL DOING IN HERE?!" I holler with my best "Daddy's-in-charge" voice.

Five pair of eyes suddenly focus on me…. glittering out of the gloom of the garage.

_Jeepers that's creepy_

Than the noise starts. A cacophony of apologies and "I didn't do it's" and "We just wanted one of the monkeys!" and "Please can we..?"….etc.  All at once. Peppered with a couple more shrieks from the baby, who felt she ought to have her say as well.

"AllrightallrightALLRIGHT! Just… Out of the garage! Take the box with you, and we'll talk about this later. Come on. All of you. Out!"

Chittering amongst themselves happily, my sweet little angels fall upon the savaged box again. They drag the box and it's remaining contents out through the garage side door, tugging it around the corner into the darkening light of dusk… like… like a… pack  of coyotes maybe….dragging a….

"OH, STOP IT! Stop it with the "feral animal" analogy.

_Jeepers_

storyboard artwork

I thought I'd upload some more of the storyboard artwork I do. Usually, it's a quick rough drawing using a light-colored animators pencil... and then going over that same drawing again with a darker color pencil. Picking out what what I like for the final drawing. These are fast drawings. And sometimes I don't like what I end up with. In such cases, I have to continue on anyway and hope that I have enough time to redo that particular drawing later.

storyboard drawings

I often have to bang out a bunch of storyboards for TV spots at work. In the heat of the fire, there isn't time to noodle the drawing to perfection. In fact, most of these drawings are whipped out within a 10 to 20 minute time frame. I have to just except what I've drawn and move onto the next panel or frame in the storyboard.

When I do these drawings, I tend to grab the nearest light-colored "Col-Erase" animators pencil on hand. Then I go over my scribbles with a darker color... picking out the lines I want.

Simple, and rough, but hopefully, able to communicate the idea.

Here are a few samples.

drawing during a meeting

Meetings are important...yes... but they also result in some of my favorite little sketches. Like, for instance, this one I did last Friday during a planning meeting at work.

I don't know why there is a bunny.

Black Yei Illustration

Here's the final version of the Navajo Diety "Black Yei". I wanted to have him glowing from within with the cold brilliance of starlight while being bathed in the warm reflection from the flame held in his hands.

You can see the glow of the starlight shining from the symbol of the seven sisters star cluster on his left brow and from his eyes.

I'm not happy with the background. Although I'd wanted it to be simple, with flat colors, I'd like to work it some more sometime.

All in all tho, I still like the final results.

I fractured my right shoulderblade over the holidays. Fell off a ladder. Wish it had been while wrestling a bear or fighting off a pack of ravenous wolves... alas... a freaken ladder. Couldn't draw at all for several weeks. Still wearing the sling now, but mostly as a reminder to take it easy until the bone has healed completely.

I wanted to upload final examples of my two entries into the Deities book. Looking back at the finished work, all I can see are the obvious flaws and silly mistakes. But I'm still pleased with how they both turned out.

Here is a shot of the final version of the Buhdi Pallien piece. Watercolor and lead pencil on cold-press watercolor board. We (the viewers) and the one little boy manage to see this larger than life, glorious feline goddess lying within touching distance of all the tourists. This was a fun one to do. Watercolor requires an enormous amount of self confidence and an ego to match.