July 23, 2007

It's been a long time since I posted anything on here. I wish I had more to show. Updated the web design section with a couple of additions. And added about 20 sites or so to my LinkU Realty section-- my day job. Too lazy to put it all in the "Recent Additions" section to the right.

I'm working on a sequential piece in my free time. But I don't really have much free time. So I have no flippin' clue when it may be done-- if ever. *Fingers crossed*

May 6, 2007

Only adding a couple new things:

Went to a Laker playoff game a week ago, and finally found time to throw up my first photo gallery of 2007 (although there really isn't much worth while there). Tried a new style for the galleries.

And I have been working on a website for a wine company. It isn't active yet, but should be within a couple days, so I decided to throw up the link now.

Just got back from Spiderman 3... Eh...

APRIL 9, 2007

No new work to show-- but I did update my web design section-- made a whole page dedicated to my work at LinkU.

And I just got finished giving an overhaul to the web design portion of my 12 Easy Steps for Breaking Up piece. Have been unhappy with the design for quite some time-- and it was something I intended to do when I overhauled the site. When I initially created it, I was in a bit of a rush to make deadline, and I was a much worse web designer then.

February 25, 2007

It's always fun to do a collaboration when the other artist has no idea that they are part of a collaborative effort. But I guess that's what you get when you publish a masterpiece of sequential art solely in black and white-- just waiting for me to color it.

I read Craig Thompson's Blankets a few months back, and absolutely loved it. It was a book I picked up for sole purpose of me being bored and wanting something to read. I had seen the über-thick book around in a few bookstores, and decided it was worth a try, since I couldn't find any other Chris Ware to buy. A few days later as I wrapped up all 582 pages of this 'illustrated novel,' I decided Thompson was a genius, and am now getting my hands on all his work that I can find.

So anyway-- if you're into graphic novels (which most people aren't), then go buy Blankets right now, if you haven't already.

Okay-- that was more of a plug than I intended to give for the book. All I really meant to do was give a small explanation of the piece I just finished up-- a coloring of page 570 from Blankets.

I have some other ideas I will hopefully be working through in the near future. I'm tired of doing a whole bunch of busy work for extra money and having no time to do anything creatively for myself.

February 7, 2007

So-- it has been a whopping ten months or so since I debuted version 4.0 of my web site. And guess what-- I got tired of that design fairly quickly. So here we are, after a solid month and a half's worth of hard labor: I introduce version 5.0; by far the largest upgrade I have ever made to my site. I did not originally intend for this much of an overhaul... but as I began working on it, eventually it just kinda turned into practically rebuilding the entire site from the ground up. As for now-- I am incredibly happy with the outcome-- but you know how it goes, I'm sure something else will catch my eye in a few months.

The design is entirely my own. Completely thought up in my own little head. But can you believe this!?: It's like the Mars Volta web site was somehow already able to completely rip me off! Weird!

The only thing that didn't get an extensive overhaul was the photography-- and I still think it will in the future, as soon as I see what the Media Galleries in CS3 are capable of. Also, just wanted to give a little thanks to the author of this script, which I found incredibly awesome.

Also added a couple things to the galleries on this update. First two are colors and inks that I collaborated with Dan Mulhern on for 'The Commission.' It is a t-shirt design that I drew and he colored/digitally enhanced. And after that is another web site that we collaborated on together. Also, if you go to the Web Design section of my portfolio, you will finally be able to see some of the web sites I have been creating for work.

October 19, 2006

Added a new image which I collaborated with Kendra on for an (ex) coworker's daughter. She did the lines, and I colored. It's Tinkerbell... and yes... she looks a bit... provocative. But whatever, I like it.

August 27, 2006

I've been working on a drawing the past week or so. Somebody from work actually asked to have a Gorillaz image done a couple months ago, which I had no intention of actually doing for her. But, I found some weird juxtaposition between her significance to me, and the association I had with the Gorillaz because of previous incidents. So I decided to create it for myself-- not her-- and now I'm done with it.

I also put up some pictures from a few weeks back. And go check out my friend's clothing line Maxxxwear.

July 27, 2006

After Comic Con last week I was inspired to do a little old-school comic coloring which I haven't done in a while. So I picked up a drawing by my talented coworker Kendra, and finally gave it some color (I had only asked her if I could play around with it like 3 months ago).

July 23, 2006

Been working a whole bunch lately on the Bases Loaded Poker web site. It's kind of a work in progress, as the whole thing is going to be redesigned in Flash, but it is up and running now, so I decided to put up the link.

I've also been spending some free time working on a side project along with some friends from work. We picked up a traveling gnome who we named Joaquin, and we've been taking him around with us wherever we go this summer, and I've set up a website to correspond.

June 26, 2006

Had a day off of work today, so I decided to put up a few photo galleries which I had been putting off posting.

May 29, 2006

Well, I have a day off from work today, so I could: a) go do something fun and exciting, or b) sit at home and update my website...

Adding a few things I have been working on recently:

First is a Tool desktop-- my first one in nearly three years. I really didn't plan on doing one, until I saw a t-shirt using the new logo and some of the new album art, and I said "hey, I want that on my desktop..."

Second is the title page to a photo album I'm working on. I was at a family member's house a couple weeks ago and was looking through a photo album of one of her trips, and decided that I would like to do that with a couple of the things I've done. Except, I wanted mine to be very graphically design oriented, with a clear theme, and since I am really fascinated with the whole Art Deco architectural ideas that dominated New York the first half of the 20th Century, I decided to go with that theme. (I'm not gonna show the whole photo album here, just this title page.)

As some of you may know, I live in the Inland Empire, which is widely considered to be the Alabama of Southern California. Compared to our Los Angeles, Orange County, or San Diego neighbors, we often don't look too intelligent or cultured. One thing I have noticed while living, going to school, and working all over the IE, is that when somebody finds out you're a "good drawer," the first thing on their mind is almost always immediately "I've been thinking of this tattoo..." I don't know how many tattoos I've been asked to draw/design/etc. in the past decade or so. Maybe this epidemic is not solely found in Reevarsyde County and similar hickish metropolitan backyards, but I have this feeling that when I finally move into LA, I won't be asked to do NEAR as many tattoos. At least I have my fingers crossed. So anyway-- this third image is a tattoo which I did for a neighbor.

May 18, 2006

After only four months or so of semi-polite-nagging, I FINALLY finished a drawing which I did for a co-worker's daughter. It's Peach, of Super Mario Bros. fame, and although I'm not incredibly happy with it, it works.

May 9, 2006

Oh yeah... after some extensive editing and revision, the photography section is now back online, complete with the newly added 2006 page with two 'barely-there' galleries.

April 22, 2006

Added a commission which I did for a friend who is selling some land. He wanted to use a conceptual drawing to show a possible home design on the property. I'd never really done any kind of architectural concept like this before, but I think it turned out alright.

APRIL 13, 2007

Added the colors of a Batman image which I did for a friend... finally. It only took me like three months after I penciled and inked the thing within two or three days back in January.

Oh yeah-- and I completely redesigned the site.

Photography still under construction for a while. Hope to have it back up in the next week or two someday soon.

April 2, 2006

Site going through some maintenance over the next couple of weeks. Certain sections (such as the Photography) will not be accessible because of this.

This also extends to my email. My normal account has been on and off as of late, and I am changing servers in hopes of alleviating that. If you try to email me, and it does not go through, then try this backup account here.

March 8, 2006

It's been a while since I put up anything of any significance. I've been quite busy with work, and most of my free time has been spent on small projects here and there. So I decided to post some of them here:

The Sunnyslope Third Graders image is a t-shirt I designed back in November for a Riverside elementary school.

The House of Portraits web-site has been an ongoing project at work for a while. I wasn't sure whether or not to post it here, but I ultimately decided to.

The Beyonce calendar is a little joke from work. We listen to SIRIUS Top 40 all day, and are forced to hear the same songs over and over. So we started to keep track of how many times a day we hear some songs, as we did with Black Eyed Peas' My Humps a couple months back.

The Bases Loaded logo is what I have spent much of my free time on. A name change from the previous Carnival Stud Poker image from a few months ago. I also decided to show the different incarnations of the logo as it progressed.

I have also been taking a Storyboarding class in North Hollywood once a week. I just finished my first assignment, and will post it here in the near future, as soon as I take the time to scan in all the pages.

And in hopes of not turning this into a blog, one more little artistic tidbit: I recently got to hear graphic novelist Chris Ware speak at the UCLA Hammer. You may know that Ware has been incredibly influential to me lately, and I owe a lot of my Twelve Easy Steps for Breaking Up poster to him. A couple weeks later, I also got to hear and briefly meet Alex Grey at a spiritual center in Culver City. Grey, most well-known for his physiologically and spiritually awakening painting was quite the influence a couple years back, particularly for pieces such as my Eye of God. They were both very interesting to listen to, and I am very glad I went out to hear some of their words of wisdom.

January 19, 2006

So not too long ago now, I had one of those things happen to me in life-- one of those things that takes us off that path we were happy to be on, and plops us down on something cold, lonely, and unfamiliar-- one of those things that serves as a constant reminder as to how unfair it can all be.

Over two months have passed and it is on my mind still, every waking minute. Of course the emotions involved have changed, as they are fluid byproducts of the grief and slow recovery involved. But in one form or another, whether it be loneliness, betrayal, anger, fear, etc., it is there, every conscious moment.

But I feel as an artist, it is during these times; what feel like the lowest of the lows; that it is necessary we create work about these experiences. I feel that not only is it a way to cope with the situations surrounding us on a personal level, but also that it is during these times that we learn the most about ourselves and the reality of life around us, and thus, we are much more capable of communicating something meaningful, worthwhile, and most importantly, honest, to an audience.

It is because of everything stated above that I found it particularly frustrating that I was unable to truly begin chronicling my emotion until about four or five weeks after said event. Although I wrote scripts, and planned out a few different versions of comics, I found the actual artwork to feel like a tedious chore-- I would quickly become physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted at the thought of trying to get everything I felt onto paper. That is until I visited MOCA in Downtown L.A. to see the 'Masters of American Comics' exhibit in mid-December. It was by far the most personally rewarding exhibit I have ever visited-- giving me that boost of inspiration which I so desperately needed at that time.

Although I was a bit familiar with the work of Chris Ware before (his style was influential with my Turn on the Fun comic), it wasn't until this trip to MOCA that I really began to fully appreciate it, and attempt to take the time to understand the intricacies involved with his amusingly honest narrative, designs, and diagrams. Although he is probably most well known for his novel, Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth (which I have since read, and loved, and I did really enjoy seeing original artwork from the book), I was most attracted to a poster which I saw at the show, with a title of: Ruin Your Life: Draw Cartoons! And Doom Yourself to Decades of Isolation, Solipsism, and Utter Social Disregard.

That piece inspired me to look at my current situation in a different light-- to take it out of the form of a traditional narrative, and subsequently, turn to a different medium. (Well, by different medium, I mean a different printing process, as my final product is meant to be seen in poster form, so everything can be viewed as a whole; one constant diagram-- no page turning.) But most importantly, I think it taught me to try to present this situation as something that is worth presenting-- by injecting just enough sarcasm and wit, and displaying that within something aesthetically interesting and new for the viewer. Because in all honesty, I've come to realize that nobody would care to read some overly personal narrative of me feeling sorry for myself. Although I've kept the events fairly grounded in truth, I feel I've been able to take much of the personal emotion out of the work-- I just hope it can still resonate some kind of broad honest sentiment, so you, the readers, feel justified in taking 20 minutes or so out of your busy lives to actually sit down and read it.