Moleskine Madness...Talking Crow!

Just listening to the very chatty crows outside this morning. Must be something very interesting going on out there.

Have a chatty Wednesday!

Moleskine Madness...Doctor Teeth!

Remember to brush and floss your teeth on a regular basis. Good dental hygiene helps maintain your health!

Have a chewy Tuesday!

Moleskine Madness...The Pets of the Future!

When biology mixes the animal and vegetable we are the beneficiaries of edible pets.

Enjoy the Yamster.

Have a delicious Monday!

Moleskine Madness...Armadillo Antics!

Just an Armadillo to entice you today.

Have a great Sunday!

Tech Savvy Saturday...This Old Stuff!

The ol' Wacom Graphire tablet sitting on top of my sketchbook and next to the Moleskine. I've had this tablet for a few years and I know that many professional artists consider this tablet absolutely worthless for creating anything on the computer. 

I think they are wrong! This is one of the most versatile little tools that I have ever purchased and well worth the fifty dollars that I spent when it was on discount sale at CompUSA. Yup, the old CompUSA. Those were fun stores!

Anyway, this tablet works with every application that I can throw at it. All of the Adobe products, Sketchbook Pro, and Artrage. It has drivers for Window 2000 up to and including Windows 8! Ubuntu recognizes it and I have used it in Inksacape, GIMP, and Pencils. How many pieces of hardware can say that? 

I know most artists that work digitally are drooling over the Cintiq or even drawing on the multitude of tablet computers available these days but, this Graphire is like an old friend that is always there to lend a hand. If you can find one at a garage sale or thrift store, pick it up, you won't regret it!

Happy Saturday!

iStock Illustrations...Grab the Veggies!

The rough scan of the latest iStock illustration. See the finished product at this link: 

Getting the Groceries!

Have a great Friday!

Moleskine Madness...Pachyderm Prince!

Yes, you must bring your elephant royalty a delicious ice cream sundae.

Have a great Thursday!

Moleskine Madness...Storyboards!

Working on the story board this morning. The sketchbook makes a great container for ideas and works well for linear projects. Though when inspiration hits, the sketches that result can interrupt the flow of the cinematic diegesis. I scanned this and did a little quickie coloring in Photoshop to play with the character's finished look. 

Have a Fantastic Wednesday!

Moleskine Madness...Martian Toads!

Here are the warm up doodles for today.

Congrats to that couple who had the baby in the U.K. yesterday.

You know who you are.

And everyone else that joined us yesterday: Welcome to the World!

Have a Happy Tuesday!

iStock Illustrations...The Monitor!

Another illustration for the iStock portfolio. Lots of exciting stuff going on over there with the iStock folks. I enjoy being a small part of that. If you want to see the colored version, it's here: The Monitor.

Happy Monday!

Soupy Sunday...It's Split Pea!

It's Sunday and time to make the soup for tonight! As you can see, I do love the garlic. Soup du jour is Split Pea. 

Here is the fast forward. Everything is cooking and in a few hours, the soup will be on!

Have a Great Sunday!

Tech Savvy Saturday...The Heart of the Machine!

I often use the Windows machine in a dual boot with Linux but, I also go back to the old PowerMac G3 to get some work done. This old girl has Illustrator 6, Graphic Converter, Macromedia Flash installed on it. Along with my ScanMaker E3 that still runs on the 50 pin SCSI interface this completes my studio.

You can get work done on almost any platform and any machine these days. I have a 1 ghz Athlon machine that I have recently installed Xubuntu on and it is serving as our media machine. If you have any old hardware lying around, I would encourage you to try a flavor of Linux to make that old machine a modern powerhouse! Remember, it's not the tools but, the talent of the user.

Happy Saturday everyone!

Moleskine Madness...Cyclopedia!

The doodles in the sketchbook this morning. The warm up session.

Have a great Friday!

Moleskine Madness...Look to the Stars!

Look to the stars!

The big gaseous ones, not the dancing ones.

Happy Thursday!

Moleskine Madness...The Skeleton Key!

Just a doodle with the morning coffee.

Have a great day all!

Animation Addiction...Watch Me Draw!

When I was in high school, one of the activities that we guys, that were cartoonists and artists would engage in on a regular basis was the 'Quickdraw' session. This was a bunch of us sitting in front of a sketch book or a large amount of paper and placing our pencils on top, so that each of us could see each others supplies. No cheating with hidden drawing implements is allowed in the Quickdraw!

I know. I laugh about that too!

Then someone would call out a subject. Could be any random person, place or thing. Or a combination of such. Then the clock would be checked and it would be 1-2-3 start! 

Grab that pencil  and draw that random subject!

Some guys could do it in 30 seconds and others would take a little longer but, it was always a fun drawing contest!

Quality was also a consideration of this artistic sport. Quick and dirty was never a good thing in the Quickdraw arena.

Anyway, I brought this up because I animated an illustration just to see what it would look like. I thought it turned out nice. It reminded me of those Quickdraw days!

Have a great day everyone!

iStock Illustrations...Ropin' Jackrabbits!

As a kid I heard many a tall tale from great uncles and aunts, great grandparents, and other members of our family and friends. Many of these stories had a western theme to them and this was due to the fact that these folks grew up on the ranches and farms that built this great state of California.

I heard a great deal of our California family history. 

My Dad and my Grandmother were very interested in this history and tried to pass it on to us kids. It was in this way that I became familiar with many of the cowboy artists. Fredrick Remington, Charles Russell, and our own Santa Barbaran Ed Borein. Even though I received a fairly truthful rendition of these times, there were those stories that seemed, well, a little far fetched.

Much like the old favorite that used to come out, eventually, at family holidays was the tale of Annual Jackrabbit Roping Contest. Where we kids were led to believe that honest and sober cowboys herded and roped a zillion jackrabbits to see who was the best! Or in one version, actually rode horse sized jackrabbits! Take your pick! It was like listening to Bret Harte and Mark Twain, with a dash of O. Henry thrown into the mixture.

I thought that would make a darn tootin' good illustration.

Have a great day all!

Monkee Business...The New Logo!

I designed a special logo for the site!

Gotta have some monkee love, baby!

The new "Chickpeas!" strip for this week is up on the oddbird arts site early to get a head start on the holiday weekend. Dare I say, it is a very cute one with the odd bird in his bird bath!

Have a great Fourth of July everyone!

Moleskine Madness...Walkin' the Dog!

Just reminiscing about those Duncan Yo-Yo's and the hours that I spent during the Summer months trying to learn those tricks. I never really mastered them but, it was fun. Just walkin' the dog!