Kubrikish

This is a photo of Claudia and Maddy taken at the Toronto Haleconian club. It's very "The Shining" even though it's horribly out of focus. You see, I'm an illustrator because I can't take decent photos. It's a terribly sad state of affairs.

No Voting!

Here's another from the Railroad series. The images from the post-war era are pretty colourful. I want there to be some distinction between the different sections of the documentary so that they have a cohesive look.

Enjoy.

Crow Toes 16

Here's the absolute final cover for the 16th issue of Crow Toes Quarterly. Not too shabby. It's available as an e-zine right now but hard copies will be available January 5th. This is the second magazine cover I've done. I feel all warm inside.

Happy New Year!

Enjoy.

In Progress...

This one's almost done. I need to step up the progress on these, only 13 more to go!!!

Enjoy.

Happy Holidays!

Only a few days till christmas. Happy Holidays to everyone who celebrates them! And to those who don't.... suck a lemon!!!

Gram.

Army Guys

Here's some guys.

Enjoy.

winter sculptures

This is a Santa Claus sculpture made out of a watermelon. Awesome.

This is also a sculpture of a bear that a guy did with a chainsaw. Also awesome.

These sculptures both happened in winter.... which is the other photo.

Enjoy.

Nostalgia

Power Rangers! This is brief documentary by some high-school students tracing the characters in the original Power Rangers. I always watched this show before going to school and I loved it. Looking back on it now though, it was pretty racist... and sexist. Really just an awful show for kids to watch. There were so many stereo types in the show.

Black Ranger = Black dude who break-dances

Yellow Ranger = Asian chick

Red Ranger = Native American Dude

Blue Ranger = White Boy (Double whammy, he has glasses so he was automatically the only ranger that knew how to work a calculator)

Pink Ranger = White Girl (Also, in the firs season or so she was portrayed as sort of an air head cheerleader type)

There were also numerous examples of fat people being stupid.

Anyway. Go Go Power Rangers!

APT - Ep. 5 - "For Those About To Rock..."

This is the closest I will ever come to being a rock star. Weep for me.

My favorite part is that our album is called "These tears are bullets aimed at your head".

Muddy Swamp Part 2!

THe Muddy Swamp sketch that I posted a few weeks ago inspired Christopher Millin at Crow Toes Quarterly to request it as the cover image for their next issue. Sweet!

Obviously I had to do a final of the image since the original was drawn in ball point pen on a scrap of paper. This is the final. Hope you all like it!

Enjoy!

Food!

Here's some fast food. I've had a cold for the past few days and as such I haven't had much of an appetite. Today I had a sub sandwich for lunch and after 2 days of soup and crackers it was about the tastiest thing ever. My cold seems to be going away now. So you can all stop worrying.

Enjoy!

Mostly Finished...

Here's the almost complete poster. I'm going to remove the paint splatts (I know! Taking away my trademark, how gauche!) and add more snowflake pattern. I'm also going to add a wreath like border to make it more christmassy and what not.

Like all the movie posters, I'm torn between drawing in my style and trying to do straight up portraits. I kind of went somewhere in the middle on this one. I'm mostly pleased with the results. Actual final will be posted soon.

Enjoy!

Even More Holidays

This is Dorothy. It doesn't look quite like Judy Garland (as Claudia pointed out) but that's OK because it's really just meant to represent the character/movie. It's not meant to be a straight up portrait. Anyway... the finished product should be up tomorrow.

Enjoy.

Game Time

This is an example page from a game that my friend Liz showed me. In a group of people each person has a page and they write a sentence on it. Any sentence they can think of. Then the paper is passed to the next person who must interpret the sentence as a drawing. Then it is passed again to add a sentence. And so on. The results are often hilarious.

Cranium has just released a version of this game. This news burst our bubble as we no longer felt cool or original. Just another example of the corporate world diminishing our autonomy and removing the "me" factor from anything.

So cynical.

Enjoy!!

APT - Ep. 4 - "The Sweater"

This is episode 4 of the APT. Rogers TV has contacted Kevin about putting this show on the air and possibly budgeting new episodes (?) This is totally crazy but I hope it works out. So cool. Kevin is really happy and excited about the idea. This is his Wayne's World.

More Holidays

Kevin McAlister!!!!!

Something for the Holidays

Here's a familiar face.

This is part of something special I'm working on for the holidays. Just a quick project but hopefully it'll turn out really cool.

Enjoy!

Muddy Swamp

Here's a sketch I did tonight. It's a guy trekking through a muddy swamp while wearing his sunday best. He eats light, which makes the swamp darker and ultimately more difficult to navigate. Silly light eater.

Enjoy.

Onderdonk!

This is a portrait of Andrew Onderdonk. He's the main man when it comes to envisioning transporting workers from China to Canada to work on the railroad.

This is for the Documentary project I'm working on with Richard Sibblies.

Enjoy!

Fukidasu - Furby!

Here's a Fukidasu about Furbies!

Remember Furbies? Crazy!!

Aleks

This is a drawing of my friend Aleks. It's based on a portrait that Claudia took of him (you can see the original and a bunch more on her blog at www.cookiesandclauds.blogspot.com )

This drawing was fun. Aleks has some crazy hair.

Enjoy!

Global Medicine

Here's an illustration I did for the cover of McMaster University's Medical Journal. The theme was Global Medicine. I had fun doing this illustration. I used a different pen than I usually do and I feel very self-conscious about the line work (I think it's a bit fat and kind of ugly in places). It was nice to break out the paint again though.

I'm starting work on a series of illustrations about the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Chinese workers that built it. It's for a documentary project and it should be fun. I'll post updates as I progress.

Enjoy!

Corporate Fishing

This is a doodle I did. I read an article in a magazine about big corporations taking over local farms and fisheries. I drew this rather terrifying looking guy in response. I like him. Maybe I'll make him better, faster, stronger, etc.

Enjoy!

Calums Wedding

My friend Calum got married recently. I'm really happy for him and we had a great time at the wedding/reception. I wanted to bring everyone's attention to the man in the window who clearly is not as happy for Calum and Lana as the rest of us are! Ha ha!

Web-Com

Here's the links to the web series that my friend Kevin has written and shot in our apartment. I think the plan is to have a new episode every two weeks posted online. Pretty funny stuff! Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABqVljmijTM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbjBrzXikfM&feature=related

(The roommate with the short hair who doesn't believe in seances... what a hunk!)

New Work Ethic

Hullo,

I plan to be updating this blog at least twice a week. I've been very lazy about the blog lately and I've been making excuses. There will be no more excuses! I will keep you all updated very thoroughly as to my goings on (by all of you I mean the two or three people that actually ever look at this blog... please tell your friends!)

Coming up on December 4th I will be selling some prints and whatnot at the Movies and Makers event at the Fox Theatre. Stop on by and check it out! (P.S. That's the poster from last years event so the date and time are wrong. It's December 4th this year.)

Later

Wowie Zowie!

It's been more than two months since my last post! What can I say, I've been busy.

Here's some pictures of Claudia and Maddy at an abandoned train near Parry Sound! We went camping there near the end of September. It was awesome, a bit cold but awesome.

The other photo is Claudia's Halloween costume. She was a Panda... obviously.

Ice Cream!

Wow it got really hot again. I really liked when it wasn't.

Space Claudia

This is Claudia having fun at the Factory Outlet Mall in Niagara Falls NY. She found a spaceship toy that is for some reason depicting the Enterprise from Star Trek the next generation. This space ship has nothing to do with Star Trek.

We had fun in the mall. Got some good deals. You know shopping is fun..... I actually hate shopping.

Buffalo

Me and claudia went to the Albright Knox art gallery in Buffalo a few weeks ago. These are some of the pieces there that I like. It's a small gallery but it's a really nice building and it doesn't overwhelm you with piles and piles of artwork. The staff were all very nice and they didn't mind that we were taking photos (a total no-no at the AGO). It's worth the drive to Buffalo especially if you want some Fruity Pebbles.

The Future is Bright

Here's three dudes clearly looking to the future.

I did this while watching Death Proof. There is no connection between the two. I didn't like Death Proof that much the first time I saw it but it's grown on me.

I kind of see it as a commentary on the evolution and decline of American cinema. In the first segment we are treated to very campy and obviously degraded film stock while we follow a group of very confident and independent women as they are stalked by the old and lame but still somehow cool stuntman Mike. Mike even goes so far in this segment as to say that it's unfortunate that CGI has replaced practical effects in most movies. In the first segment Mike is kind of the cool king of old school. In the second segment we are introduced to another group of women who are all extremely extroverted and independent. These women all work in the film industry and talk freely about who's sleeping with who etc. Kind of a sly comment on how celebrity culture has overridden the films themselves. Mike returns and starts off as the king of cool old school but it quickly becomes evident that he is no match for the new school as the girls overpower him.

This is a pretty lame little "essay" and I'm sure I could do better if I tried... but I'm not gonna try right now. Enjoy the picture!

The King

Here's one from my sketchbook based on a birthday card my brother got for me. I'm not sure the red is really working for me. Ah well.... that's the whole point of a sketchbook though isn't it?

Enjoy!

Black and White Beard

I started trying to fix what I didn't like about the last Beard Man drawing.

I like the line work and the deep shadows better in this image. I think it's generally just a better drawing. Check out his hair. I like it much better. I'm not sure that I'm going to bother with the highlighter for this one. I think I like it as a Black and White drawing.

Sketchbook drawings are so fun. You just doodle and doodle until something you like falls out of your pen and lands on the page. Then of course you drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to recapture what it is you liked about the drawing in the first place. Oh if only I could get paid to make sketchbooks... well not to work in a sketchbook factory or anything, but to doodle and paint in sketchbooks all day long. Life would be more fun.

Enjoy!

Fluorescent Beard

I liked the drawing I did of Mel and it made me want to play with my highlighters some more and create another portrait.

This is a random old guy with a beard. It turned out OK. I don't like what I did to his shirt with the ballpoint pen and I also don't like how my pink highlighter started to run out of ink and I tried to mix it with orange highlighter. Also, the lines on the contours of his coat are too chunky.

You know what... I don't think I like this one all that much...

Mel

I know you've all been wondering what I've been up to lately. The answer is: not much. A lot of work and a lot of rethinking things. There's been a lot of opportunities around lately but none of them really felt right. So I've been biding my time trying to figure out what exactly is right for me. Other people seem so able to make decisions and change their entire lives overnight and that scares me. I can't do that sort of thing unless it's a change that makes absolute sense to me.

So in light of that fact I drew a quick portrait of Mel Gibson in my sketch book. It's not the best portrait ever but I like the drawing. I hope you like it too.

Enjoy!

Time flies...

Wow. It's been a long time since I posted anything.

I haven't had any free time/energy since I've been working so much. In my down time I've been killing zombies with my roommate in Left for Dead 2. I feel drained right now.... time for a vacation?

I think it might be.

That's all!

Dogfight

Here's one from my sketchbook. Tonight I wanted to work on a specific illustration but I am always too tired after work to concentrate properly. This is something that I'll need to fix in the near future since I really need to be able to concentrate on illustration in order to make good work. I find that I spend too much time sitting around being sleepy to get anything done.

Argh!

Enjoy the dogfight.

World Cup

Here's a poster I did for the Fox Theatre. They're plying the 2010 World Cup Final on the big screen. If you like Football (soccer) then you owe it to yourself to see it as large as possible. On the Fox's gorgeous Silver Screen with digital surround sound!

Boom!

I haven't done much graphic design but I think I'm getting to like it. I had to match the branding/colour scheme to the Fox's standard. I hope to be doing more work with them on this level.

Enjoy!

Wood Cutter

This is a portrait I did based on a photo-booth manipulation. I did it very quickly in my sketch book. I like the way it turned out. Enjoy.

My first Cover!

This is the cover of the current issue of Boston's Weekly Dig magazine. I got an e-mail from AD Tak Toyoshima on Monday requesting the use of this image for the cover of the magazine. Obviously I said yes! It's pretty exciting for me to know that people in Boston will be looking at my illustration. Thanks Tak!

Kevin's been injured!

Here's some stills from last weeks shoot. This episode features a very intense Roman buying a gun. Carnage ensues.

Creepy Basement

The Basement at my new job is the creepiest place in the world. It has dirt floors, cobwebs, old boilers and, yes, scary mannequin parts. It looks like a good place to get some serial killing done.

Kings of Convenience

We went to the Kings of Convenience show on Tuesday. It was really good. They are a really funny duo, despite the tone of their music. This is the second time I've seen them. I'd go again cause they put on a really good show. The opening band was OK. Pretty forgettable.