Prescott Draw-Blog

Randomness

2012-01-13T18:53:00.000-08:00

Here's another sketch page just to move the pencil around and try to catch some drawing rhythm. I took a good week around Christmas off and away from any sort of creative outlet. Needed to recharge. But, as usual, when I had to get back to it, I was rusty. That's all it takes sometimes - five, six, seven days. Anyways, this helped me a little bit get back into the saddle.

Throwin' a bone.

2012-01-03T15:13:00.001-08:00

Ugh, what a holiday season it was for me. I say "ugh" not as in it sucked but as in it was just a whole heck of a lot of work. Including non-freelance job projects, I had creative work going on right up until when i went to bed at 3:00 am Christmas eve!

Here's my laundry list of projects that I started and finished in the uncomfortably snug span of hours between Thanksgiving and Christmas:

*One D&D cover (and a none-too-easy one at that)

*Three Magic:The Gathering card paintings

*Five fairly intensive black-n-white pieces for an undisclosed M:tG project

*Scanned and laid out a book of my daughter's artwork (through Blurb.com) as a present for my wife

*Illustrated and designed a custom beer label

*Made an exotic tent-fort for my daughter for Christmas (with help from my wife's parents)

Somewhere in that mess I was able to go to a couple parties, drive to Cleveland to see Chris Cornell in concert, and get a few hours of sleep. Christmas day came along and I found I had no looming deadlines and nothing of immediate concern - what a joy to just be with my family and eat and not frazzle myself with the thought that "I need to get a certain amount of this or that done by the time I go to bed later than I should."

So goes the life of a freelancer, eh? It's all good though. All the projects were fun and worth it. I just wish there were like two more weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas is all!

So, as you can now see, squeezing in a draw-blog post was pretty far down my list of priorities for the past four or five weeks. Things have settled down now - but I find that I have a tremendous lack of anything worthwhile to post right now. No new sketchbook doodles and no preliminary drawings worth sharing. I had to go back dig up this (2.5 year old?) piece - a sketch I liked because of how snaky the girl's pose is and her accidentally cute profile. The painting turned out to be a mess though. So, here's a bone I'm throwing out until something better comes along.

Speaking of something better, I'm eyeing another guess-the-album-cover contest on the horizon. Aw yeah.

She Really Grinds My Gears

2011-11-27T07:47:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine enlisted me to embellish on a tattoo he has had for the last 15 some-odd years. It's the Loony Tunes Marvin the Martian holding a "FORD" flag and drinking a Coors. Just kidding - though I have indeed seen tattoos as mindbogglingly idiotic as that. No, the tattoo has a couple people getting run through gears and he wanted a few more around the edges. Here's one of the less "gear-mangled" figures I did for that - polished up a little bit to put on this here draw-blog.

Limited Edition AGGREGATES!!!

2011-11-21T21:49:00.000-08:00

I posted a couple of these L.E. drawings a couple weeks back but the post was skimpy and lonely so I decided to delete that one and make it a foursome for this much NEWER post - though really I don't have anything new to say. Other than check out these fun drawings!

Well, my workload is getting into a thick spot now. Time to buckle up and saddle up and soldier on and put the pedal to the medal and bite the bullet and separate the men from the boys and all those other things people say when they have to stop getting distracted by Facebook and blogs and go do some friggin' work, fer Gad's sake.

But on the edge of this madness, I'm able to scan some drawings from my recently sold Limited Edition Aggregates (my book of fantasy pencil drawings). I've sold nearly all of them now. I might even be done with the Limited Edition thing before Christmas! If you have interest in buying one of my books with a signed and numbered original pencil drawing on the title page, ya better make your move!

Diminutive sketch of a diminutive fella

2011-11-21T08:43:00.001-08:00

I did this ho-hummer sitting at my daughter's little art desk that we have in our main living room. She wanted me to sit and draw with her and she handed me a sheet of paper and one of her wonky school-grade pencils. I always thought it was my trusty old .5 mechanical pencil that held the powers to drawing but I guess any old utensil will do. Until things go wrong and the drawing looks terrible - then it IS the materials, not the artist.

Totally Nordic

2011-11-15T13:15:00.000-08:00

Just a little doodle out of my sketchbook for ya today. This was actually something completely different at first but I thought it had more of a viking marauder essence than what it was supposed to be so I took it that direction just for fun.

The Girl with the Dragon Familiar

2011-10-13T11:20:00.000-07:00

I just finished a little side commission. Nuthin' very big - just a single figure and her little dragonlet familiar. But it is for a project for which many "name" artists in the fantasy game world have contributed - pretty interesting from an art stand point. Anyway, the final painted piece will be posted on their website next week I believe. Until I can post that link, check out the sketch.

Ghoulraiser

2011-09-27T14:33:00.000-07:00

This is a sketch I did for the Magic: The Gathering card "Ghoulraiser" for the freshly released gothic-horror set: Innistrad.

There's nothing particularly fresh about this scene. Just your ordinary zombie-with-a-shovel helping his pals out of the dirt to go clubbing. But, along with the previously posted "Daybreak Archer", it's one of the few preliminary drawings I have done lately that is a little bit more refined than a thumbnail. The other preliminary drawings I have done for this set were fairly loose thumbnail sketches that I took straight to the paints. That sort of approach is not my usual process but this particular set called for more attention to composition, mood, and atmosphere more than details. Which was a fun departure for the most part.

Tweety.

2011-09-23T15:29:00.000-07:00

Haven't posted anything in way too long. Luckily, I had this doodle of a weird fat bird in my sketchbook that I drew up after getting some inspiration from fellow artist PA Lewis's similarly themed blog. So I went back and fleshed it out a little bit to make it more than just a little scribbling.

If you're into fantastical pencil drawings and sketches, I beseech you to check out PA Lewis's drawings and artwork (hyperlink to her awesome blog of pencil drawings above!). She has some of the most elegant, lively, and whimsical drawings you will see this side of Claire Wendling. Just so delightful to the eye......

Daybreak Archer Sketch

2011-09-06T07:24:00.000-07:00

This is the rough drawing I did for what became "Daybreak Archer" for Magic: The Gathering. It was drawn smaller than I usually do when I'm trying to work out a composition for a painting but sometimes that helps. If things aren't working right in the drawing phase, I'll switch sizes to get a different look. Usually I go down in size since the images for Magic are only a couple inches wide in the end product anyway. Plus, going down in size will simplify shapes and it ends up making it easier to piece together something that works. That's what happened here (though this isn't quite "thumbnail" in size - it's about 6 inches wide I think).

On occasion I will ditch the thumbnails and jump into drawing out an image at full size or nearly full size. For me sometimes the little rough thumbnails aren't helping and I need bigger pieces and some important details put in before I can "see" where it's going. When that happens, it is usually because I feel a certain facial expression (or a similar "mood" detail) is the key to the whole image. If I can just nail down the right face, I can piece in everything else.

What's that you ask? Was there a background for this piece or was the mysterious bow-gunner just on a field of white? She's in a forest - the trees were added much later in the process and so never were part of the original drawing.

Hey look! An ELF!

2011-08-26T20:02:00.000-07:00

I recently was commissioned to do a drawing of an elf warrior for a birthday present. The giftee and his girlfriend, upon stopping by to pick up the drawing, got the added bonus of not only getting to see my luxurious and swank studio and the blank space on my trashy easel where my latest painting would have been if I was allowed to show it, but also get regaled in tales of my dog's bloody adventures in vanquishing fat groundhogs from our yard. And I learned that lightning is beneficial to gardens. How's about that?

Rust-knocker

2011-08-21T22:57:00.000-07:00

I get rusty quickly and frequently. Sometimes just switching from one job to another is enough for me to lose focus - and suddenly I ain't drawing what I want to draw. At least not very well. My common remedy for this is to keep drawing that fucker over and over and over again until something starts to look right. But sometimes even that isn't opening up the right circuits for me and I need to just numbly move the pencil around and draw ANYTHING to kinda kick-start myself. So, every once in a while (though not nearly as often as I should) I'll sit down and just freely doodle a bunch of crap all in a big amorphous blob - warm up that muscle memory. This is an example of one such page.

I apologize for the lack of posts here in August - been a busy month. But I should get in another one or two new drawings before August closes out.

CHAKAAL!

2011-07-28T14:28:00.000-07:00

Thought I better squeeze in at least ONE post in July before the month closes out! My lapse in posts has been mainly because, well, it's Summer, baby. And even though my workload isn't particularly harrowing and burdensome, I'm still busy with Summer stuff - including a welcome trip to Colorado to hike n' camp around Rocky Mountain National Park - topped by seeing Soundgarden at Red Rocks. Needless to say the entire trip was tantamount to a religious experience.

Enough about that though - I'm adding on to my Groo series with the fearsome, carnage-dealing swordstress Chakaal - who is, of course, Groo's perpetual love interest. I would have drawn her all the way down to her feet - but I ran out of room in the sketchbook!

More Groo characters to come!

Rufferto!

2011-06-28T11:54:00.000-07:00

A series of drawings based on Sergio Aragones' Groo? Why not. Here's Groo's steadfast and loyal companion, Rufferto.

For the love of the FRAY!

2011-06-22T08:14:00.000-07:00

"Now Groo does what Groo does best!"

Comic books had quite an impact on me - despite the fact that I didn't get into them until 7th or 8th grade - and I really didn't collect TONS of comic books at any point. Besides the comic book follow-ups and sequels for sci-fi classic franchises The Terminator, Aliens, and Predator, (and then Hellboy and BPRD later on) the only other comic I was really into was Groo the Wanderer - which, besides being awesome, were plentiful and none too expensive to buy back issues for. And so I ended up with about 60 or 70 Groo comic books before my desire to keep buying comic books fizzled.

They're still really fun to go back and read and, of course, Aragones' artwork is endlessly detailed and masterful. So I thought I'd do my own version of the cheese dip loving marauder as tribute. If you have never seen what Aragones' Groo looks like, pictures are easy to Google - or you can just check this GROO ANIMATION TEST that makes me pine for a hand-drawn Groo movie.

Enjoy!

AGGREGATE Sketch

2011-06-09T11:13:00.000-07:00

Finally wrapped up my 2-month stretch of intensive work - lot's of Magic, World of Warcraft, and even a cover for Shadowrun all put behind me - generally pleased with the results. Perhaps now I can get back to adding some good stuff to the Draw-Blog. but first, I need a breather.

To get back in the game, here's a whimsical and simple sketch I did in one of my Limited Edition AGGREGATE copies (only 19 left, by the way!).

ANGRY TROLL LADY KILLS 8 TOURISTS AT ANCIENT RUIN SITE

2011-05-19T00:31:00.000-07:00

"There's a really angry blue woman mutilating some tourists!" said Marcus Antanapala to the emergency dispatcher. He made the call after a bluish, tusked woman with ridiculous cleavage erupted from a ruin site and rained terrific clawed blows down upon the idiotic onlookers as they attempted to take pictures with their cell phones.

"Does she have tusks, armor protecting her knees and forearms, a fairly big rack, and is exuding a sense of total 'Grrrrawesomeness'?" asked the dispatcher.

"Um yeah. How'd you know?"

"OK, sir. She's a female troll from World of Warcraft. I'll send a black-n-white to check into it. Have a nice day, sir."

Guy that fights dragons.

2011-05-04T00:11:00.001-07:00

Just a heads up to everyone - I'm about to enter a maelstrom of furious work that'll take me into June. The chances that I get some posts up on my Draw-Blog in the next five or six weeks may be as slim as Donald Trump is annoying and douchey. Luckily, I still have a reserve of preliminary drawings I can tap for just such occasions.

That said, here's a portion of a drawing I did for a Magic: The Gathering card called "Silver Knight". Almost all of the cropped out parts were extensively overhauled in photoshop after I scanned it in. I even changed his helmet and a few other details once I started painting it, too.

To see the final piece, you'll have to "friend" me on Facebook or wait another 43 years when I finally relaunch my website.

SUNSHINE and WARM WEATHER ANTHEMS

2011-04-13T22:00:00.000-07:00

Ah Spring. Lovin' it. Spring in Central Ohio is usually, day-to-day, either gloriously sunny and summerlike - or gray and cold like November. Knowing that the latter is heading out the door like a stumbling, oafish drunk that has yorked on someone's shoes and generally overstayed his welcome, I choose to focus on the sunshine and the upcoming long, lazy days of Summer - the realm of cookouts, camping, roadtrips, fresh veggies from the garden, and blessed vacations. And as I sit here listening to cheesy (but potently nostalgic) hair-metal of yore on Pandora, I am reminded of the music of the season, songs that became part of the soundtrack of Summer. Even though the days of completely carefree gallivanting are over, I still love songs that remind me of Summer whether they are literally from Summers past - or new songs that just sound like songs that should be played while driving with the windows down on the way to a beach. Summer anthems, baby. Here's just a tiny smattering of songs that, for whatever reason, stir my zeal for the sunshine months:

Peggy Lee - "It's a Good Day"

Steel Dragon - "We All Die Young"

Walt Mink's whole album "Miss Happiness"

Johnny Cash - "Ring of Fire"

Hans Zimmer - "You're So Cool" (True Romance soundtrack)

Coldplay - "Clocks"

Delta Spirit - "Trashcan"

U2 - "Beautiful Day"

Poison - "Every Rose Has Its Thorn"

Pretty much anything by The Sundays

OneRepublic - "Good Life"

The last one by OneRepublic I just heard on the radio earlier today and is what inspired this post. And laugh all you want at Poison - but how can you sit in a car on a beautiful day and NOT sing along to that?

Share with me your own Warm Weather Anthems and crack a cold one, friendo - those days are comin' up fast.

Btw, the drawing above is another oldie - plucked out of my White Wolf vault - I believe it's from a Mage: The Ascension book. I had to go THAT far back to find an appropriate pencil drawing to accompany this post!

And one last thing for those of you that don't know yet - I has me a little book called AGGREGATE and it has all sorts o' fun pencil drawins in it. Have interest? E-mail me! - steve2@rottface.com

A LI'L CLASSIC D&D FOR YA

2011-04-09T20:57:00.000-07:00

I unearthed a fairly old drawing of a scale-mailed halfling trying to look tough in some ancient and perilous cavern. I'm too lazy to go find out which long-forgotten D&D book it was in. Geez, I make it sound like this was from the 80's or something! No, it was probably from around 2007(?) - but it seems like decades ago. Nothing special here - just a little spot illo piece that I thought was worth posting just for fans of really classic D&D subject matter.

Subsequently, the final painting I did for this piece was a big pile of crapola. It was one of those instances where I had something in mind, it didn't work, and I wasn't able to recover. Such results I colloquially refer to as "turds".

Post-CONTEST Post

2011-04-05T23:20:00.000-07:00

So, the very first drawing I did when I came up with the album cover contest idea was this drawing here. It's based on what I thought was the cover of an album I have. Turns out, long long ago when I first bought the CD, I had reinserted the little album book with the inside artwork facing out and had never switched it back. Only when I looked it up on the ol' internets did I get reminded that it ain't the cover! So, anyway, simply for shits-n-giggles, this drawing is a tribute to the INSIDE cover of what album?

Oh what the heck - first to guess it right gets an envelope full of free crap.

NAME THAT ALBUM COVER!

2011-03-29T19:40:00.000-07:00

Here it is, folks! Here are all ten album cover tributes! Be the first to "comment" the correct album title and band(artist) name for all ten and win the original artwork pictured HERE. And also bask in the glory of winning a contest for which you successfully employed your nearly useless knowledge of album cover imagery. Hoozah!

The drawings are listed from ONE (first) to TEN (last) so make your list accordingly when you submit it. There should be no need to make a random guess here - I picked albums based on the uniqueness of the cover image - thus, there is no doubt when you put the drawing and the original cover side by side. If you're uncertain, why, you're already on the internet - you can find out if you're right in like, two seconds.

Good luck!

NAME THAT ALBUM COVER! - set1

2011-03-21T00:32:00.000-07:00

All righty, folks. Here is the first five (of ten) album cover tribute drawings. As stated before, I have taken ten existing album covers - carefully chosen for their iconic/memorable imagery (but not too iconic and recognizable!) and reworked them in varying degrees of artistic license. But there is no doubt that they are referencing the source material - none of them will "kinda" match a particular album cover. Side-by-side with the original, it will be obvious.

Once again, feel free to make comments and crack wise, but keep your answers/guesses to yourself until I have posted the last five images which will be next Tuesday (March 29th) at 11:00pm Eastern Standard Time. First person to "comment" the correct band/singer and album title for all ten wins the original artwork shown in the previous post.

Good luck!

CONTEST PRIZE:

2011-03-16T22:41:00.000-07:00

So, should you have the best eye for recognizing album covers through my re-envisioned pencil drawing guises (as explained in the previous post), here is the glorious prize that awaits you:

A handsome 9"x12" acrylic painting depicting an angry minotaur and his magical warhammer of pollution! More specifically, it is a painting done for the M10 set of the Magic: The Gathering TCG and is called "Canyon Minotaur". I personally like this little piece though I get the idea from MTG gamers that the card itself isn't stellar. Alas, you don't win a little Magic card with minimal collectible value - you get a one-of-a-kind painting with which you can brag to your buddies and family how you dominated Prescott's little contest to win! Boo-yah!

Anyhoo, that's what is at stake. Expect the first set of skewed album tributes to be posted Monday March 21. Though you are welcome to make comments, I encourage you to keep your guesses and answers to yourself until after the second set has been posted.

See you on Monday!

NAME THAT ALBUM CONTEST!: rules and regulations

2011-03-15T01:19:00.000-07:00

The other day I was checking out and otherwise waxing nostalgic on cool album cover art and found myself contemplating that the days of album cover art notoriety and recognition (much like music videos - stupid MTV programming....) is waning thanks to music downloading and the death of music stores. I love album cover art as much, I'm sure, as all of you do - and I've been wanting to do a couple homages on my draw-blog for a while now. Well, I came up with an idea and am now currently finishing up a series of TEN sketches that pay tribute to various album covers.

The pencil drawings will be tributes to the original album covers but will not be exact representations - I'll have trimmed them down and put my own personal skew onto them in varying degrees but there'll be no doubt that they are a pencilly homage to their real counterpart.

In order to win the contest, you will have to be the first to name all ten albums (and the bands/artists, too!). I will post two sets of five spaced by a week or so. Upon posting the second set, the first person to list all ten in the "comments" column will win the original artwork.

To answer your skepticism, none of the albums are mega-obscure bootlegs or German imports or anything like that - but they're not anything as immediately and universally recognizable as "Abbey Road" or "Thriller" or anything by Christian-metal supergroup Stryper either. You may get some right away but have to get an audiophile pal to help you out on others (I don't want this to be TOO easy!).

I have no idea how this will go - someone might get them all right away or maybe it'll be too hard. If the latter is the case, I'll start dropping hints - but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Ok, so there's that. I'll post the artwork that'll be up for grabs by Thursday and hopefully the first salvo of draw-blogified album tributes by the beginning of next week (as well as let you know the exact day and time I will post the last five images!).

Until then, start thumbing through your 8-track, vinyl, cassette tape, and CD collections to get your juices flowin'!

WIN AN ORIGINAL PAINTING!!!!

2011-03-09T11:03:00.000-08:00

First of all, the above sketch has nothing to do with anything. I just felt like I needed to post a piece to fill in the vacancy - even if it IS a drawing I did many years ago.

Secondly, I am announcing an upcoming contest that I will be putting on this here Draw-Blog starting sometime later this month. The prize will be an ORIGINAL PIECE OF ARTWORK which I have yet to pick out. Most likely it will be a Magic: The Gathering illustration in hopes to loop in as much interest as I can get.

What kind of hoops will I require you to jump through to win this contest? Well, you'll have to stay tuned to find out but (hint) if you're a music lover, you may have an edge.

AFRICAN ART MONTH! 6

2011-02-27T10:39:00.000-08:00

Well, I didn't get to post nearly as many pics as I wanted to in this series - my schedule got busy and bottlenecked quickly - but that's the way it goes.

For this last piece I thought I'd do a little "two-birds-with-one-snowball". I'm doing a painting demo at Morehead University this week and needed something somewhat interesting for that - and I needed one more good post for this series, as well.

Among so many other really cool and inspiring things found in my collection of books about African tribes and such are the tribes that incorporate mud into their hair styles. I found a handful of pictures of Namibian people with this gorgeous reddish clay mucked into their hair into different fashions - and so this girl was inspired by some of that - except I made her clay-mucked hair even more organic and weird. Should be a fun one to paint.

Again, if you're in the Kentucky or southern Ohio area, come check out some of my original fantasy paintings hanging in the Strider Gallery at Morehead University. They're only up for another five days or so. I'll also be doing a presentation about my work and career on Thursday - (plus the demo but I think that may be exclusive for the art students perhaps?).

Also, and as usual, if you like the pencil drawings you see here, you may very well like my book of pencil work: AGGREGATE. Wanna buy one? Contact me at: steve2@rottface.com

See you next month!

AFRICAN ART MONTH! 5

2011-02-22T13:26:00.000-08:00

Sorry about the long lapse in posts - been busy as well as enjoying a bit of solar radiation down in Florida.

As I try and bust out four paintings in 8 days, I'll have to dip into my reserve of older sketchbook drawings yet again. This is another from 7 or 8 years ago with some African flavor. Her hair is more Hopi indian - but I have a big book on just African tribe hair styles and there are a few that closely resemble that Hopi look. I don't think any had exclusive copyrights on the hair though.

Hopefully I can squeeze in one more drawing before the end of African Art Month and the beginning of a new series that will be part of a contest to win a free original painting of mine - so spread the word!

On a side note - if you happen to be within reasonable driving distance of Morehead University in Morehead, Kentucky, I have 12 fantasy paintings on display in the Strider Gallery through March 3rd. The paintings are from a handful of jobs from the past 6 years or so - all framed up and looking sharp. Come on over and take a look!

AFRICAN ART MONTH! 4

2011-02-10T13:53:00.000-08:00

This is an old piece - done about 7 or 8 years ago.

I love the idea of giant, ungainly masks and ceremonial garb.

AFRICAN ART MONTH! 3

2011-02-07T11:20:00.000-08:00

There's no specific allusion to dragons that I can find in African lore - (the closest I can find are Rainbow Serpents, of which there are MANY for all corners of the continent it seems) - but dragons are so ubiquitous in the mythologies of mankind that I am sure one is out there. Heck, maybe rainbow serpents are essentially dragons - I mean, anything longish, toothy, and covered in scales can pass for a dragon, after all.

Anyways, here is my take on what an African icon of a classic (European?) dragon might look like.

AFRICAN ART MONTH! 2

2011-02-03T11:35:00.000-08:00

Here's another random mask drawing. On this one I was reminded of the subtleties than can separate two different styles from different parts of the world. When I first drew this, I used really bold geometric black and white patterns and a round mouth - but it quickly started to look like a Pacific Islander mask and much less like one from Africa - so I went with more of a carved texture for the geometric patterning. I'm not trying to be specific with the look as far as tribe-to-tribe styles of Africa - but it has to look African for sure. Which goes to show that you can't just slap anything together - there is a certain look and feel. Too much of this and it looks Iroquois - too much of that and it looks Innuit - not enough of that and it looks Australian Aboriginal.

I have posted African art inspired stuff before - here are links to previous draw-blog posts (some of which contain interesting African mythology):

AFRICAN ART MONTH!

2011-02-02T00:40:00.000-08:00

February is the turdliest month. Although I started getting sick of the winter part of the year much earlier this season, February is usually the point where the memory of what it is like to go outside in a t-shirt or see the color green starts to alarmingly fade. The novelty of snow and wearing coats and snuggling under a blanket to watch 30 Rock and way-too-early sunsets has trickled away down the storm drain under that dune of car-filth blackened snow. What I need is something to help get me through this wretched stretch of Winter.

If you know me then you've probably realized my penchant for sucking inspiration from the styles and motifs of antiquated/ancient cultures. Well, since February is Black History Month, that gives me a good enough reason to indulge in some African art inspired doodling - for what is more a part of Black History than Africa? Actually, Africa is in all our histories - since humans first busted onto the scene there - but I digress.

So, I'll be posting little drawings and doodles with very African flavors all month long. They are all my own takes on different design sensibilities of the different art forms and peoples of Africa - and not anything specific (so don't go cross-referencing my stuff to see if it fits into Ndebele or Hottentot parameters!).

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS - #10

2011-01-29T00:12:00.000-08:00

I love to travel - to go places. While I prefer road-tripping and just incorporating the process of getting there into the adventure, I surely don't mind how a massive tube of metal with wings fossil-fueling its way through the sky can get you there much quicker. I kind of endure the airplane thing - it's not nearly as much fun as when I was a kid. BUT BUT BUT, it's all worth while if I get a window seat and a nice crystal clear day.

I know I indulge in hyperbole quite often - too much even, but I don't think it's too hyperbolic to say that I find looking down at geography and terrain from 30,000 feet CEASELESSLY fascinating. Honestly - the plane landing or a serious headache would be the only thing to stop me from enjoying the abstractly fascinating textures and colors of a landscape scrolling slowly by.

I once had a flight straight from Seattle to Columbus - a beautiful cloudless day. Most of the 4+ hour trip I spent with my head firmly pressed against that little oval window looking down at the crazy quilt-patterns of the plains - the strange circles and half-circles - the dirt roads that matriculate aimlessly up into the Black Hills - strange man-made structures in the middle of nowhere - the gleam of a tiny little car on a lonely farm road (wondering what the heck that person was up to at that moment) - how streams and rivers divide farmland - the weird colors and shapes of retention ponds - and trying to guess where our plane was according to that urbanized area way over there by that lake.

It's one of the most interesting things in the world to me - and that's why, with a trip to Florida to escape the dregs of Winter in the next month, I wrap up my Things to Be Thankful For Besides The Obvious by being thankful for: WINDOW SEATS.

And here's my "Twilight Zone" tribute (still to this day one of the creepiest and most entertaining things I have seen in a movie...)

INTERLUDE II

2011-01-24T00:51:00.000-08:00

On my Rottface News blogsite, I have posted links to what some of my talented friends from art school days are currently up to. Well, I MADE these friends in college - they are still close pals today. What is interesting is how diverse our creative paths have gone yet essentially fueled by the same creative drive. So go on and give it a look.

To catch your eye, I have put up a Magic: The Gathering rough for the Zendikar set. "Soul Usher" it be. She's rubbing a medicated salve onto the warrior's scalp.

After my last "10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS" entry, I will be kicking off a month-long series for February that should be pretty fun - so keep checking in!

Oh yeah, and as always, if you like my pencil marks, perhaps you'd like my book? Take a LOOK.

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #9

2011-01-18T10:48:00.000-08:00

I can't imagine a more substantial and praise-worthy jump in technology from one generation to the next as there was in the jump from VHS to DVD. Even going from audio cassette to CD pales in comparison to what you got with VHS and then stepping up to DVD. Obviously, there are many reasons for this - but I am going to concentrate on my favorite aspect of buying/owning DVD movies: The EXTRAS! (and even more specifically: commentary tracks!)

As a bit of a movie geek, I love getting even more out of the movies I love than just the movie itself. Sure, many DVD extras are fairly mediocre bells and whistles - 10 minute featurettes and unsatisfying behind-the-scenes stuff. But with most movies that grow a cult following (I suppose you can call these "Guy" movies), the extras can and usually are nice and juicy.

FX breakdowns, "making-of" mini-docs, cut scenes, interviews, etc - I dig all of it. As a freelance artist looking for something interesting to listen to while I toil at the easel, my favorite are the commentaries. I love all the insights from the directors and writers (and actors sometimes) - explanations why/how they filmed certain scenes, chatter about locations, tidbits about how they cut corners - even the REALLY trivial stuff like (for example) Viggo breaking his toe when he kicked an Uruk-hai helmet in Two Towers. I just eat it all up.

So, today I say thank you for: DVD EXTRAS. Countless hours of late-night working have you kept my ears and brain entertained. This post was inspired by the extras on my "Kingdom of Heaven: Director's Cut" DVD - which are awesome. I didn't know what to draw to represent DVD extras so I just drew a crusader guy to represent one of Ridley's best flicks (which is saying a lot).

Not all commentaries are great. I have heard commentaries where the director stumbles through the movie just saying what is happening on the screen - useless! Predator, sadly, has a fairly lame commentary like that. But here are some DVD commentaries I dig especially:

Alien (Ridley knows a few things....)

Aliens (Cameron is interesting but the cast members (paxton, Henrickson, etc) are hilarious!)

Alien3 (go watch the re-cut version - it's a lot better and the commentaries are really interesting - as well as the extras)

Gladiator (Ridley again - good stuff. Great extras, too)

Lord of the Rings Trilogy (so many commentaries.....all good)

Conan the Barbarian (Milius and Arnold - you get the feeling Arnold had sex with every female on the set)

Seven and FightClub (Fincher, like Ridley, are way smart, very interesting, and enthusiastic - Pitt and Norton are funny)

Big Trouble in Little China and The Thing (Carpenter and Russell are profoundly entertaining to listen to)

Apocalypto (Gibson is an ass in real life - but his movies are awesome and this commentary is great)

Shawshank Redemption (Great stuff from Darabont)

Beastmaster and Equilibrium (both these B-movies have tremendously interesting commentaries about filming on a low budget - Equilibrium especially - check 'em out!)

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #8

2011-01-07T14:38:00.000-08:00

By far, the most useful household tool (at least in my house) is the POWER DRILL. Yes, the hammer comes in handy a lot, the stud finder, the level, needlenose pliers, jar of miscellaneous screws, etc - all are useful and every household should have them - but the power drill (for drilling, unscrewing, screwing (screws), and torturing naive tourists) seems to be brought out every other day around here.

There might be a few out there that have bought into the hype that duct tape is one of those things to always keep within reach - that duct tape alone can keep a house functioning well into the post-apocalypse. Frankly, I almost never use duct tape for anything other than making last-minute costumes for Halloween (or binding naive tourists). Mind you, power drills won't be too useful when the infrastructure of society collapses - but still, POWER DRILLS, baby -POWER DRILLS!

Interlude

2010-12-28T13:31:00.000-08:00

While I try and muster the post-holiday energy to make three more installments to my "thankful" miniseries, I thought I'd post a few random sketches that I have put in Limited Edition AGGREGATE copies.

Speaking of that, if you have no idea what AGGREGATE is, well, it's a book of a whole bunch of my drawings. Here's my official ad (which doubles as a pleasant distraction from my ever-languishing website that I promised to update like 5 years ago). The limited edition copies are suddenly going fast - thanks to THIS flattering post by Dan Dos Santos on the most excellent MuddyColors blog.

And speaking of self-centered hyperlinks, I have a long-winded 2010 look-back post on Rottface News if you have the interest.

Hope everyone has had a fantastic year and that y'all have a great New Year's. Thanks for all your look-sees and comments - and to everyone that parted with their money for a copy of my book! Take care and see you in 2011!

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #7

2010-12-16T23:26:00.000-08:00

Armor that favors sex appeal over protecting vital organs.

Why should I be thankful for this? You take away cleavage-accentuating armor and pointy toothed creatures and fantasy art doesn't exist. And I'm left to mow lawns for a living. And I'm not even that good at mowing lawns.

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #6

2010-12-04T08:41:00.000-08:00

We live in the day and age of planned obsolescence. Makes me sick. To think that people actually design crap to perish and need replaced after a very short lifespan, when, obviously even to a layman, they could make it last for decades with little maintenance! Christmas lights and everything tech-based come to mind as the leaders in this frustrating and disgusting practice .

But even with built in short life spans, sometimes you get something that totally defies the system. First of all, I have a Zebra Danio (a tiny inch-long fish) that is at least 6 years old. It has looked like it got stepped on and spent some time in a garbage disposal for the last few years - Many times I thought it was dead - yet, there it is, still flitting around my aquarium - eluding the little mer-grim reaper.

But secondly, is my scanner. It's an AGFA Snapscan 1212 that I think I bought in 1998 or early '99. It has been my workhorse for all those years - scanning no less than 8000 (but probably much much more) drawings and paintings for me in that time. It has long since lost the lid which broke off like 5 years ago. And for the past two years or so, the power line connector has been really touchy so I have to unplug it and then plug it back in to get it to work. But it keeps kicking and doing what I bought it to do - so I keep using it.

Over 11 years of life and use from a computer component is unheard of! Anything that sticks it to greedy-ass companies that design shit to break down so you have to buy a new one more frequently is exactly the kind of thing that warms the cockles of my heart. Bravo to AGFA, even if I have the only 1212 that lasted longer than 4 years, I applaud them for letting this one slip by them on the assembly line.

Yet, I'm seeing the signs of approaching death for the old girl. She's a bit more persnickity about starting up these days - it's taking a bit more attention and fiddling to get it scanning. But, even with death so close, it still works - and I keep scanning.

Thank you, AGFA Snapscan 1212 for your many moons of honorable and courageous service!

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #5

2010-11-25T21:55:00.000-08:00

I love books. I like reading books but those kind I usually borrow or get from the library or possibly buy and then lend/give to someone else. But as far as buying, collecting, and stocking my shelves to their weight limits, I love books with lots of great pictures to look at.

I had a very modest, easily moved collection of books before discovering the greatest store ever. Ever since I discovered this store and gave myself the (mostly justified) reason to build a vast library of reference material, my collection has exploded. I don't know if I can estimate how many books I have purchased from the greatest store ever - but it's a lot. I recently just moved and believe me, there is a lot - and books are heavy (in case you didn't know).

Books of art from Klimt, Homer, Wyeth, Rockwell, Lockwood, Whelan, Berkey, Hildenbrandts, Gurney, Brom, Remington, Poortveilt, Alan Lee, Howe, Ian McCaig, etc - all for dirt-ass cheap. Books of photography - I scoop them up and devour them, too. The greatest store ever's a phenomenal trove of reference books and inspiration - and a dangerous place to be if you're trying to curb spending money!

So, what is this glorious place? Why, Half Price Books, friendo. If you didn't know that already, you have problems with your cerebrum.

Oh how I am thankful for Half Price Books!

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #4

2010-11-21T23:33:00.000-08:00

Speaking of piping hot liquids (as per my previous post):

In the last four or five years, I have become a hot tea junkie - and not because I'm addicted to caffeine - because I'm drinking no-caf stuff most of the time. No, I just really like drinking hot tea. I like iced tea, too - but the hot stuff is where it's at. I even drink it all through the Summer (though I don't come in from a sweaty lawnmowing session and toss back a cup o' steaming chamomile!). But certainly during the cold and dark months, my hot tea consumption goes way up - with green tea being my fave.

I might not ever have another reason to draw something as simple and unremarkable as a teapot ever again so, with that, as I sit here sipping yet another cup of green and staining my teeth, I'm thankful for HOT TEA!

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #3

2010-11-17T00:02:00.000-08:00

I'm no fan of modern technological advancement. Because most of it these days is thrown out there way too soon and was created just to get people to buy shit - and/or replace something they already have even though it works perfectly fine. That's our abominated version of capitalism for ya.

There was a time before this suffocating tide of money-worshipping when inventions and innovations were actually benefitting quality of life - instead of unnecessarily complicating it and thus making us undoubtedly the most annoying organisms in the entire universe. Inventions like the telescope, the screw, the toothbrush, the radio, scissors - all very good and useful. My vote for one of the greatest inventions of all time? The Water Heater - specifically for HOT showers.

So this day I am thankful for HOT SHOWERS. Not showers made hot by hot naked ladies taking a shower (though that makes a more captivating sketch than just a shower head). No, I'm talkin' about temperature hot - as in a degree less than scalding hot. I loves me a nice, near-boiling hot shower. You didn't think I bathed at all, did you? Well, I probably never would if the hot shower was never invented. Aw yeah. In fact, I'm going to go take one right now.

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS #2

2010-11-15T23:36:00.000-08:00

There's only a small handful of singers that can give me goosebumps when their pipes go into action. At the top of that list is Mike Patton. And on top of the top of that list is Chris Cornell.

I'm not going to break down every song and album and all that - just suffice it to say when Cornell lets loose with the larynx and lungs, I lean homosexual. Just a tad. Soundgarden was on Conan just the other night - Cornell sounded like he was 20 again and singing with Badmotorfinger abandon!

I was sitting at my booth at IlluxCon with "Like Suicide" in my head and doodled out this little portrait from memory. Such whims as drawing likenesses from memory usually end up a crappy mess - but this one came out well enough.

So, in honor of Soundgarden reforming and the upcoming holiday, I give thanks for Chris Cornell. Well, specifically his voice I guess - but you get what I'm saying.

Appropriate to Thanksgiving and this post, check this: Thank you!

10 THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR BESIDES THE OBVIOUS - #1

2010-11-02T00:36:00.000-07:00

It's too easy to be thankful for good health and great family and friends and that I am able to somehow make money painting pictures of dragons and guys with convoluted armor schemes. I take none of that for granted and am thankful daily for it - hourly even!

But way off to the side is that little pocket of minutia that doesn't often get any thanks come November - or any other time of year. I'm here to spread the thanks to those too often unthanked things.

25 days to Thanksgiving. What's one of the things I'm thankful for? Predators. Not the recent movie Predators - that movie was ho-hum at best. I'm talkin' in general. Predators are like, totally awesome to the max.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 100!!!

2010-10-23T00:23:00.000-07:00

With a little surge in posts not seen since the early days of my draw-blog, I made my way to Sketch-of-the-day 100! And it only took me about 500+ days to get to that number. Wow. Bad.

I wish I had something more grand to display for this momentous occasion - but, considering the jobs I have beating down on my schedule like a silverback, this is all I had time for - a modest random-sketchbook-doodle. Enjoy!

Oh yeah, and since plugging my book of pencil drawings hasn't gotten a plug in a while - I will take the time to plug my book: Buy my book! Seriously. Do it. Your life can't possibly be complete without it.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 099

2010-10-19T14:11:00.000-07:00

This is an oldy I dug out of a folder of D&D miniature designs that was still lingering on my computer. Ugh - age does not serve many of my D&D miniature drawings very well - but some of them do retain some fun and flair. This one is fairly nice - even if it does look like she has no left arm. The miniature came out nice, too.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 098

2010-10-12T13:58:00.001-07:00

PROPELLERS!!!

In other news, Studio Rottface has moved to Dublin, Ohio! So all y'all Magic: The Gathering folk out there that like to send cards for signing would be advised to e-mail me first (steve2@rottface.com) lest your cards go to my old studio location. Which is now a deep chasm with a river of bewitched magma at the bottom.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 097

2010-10-06T00:39:00.000-07:00

Will I break the 100 entry mark before the end of the year? These days, that seems to be asking a lot. While everyone else was having fun and taking vacations, I spent the Summer slogging through a long chain of decidedly UNfun days - all revolving around the profoundly stressful project of cleaning and "staging" one house for selling, looking for, finding, and buying a new house, and then MOVING into the new house. Now, living amidst boxes, I can say that the worst is over - unfortunately, so is Summer!

I celebrate my melancholy over a lost season by posting a random sketchbook page that I doodled out in some Renton hotel room at the very beginning of Summer so many moons ago....

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 096

2010-08-30T23:44:00.001-07:00

Dogs? Not slavering hounds from planes of evil and chaos - but silly ol' dogs? That's right - just when you think I'm going to go fastball high and tight, I throw a change-up and make you look silly. And what's with the baseball analogy?

Anyways, yes - dogs. A good friend wanted to get a little sumthin special for her beau so she requested a drawing of the four dogs that they share their lives with. In a very rare occurrence, I worked directly from photographs - *gasp*! - and exaggerated some of the their features ever so slightly to emphasize character.

This was a fun little side project. But don't expect a series of sketchy dog portraits now though.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 095

2010-08-12T23:27:00.000-07:00

"My Wish is Your Command" is another piece for a Archenemies Magic: The Gathering card. Along with the previous post's "Fauna Shaman", this is one of the most fun pieces I have done for the acclaimed collectable card game. The drawing I am particularly fond of mainly because it took so long to get to. I must have went through a dozen or so iterations of this awkward concept before something finally clicked. Someday soon I will post to final painting but for now, enjoy the pencils!

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 094

2010-07-23T00:35:00.000-07:00

Leading up to GenCon, I thought I'd chuck a Magic: The Gathering drawing up on the ol' drawblog. This drawing is for "Fauna Shaman" and the finished painting (which you can see over at ROTTFACE NEWS) is one of my favorite that I have done for Magic. Yeah, you can argue that maybe it isn't my best piece - but a lot of the feelings I have for my artwork comes from how much fun I had creating it. In the case of Fauna Shaman, I had loads of fun.

In fact, I knew going in that this would be a fun painting so I made it a much bigger image than necessary. The cropline for the actual card art is roughly through the middle of Mr. Toad.

Anyway, if you're wondering what my status is for GenCon, again, go on over to ROTTFACE NEWS and waste some more time reading my writings!

SOME THINGS DON'T MAKE THE CUT

2010-06-25T10:53:00.000-07:00

It's hard to say how many drawings are in my book AGGREGATE. On the back cover, it says "over 150". That was just a big number thrown out there because I knew it was safely over that. But honestly, I think the number is closer to 200 drawings - but that's because there are lots of little doodles and snippets included - and can I rightly count all of those as separate drawings? Probably. But it's not necessary to count every single one - the buyer of one of these books is definitely getting their money's worth if only in amount of things to look at.

But even with how many pieces got put into the book, I have a whole folder of drawings that didn't. Probably another 100 or so drawings I'd say. Picking artwork for the book was mainly about quality - but I also made cuts based on diversity. And some cuts were made, simply because the book is 80 pages long - not 81. Something had to get left behind. So this piece here was to be the drawing on the last page up until pretty late in the game when I did some reshuffling and reworking. Even though it didn't get in, I thought I'd give it an extra life here on the blog. Enjoy!

CAN YOU GET FUNGUS FROM AGGREGATE?

2010-06-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

Are you one of the many people concerned about contracting a harmful or embarrassing fungus from handling AGGREGATE: The Art of Steve Prescott? Studies have shown that 1 out of every 245 million people will be exposed to fungus spores (known as "Myconids") - most notably on page 68 of AGGREGATE. Are you one of those people? Top scientists believe so.

If you are a hypochondriac and are very easily duped by health-related scare tactics, then you are at extremely high risk. But hope is closer than you think. In a Harvard study of 3 people that may have had a fungus problem, symptoms subsided after the purchase of a second or even third copy of AGGREGATE!

If you think you may be at risk, ask a doctor about this delightful book of pencil drawings. Or, just self-diagnose and begin your treatment today!

Contact steve at: steve2@rottface.com for more information.

ANOTHER SNIPPET FROM AGGREGATE!

2010-05-15T20:00:00.000-07:00

Most likely for the rest of this gonna-be-crazy Summer I'm going to be posting various pencilworks that I have included in my book: AGGREGATE: The Art of Steve Prescott. I'm doing this for two reasons -

1) to promote my book which everybody should buy if only to reduce the amount of boxes taking up room in my studio!

And 2) because I'm going to be insanely busy with a wide array of projects and work for at least the next two and a half months which will make squeezing in some fresh draw-blog material difficult (but not to be completely counted out!)

Today's post is a preliminary drawing I did for a German card game called : BlueMoon. I did the entire "Buka" set which you can check out HERE.

This particular drawing became THIS PAINTING which was one of my favorites from the whole set. AGGREGATE includes a two-page spread of drawings from this project.

What is this AGGREGATE book I speak of? Go to: ROTTFACE NEWS for more info (second article down.)

AGGREGATE IS NOW READY TO BE HAD!

2010-05-03T22:17:00.000-07:00

That's right, people! My books are finally in and ready for the purchasing! Since this is my Draw-Blog, I'll spare you most of the blather and commentary. But, if you insist on a bit more information (not to mention ORDERING information), I then send you to ROTTFACE NEWS.

For the sake of interest and for something worthy of being on my Draw-Blog, I have posted the raw image for the wrap-around cover to my book - sans type and such - as you can see. I actually did this drawing in two separate pieces and just kind of stitched it together taking advantage of the hair texture to hide the seam. The wonders of photoshop.......

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 092

2010-04-15T00:10:00.000-07:00

I've been a bit preoccupied as of late so I haven't had a chance to come up with a new series of sketches to start. In leu of this lull in ideas and activity, I will instead dig up yet another pencilling from the past. This is an oldy but a goody - one of my favorite little D&D interior drawings despite being near 5 years old I think (maybe 6!). It's a Poison Shadow Lizardfolk considering sinking one of his primitive-but-effective arrows into that trespassing adventurer over there.

AGGREGATE flight status: DELAYED. I will report news when it gets to me. Soon though.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 091

2010-03-29T10:21:00.000-07:00

Z is for Zägh

A mysterious giant bird in Islamic mythology, Zägh is said to have a human head and the ability to understand and speak all the languages of mankind. So basically, a big, weird, translator that is able to fly from one language-barriered conversation to the next.

This manface bird could have been very useful to the Babylonians when they were trying to build their crazy tower. If you recall, the Tower of Babel was supposed to be built high enough to reach heaven - but since it was being built as a testament to the ingenuity and totally-awesomeness of mankind (and not the totally-awesomeness of God), Yahweh came down and bestowed upon the Babylonians citywide language confusion. The Babylonians could not understand one another anymore. The brick layers wanted more mortar but they kept getting tunafish casserole - the architects demanded more buttresses but kept getting slapped in the face. Thusly, their lack of communication halted construction of their ridiculous tower and it fell into ruin.

AGGREGATE update: My 80-page book of delightful pencil drawings, sketches, and doodles is nearing the end of the printing process. If all goes well, I should have the books in a week or less!

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 090

2010-03-20T13:31:00.000-07:00

Y is for Yehwe Zogbanu

If you be a hunter wandering around the west African state of Dahomey and you don't mind where you be walkin', you might just stumble into the territory of Yehwe Zogbanu - and that would be quite bad for you (especially if you like being alive and uneaten).

Yehwe is said to be a gigantic, fiendishly predatory giant with 30 horns on his head and body. And he likes to kill and eat hunters that wander into his yard. So next time you see a "No Trespassing" sign - well, consider staying out of there.

On another note, my book AGGREGATE is now going to print!!!! I'm hoping to get the books possibly by the end of March - maybe early April!!!!

Soon.....

2010-03-04T23:52:00.000-08:00

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 089

2010-02-23T09:01:00.000-08:00

ELFY PINUP

This elf chik was a private commission. I do private commissions every once in a while if I can fit them into my schedule - this one was easy and fun enough that I was able to knock it out rather quickly and so it didn't end up causing any problems.

I'll get back to the last two letters of the alphabet of mythological figures in due time - but since it has been a while since my last post, I thought I'd post some decent filler for the time being.

Enjoy!

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 088

2010-02-02T13:21:00.000-08:00

X is for Xiang Yao

In Chinese mythology, Xiang Yao is a monstrous serpent with nine human heads that accompanies the black dragon Gong-gong. When these two chums travel around together, where ever they go, their "excrement" turns pristine rivers and lakes into wretched, tainted bogs. Lots of ways to spin THAT into a metaphor about stupid-ass humans.....

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 087

2010-01-26T00:18:00.000-08:00

W is for Wendigo

The Wendigo is a malevolent, cannibalistic, and a downright horrible evil spirit common to the lore of north-eastern native American tribes - most notably, the Algonquian Indians. There are many descriptions of this eidolon but most boil down to a gaunt (almost skeletal) humanoid with nightmarish features seen skulking around cold and windy northern boreal forests chowing down on humans. A person can change into a Wendigo or be possessed by one - either causing cannibalism or because of it - not a good thing. And so the Wendigo is kinda the boogeyman of the Algonquians - used to keep tribe kids in line: "Hawk-in-the-Sky, stop biting your brother, you'll turn into a damn Wendigo."

Interestingly, there is a condition called "Wendigo Psychosis" (not kidding) where a sufferer, even in the presence of normal food like Doritos, craves nothing but the delicious flesh of a human - human steaks, human-kabobs, human casserole, human sandwich, human buffalo wings, and human smoothies. You name it - Wendigo Psychotics dig it.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 086

2010-01-12T10:35:00.000-08:00

V is for Vodyanik

Vodyanik is a water spirit in Slavik mythology described as resembling a creepy old man with a fat belly, a hat made out of reeds, and a skirt made out of rushes (that fits the description of most pan handlers, doesn't it?).

Vodyanik can be either a malevolent spirit or a benevolent spirit depending on which side of the bed he wakes up on. If the day starts nicely, he may just overturn fisherman's boats - but if the coffee machine isn't working, he's more likely to drown people trying to bathe in the shallows.

In other news:

Be sure to check out my new Rottface News page: rottfacenews.blogspot.com

Especially if you're in the mood for a long-winded recap of my 2009 tribulations. But low, there are some links in the article for new artwork of mine.

And speaking of new artwork - I might not have a new website up (what else is new) - but I did post a bunch of new paintings there - so check out ROTTFACE.COM for some new stuff, too!

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 085

2010-01-04T11:26:00.000-08:00

U is for Unkulunkulu

Unkulunkulu is the supreme deity - the sky god - the Ayatollah of Rock-n-Rolla of the Zulus in southern Africa. As the great defender of warrior nations, Unkulunkulu is also regarded as "He who topples kings" and "He who roars so that all nations are struck with terror". Essentially, he ain't no wuss and he ain't no ball boy.

As such, he arrived in the cosmos and made humans out of grass. Then he sent these silly creatures two messengers - a chameleon carrying the secret of immortality and a lizard with the message of death. Chameleons are ponderous and easily distracted so, of course, the chameleon stopped to eat some ants or something and the lizard got to the Zulus first. Alas, the dumb humans took the message of death and missed on the opportunity of partying through the centuries with Connor McCloud.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 084

2009-12-01T23:16:00.000-08:00

T is for Talos

In Greek mythology, Talos is a giant made out of bronze that Zeus sent to protect his hottie-of-the-week Europa on the island of Crete. Talos patrolled the shores thrice daily and heaved huge rocks at any sketchy lookin' boats that got close to the island. Even though he was a GIANT MADE OUT OF BRONZE for God's sake, he was also imbued with the power to glow red-hot and take intruders in a fatal embrace - I guess this was in case he somehow couldn't crush them with rocks. Or his fists. Or his feet. Or whatever.

Talos, however seemingly invincible he might seem, was crafted with a tiny little weak spot in his ankle - a small vein that was the supplier of lifeforce to this towering automaton. And of course, when Jason and his Argonaut buddies came bopping along, some lucky chump named Poeas, probably aiming for Talos's head, missed horribly and struck him in the ankle. End of Bronzy.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 083

2009-11-20T00:27:00.000-08:00

S is for Serqet

The Egyptian scorpion goddess was a deity of poisons, snake bites, and obviously, scorpion stings - either dishing out stings to unrighteous jerks or curing the effects of poisonous bites and stings. Serqet was also commonly known as a funerary deity with the delightfully morbid job of protecting embalmed entrails and was considered either a companion to Isis or an aspect of Isis.

Boringly, Serqet was usually portrayed as either a scorpion or a woman with a scorpion on her head. I think she needed a visual upgrade.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 082

2009-10-26T11:08:00.000-07:00

Another work sketch just to pass the time. This is a detail for a larger scene that was done for a RPG book cover. I like how the poses of the adventurers came out - I didn't have to rely on fun costume details to make it work!

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 081

2009-10-19T12:07:00.000-07:00

This is going old school.

I was continuing my ongoing odyssey of cleaning/reorganizing my studio and dug up this drawing out of a big pile of crap. I'd say it's from the mid 90's - maybe around '95 or '96. Back then, I was all about space marines and military crap. And also boobs - but that part hasn't changed much.

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 080

2009-10-06T14:15:00.000-07:00

Yet another dip into my job scans for the latest drawblog entry. Consider this delightful family portrait of fungus weirdos a preview for my upcoming book of drawings. This drawing was subsequently painted - but was nixed from the book it was supposed to be in. Cry for the mushroom people. Cry for them.......

SKETCH-OF-THE-DAY 079

2009-09-26T10:39:00.000-07:00

Man, it's been too long. Way too long. I've had a really busy and distracting Summer - compounded by sketch-laziness and you get a serious drought of drawblog updates.

As of late though, my studio work has been focusing on a little book project I am just now finishing up. It is relevant to this blog in that it is a book of my pencil work - chock full of it, to be exact. Mostly professional stuff, preliminary drawings for paintings, thumbnails sketches, and some finished pencil illustrations - there's also some plain old sketchbook stuff and I have included a smattering of my drawblog entries as well. With luck, I'll be sending that off to the printer sometime in the next week or so to have ready and available by November. I'll let you know more details as they come in.

For this entry, just to get something, ANYTHING, posted, I'm showing a Magic: the Gathering sketch I did for a card called Berserk. Don't worry though, I do plan to finish my alphabet of mythological figures - I'll come back to that when I can!

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2009-08-08T00:06:00.000-07:00

R is for Raktavija

This gargantuan Hindu demon teamed up with other demons to deal an assortment of horrors all over the place. Raktavija had the grisly charm that if ever his blood was spilled, another Raktavija would spring up from every droplet! Eegads, that's a problem! He sounds like a really infuriating level boss for an old Nintendo game or something. Anyway, Kali was eventually sent to deal with this bullshit bastard - finally coming up with the idea to drink all his blood and then kick his ass into oblivion. Nice.

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2009-07-19T00:24:00.000-07:00

Q is for Quetzalcoatl

The plumed serpent god of ancient Central America drew an enormous cult of followers in the Aztecs. And as everyone knows, the Aztecs didn't need to look far for a good reason to sacrifice humans. Quetzy himself, in fact, gave the Aztecs reason enough to wage war on, well, pretty much everyone, simply to capture lots and lots of people to sacrifice to the snake-bird god. What a pleasant era to live in Central America - it must have been so much fun.

Sorry for my long hiatus from the alphabet - I had a bottleneck of projects and then a week-long trip to Colorado. Still have lots of work but I think I can squeeze in some mythological beings now and again.....

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2009-06-28T22:50:00.001-07:00

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2009-06-25T22:48:00.000-07:00

P is for Polyphemus

The Cycloptic shepherd son of Poseidon lived upon the island of Sicily - where, bringing in his herd of sheep one fine day, he happened upon Odysseus and company goofing off in his cave. Polyphemus trapped the Greeks in the cave and began to snack upon them as if they were delicious Feta-flavored jerked beef. Ah, but clever Odysseus got the giant Cyclops totally wasted on wine, stabbed him in the eye, and escaped the cave clinging to the underside of Polyphemus's sheep.

To this day you can still hear the Cyclops bellowing curses at Odysseus - for he will never again be able to look at his stack of "BUSTY ONE-EYES" magazines.

Origins!

2009-06-24T23:05:00.000-07:00

Check out my lame no-sketch post!!!!! Well, I'll go back and delete this sucker in a couple days - I just wanted to tell everyone (most notably those of you in the central ohio region) that I will be manning a table at the Origins gaming convention at the Columbus Convention Center from thursday through sunday. I'll have a whole heap of my artwork there as I try and trick people into buying it if only to use as litter liners. There should be some nice artists there including Guest-of-Honor Wayne Reynolds who does some supremely fun and detailed fantasy work. I don't know how much admission is but if you have the time and a fistful of dollars, swing by and check it out.

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2009-06-16T23:16:00.000-07:00

O is for Oceanus

A sea god in Greek mythology, Oceanus was the son of Gaia and Uranus (hee hee hee....your anus....). As the personification of the river of the same name that circled the Earth (from which all other rivers flowed), he was the father of all other sea gods and nymphs except Poseidon. Dude did some fathering, eh? Child support must be a bitch.

I wasn't too interested in Oceanus at first as he was described as being an old man with bull horns. Wha? Upon slightly more research though, I found out his horns were actually crab claws and he had the body of a fish or snake. Sweet. You had me at crab claw horns......

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2009-06-07T00:16:00.000-07:00

N is for Na Kika

The Octopus God of Micronesian mythology (specifically the Gilbert Islands) was the son of the primeval creator gods Na Atibu and Nei Teukez - and his many arms proved indispensable in pulling together all the billions of tons of sand and rock to build the archipelagos of the South Pacific. That is a lot of work, man.

Between my three books and the internet, I couldn't find much more about this octo-guy than what I just wrote - and certainly no visual reference. I couldn't figure out if Na Kika was an Octopus or a humanoid - or a crazy combination of both. When in doubt though, always go with the crazy combination of both.

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2009-05-30T00:33:00.000-07:00

M is for Mammon

Mammon is a demon of Christian lore and is the embodiment of the evils of avarice: the insatiable greed for riches - and riches as an object of worship and greedy pursuit. From the Bible: "No one can serve two masters. for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Mammon."

There were a couple good M mythical figures but I had to do Mammon because frankly, I think that greed is the most despicable attribute of humans - unfortunately, there are signs of Mammonism all around us all the time - people making decisions motivated entirely by the pursuit to make as much money as possible no matter what the cost.

Plus, I figured it'd be fun to draw a gross demon.

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2009-05-24T00:26:00.000-07:00

L is for Lady-of-the-Lake

The Lady was a Celtic enchantress that lived in a castle in the middle of a lake. She raised Lancelot and tossed Arthur that wacky sword and probably did some other mystical crap in between.

Frankly, "L" had a pretty lame assortment to choose from and I just couldn't muster much enthusiasm for the oft-depicted lake dame. I guess I could have made her a fish-woman or a weedy hag or big and fat just to do something different - but I just want to get past L and back to the good stuff!

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2009-05-17T20:29:00.000-07:00

K is for Kali

The most destructive aspect of the Hindu goddess Devi, Kali is an incarnation of annihilation - sent to Earth to destroy demons and probably whatever else was nearby while she was destroying demons. Well, Kali, wearing her favorite necklace of skulls and a designer skirt made out of human arms, went about her job of laying waste with so much gusto that she didn't even realize it when she cut down her own husband Shiva who was probably just asking if she wanted lentils for dinner.

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2009-05-11T22:56:00.000-07:00

J is for Jormungandr

Fathered by Loki, the gargantuan sea serpent Jormungandr has a pretty important role in Norse mythology - or at least will eventually - as Jormy's role hasn't happened yet. You see at Ragnarok, the epic serpent is destined to bust onto the scene and cause all sorts of problems like spreading clouds of poison, steal library books, etc. It will culminate in one last head-to-head fight with Thor - they will trade body blows until Jormungandr will finally be slain. Unfortunately, Thor will then drown in the sea serpent's venom. Booyah!

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2009-05-07T13:55:00.000-07:00

I is for Ixchel

The malevolent moon goddess in the Mayan pantheon, Ixchel was often shown as a withered old woman crowned with a snake and wearing a skirt decorated with crossed bones (actually that sounds like normal attire for girls at rock concerts - those crazy youths). In her clawed hands she held a vessel filled with destruction which she not-so-nicely pours out onto the Earth.

I almost did the Mayan goddess of suicide, Ixtab - I'm not kidding, they had a goddess of friggin' suicide! Even better, the goddess of suicide is a partially decomposed corpse hanging in a noose from a tree limb.

Ya gotta give it to those Mayans, even their least morbid gods probably ate brains and pulled teeth and wore flayed human skins.

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2009-05-03T00:33:00.001-07:00

H is for Hino

The God of Thunder and guardian of the heavens in Iroquois mythology - a hater and destroyer of monsters and other scumbaggy spirits. Armed with a tremendous bow and arrows of flame - Hino saved the humans from the mighty serpent of the Great Lakes and sent it back to the sky to lick its wounds.

There is no mention of whether Hino can defeat the loathsome Zebra Mussel - but I can only assume that a giant flaming arrow or two would probably do the trick.

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2009-04-27T00:49:00.000-07:00

G is for Ga-gorib

According to the Hottentot peoples of southwestern Africa, Ga-gorib is a horrid monster that sits on the edge of a deep pit and challenges passers-by to hurl stones at him. The stones always rebounded and killed the thrower, whose body would topple into Ga-gorib's pit. But along came a hero named Heitsi-eibib - he waited and waited and waited until finally, when the monster's gaze was averted, he drilled Ga-gorib in the noggin and toppled him into his own corpse-filled chasm.

The homeplate umpire then warned both dugouts.

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2009-04-23T09:28:00.000-07:00

F is for Fafnir

Fafnir lived in the Germanic world of giants, dwarves, greed, and deceit. Oh yeah, and of dragons. When fan-fave Loki killed Fafnir's bro, Loki had to compensate the misdeed by filling the corpse with red gold (or something silly like that). Alas, the treasure was cursed and caused all sorts of greed-fueled intrigue - eventually leading to Fafnir having to turn into a tremendous dragon to guard the gold. Faffy was eventually slain by the hero Sigurd.

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2009-04-21T00:14:00.000-07:00

E is for Echidna

I wasn't going to do Echidna at first since I have drawn plenty of snake-bodied weirdos in my career. But upon a little more research I discovered she wasn't just any old snake-bodied weirdo - she was the mother of pretty much every freakish monster in Greek mythology - from the Hydra, to Cerberus to the Sphinx! That's more than enough to get you a spot in my little alphabet project.

I find it amusing how genes and cross-species sex mean nothing in ancient myths. Humanoid gods are always knocking boots with bulls and snakes and amalgamations and then giving birth to dragons and chimaeras and such. Thank the sky that this isn't the case with modern human society - can you imagine the anxiety going in for that ultrasound? Is it a boy? Is it a girl? No, it is a three headed dog that is destined to guard the gates to hell. I mean, how do you decorate a nursery for that?

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2009-04-17T01:23:00.000-07:00

D is for Dharmapalas

There are eight of these protectors of the Dharma (the Truth) in Buddhist lore - and, fortunately for me and having fun with this sketch, the Tibetan versions are particularly terrifying (even though they fight against evil).

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2009-04-15T00:48:00.000-07:00

C is for Cerberus

The three-headed dog that guarded the gates to Hades welcomed the freshly dead to enter, but any jerk that wanted to flee Hades and bop around ancient Greece once again would most likely be too horrified by Cerberus's howling or too horrified (and sickened) by the stench of its breath. I can vouch for dog breath - it can be pretty damn putrid. As with seemingly everything the Greeks could conceive, Heracles ended up besting it - most likely with the help of Cesar Millan.

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2009-04-14T01:55:00.000-07:00

B is for Bachue

In South American mythology (specifically Columbians), she is the Mother Goddess and the protector of crops. Based on my very minimal research, I decided that this meant she was a nurturer of both humans and food plants. The name Bachue, according to the book I have, means "large-breasted" - that's about as obvious an invitation to draw some gratuitous skin as I will have on this project.

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2009-04-12T23:52:00.001-07:00

Starting today, I'm going to get a little ambitious with my daily sketches in order to make up for some gaps in my frequency of posts. My ambition will take the form of an alphabetical series of Mythological Figures . Obviously, we start with A:

Anubis

The Jackal-headed guardian of the Egyptian underworld has been portrayed countless times in fantasy art - mostly weak movies and video games. There are actually a handful of "A" mythological figures that would have been fun to draw - but I've loved Anubis since I was a grade schooler (I did a report on Egypt once and I think I devoted half the report to Anubis!). That said, I have a feeling Anubis might have had some early influence on my career path - so, I felt I should give him the seat of honor in kicking off my alphabet. Before he and Thoth weigh my dead heart against the feather of truth, maybe Anubis can take me on the scenic rout to the Hall of Judgement.

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2009-04-10T00:18:00.000-07:00

I mustered up just enough energy for a cliche giant. Cliche giants have terrible posture, crappy clothes, none-too-good hygiene, cows on their heads, and play with rocks.

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2009-04-09T00:48:00.000-07:00

I have nothing to say about this. Nothing at all. I will instead, go to bed.

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2009-04-07T23:54:00.001-07:00

Don't touch that.

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2009-04-07T01:00:00.000-07:00

Tetanus from an unclean fork wasn't nearly as worrisome to Gil as the possibility of getting a case of West Nile.

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2009-04-04T23:03:00.000-07:00

Micky was a trouble-seeker and when there was no trouble to be seeked, he made trouble. You name it - racin' cars, shopliftin' cokes, smokin' in gym class, loitering at The Tar Pit, trampling cromags, cussing - he did it all. One might say he was the most delinquent of the delinquents at Mastodon High.

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2009-04-01T23:51:00.000-07:00

Just finished up my second to last big project. Don't have much time for anything high-concept tonight so chew on this until I can get my brain gears back on track.

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2009-03-29T21:56:00.000-07:00

This one is for Tim. One of the toughs that lived in our neighborhood back in the day was named "Mitchell" - isn't that such a bully name? I mean, MITCHELL for God's sake. Given, it was his last name but still - his name wasn't Les Walbenstein or Harold Bortle - it was Chris Mitchell - and by those of us he terrorized, he was known simply as Mitchell. Anyway, Tim and I likened him to a demon the likes of Tim Curry's character in the movie Legend. And we further fantasized that he roared around our 'hood in a demonic roadster - bellowing threats to the physical well being of the younger kids, the less-tough, and, in my case, the ludicrously geeky.

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2009-03-29T00:27:00.000-07:00

Still languishing in a sea of all-consuming and brain-frying work. Alas, is that land I spy between the swells? Whilst I slog through the remainder of my heavy-duty work, enjoy toadman as he skips the chocolate and graham cracker and goes right for the gooey marshmallow.

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2009-03-25T09:10:00.000-07:00

I knocked one more thing off my list of harrowing deadlines and gorillas on my back. To celebrate, I'm going to try to get back in Sketch-a-Day rhythm. I'm RE-starting out slow with a little guy I call TOILETRON. The small scented votive helps him fit less stinkily into society.

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2009-03-19T22:36:00.000-07:00

Here's some Euro-hottie doodles. Why? Because I was just in Germany. Why in Germany? Signing Magic cards. Do these accurately portray European hotties? Not really - if I had to make a living accurately portraying anything, I would be king of the hobos.

By the way, German accents - surprisingly sexy.

Bis morgen.