Remembering Nelson Mandela

"Everyone can rise above their own circumstances and achieve success if they are dedicated to and passionate about what they do."

 --Nelson Mandela

1918-2013

Peace & Love

'Tis the season....Happy Holidays!!

This should be on a card.

Really, Really Belated Halloween

With Thanksgiving around the corner, I came to the sudden realization that I had never posted any photos from Halloween!!  This year's Halloween was a bit different, in that my girlfriend and I actually got to celebrate it together.  The past few years she had to travel for work, and would normally miss Halloween along with the rest of the holiday season.  So finally, we were able to get into the halloween festivities by carving pumpkins and dressing up together.

This year also, the siblings and I actually had a few close friends join us for the pumpkin carving as well.  This year was also a bit different in that my brother didn't carve a pumpkin.  He had been so indecisive about what he wanted to do that he eventually didn't have enough time.  Oh, well...it was still a success.  All the kids that came to my house were not only impressed with our pumpkins, but also our costumes.  I think what surprised me the most was, there were entire families coming to our house just to admire our pumpkins.

"Well then...'Gidday mate!'"  haha
Lloyd Christmas from Dumb and Dumber

Our creations for this year

"Light bulb..."
me dressed as Gru, from Dispicable Me

"Papoy!"
gf dressed as a minion, dressed as a baby...haha

Dispicable Us

The Dawn of the Dixon

The new season of The Walking Dead recently started about a week ago.  Two episodes into the fourth season, and already the story's shaping up to look pretty crazy.  If you haven't seen or watched The Walking Dead, it's definitely a show to watch.  It's one of those shows that will suck you in right away.

Anywhoo, since the new season is upon us, and also because I'm such a huge fan of the show....

Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus)

Happy Un-birthday!

Recently, I was asked to do a painting for a friend's birthday. I was told that she wanted something birthday-themed, but wanted it to be displayed all the time. My girlfriend had the clever idea to do an "unbirthday" mad hatter from Alice In Wonderland...and to give it more of a darker theme, I decided to make it a zombie mad hatter.  I ended up whipping out the old acrylics and dusting off the unused paint palette, and actually painted the image onto an 8x10 canvas board.  Even though I only had about a day to get it done, it was a lot of fun...since I haven't painted traditionally in a really long time.  All-in-all, it took about 12 hours to complete.

Initial sketch in my moleskin

drawing onto canvas

detail of the face

finished painting

finished painting w/text

Let Freedom Ring

I recently saw the Google doodle commemorating the 50th anniversary of the March On Washington where Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his "I Have A Dream" speech and I was reminded of this illustration I did in an old sketchbook.  Originally, the illustration was done for King's birthday (January 15) but I thought it was appropriate to share.

Animation Update

I just recently compiled a collection of animations that I've worked on and made sort of a Character demo reel. A lot of it includes stuff that I did while I was in school.  So it actually has some traditional hand-drawn, 2D-paper-flipping animation.  Lately, I've been experimenting more with Maya and 3D animation, and included a few 3D clips into the reel.  There were a lot more clips that I wanted to include, but chose to edit/leave out.  Essentially, they were just unnecessary and made the reel too lengthy overall.  I'm definitely hoping to crank out more animations, so I can eventually add onto it.  But i'm happy with how it turned out.  Enjoy!