Much Love to you all.

     Hello my friends. This will not be my normal blog, but a short one. I had trouble last week passing a kidney stone and it threw a monkey wrench in the works. But I did manage to work through most of it. This is a painting I call "Heaven and Hell"  I have done versions through the years of it, but never got it right. I think when I post the finished picture of it, I will post as many of the past versions of it that I can find. The Model for this version is none other that Horror Diva Dai Green. I am hoping to work with her  more in the future for she is a wonderful model. I feel like my skills are finally to a point to where I can do some of the old idea's I have had but just lacked the skill to do them properly.  Here are some of the in progress photo's of it.

     Right now, the background is almost done and I hope to finish that today, and all I will have left to paint in Dai. I hope to get back to the lessons in the  week afters blog, and please write to me if there is something specific you want to see or for me to talk about. I am getting a video camera for Christmas and that will really help me show you things in much more detail than I could ever explain.
    My time is going to be tight the next 2 weeks. One reason I want to finish this painting and get to the next, but I am also doing the biggest interview to date, and I am really spending a lot of time on it. It will be reaching a 6 figure readership, so like all the interviews before, will bring us new friends and much more business.  I am very blessed that I can pick and choose what work I want to do these days. Money isn't even an issue anymore so I am allowed to be a"Artist" now over being and Illustrator, although I will still be doing Illustration. I have one coming up soon that I am very excited about. It is a painting of "Cerberus"  and the publisher is given me the freedom to do it anyway I want. Painting the 3-headed dog guardian of Hades should be a blast! Plus outside of it being in the book, it will also be offered as limited edition prints  as well from the Publisher. This hook up is one of the best so far. He pays well, and is a collector of my work on top of that.  It is exciting to have people who collect my work.
    For my friends that have known me for a few years know that I am not bragging by any means, but I am just a big kid that gets excited about all these things, and now to have all these really wonderful things going on, it is just wonderful. I am truly living my dream. I wish you all could, I really truly do.  There is even so old friends that hate me now that I truly wish all these wonderful things would happen for them, I really do.  Perhaps then their hatred would fade into passion for their art.
     I have a couple of quick tips before I get back to painting, one I've told you before, and really listen because it can save you a lot of money. Don't buy all those fancy high dollar cleaners from the art store, just buy a orange cleaner. It comes in a spray bottle like windex, and only cost a couple of bucks at the family dollars. After you clean your brushes in turpentine, swish it around in a container of the orange cleaner. It keeps your brushes really nice, and if you have a brush that has dried paint in it, let it set in the orange cleaner overnight, and the old paint will come right out.  Another tip is if you work in pencil much you probably buy a fixative to spray on the  finished work so the pencils wont smear. From the art store, the fixative is expensive. Use a aerosol hairspray form the dollar store. It is the same thing.
     Okay my friends, I have to get back to work. Much love to you all and "May the Darkness Comfort You"