Hello my friends. I hope everyone had a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving. We did, although we both worked. Of course for Madison and me, it really isn't work when you are creating, it is an act of love. The painting above is called "Heaven and Hell" and it features Horror Diva Dia Green. It will be shown on "Horrornet" to accompany a new interview with me, and a good one. I know I have done 13 interviews now in 14 months, so I do my best to make each one different and the readers can learn more about my dark past and future. I have the 14th interview coming up in January. The publicity I am receiving is just mind blowing.
I just got a new scanner and have much better scans of the new oils I am doing. Here is the scan of "Hellcrow"
as you can tell from the version a few post ago, this is a HUGE difference in quality.
Outside of showing you what I am doing and tips here and there, I will not be able to continue the "lessons" until around the first of February, and those will be video's from now on. Right now I am swapped with things. As of later this week, I will be revamping the website, and most of the digital art will be gone forever, except for a few pieces we plan on marketing or we make good prints of. The lever of prints are going up. I just spent a small fortune on a new scanner and printer. This printer will print up to 13 x 19, and this are the nicest prints I have ever seen that a artist can make at home. Since now Tilly is going to get my work in galleries as well, we will be doing large, very high quality limited edition prints as well. They will sell for several hundred dollars a piece. All the things that will be happening in 2011 are just mind bogging and far exceed any dream I ever had for my art. I will tell you about them as they are happening.
Here are more pictures of "Dragon Mystress" in progress. First we have the background finished and the background dragons done, and then a close up of the baby dragon with the soon to be painted Tilly.
and here is a close up of the Dragon.....
The next painting coming up is a private commission from one of my collectors and friend. It is my take on the Mythological creature "Cerberus" At night after a 10 hour day of painting, I sketch while I sorta of watch a little TV. Here is the first study I am did trying to work out the bulk and proportion of a 3 headed dog to prepare for the painting. There will be plenty more sketches of it in the next blog, and the "Dragon Mystress" should be done as well. The Cerberus also be appearing in a book as well published by the client.
On other news, my health improves every day, and I am more motivated and inspired than I have ever been. Madison and the kids are very proud of me. Our daughter is quite the artist herself at 11 years old. The other night, she pulled a chair behind me and watched me paint for 3 hours straight. The kids and I have really bonded this last year as well, and I know they are not my children, but i fell like they are, and I love them like they are.
It seems like I can't say enough about Tilly. I just found out from reading her blog that she is like a quarter away from getting her Law degree. That floored me. Not only will she be representing me, but she is also capable of taking care of the legal matters that may arise. Her Agency will be one of the top ones in the world. I have no doubt and I am extremely honored that she wants to represent me.
The truth is that if you have a good business mind, there is a fortune to be made if your work is popular. The problem is that most artist don't have time to pursue the things that will make them the large amounts of money and paint too. So now, I will have the best of both worlds.
The art tip I want to share with you is a bit profound and I don't know if you will understand just yet. When Daniel told it to me, I didn't get it until 5 years later. One of the first things he said to me when I told him how grateful I was for what he was teaching me, he told me "I'm not teaching you, I am simply unlocking the knowledge that you already have." I didn't have a clue at the time to what he meant, but with all the things I have been through since then, and now returning to my roots, my confidence in my abilities has gone off the charts, where as before, after the Dark Angel nightmare really made me doubt myself. But with the support of Madison and allllllllllll the fans encouraging me, my confidence started to grow. (Not Ego) Now when I paint and draw I find that I am doing things that I was never taught, but for some reason, I just understand them and how to do them without even thinking about it. It is like I've always known how to do these things. Daniel's words now make perfect sense to me. One day they will to you too if you believe in yourself.
This is the first Christmas since 1998 that I am actually able to buy things for the people I love, including my friends and family. I am so thrilled about that, and I am very excited about the holiday. We are putting up the tree tonight with the Kids. I can't believe how I went from being a hermit for 8 years and not wanting anyone in my life to having Madison and the kids and them being a huge part of my heart. I love them more than I ever thought I could love anyone. Finally after 52 years of living a nightmare, I have found happiness, love, and more success than I ever thought possible.
Much Love my friends. "May the Darkness Comfort You"
Happy Thanksgiving my friends. I hope that each and everyone of you have had a wonderful day filled with good food, much love, family and friends. Please do not forget to click on the ad under the visitor map on the right. Every time you do, a penny goes to help the Shriner's Children Hospital. It will only take a few seconds, and if you do it every visit here, it will mount up to a lot of money. I think we have over 1200 readers now?
Thanksgiving is a day to be thankful, and I know they where plenty of years that I didn't feel like I had much going for me. My real family is spread all over the country, and with the exception of my younger sister and her offspring, I don't hear from the rest of them. But this year has been a miracle, a real miracle for me. Those of you that read regularly know of all the wonderful events that have happened, and the things that are coming are even more exciting and wonderful. I now have a agent, and she is in my opinion the best I could ever hope for. She is a wonderful woman with a strong business sense and most important, we trust her. So doing business with me has changed forever, now I will be sending folks to my agent to discuss commissions and whatever else I can do for them. She is a celebrity in her own right, a top selling writer, a ex model, a photographer and publisher, Tilly Rivers.
She understands what it is I want to do and what I hope for the future, and I know she can make it happen. I believe in this lady 100% and will stand behind any decision she makes. So I am very thankful for this. Now I know that have a home to call our own, and that we will be able to send the kids to college.
It wont be much longer that I will not need disability, and will be able to give back to the state that helped me through a very difficult time. This year has been a fantastic year and I/we are very grateful to all involved. Enjoy your turkey everyone. Much love always. "May the Darkness Comfort You"
Hello my friends, until after Christmas I am not going to be detailed lessons, but once I have the video camera I will be much easier for me to do them and I believe you will be able to understand what I am trying to teach you better as well. So until then, I will just keep you up to date on things and show you step by step of the paintings I am doing. I have decided to start showing you my sketchbook work that I do that precedes a painting.
Next is drawing out the whole ideal and mounting it to Masonite....
and then the start of the underpainting. I am doing something different in this one, I am underpainting it in oils.
This painting is called "Dragon Mystress" and it features one of the most famous models in the world, Tilly Rivers. Tilly and I will be doing a lot of work together. She has also agreed to be my agent, which we are very excited about on so many levels. Unless you know who Tilly is, you don't have a clue to how major this is going to be.
I also bought a huge printer to make prints at home. It prints up to 13 x 19 which is a huge improvement over the 11 x 14 ones I have made in the past. We are so working on having much larger artistic prints made of the new oil paintings as well.
My scanner bite the dust, and I have a newer and much better one on the way, so you will be able to see much better versions of the work I am doing now. One of the things I am very excited about is that all the work I did during my training days is now owned by private collectors, including sketches. An I am being commissioned to do new pieces for them. At this rate, I will not have to be on disability much longer.
I've got to run for now, but I will see you next week with the progressing of the painting in progress. Much Love everyone. "May the Darkness Comfort You"
Hello my friends. I hope everyone had a great weekend. Mine was great and I got a lot of work done, as you can see. I did this painting in a total of 10 working days which I am very happy about, and I didn't sacrifice the quality in any way. Now on to a quick pencil of Horror Hostess Roxy Tyler, then on to my next painting "Dragon Mystress" Another thing is that I have really been studying the work of Catherine Jones, one of the most amazing artist I have yet to see. I am starting to do some things I have picked up from her, like doodle sketches (and I will be posting some of those soon) with a pen in my sketchbook, just concentrating on the dynamics of a figure. It also helps to understand contrast in your work better and I cannot express just how important that is to any piece of illustration. It is far more important than how you use color. If you are not familiar with Catherine's work, look for her on Facebook and friend her. You will be glad you did.
Here is the scan of the painting I did for Halloween, it is an oil and it is called "Hellcrow" I was finally able to scan it.
This year as you all know, I have been rebuilding my studio basically from scratch. Most of it I had to leave in NC when I moved to Michigan and the rest was stolen from me. That is one of the main reasons I did digital art for 2 years, simply because I had to replace all my traditional art supplies and equipment. We all know that artist are not rich people and buying a new tube of oil paint is a big deal for us. lol So this blog and a few more are going to be about how to save money on the things you need.
The first and easiest thing to get is plastic milk crates. (see the pictures below) You can make tables out of them, desk, storage bends and so on. I got these from Wal-mart for a dollar each and I know they will last forever. If you have a friend that works at a food store, they probably can get you some of these as well.
The table pictured above is made out of 12 crates and is very sturdy. I just covered it with a cheap black cloth and it fits right it to the studio. I have 4 more similar type of tables built of these crates as well.
Since Madison has to sleep during the day, and i at night because of her job, I keep my everyday clothes in the studio. I used 9 crates to serve as a dresser.
On these next pictures, please remember I am not a carpenter, lol I built these shelves for storage of paper, artwork, masonite that I use for painting, and tools. I spent around 50 bucks on all the wood to make them with, and that includes liquid nails and screws. I haven't painted them but probably will when we move into our own home in the future. These also save a great deal of space and allows you art to lay flat.
I did buy one of my chairs brand new, but if you go to a used furniture outlet, you can buy them pretty cheap. I still need to buy one more for the drawing area. Right now I just switch chairs around as I need them.
I thought while I was taking pictures I would take one of my published work. The top 3 shelves are publications my work is in or I did the cover's for. An during the move, one large box of my published work got missing, so actually it would fill the whole shelf if I had that one. No use crying over spilled milk. If I knew that I had to go through all that i did to be where I am right now, I would choose to take this path again. Even the bad I would embrace knowing how it would all turn out. I have become a working madman, lol. I haven't been on Facebook or any of those kind of places lately. I have to much work to do, and honestly that is all I want to do.
I hope to see you next week and I will have plenty of new work for you to see. Much love my friends, and "May the darkness comfort you."
Folks, please don't forget to click on the little ad under the visitor map on the left hand side. Every time you do a penny goes to the Shriners Children's Hospital at the end of each cycle. Thank you.
