HAPPY GNEW YEAR

Happy New Years everybody, I look forward to this coming year with more hope and happiness than the past year, and not as much as the next!! Lots of projects in the works and can't wait to post um here for those of you who come by to see them.

As I have done every year for the past few years.........here is this years Gnew Years Gnome, he is a bit early. I have usually done these on New Years day, but now I can relax and enjoy it more with my family.

Can't wait to see ya'll in 2012

SANTA HEADS SOUTH

I haven't done a " naughty" Santa in a while, and to be quite honest, I hadn't thought about it until one day last week a good friend of mine, who I will not name.............MARY WILMER, brought up the past and told me I should do another Naughty Santa....................well the seed was planted and my mind started working without me and then all of a sudden this sort of popped out.

So there you have it, and MERRY CHRISTMAS, I'll post again at New Years with this years Gnome picture.

May God Bless and keep you always.

END OF THE YEAR CLEAN UP

This rather cluttered picture is of my drawing table,and  although I wish I could claim to be this productive on a daily basis, these scattered images are the culmination of personal projects I have started and had to stop and or start again due in large part to other more pressing matters.

I tend to stop working on commissions during the last part of November and all thru December, the holidays are so close together and family time is in all honesty more important, but during this time I also try to clean up a few things that lay about for the year ( or 2 in the case of the Batman, Green Lantern and hidden Superman inks ).

Along with the 3 new Hippie Chicks I posted this morning..... yeah I know, I will go for a bit with out posting anything then here today are 2 .............. I have completed 3 other inks, and a cartoon for the Naughty Bits collection. I will post the 3rd of the 3 inks tomorrow since my computer is refusing to recognize my scanner today after scanning 6 images earlier, and the ink is a bit large and I do have to paste it together............it is the cavemen drawing in the top right hand side.

CEREMONY

 SHE WOLF

YES!!!   

Well that is all for now, if the computer and scanner make amends, I will get the other one scanned and posted as well as any other things I manage to finish during this time............there are maybe 4 oils I would like to get back to as well.....................

HIPPIE CHICK PIN-UPS

It all started with the song "Downtown", a young lady dressed in the current nuvo-hippy attire, and what is in my opinion not a very nice smelling substance called patchouli. Whether you like the aroma or not................it set my mind running because of the coincidence of time. I have Petula Clark singing a wonderful song. Downtown, and this rather attractive yet foul smelling young woman next to me.

Next thing I knew I did a quick watercolour of ...............

PATCHOULI CLARK

 .... and yes the image is somewhat based on the young nameless woman......

After the incident the names and images started to come to me and I couldn't stop, I started to write them down and do the paintings when I wanted........they were there and it really seemed like the thing to be doing at the time. 

So let me introduce to you a few more of the women that have come to me since the incident:

AMBER WAVES

SUMMER RAYNE

LORA BUSCHE

There are even little histories behind some of the names, like Amber Waves is a mid-Western girl  who loves to walk barefoot in the fields of grass, Ms. Busche is a natural girl who enjoys dancing at parties and enjoys life as it comes...............this is all pretty scary when you think about it, but I have honestly come to terms with these things and accept them as they pop into my head.

I have a file somewhere labeled " NAUGHTY BITS", that has more images that are not as tame as these, and one day I will get around to posting a few of them.

Any how, this is just a wee bit of what goes on in my mind as I relax and let the ideas flow. Most of these come out at night as I sit and watch t.v. before going to bed. I think this is why I don't really dream all that much, or have nightmares.......... I take care of it before hand, and allow myself the opportunity to just sleep.

SNAIL GIRLS

For those of you who are on my Facebook you are or maybe aware of my on going SNAIL GIRLS  drawings, but for those of you not on FB with me or are unaware of the series I am going to recap a little bit. ONe day I sat down with my sketchbook and doodled out a little thing of a faerie riding on the back of a snail sort of like  bull riding at a rodeo, I like it so much that I found a small piece ( scrap ) of paper that I had lying about and quickly did an ink thing of it:

....and here she is, the "first" Snail Girl. I believe I drew her in 2010.

At some point in the past year I was sitting in my living room ( aka Studio B ) and had messed up a drawing that I was working on, and as I sat there tore it up as usual, but then as I was sitting there looking at the torn paper, I drew a girl talking with a snail:

It was a fun thing to do, and I liked the image, for me it was sort of innocent a girl talking with a snail. After I a while I did another and another. All were done on torn sheets of paper of messed up drawings, and as my collection of Snail Girls grew I decided to keep the torn sheets of paper and have them on hand for the purpose of doing Snail Girls, this envelope sits by my chair in Studio B and is there ready and waiting for the next one to appear:

Here is an example of the approximate size of the drawings:

...and a few more closer images of the girls as well as an early family portrait:

As I continue to do these and looking back at them, I realized there is some sort of conversation going on between these two friends, and in realizing this, it became all the more important to me to continue with this until the conversation was over. At first it was for me about getting the body posture right, balancing the blacks and whites to where one did not over power the other, but now it is more about keeping the friends together...........sort of silly I know, but I like it.

I have to mention that all the drawings are done to the shape of the paper and not tearing the paper to fit the drawing, that would be cheating. The shape of the paper helps to determine what is being said in the drawing. The more of these I do, the more intense the conversation becomes in trying to find a posture or pose that I haven't done before..........who likes to repeat themselves in a conversation.

At the top of this I posted the "first" snail girl, well in cleaning out some things and trying to tidy up the place I found this:

This is the actual First of the SNAIL GIRL images, she was done in 2004, six years before the other First. As you see in the first to images the gals have wings and are in a sort of ironic action pose...........bull riding a snail and surfing on a snail, just something that leans towards my sense of humor, but as I went on they changed, no wings and more of an equality between them.

Anyway, this is some of what comes out in the evenings as I kick back and chillax to end my day. In the next few posts, I will be going to put up a few of the pieces that come out as I wind down and relax in the evenings before going to bed............or on the nights that I can't sleep and get up and try to get sleepy.

George Lasso's the Moon

This image goes along with the last post of Stick People, in which I sort of discussed how I arrived at the figure and posturing of George.

This image was done for our local theatre group the RUSH COUNTY PLAYERS 2011 production of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE. This was a really fun thing for me to do especially since this is my favourite of all time Christmas movies, and not to mention I have ALWAYS wanted to do a drawing of this as well. So for me it is a wonderful life, I got to do something for a great group of folks as well as one of my favourite images.............not too bad!!!

STICK PEOPLE

I know you're saying to yourself.............THAT IS NOT A STICK PERSON!!! and you're absolutely right. but how I got to this image was through a construction of a sort of stick figure. I was recently asked to to an image based on It's a Wonderful Life's  drawing of George Lasso's the Moon, and since this is one of my all time favourite movies, this image is burned into my memory. As I sat down with my sketchbook to draw out ol' George, the key thing to this image was his posture. He HAD to have that schlump, and as I started to work the pose,I realized that to get it right I had to break things down to their most basic structure....the stick man:

The outline drawings are the first attempts at getting George's posture right, and as you can see I started to break it down into more basic components of the structure.............STRUCTURE  is a key word too, it is what we are built on, it defines and dictates where we bend and how we move....... so for this to work I went to the internal structure or framework of the body.... a simplified skeletal structure or a stick figure.

 Now some of you are saying this is not  how I draw a stick figure...................most people think of the stick man as this:

As artists we sort of do a more detailed if you will stick figure based on the rib cage, pelvis and head.....the limbs are really the only sticks:

As you can see the rib cage is sort of a cylinder and the hip structure or pelvis is sort of a barbell......a wider barbell can be used as female and narrower as male.... the dots at the end of the stick represent the joints and an oval like thing is the head, the little blob at the bottom can represent the hands or feet.

This little fellow is not new..........Andrew Loomis used a slightly more elaborate fellow than what I do and just about every artist I know or can think about has at one time or another used someone similar to this guy. In Bridgmans books he used more of a blocking system which as you will see further down I used in getting to my final image as well.

The Block man is wonderful in establishing the planes of the figure and helping to map out shadows and musculature in a basic way.

Block man also gives you a whole lot more surface area to see how things can pan out.... he is a cool dude.

In the doodles to the left you can see the page in which I arrived at my George figure. Here you can see I used the stick man as well as a version of block man.

In this I initially drew out the pelvis and to achieve mys schulmp.....I set the ribs back away from them and not linearly on top where they would usually go  ( this is the little fellas at the bottom of the page ). I then used block man up top to sort of see a more solid form and from there I drew the final George.





So as you can see..............the Stick Figure is not really a lowly creature but really an extremely useful little guy. He can help you to find a position, or specific posture, he can help you to define movement and perspective. He is a work horse.............

..................................you can even draw a stick horse ( bottom of the page )

 So, whenever someone says to me " I can't even draw a stick figure" I really can see why at times. The Stick Man is  a cool dude and someone I come to rely on a lot at times.

Ya'll should get to know him if you don't.

PRINTS AVAILABLE

This just in............prints are now available thru this site here :

TRACY'S PRINTS HERE

Dragons

In my world, dragons still exist,...................

Those 6 words are at the top of this page............I was looking at this the other day and realized, except for ol' D'Argon ( that fine beastie of a yellow dragon at the top of the page under the words ), I really don't do many dragons, well that is changing and I am going to be revealing more of those fellows to you as the time goes by, and here is a quick look at  Gadron, a red dragon who lives in a sulfur cave. I hope ya'll enjoy and I'll post more on him later as I get time.....and if not I WILL definitely post the finished piece.

 

THIS JUST IN......A Nights Horror by Timothy Ray Jones

Awhile back I posted a painting in the post called Candle Cover and it was basically the picture of the painting and saying that I would post about it later......................


.................well its later.............


Author and friend Timothy Ray Jones has put his newest works up on Lulu for all the world to see, buy and thoroughly enjoy.

Monsters, monsters everywhere! Is it ever safe to come outside at night? You will ask that very question when you delve into the Horror stories within -- and more. Will Marge ever free herself from childhood fears by facing down an old...friend? How will Jonathan react when the truth he seeks is revealed? Can Irvin find solace in the arms of the new woman of his dreams? The answer to these questions and more await you. Do step inside to find them... 

I do hope ya'll will stop buy and pick up a copy or two today

INK A DINK A DO.................

Right now on my drawing table is a pile of pencils just waiting to be inked, and along with that pile is a pile of pencils that are partially inked.

These all range in size and scope from the torn paper pieces of Snail Girls which are no more than 4" X 5" to
9 X 12's to11 X 14's and a 14 X 17 .............. 

Here are just a few o them:

 

The pile............

 ........and these lovely cavemen which I penciled in last night while hanging with the family and watching t.v.................there was a slight preview of this piece in my post back in April about sketch books in it you can see where I was working out some of the body positions before I went to the big sheet ( this is the 14 X 17 piece ).

Since most all of these are personal pieces, I just sort of let them pile up as I moved from one thing to another...mainly was just concentrating on doing some oil paintings, but now that I have this lump of stuff waiting to be inked, I guess I can just sort of get my ink on and do them all at once............

A little bit of INK-site into my process

The other day I received a few pages in the ol' E-mail for a Werewolf story that I was asked to do some illustrations for, and thought to myself, this would be a good time to go into a bit of my process for doing the pictures. There is no surprises here, or any ground breaking information, nor any divulging of any secrets.....it is read and think..........or at lest in my case read and doodle out what pops into my head as I read.

Any way, as I said, got a few pages of text that contained scenes for the illustrations and I printed them out to read. I know you don't have to do this and can read the words right off the computer screen, but I am really sort of old fashioned and like having paper in my hands. I also like to tote the things around with me and get to them as my schedule allows. If it is nice, I like to  sit on my porch and do this, or in some cases if  I have an appointment I carry them with me and do it whilst I wait. 

{ The pages were really good for me and the way I like to work as well, there was detail, but just enough to give me the impressions of the illustrations, but also not so much as to limit what I see .......... I will work with whatever is presented me, but really like this combination and the freedom of interpretation }

The printed page also allows me to doodle right on the page as I read.............

........I am pretty sure there are programs and what not that allow you to do this as well, but like I said........I like paper in my hands.

So, now I have my initial doodle and idea down on the PAPER, I move onto a more "tighter" rough and play with the composition more if I feel the basic idea needs improvement ( or if I am told to by an AD or whomever I happen to be working for at the time ).....

... in the above photo I took my original idea and played with it some more. In this case I wasn't totally happy with what I jotted down, it didn't quite "feel" like the scene to me, so I played and felt I had it in the bottom thumbnail  and proceeded to move on...

The two doodles in the boxes are the ideas I went with to move onto my inking .... (I will talk a bit about the other two in a few when we scroll down to it) ........ the bottom one is really fairly close to the original concept I scribbled onto the page with the text, and as you may notice the other has changed from the initial rough to more like the secondary doodles. From here I went on to do a bit of inking.........

... and ...

..........so I was really happy with the drawing and the inking of the second picture here, but still felt something wasn't right with the top one.......not too bad of a drawing in itself, but really sort of sucked when I looked at the She-woof I did just after, so I went back and re-read the text and found a clue...

( CLUE )

... once I found my clue, I went back to my paper and did some more sketching...........remember the other two drawings on the page.....

I moved the thing from her wrist to her waist sort of like my clue said, rearranged her on the page and bingo, I had something I liked better and felt right as well. 

So now that I am feeling better I drew out the image from the bottom left onto a piece of bristol and have my pencil ready to ink............

.......which we'll get to later, but until then that is my process, and as I said there is nothing ground breaking in it, just good basic reading and comprehention and translating what I read into a picture....ILLUSTRATION!!!

IT GOES WITH THE COFFEE

I am not sure what anyone else does with their mornings coffee, but for me, I like to sit down and do a little doodling and sometimes you just come up with something fun.

Well I had been playing around with a few ideas for a Vampirella image, and had a couple of sketches laying about:

...........and the next thing you know, I am sort of hanging out on the couch, watching Reservoir Dogs and by the end of the movie, I have this sitting in my lap:

It was a really fun morning, good movie, COFFEE, and a nice little pencil piece!!

GET THE PICTURE or a photo studio on the cheap

I am pretty sure that there are a few of you out there in a similar financial situation, and looking for ways to conserve and/or save money...........get the most for less as it were. I am also sure that there are plenty out there in towns smaller than the one I live in and may not have a professional photographer around to take the image you need.

Fortunately, our town does have a great photographer in it, as do some of the surrounding towns, BUT..... they might not always be open when you need them, or like I said above...........money can be an issue. Well here is a pretty simple and easy way to get the picture when you need.

A good friend of mine ( Joe Vicas ) gave me this tip a few years back and I thought it time to pass it on.

Lights:

These are a pair of painters lights .  I do a lot of our home repair and remodeling of our house and have had them quite a few years, but they are the light source for setting up the photography session. You can get them fairly cheap at any number of stores..........I am not sure but they probably run anywhere from $10 to $15, I think when I got these they were even cheaper than that.

Tripod:

This tripod was my Dad's and I have had it forever.............I am not sure what the run, but you will need one to keep things steady and not have a blurry picture.

I use my easel to hold the image, sort of handy for that sort of thing, but I have taken a marker and written on the side 2 different settings.........one for painting and one for photography, for the picture taking I stet the easel in a more upright position.

There really isn't that much of a difference between the two settings, but believe me......it does make one. If I paint on the photo setting.........the board tends to want to fall over since it is more straight up and down.

You can use several different ways to set your lights up to take the picture, you can get some extending paint poles and have them run from floor to ceiling and clamp your lights on them, or like I have been doing, I sort of use the furniture around me to get them set up:

Do not aim your light directly at the surface of the painting or what ever it is you are photographing....you will get a hot spot or glare. You want to have the light just sort of wash over the area and not really have it hit directly.

Once your lights are set up, put your  camera on the tripod and take the picture. My little digital camera has a little feature on it that allows me to bracket the photos........that is adjust the light/dark to help me get a truer image of the painting. I can go a stop or two above or below and then choose the image that is closest to what is on the easel.

Once I get the image, I go to the computer and do my photo editing in Photoshop..........you will have to use whatever programs you have.........and then I am ready to save it and send it off.

The painting used as an example in this blog is not a finished piece and so I really didn't take the time to set things up properly, but all the images for the past few years have been done this way so for better examples run back thru the blog and take a peak, look at these example 1, example 2, example 3