Kitten Day!

Kitten Day: Taffy
9x12 Prismacolor marker, Sharpie, and Staedtler Lumocolor on Strathmore 400 Series Mixed Media paper

Sketchbook page.

Tracing paper transfer. 

Prismacolor marker outlines.

DONE!

My friend, Heather - Daily Cat Drawings on Tumblr - hosted a Kitten Day reblog-a-thon today as a means of calming anxieties over the results of the election. I know little Taffy doesn't have the power to heal the hurt that so many feel right now, but I hope she managed to bring smiles to the hurting.

Taffy was inspired, in part, by my late cat, Gimpy. While not actually three-legged, Gimpy earned his name for his gimpy foreleg. He passed away July 2015. Although sorely missed, he brightened my life, and my brother and parents' lives, in more ways than I can count. 

INKtober 2016, Day 25!

INKtober 2016, Day 25: Self-Doubt
9x12 Prismacolor / Copic markers, Sharpie, and white out on Crescent Rendr paper

Prismacolor marker sketch.

Cathartic vent art.

INKtober 2016, Day 23!

INKtober 2016, Day 23: Derp Frog
4x6 Prismacolor and Copic markers with Sharpie on Strathmore 400 Series marker paper

A quick one-off I made in between sessions on my Brainsick poster. Sums my my feelings about recent... stuff.

INKtober 2016, Day 22!

...so says the demon puppy.

BaBEE Sitter babysits bees!

Blep-O-Tron is fast and likes to blep.

Day 22 meant another drawing shindig with friends! I made these three silly drawings while visiting and eating too much bad (delicious) food. I like letting my goofiness reign supreme sometimes.

INKtober 2016, Day 13!

INKtober 2016, Day 13: Never Say to Finch
11x17 Sharpie and Copic marker on smooth bristol paper

It was only a matter of time before I made a large comic page for this longstanding inside joke. :D

INKtober 2016, Day 2!

Inktober 2016, Day 2: Megatron vs. Dinobot
9x12 Sharpie marker on Crescent Rendr paper

Forget Michael Bay's movies; the Transformers cartoons are where it's at (and I've heard that some of the recent comics are good, too!). Being a 90s kid, I have a soft spot in my heart for Beast Wars. Robots who turn into animals? SIGN ME UP.

Dinobot was always one of my favorite characters. I drew a lot of dinosaurs as a kid, but I don't draw them often now. This was a great excuse to jump back on the dinosaur wagon. Throw Tyrannosaurus Megatron in the mix and we've got the ingredients for a badass dino-brawl.

Although my final drawing isn't as epic as I'd planned, I had fun using straight Sharpie to go with the flow. I saved tons of reference for the fight scene, so perhaps I'll revisit it!

If I were to make one crucial change to this drawing, I'd extend Dinobot's forearm feathers so they'd flare out with his raised arms. Dromaeosauridae and Tyrannosauridae had feathers, so I wanted to apply updated paleontology to old character designs. I still love the antiquated dry 'n scaly Beast Wars bastards nonetheless. :D

Book cover: The House of Lazarus, Part 1

I am lucky enough to be working on a second book cover for my good friend, author T.L. Bodine! You may remember the cover I did for her short story anthology, The Beast in the Bedchamber, back in 2013.

Her upcoming novel allowed me to work with a new subject: zombies! The sketchbook pages here are an exploration of figure and textures. I'm going to make some digital mockups to show Tiana before I begin the final illustration.

I have a second book cover in the works for another good friend, author and artist Robert A. Sloan. I am illustrating the cover for his novel Elder's Pride, a Raptor Red homage following a family of Smilodon fatalis as they navigate the Californian Pleistocene in search of home territory. Although I took the cover on two years ago, Robert and I have both had setbacks in getting it ready. But I have several study pages to share, and you'll see them soon!

The Missing INKvember Scans (aka Hello, 2016!)

Some of you may remember that INKvember was a thing I wanted to do.

...Yeah. Sometimes plans don't pan out.

My goal was to create a handful of polished drawings. "Gravity's Angel" was the one full illustration I made. But I did complete several sketches and rough paintings I liked; hope you enjoy them.