#inktober - Days 14-17

Playing some catch-up today.  4 new entries, puts me at presently down by 4.  I'm pretty sure I'll make it to 31 on/before the 31st.  Though I think, I might cancel the 30 Characters Challenge in November this year.  We shall see.

These entries show another media swap-up.  I hit up the art supply store this morning and picked up two different sizes of Faber-Castell PITT Artists Brush Pens.  It still uses india ink, but it handles a bit more like a marker... so there's some more control, and less bleeding.  I also bought some better india ink, cuz the stuff I bought earlier this month I feel is not as opaque as it could be... and while that has some advantages, it isn't what I wanted it to be.  So I'll experiment with that later.  I also bought a Sharpie Water-Based White Marker, which I thought I would experiemnt with, but haven't really got the results I was hoping for... again having to do with opaque-ness.  I've had better luck with White-Out in the past (and it was cheaper).

Merry Christmas!

I go all of November, posting 30 new pieces of art, and all I can scrounge up for December is 1?  Love the holidays... really.   Anyways, one thing I DID do that was artistic this December was this little beauty here.  That's approx. 4 feet by 4 feet of Disney Christmas magic.

Let me backtrack a bit, last Christmas the girlfriend and I decided to check out the neighborhood nearby that is "known" for their Christmas displays.  Y'know the kind that goes all out?  So we check it out and walk around and I make the astute observation that most of the "characters" seen on people's houses and lawns are nothing more than painted things of wood (and some aren't drawn all that well, but I digress).  To which I say... "Hey, I could totally do that!"

She takes me up on the offer.  Lady and the Tramp is what we consider "our movie", so it became the natural choice for our balcony (cuz we live in an apartment, and can only go "all out" so much).   So we bought the wood, grabbed reference material and went to work.  I drew the characters out on pencil, we cut them out, painted them, glazed them and hung them up, and wah-la!

These took a lot longer to make than my cocky arrogance thought, so we only had time to finish the sign and the spaghetti eating dogs.  The chefs, Joe and Tony, remain pencil sketches on wood.  They will make their debut NEXT Christmas, joining these dogs.  It was quite fun to do, actually, and we easily have the best decorated apartment in the complex.  Yay!

Let the painting begin!

Okay, technically this painting began...  FEBRUARY of 2009!!!   Nearly 2 years ago.  But I've been busy, I moved, and the painting was buried in the "studio" for the past year and some change.  My girlfriend had me start this to get me to be more artsy, but it fell by the wayside.

But in an effort to get more creative, we finally got around to get the "studio" to be more studio-esque, and less like Matt Paxton's day job, so now I can attempt to get it done!  She's requested I finish it by her birthday, April 1st.  So we shall see.  The important thing is that it's now on an easel, and not buried under other art projects shoved behind boxes, behind a door, and then barricaded.   Now I can begin painting!