Well, this is something. It's not the grand prize but to be fair I have never gotten this far before with design contests. Seriously, this is sorta amazing. You can actually buy this sucker here: http://www.welovefine.com/2403-sex-bob-omb-icons.html
Thanks to anyone who voted, always appreciated by yours truly.
So what we have here is a little something something that will keep me busy for the next few months. I call it months, because calling it anything else would seem like I wanted to make this more complicated than it is.
As I mentioned in my last post, I had a conversation with a friend of mine. He seemed a tad distraught over how our memories begin to compress things more and more as we grow older, recollecting years from only a few moments at a time, remembering decades from the memories of single events. It's inevitable for all of us, we can't expect to remember every little thing that happens in our lives and that's not a losing battle I expect to win. But I decided to make an attempt to catalog my life month by month, noting the experiences I have in a 5 x 5 grid.
So I've been writing down all the things I see, experience, work on and enjoy and making these little layouts. It's a tad personal, so a lot of these won't make too much sense. The sizes of the blocks don't necessarily mean anything, I just use the space that I feel like using for each event or thing. Normally, important events happen to be larger but sometimes I have to settle and make them smaller.
I can't very well post this to websites like DeviantArt or what have you because of the blatant copyright infringement I've committed to make these grids but to be fair the whole thing is an experiment so I'm not too torn up about that bit.
What we have here is March of 2012, the first in my series of month grids that I'll be doling out once a month. I've just started to get April underway and I can only hope May gives me some time to get things in order.
I have decided try something interesting for the next couple of months, just something for the hell of it. Documenting the major events of each month as a sort of collage. I'll explain more in detail at a later time, but for now there is this. Post something later this week.
Just a reminder that the designs I had submitted to the welovefine.com Scott Pilgrim vs. the World design contest are live and up for voting. Well, they have been for a few days now. Swing on by to the link below and vote if you have a moment to spare: https://www.welovefine.com/contest.php?id_contest=10
I finished this piece close to seven months ago as a submission to the Artrageous! 26 Auction. Hard to believe that I would plan so far in advance, I know. The auction is run through Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, MA and almost all of the proceeds go straight towards funding a variety of programs in the school. Last year the proceeds helped establish an animation department in the school. Now kids can major in an animation concentration, a few people I know personally have already benefited from this.
I had submitted two pieces similar to this one for the past couple years, each usually ending with some great success for the evening. Over the past few months I had taken the pleasure of reading the written works and the listening to the music written by Gil Scott-Heron, best know for his spoken word piece "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised." I liked what he performed and eventually picked up two of his albums and read his memoir that was released earlier this year. Turns out he had done quite a bit more than I had imagined in his lifetime.
I decided to make this piece similar to the other auction pieces I had submitted before but I wanted to see how much more I could add into it color wise. Personally, it looks fantastic printed and physical rather than just another .png floating on the internet. I'm hoping it'll do as well as the other pieces that have come before it.
Welovefine.com was having a Scott Pilgrim tee shirt design contest, with the celebrity judges and the cash prizes. I couldn't resist. So, I decided to throw caution to the wind and create my own batch of designs. I thought I would continue with the same methods I used for the Wizard of Oz illustration show piece since that turned out well for me. After two weeks of pulling my hair out, gathering materials to use for reference, rereading the comic series, watching the movie, and actually making the designs and planning what kind of shirt to put them on, I finally, finally, finally finished two very fun designs.
The unfortunate thing is that when I went to submit the samples to the website, it seems that the colors got washed out when they decided to put them on their website and now I fear that I'll need to take action in order to secure what chance I had with these designs of winning any sort of mention. But at least, somewhere on this vast sea of electronic aether and magic, these designs are being shown properly and in true color. Wish me luck, I'll be posting/spamming the contest when it begins sometime next month.
I've put a majority of my artistic pursuits on hold in lieu of design contest entry(s) that have commanded a majority of my attention, combined with my day job and freelance work that was already on my plate to begin with. I'll be updating the blog soon with new work and new stories, I'm hoping this will be sooner than later.
A new print piece I made for the Montserrat College of Art annual
illustration show. This year the theme was the Wizard of Oz. I figured I
could make something for the show with my set of skills, despite not
actually being an illustrator. I had thought to screen print the image
to paper but to learn enough about screen printing in the short time I
had to make the image seemed a little foolhardy, so I ended up printing
it digitally. And since I had the option to print it without size
restriction since it was digital, I wanted to make it a poster instead
of just a standard mounted printout.
I decided to make
it look like something that might be considered "poppy" or "trendy", so
having the bright colors in here seemed to be a smart option. That,
combined with the vertical arrangement, made the traffic light theme the
logical choice. But even though the animal faces are obvious, I had to
be sure to follow with the theme, throwing the "Oh My" logo for faux
branding.
After the show, some people have asked for
their own copy of the poster (and have even offered money for them too).
I might have to consider selling copies of these things in the near
future.
I’ve made images that incorporate text as a sort of canvas that creates an image when seen from certain distances, usually important people or writer’s whose faces are inside words they had said or written. I had called the series of these images “Speech,” because frankly I wasn’t in the mood to think of something that wasn’t straight out of an art school show. I have made a considerable amount of money with these images, mostly for the Artrageous auctions where the proceeds go to fund various programs and supplies at Montserrat College of Art. The first one I ever made featured Abraham Lincoln. That’s the back story as to these images. Now I want to tell you the back story to this one.
The Mighty Mighty Bosstones are a ska-punk band that was formed in 1983 in Boston, Massachusetts and during the 90’s became one of the key bands that brought this genre into mainstream music. With over 20 years under their belts as a band and even after the passing of ska punk’s mainstream influence they are still going strong. Every year, they preform a special series of concerts in Boston known as the Hometown Throwdown as a way to thank their local fan base and to end the year with a bang. I have been fortunate enough to attend this event for three years. The energy in these concerts is really unlike anything else I know and I can’t get enough of it.
Every completed piece in “Speech” usually focuses on a dead politician or writer, someone who has left words behind that have been remembered. The reason I create these images at all is because that these people who left those words or wrote the speeches and passages that are still with us today are still very much alive because of them. The words give them a sorta of life of their own. And to me personally, the songs of the Mighty Mighty Bosstones have been music thank I can learn from. This band makes me happy that I happen to live in this part of the world near Boston, hell, it even makes me feel proud to be from this area. And I wanted to get that feeling down somehow. So I decided to make a “speech” for someone who was still alive, the song writer and front man himself Dicky Barrett.
I used the song that I had heard the most by the Bosstones “The Impression That I Get” (below) which was played heavily during the nineties and the song that launched their career into the mainstream. It was either that or the first Bosstones song that I ever heard, called “I Wrote It.” Finding the right image to use as reference was actually not as bad as I thought it was going to be, I managed to stumble on a great site online and found exactly what I was looking for (also below). I tried to make this one a little differently, using more materials to create a greater sense of depth with colors. The transparent layers stacked up on each other like an animation cel, everything stacked on top of each other in the right order. I was constricted by the text from the song but it wasn’t too great of a hassle to work with. I had to make sure everything fit together nicely or else the whole thing would fall to crap.
After finally getting the layers together, constantly trying to frame it straight and almost killing myself every time I messed up and had to try again, I did manage to finish the damn thing. I would like to think that this piece was the next step in how I make these particular pieces of art, but I had to make sure that I kept the same sensibilities in this piece that I had when I made the first print with Abraham Lincoln. So I had finally gotten it done despite setbacks.
I decided to give it to Dicky himself, a fan gift I suppose. I felt it was the least I could do for a man who had written songs that have offered me a great many things. They helped me unwind when I desperately needed to, offered me ideas about how to write and gave me insight on things that I was clueless about otherwise. I suppose I could call him a hero of mine because of how much I respect him. I had thought to deliver it somehow at the upcoming throwdown, but the likelihood of this actually working was slim. I lived on the Bosstones fan forums for any possible clues and I discovered my possible opportunity. On the evening before the third show, the band met up at an Irish bar called “McGreevy’s” on Boylston St. in Boston for a fan meet and greet. After the times were confirmed,
So I got on the train that evening on December 30th 2011, heading to a place I’d never been to before carrying the print in a plastic sleeve in my messenger bag. I found the bar. Got in the unruly crowd within the bar, sneaking through whoever I could to get to the back. I remember seeing a lot of the people from the show I attended a few days before, it was a little crazy. But to make a long story short:
I didn’t sign the back of the print, I felt that putting my name on it would be cheap but I ultimately wish I did. But given certain facts I think it's best that I didn't use this to promote myself, this wasn't that kind of thing. I was able to bring 2011 to a proper close. I met the man, I gave him the art, mission accomplished. It was weird meeting Dicky Barrett in person because on one hand, there is the whole hero aspect in your head and on the other you know he’s a human being too. But I digress, not everyone gets the chance to have meetings like this with people like Dicky Barrett let alone to be praised by people like Dicky Barrett for making something like the print. Because now when I look at that picture, I can know that the work I did was appreciated by someone who I respect and when it comes to the times when you think to yourself that your not good enough, it makes a world of difference.
So that's the story. I didn’t mean to sound sentimental or mushy, I suppose it can’t be helped. I'm putting up here in the ethers of the internet for the world to read. I can only hope that you, dear readers, can get something from all this. And that I don't get sued. But that's just something I hope for every day when I wake up.
A new print piece I made for the Montserrat College of Art annual
illustration show. This year the theme was the Wizard of Oz. I figured I
could make something for the show with my set of skills, despite not
actually being an illustrator. I had thought to screen print the image
to paper but to learn enough about screen printing in the short time I
had to make the image seemed a little foolhardy, so I ended up printing
it digitally. And since I had the option to print it without size
restriction since it was digital, I wanted to make it a poster instead
of just a standard mounted printout. 
