Gas Mask

"Gas Mask"

12" x 18"

Watercolor and India Ink

on Cold Press Watercolor Paper (140lb / 300g)

Now for sale in the Etsy Store!

One Done Overnight

I've had a bit of trouble sleeping in the past few weeks. I won't get into why as it's not that thrilling of a reason, pretty normal for this day and age I would guess. So, in spite of my bouts of insomnia, I decided that it would be prudent of me to do something productive with my extra hours. Instead of pacing around the house and having conversations with the cats and dogs, I painted this piece. It's a triceratops skull (I know you know, we've all seen "The Land Before Time", or at the very least, "Jurassic Park") with the important bits labeled in old-timey handwriting. I then "stained" the paper with watercolors to give it that parchment paper look. I may end up going back over some of the lines to make it pop out a little more, and add some white highlights for the sake of separating the skull from the neutral tone of the paper. That's all for now :)

Anatomy of a Triceratops' Skull

12" x 18"

Watercolor and Ink

on Watercolor Paper

Three New Paintings in the "Colors" Series

Here are three new paintings in the "Colors" series. Each one is 12" x 18" on watercolor paper, done in watercolor and ink (and colored pencil on the Deer Skull piece). Visit the link to see which ones are still available on Etsy :)

Retro Joe

New Painting! Woo-Hoo!!

I'm calling it "Retro Joe" because I based this off of a photo of a man who's identity is still unknown to me.
The painting is watercolor and ink on paper, which measures 12 inches x 18 inches. I really like the look of the motorcycle racers from the early 1900s through the early 1950s. The clothes and gear were typically handmade, and not many racers were sponsored by high-dollar companies, most did the prep work themselves in barns or sheds with their friends. If a bike broke down on the side of the road during a race, then the rider would pull out his tool kit and try to fix the bike before the other racers could pass (it was okay if they did, because chances are they would break down at some point too).

It's because of men like the one in this picture, and the work of himself and others like him, that modern motorcycles are more powerful and efficient than they have ever been, and that we as riders have better protective and safety equipment than ever.

Painting the Fender - Part 2

After spraying a clear coat over the fender I had to start over. The clear paint I was using was incompatible with the black paint, so once it dried it turned white and looked really cloudy. I ran my finger across it and in came off like dust in some spots. So I sanded it off and began again.

Here's the cloudy fender after the clear coat had dried...

I sanded the fender, cleaned it off with mild detergent and rinsed it with water. I started spraying it again with a semi-flat black (just a hair less glossy than the satin I started with) and eventually after a few coats it came out looking like this...

And here it is mounted on the front end that will eventually go on the SV...

I'm happy with the end result. This was the first time that I had painted anything larger than a small piece of metal, and the texture is relatively smooth and pretty uniform throughout. All in all I'll call that a win, and a small step forward towards making my little Suzuki a bit more attractive :)

Painting my Fender - Part 1

So today I got a little bored and with the lack of finances to go buy every cool motorcycle part under the sun, I decided instead to paint my GSXR fender, which has been in need of some refreshing since I rescued it from Ebay.

I forgot to snap a photo of the fender before I started, but here it is after a light scuff.

Satin Black is a nice color. It also just so happens to be one of the fullest cans in the garage, so it works out nicely :) Krylon is awesome, and this paint is specifically for plastics which helps in the adhesion process and will hopefully wear a bit more gracefully over time. (Yes the picture is upside-down... I know... just turn your head to read the can, or pick up a small child by their ankles and have them read it to you)

One thing about the Krylon Fusion paint I really like is that you can do dust coats and it dries in just a few minutes. So after three dust coats with about 15 minutes of dry in between each one, I finally sprayed on one thicker coat (really it's a light or light-medium thick coat) and it's currently drying in the sun.

So now I'm going to check it again and if it's dry then it's getting wet sanded. Be back in a bit with more of that.

Oil on Wood, Rustic style paintings. Now on Etsy

Two paintings I did over the recent semester at college. They're both oil on refurbished plywood. The coffee cup painting measures 10" tall x 13" wide, the Landscape painting measures 12" tall x 15" wide. I screwed eyelets into the tops of these pieces and used a leather strap instead of traditional hanging wire, so these two are ready to hang and have a very strong, rustic feel to them. If you'd like them with a frame you could always unscrew the eyelets and have a local frame shop mount the piece. Traditional Underpainting technique using only two colors, Burnt Umber and Burnt Sienna. Now for sale on Etsy :)

New Projects That I'm Not Ashamed To Show You Guys :)

Some recent other projects that have been created.

Project "Give Me Speed" and a few goodies that were made for my friend Motolady and her 'End of the World' Ride on 12-21-2012. 

Here's what the letters look like once they've been cut out with the strip applied to the sides to give them their dimension. The welds were ground down where possible, and in the tight spots (corners and inside the letters) the welds were kept as small as possible to be less obvious, while still appearing rugged and very masculine.

The letters have all been cut out of 14 gauge sheet steel and the sides will be added using 1/2" wide steel strip. Here's a photo of the letters all cut out (some with sides, some without) and trying to mock up the sign for spacing, playing with alignment. Just kind of a bit of planning ahead :) 

 A sharpie art skateboard for Motolady (link to her site at the top of the post, pretty cool). 

A painting for the same 'End of the World' party/ride for Motolady. The piece is meant to be sort of a 'take the power back' statement, while the wrench was meant to emphasize hard work and real labor. Painted with watercolors and metallic inks on paper, 12" x 18".

The New Goodies :)

The last few weeks have been pretty fun. I've been finishing up some required classes for my AA, one of which is 3-D Design. The teacher is enthusiastic and has more tattoos than me, I am loving it. Our first project was a paper sculpture. This one below was based on the idea of a radial airplane engine. I was going to use some metallic colors but I didn't feel quite right about it, so instead I went for a nice, warm color palette, thinking about fire and combustion. Kinda reminds me of the sun :)

Radial, approx. 16" x 16" x 3"

This next project is a wire sculpture. Of all the ideas I had sketched out and thought about the ease of making, this Barn Swallow was probably the easiest, and most fun. I used to watch the swallows try and dive bomb my cat at the old farm house in this nice pose, kinda where the idea came from. The frame was made from 5/8" steel rod, the outer contours made from 1/8" steel rod, and then finished it off by wrapping the wings, tail, and beak with 16 gauge galvanized steel wire. It hangs from the ceiling surprisingly balanced and looks like it's just about to fold in it's wings for a quick dive. I think once the summer semester is over it may be taken apart partially and redone with sheet metal to make it more representative.

Steel Barn Swallow, approx. 36" x 36" x 9"

This last painting is one that I've been wanting to do for awhile. It's based on the Ural Racer from Saint Motor Company that I had done some of the pictures for awhile back. After doing the "Tesla" painting I really wanted to do another dramatic, moto-inspired piece, but since it's raining outside and I can't ride today, I went a little nutty with my big brushes and did this one pretty wild and loose. I like it, I've always dug the abstract expressionism, so maybe this could be my new thing :)

Ural Racer, Acrylic on Canvas, 24" x 48"

More Tesla Paintings

Some of you may remember that I did a small 6"x6" painting for the RoCo6x6 exhibit currently going on now in Rochester, NY. The purpose of the event is to sell artwork from artists who are local, emerging, yound, old, out-of-state, or international, etc. and are kept anonymous until the piece sells. The proceeds of the art sold goes to the Rochester Contemporary Arts Center to help keep their programs running and supporting local arts.

Another show called "Oil on Asphalt" is being arranged for this Saturday, June 16, 2012 at the Covet Boutique in Arlington, VA where Bad Juju, Saint Motor Company, and myself, along with a few friends and other artists will be trying to pimp ourselves out to the crowds (by showing up, eating and drinking, being socialites, pretending we know what we're talking about, having your people fax our people...). This weekend should be pretty entertaining. I started painting for the RoCo6x6 exhibit and liked the "Tesla" pictures a lot, so I decided to hold off until later to do another Tesla themed painting a bit bigger. This show has a motorcycle and art theme, so it worked out perfect :) Here's the new guy on the block!

First Painting for 6x6x2012

Here's the first painting I'm entering for the 6x6x2012 exhibit in Rochester, NY.

Based off of a photograph of the project build "Tesla", a Triumph Motorcycle by my Dad, Jeff.

Art School...

I had a painting class last semester and the more I think about it the more I come to despise and loathe that teacher. It got to the point where I was angry from the moment I got outta bed in the morning until I left class at 11pm. He just argues with you, tells you you're wrong, and then gets pissed when you decide to have an opinion. I stopped going. There were three paintings in the 11 out of 16 or so weeks I was there, none of them were finished and none of them were graded. The other two are going to make some nice kindling this winter. This is the only one I like from last semester with Prof. Beelzebub. I'm glad I never finished it, otherwise it might've ended up in the pile with the other two.

Motorcycle Watercolor - Part 3

Alright, so this is where the fun part begins...

First off before you start the inking process, you'll want to make sure the pencil lines on the paper are pretty light. Otherwise, when you begin tracing over them with the ink pens, the pen tips may get clogged with graphite and need to be taken apart and cleaned (if you use the fancy kind), if you're like me and use the disposable pens, you'll end up having to throw them out if they get clogged.

So first thing is to take a white vinyl eraser and lightly erase the lines, just to the point of still being visible enough to trace.

Once the initial erasing is done, you can start to ink. I'm doing this freehanded but if you want to, you could use French Curves or Shippens Curves, which are very easy to use and very affordable. Also, it's important to start with a pen that has a small tip. For this illustration I'm using a Staedtler .03 india ink pen. The reason that you start with the small pen is because with inking you can always add more ink to thicken a line, but you can't take away to make a line thinner. Since I'm using watercolors too, which are very transparent and don't cover the picture plane like oils or acrylics, you have to be very mindful of this as you won't be able to paint over the lines later. (This is actually an advantage, you'll see why in the next part of the tutorial)

So in the above picture you can see that the lines I've added around the rider are pretty defined and solid. This is because the rider is in the foreground, also, he and his bike are the main subject matter. In the picture below the background objects are drawn very loosely to convey the idea of distance and to attempt to show that the rider is in motion.

Below is another example of the same concept. Drawing background objects a bit looser to convey distance and that they would be "out of focus" being so far away.

In the middle ground, between the background and foreground, the objects start out less defined as they are further back into the picture, but become more pronounced as they come forward. Look at the lines in the road for example. They are small and insignificant towards the back (the dividing line in the road behind the rider) but become more defined as they come forward (the two remnants of a dividing line to the right of the rider).

Now take a look at the spokes. They are a little bit of a problem that a lot of people would solve differently. The problem is that they are in the foreground, so they should be in focus, but since they are in motion, they should also be out of focus. Tricky, tricky...

What I've done is drawn the base of the spokes closest to the center of the wheels. As they move outwards to the tire they appear to be blurred more, so with a small "whip" of the pen tip, you can create a line that begins solid enough and quickly tapers to nothing. It works very well to go from a defined area to an obscured area in a short distance.

Does this motorcycle look funny to you? Where's the motor? The top tree on the fork?

It's all there, but if you look back at the photo from parts one and two that a lot of the motorcycle is black from the shadows that the machinery creates. So instead of driving yourself crazy, just trace the blocks of color, this will make it look like a "paint by number" but trust me, you'll love it. One thing to remember (and this is just my way of doing it, so if you ever meet a real painter, don't hesitate to listen to them too) is that areas that are highlights should be traced a little larger than the highlighted area. The reason being because when you go to paint with the watercolors, you'll want to try and match the transition from black to white (like on the exhaust pipes for instance) and that gradation, or "fade" will require that the line not be shown too much. You can certainly leave the pen showing when you're painting and not worry about it, or try to fade the shadows into the highlights and cover the lines as you find fit. No wrong way to do this, just fun to try different things :)

After all that, defining shapes and being aware of line thicknesses, solid or loose lines for depth and all the other fun stuff that goes into the drawing with ink, this is really the fruits of you labor. After the ink has dried, which should only take a few minutes from the last place you put you pen tip, you get to take the handy dandy white eraser again and clean up the whole drawing. Erase everything on the entire page and VOILA! All the pencil lines and smudges will be gone and you'll have a very dramatic little pen and ink drawing on a stark white piece of paper. Really fun to do the first time around :)

If you'll notice that I didn't ink the shadow underneath of the bike, that's because I plan on using it to paint over and keep the blurry quality of the shadow intact. This technique can also be used for highlights as well, but when you paint, remember that the water from the paint may wash out some of the leftover pencil lines as well.

Isn't it cool?! Very good, and now the really super awesome part! PAINTING!

One difference from this painting and the others in the motorcycle series is that this was done on watercolor paper and the other ten paintings were done using illustration board. The change in media should make for small adjustments but an interesting challenge as well :)

Enjoy!

Motorcycle Watercolor - Part Deux (2)

So today I'm tracing the images and transferring them to the watercolor paper. Now that the stencils are made from the print out and taped onto the paper, this is a breeze.

You can begin wherever you like, but I usually start out with the important parts of the painting. The subject matter in the foreground is the rider and his motorcycle. These are the time consuming parts, but also the most interesting, so be careful. Try to stick to tracing the shapes or "blocks" of color, and a few contour lines here and there will give you good reference points for later. Also, you don't have to press very hard when tracing, so try not to poke through the paper. (NOTE: If you used charcoal or very soft graphite (3B-8B) on the back of the printed image as the transfer material, you don't have to press very hard at all with the pencil. If you used something harder (graphite from 8H-B) then a little more pressure will be needed.)

Now that the bike and the rider are all traced, look over it quickly and make sure that nothing was missed. If you need to retrace anything, now is the time to do it, if not, scan the background and look at the objects.

Softly, scribble underneath the bike to add in the cast shadow.

The road lines in the foreground are in focus with the rider, so try to match the shape accurately without drawing too much attention to it. A little looseness will be good in this area to keep the attention on the rider and keep the viewer's eye from wandering too much.

Notice how everything is blurred? The rider is in motion in this picture, so you need to trace the objects in the background loosely. It'll give you a good head start when trying to paint a blurred background. When tracing the background, it doesn't have to be perfect, just enough to get the basic shapes out of it.

Now that you're done tracing, try to peel back the tape at a fairly sharp angle, while pulling out to the side. This will give you a chance to minimize ripping or tearing the paper and will also preserve the printed image should you need to start over with a new stencil.

Once you have the printed image removed from the paper, take a look at your transfer. The basic shapes are all outlined and there are a few contour lines to give you an idea of the depth of objects and the placement of shadows throughout. Also, if you missed an area here or there like I did (the handlebars, and the back wheel), this is an easy fix. Choose two objects close to the edge of the printed image and try to line them up with the traced image. Be careful as this can be kind of a pain to undo if you're a little off, but once the images are aligned again, just retrace the areas you missed :)

That's all for now. I'm going to go back and trace the other two stencils from the previous post.

Next will be the inking process, which is fairly easy and along the same lines as the transferring steps in this post. The big difference is that the inking process allows you to start being creative :)

Motorcycle Watercolor - Part 1

I have three pictures that I'm going to paint and send out to California :)

The easiest and fastest way of doing this with watercolors is to make a transfer, it works the same as Carbon Paper.

Here's the images printed off on standard printer paper, 8.5"x11".

Next, I'll scribble all over the back with a soft graphite pencil. When I trace the image from the front, the graphite leaves the transfer and sticks to the watercolor paper, leaving a light tracing for me to work with.

After the scribbling, tape the image to the watercolor paper with the lowest tack tape possible. Most art stores sell drafting tape which is very low tack (stick it to a piece of tissue paper and peel it off, and the paper won't rip). The blue tape I'm using here is "Delicate Surfaces" Painter's Tape. It's a larger roll, with a little more adhesion, but not enough to tear the paper, and it was cheaper :)

So there's the first step. The transfers have all been taped tot he watercolor paper and are ready to be traced. The tracing is fairly tedious and time consuming, so if you're trying this, prepare to be slightly annoyed lol

Once the tracing is done, the ink pens can be used to trace thick lines directly onto the watercolor paper, or you can jump straight into the painting! YEAH! ART IS AWESOME!!

ahem... airplane ride got postponed again, btw, there were some very strong winds this morning left over from a storm that had passed through late last night... LAME, try again next weekend.