Scum Choir

Mask in Motion

Here's my mask design idea. I'll probably change the ornate gashes. But this is the concept

I got these blank paper masks and started painting some skin texture.

next I'm going to start adding the ornamental gashes. 

Then it will basically be a long back and forth of repainting the s...

Mask Sketch

For me it seems like some of the best ideas come when I don't have time for them. Yesterday I was late for something and rushing out of the house. And then this mask idea just popped into my head. It seemed like the answer to the problem of the painting I'm working on, and to my mask prompt problem. A mask that looks like a real flesh, with the ornamental designs of the Venetian masks carved into the flesh. 

So I drew a really quick and sloppy sketch and wrote down the idea.

...

The Map, two masks and some hands

Many of the earlier mask thumbnails I did were a little too wild for the purposes of this painting. 

The thing about masks is that they are designed to disguise, In many cases they were used to symbolically transform. 

I love them all. That's why I drew them. 

But after looking at the original study again, I realized the mask needed to be more simple. More of a basic face. 

So I sketched some basic Venetian masks. these are just copies from referenc...

Composition Sketches

Some more sketches of this idea. Variations on the mask. I realized that I basically drew the same thing twice. So I think I'm settled on the composition and am going to focus on some of the details. Such as the mask, the hands, the costume, etc. 

I'm setting up a date to shoot more reference photos where I will focus on these things.

I've been collecting references of masks and trying to come up with an idea for that.

I might be a broken record here, but I'm happy I'm ...

Back from the Photographer

Sometimes I think about how much work goes into this. Not just the painting, but the framing, varnishing, photographing it. All that kind of work. It really makes me want to make work that is worth doing all that work for. Because if you're going to go through all that, you have to believe in it. Otherwise what are you putting all that effort toward?

This is Annie Appel. She's holding up a print she made to replicate the colors, that's the photoshop document open on her computer and tha...

Given over to the Bitter Flames

Here's some video from the sculpture night the other night.  So many people working on cool stuffs. 

Mine's definitely the least fun of all these creations. 

I just made a template to help me build other (hopefully) cool stuff off of.

Here's my little mannequin head thing.

Happy January 21st everybody

We painted gumball machines in art class ...

Mask sketches

A couple of mask sketches. These are copies from a book. I'm just looking for ideas at this point.

Happy Jan 20th Everybody

Last night I went to Sculpture night at the Hive.

It was great. I feel rejuvinated. I worked on a head mannequin type of thing that I'm going to use for future portrait painting references. More on that later.

Some people who do make up effects for film and tv came and worked on their sculptures. Then all of us noobs would ask them questions about...

Sketches for a New Piece

I have all these painting studies that I did last year that I'm going to start developing. I'm doing sketchbook sessions based on this painting:

I'm starting this one because the idea is strong, the colors are strong, and it's already a pretty decent painting.

When I was taking reference photos with my friend Jazmin for the cave painting I had her sit in the pose for this painting. She h...

Full painting timelapse of "The Cave"

Usually I like to edit these things down to 1-2 minutes. And I'll still do that for the social media and what not. But I wanted to show the Choir the whole thing.

I filmed everything with my regular camera and I had my phone set up behind that recording timelapses. 

My phone compresses timelapses into 20-30 second videos. If I record for 10 minutes or 4 hours the video will be 20-30 seconds. 

I typically end up with 5-7 minutes of timelapse footage from my phone. F...

My best painting

Well. About a month of development and prep and 2 and a half weeks of solid painting in 4-12 hour shifts. This is the biggest painting I've done in over 5 years. I haven't felt this good about a painting in a long time.

I think this is my best piece ever. I usually feel that way about my most recent painting. But this one feels a level up. I want to create a body of work at this level.

It's 24x36 inches. I don't have space for a lot of paintings this size but I really want to work...

Signing it as jolly as ever

I think I'm done. Signed it last night before bed. I did more looking at it today. I didn't touch it.

I took some pictures in its frame to send to the gallery.

I took it to the photographer tonight in San Pedro. More on that later. I'll have a window where I can add some finishing touches before I have to varnish it.

I thought about names all day. And I think the best option is just "the cave."

Happy January 16th Everybody

I didn't do much today. I tried to cle...

Looking at it

Today I mostly just looked at it. I made small changes where I saw fit. But I spend hours mostly just looking. It’s kind of hard to think of it as “working on a painting” if you aren’t doing a lot of painting. Just sitting and looking. But looking is just as much a part of painting as painting.

I need to get hi res quality photos or a scan of this. Today my friend Jana hooked me up with her photographer friend. She’s done photos for museums before. She’s only available tomo...

Who let the dogs out?

I think I’ve put 24 hours of work into this over the last 2 days. I’m trying to find a photographer to take pictures of it. I also have to varnish it. The varnish will take about 2 days to dry. Assuming I find a photographer, that will take a day. Given all that, I think I can only count on 1 or 2 more days of being able to work on this.

Sorry if that doesn’t make sense. My brain feels fried from staring at this all day.

Going to work on the background landscape more toni...

Closing in

I started putting in details and textures. For the first time since I started this painting, I feel confident that I can finish. The end is in sight. There will be more 8 hour shifts for the next few days. But It's just about zoning in and doing what I need to do. 

Happy Jan 13th Everybody

I drive with my foot up next to the steering wheel like this. It's super comforta...

Cute Killer Penguin First Color Pass

Very loose first color pass. Just wanted to add some color to everything at this point. It kind of flattens everything down a bit, so I'll have to go back in and bring the shadows and highlights back. 

From here on out that's what the process will consist of: Big layers of color, redefine the shadows, redefine the highlights. 

Color really changes the mood of a painting.

I've gotta come up with a name for this. 

Happy Jan 12th Everybody

Yesterday I...

Today I thought about the Donner party in the shower

I'm about to prepare my Sta-wet pallet and I'll start coloring this tonight. 

Mostly because of tick tick tick at this point. I've got less than a week to finish. 

But it also feels like a comfortable time to do it. 

Ideally I'd like to have a little more time to finish the grayscale painting. Do the details and all that. But like I said yesterday, a lot of that stuff I can do with the color as well.

Happy January 11th Everybody

I dreamed about C...

Texture on the Primordial Face

Today I spent a lot of time working on the texture on the "primordial face." I'm trying to get a good texture on it without losing the structure. I made some texture marks on the clay model to help me see the lighting effects on the little nooks and crannies but I didn't get too detailed with that. 

I'm getting to the point where I should start adding color. I'm doing a lot of back and forth stuff with details so I should probably be doing that with color. After I get tat texture f...

Dogmatic Surrealism

Still making the rounds with the gray scale. It's getting a little more detailed, a little more refined. Started adding some texture to places. The fabric on the figure in the very front is driving me a little crazy. I keep coming back to it and redoing it.  

Happy January 9th Everybody

I painted this all day. 

I also went to the grocery store. My drummer friend wasn't there today. 

I also practiced my Chopin piece on the guitar. I feel like I'm almost...

The Belly of the Whale

The Frame came today! I put the painting in it to make sure it would fit. It does. And it's cool to get an idea of what it will look like when It's finally done. 

I call this part of the process "making the rounds." Because I just keep bouncing around from area to area going over everything. Bringing out the highlights, knocking back the shadows. 

At this point I start to get way more confidence about painting. I feel comfortable painting over entire areas and then redoi...

The Landscape Zone

I zoned in to the background landscape today. I love doing landscapes. I think because they can just emerge out of nowhere. It's just natural for me to create random brushstrokes and be able to see hills and cliffs and valleys in it. I always feel like I'm in my zone when working on landscapes.

Here's the Full Piece at the moment

Happy January 7th Everyone

I'm writing this one ea...

Common Foolishness

Light, Shadow, Form

Making progress. Still sticking with the process as stated in the last post. At this point I'm just trying to get the values right. I started on the background a little bit. I'll probably try and finish the background and then go in for details and textures.

I don't know if you all want to see daily progress updates of this painting. I'm going to be pretty much exclusively working on it for 10 more days. At least. 

I could probably find old pieces of...

Update from the Cave pt. III

Painting. Finally. 

To be honest I was a little shy with the paint at first. I did all this sculpting and prep stuff and then I thought "I don't know where to start."

So I just started.

I started with some semi transparent highlights. 

I really wanted to do a proper grisaille style painting. For that, typically you leave the shadow areas a little warmer by the letti...

Update from the Cave Pt. II

After I started looking at the canvas with the reference photos I took, the ideas started coming into focus for me. 

Ideas about the design and about the themes.  Also ideas about how to sculpt the reference model.

This was one of those moments where it all just came flooding in really fast. 

It was like weeks of just grinding my gears and going nowhere and then all at once I know what to do.

I got out the sketchbook and did a very rough sketch of what I...

Update from the Cave pt. I

After I did all those little thumbnail sketches and color studies, I wanted to make some 3 dimensional references for the painting. 

This is not a very straight forward process for me. 

Typically when an artist creates reference for a painting, they are working from things that already exist. For example if an illustrator needs a horse in her illustration, she can look up references of a horse, and build a little model based on the reference. It's not easy, but it's stra...

New Prompt Announcement

EDIT: The original flyer said submissions due January 2nd. They're due February 2nd

We're doing masks! This was another tie breaker vote. I chose masks because it seems appropriate for that to be the first prompt of the year.

It would be awesome if everyone made an actual physical mask. But if you want to do a drawing or a painting of masks that's totally cool.

The mask on the flyer was one that I made for a contest at Blick back in 2017. For that one Blick provided us wit...

Insect Larvae

Sketches for the big cave painting. I don't want to describe the idea here because I feel like if I articulate it in words it will loose something. 

But I started looking at pictures of insect larvae, eggs, caterpillars etc. and I drew them on toned paper with black and white Prismacolor pencils.

The votes are in and I'll share the new prompt tomorrow.

Happy January 1st Everybody

Last night I put on Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen's New Years special that they do...

Inner Landscape Submissions

The prompt submissions this month made me remember why I love doing them. Good Job Everybody. I like seeing what everyone comes up with every month. But for this one especially I enjoyed the strength and variety of the submissions. Every new one that I opened made me go "yeeesssss."

Featured Piece: Lulu 

Instagram @biblicallyaccurateboygirl

Lulu Said: "an inner landscape exists in constant motion, so this was the outlet for a months worth of thoughts and feelings. som...

Last Painting Last Playlist

Well. We did it. This is my prompt submission for inner landscape.

I'm leaning towards the name "Necro Hermit Golden Sunshine."

Or just "Golden Sunshine." Or just "Necro Hermit." I don't know. thoughts?

I know I Just did a 20 minute video about this, but this year was pretty solid. I felt a lot of things start to click. Different parts of my personality and various interests and creative outlets started to harmonize.

Inner Landscape submissions are officially due. At t...

Last Video of the Year! Recital and Recap of 2023

In this video I do little (sort of) guitar recital, paint my inner landscape painting and recap the significant things that happened regarding my art life this year. 

This was a pretty positive year for me and my art. 

The most significant things were:

Going Viral in early 2023.

 I'm actually embarrassed by this one to be completely honest.  I'm embarrassed by the amount of space social media takes up in my life. I don't like social media. I consi...

Janky Set Up Automatic Drawing

I did some automatic drawing using the thumbnails I did as a loose reference for the gesture. 

I didn't think about what everything was. just let it flow through. Then I spent probably 30 minutes looking at it.

What I see, I will create reference material for. 

Yesterday I forgot to do a A happy December 29th to everybody

It was a great day too. I was just busy and wanted to post the poll real quick.

I took my grandma to hobby lobby. I gave her a gift...