looooving me is easy 'cause I'm beautiful!

     This is the only honest to goodness, actually attempting a photographic likeness, self-portrait I have ever done.  This was completed when I was 19 years old.  Early college, when I was all ambitious, arrogant and very serious about myself.  At the time I was all like, "I'm gonna draw myself using two mirrors, man!  That way what I draw will be an actual likeness of myself and not just a mirror image!"  And so I did.  I used two mirrors, concentrated very hard, narcissistically paid special attention to my eyes and pursed lips and, in the end, screwed the whole thing up by making the distance from the tip of my nose to my chin noticeably shorter than it actually is.  Eh, whatcha gonna do.  I was young, dumb and fulla cum.  The odds of me not screwing this up were pretty slim to begin with.

     Have a good new year.  I plan to get drunk and burn shit.

breakthrough

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     I was going to make this the first completed work for my Octoberween-Palooza-Ganza but I am simply not that patient.  I just had to share this one because it represents a breakthrough in my use of watercolors!

     This started out as another one of my nose bleed marker drawings but I decided to use some watercolor paper and do some experimenting while I was at it.  Once I finished the drawing and basic colors with the markers, I moved on to the watercolors, fully expecting everything to smear and bleed.  To my surprise, no such thing happened.  Instead, I was very pleased with how easy (and fast) it is to colorize large areas.  The watercolors are also very effective at deemphasizing some areas while making others pop more.  All in all, I'm very excited with this new technique!  Woot!

birds in the sky

     I drew a handful of these creatures during the Sharpie craze.  I think they were just attempts to recreate what I had done in eruption, one of my all-time favorite drawings.  I can only assume that this is also a self-portrait of sorts.  Not sure what it's all about but the birds in the sky in the background are nice.

     Oh well, that's all I've got.  Thanks for taking a look.

Mutant Santa...

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)

     ...in a sick twisted christmas complete with xmas trees, elf porn, and the everseeing eye...spying on all those children of the 3rd dimension.


- Credits -
Original artwork:  Me
Title and description text:  Mr. Gable (used without permission and hopefully forgiven!)
Color scheme/ideas inspired by:  Katn and Mr. Gable


     I don't normally do anything special for xmas but I just couldn't resist!  When I read the comments on hungry head they totally stuck in my head and I just ran with it.  The colorizing is a bit primitive and goofy but I just decided to have fun with it.  I did my best to achieve what was in the comments of the original post, turning the "xmas trees" green and going with the Grinch colors for Mutant Santa.

     I hope you all get a laugh from this one, that's what it's for!  This also turned out to be my 100th post!  Yay for me and Mutant Santa!

freak accidents

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     When I was finishing this up with the pole through the head I suddenly realized this reminded me of that whole Phineas Gage thing.  I guess it's fitting this reminded me of a freak accident.  I feel like most of my drawings are freak accidents in their own right.  I usually despise planning in my artwork and I often just go with the flow when it comes to the basic shapes and ideas.  When I'm lucky, the end result is like some sort of weird, happy accident or a sort of order from chaos, if you will.

buggy bugs

     Back in ye olde days of the Sharpie craze I drew this little pair of bugs perched on some dragon breath.  They seem to have a definite enthusiasm to them, like they're at a football game or something and they're all like, "Woooo!  Go Packers!!"

cranky

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Here is my latest.  I seem to be digging on this exposed, bloody brain stuff.  Also seemed to have thrown in a gratuitous peen for good measure.

     Man, I've been cranky lately.  I think it's because the Thanksgiving break, pleasantly snuck up on me like ninja and now the Christmas break is on its way here like a sloth on quaaludes.  Yeeaarrgh, I'm impatient!  Oh well, I guess things could be worse.

first page

     This is the first page of the sketchbook I started over 7 years ago in the midst of the Sharpie craze in full swing.  This is the very same sketchbook that I'm just a few short pages away from finishing here in the near future.  I guess it's not much of a milestone but it is yet another one of the fascinating bits of trivia I try to give to you, my gentle and attractive readers.

the heart in my chest

     Here's my latest completed work in the new nose bleed style.  This turned out to be an amalgam of past and present components.  I also noticed during the early stages of this drawing (while the bones were just hanging in space, before I added the fuzzy connective tissue) some definite foothead influences.  I'm not surprised.  If you've read my Links tab, you know I find his work inspiring.

     Anyway, I also did some experimenting with my new fine tip color markers, which was fun.  There's nothing like a brand new marker, let alone a whole pack!  Oh well, not much more to say.  Thanks for taking a look.  Enjoy!

rygar hanging

     More stuff from my past.  The creature at the bottom was probably the result of me playing the original NES Rygar game too much.  Looks a little like one of the level bosses.  I loved Rygar.  There was no time limit, no score, just a quest to complete and you could take your own sweet time.  My kinda game.

     Anyway, I'm sure there's lots of symbolism in this one but I've never really gave it much thought.  Maybe the little guy hanging below and inside the powerful beast man is supposed to be my vulnerable, inner self, preferring to die rather than face the difficulties and pain of life.  Or maybe he's just too tired from playing Rygar.

spire of doom

     It's the Spire of Doooom!  It reaches up into the skyyyyyyy!  It's opening a portal to helllllll!  So Satan can screw us with his cooooock!

     Okay, I'll stop now.  I only drew one of these things, unless this counts as a Spire of Doom.  I really need to get back to these fast drawings.  Lately, I've been bogged down with fussy details and color experimentation.  I think it's getting on my nerves.

blood brain

     Drawn in between fire woman and brain fire,  it took me a little while to warm up to this one.  I went ahead and put some finishing touches on it tonight and deemed it worthy of posting.  I guess I wasn't real wild about this one when I first worked on it due to the fact that it felt like work.  I basically had to draw this twice.  I laid down the basic shapes with one of my gray tone markers and then went back over it with the black, fuzzy stuff.  No one to blame but myself but that's never stopped me from getting cranky before.  Oh well, maybe I was trying to tell myself something.

obstructed view

     Here's my latest nose bleed stuff.  This is too fresh for me to say anything insightful about but I'm guessing the obstructed view of the eyeball might have something to do with the floater I've had in my left eye for about a year now.  It's like having a permanent piece of lint floating around inside your eyeball.  The eye doctor said it was a pretty common occurrence for near-sighted eyes.  I can at least take comfort that it won't happen in my far-sighted right eye (not kidding).  When getting my prescription filled I was once told by the office tech who was copying down my prescription onto the form for the glasses that it reminded them of a test question they once had in school.  I believe them too.  My left lens is concave and the right convex, making one eye look smaller than the other.  Sheesh, I'm surprised they're both the same color!

     And I've just rambled on for a whole fucking paragraph.  I'll shut the hell up now.  Thanks for stopping by Vincent's Handmade Eyeballs.

crazy cats

     Here's some quick, cat cuties from my past.  This is a sample grab off of one of the three pages that were in between this and this, believe it or not.  I've always been a cat person so they tend to creep into my work in one way or another.  I'm all like, "Death, skeletons, death, insanity... Aww!  Lookit da cute kittehs!  Puking, porn, death, porn, porn..."

hot head

     I think I'm getting more comfortable with this whole color thing.  I recently bought some fine point markers with a little broader range of colors.  Hopefully I'll be able to reign all this in and start getting closer to producing the vivid images I have floating around in my head.

     I've also decided to tentatively name this new, developing style "nose bleed" since that's the drawing that started it all.

protrusions

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     These protrusion, horn-type things show up a lot throughout the Sharpie craze.  Not sure what they are but I enjoyed drawing them.  Also threw in some martial art-type hand gestures for some reason.

chicken skellie

     I think it's a chicken skellie.  Some sort of bird-like creature anyway.  Not really sure what the hell is going on in this one, I just like how my chicken skellie turned out...

     Or maybe it's a turkey skellie!  Ha!  This was a 100% by chance coincidence that this post fell on today of all days.  I've had this sitting around in my drafts for about a week now.  Complete accident, I tell you.  Anyway, here's some more incidental stuff from the backstory of ye olde Sharpie craze and I'm pretty sure it wasn't drawn on Thanksgiving, but who knows!

     Thanks to all of you who've taken an interest in my efforts and have a great holiday.

brain fire

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Well, it was bound to return sooner or later.  Here's my latest crazed death porno thing.  When you look at this and nose bleed I think the beginnings of a new style might be forming.  We'll have to wait and see.

chalkboard nude

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     When I first completed this drawing I recall it making me pretty uncomfortable at the time.  I think it was because it was a little too honest of a self-portrait in some ways.  Obviously, I'm much more comfortable with it now, although I'm still not sure what the whole tornado-like thing is supposed to be.

     As far as the digital effects go, this was another one of my happy accidents.  After a quick auto-adjust of the colors I flipped the negative tweak and, whamo, chalkboard!  Who knew?

fire woman

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Someone once said that Lynyrd Skynyrd had only two songs:  Freebird and Not Freebird.  Similarly, I think The Cult also had only two songs:  Fire Woman and Sounds Like Fire Woman, am I right?  Anyway, here's my fiery woman.  I guess she's more of a monster than a woman but, hey, I'd hit it.

     This started out as another one of my super hairy creature drawings but then I started fiddling around with the colors post scan.  Honestly, I kind of stumbled upon this color scheme but it really caught my eye so I ran with it.  I'm glad I did because it completely transformed the drawing.  The fuzzy suddenly turned into flames.  I couldn't have planned this better in a million years.  I love happy accidents!

nose bleed

     I'm pretty pleased with this one.  This past weekend was pretty good for me and I think it shows in this drawing.  Kinda has an Alan Alda look to him.

peen, hand, tongue and mouth

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     This is one of my favorites mainly due to the stylized peen I drew up there in the corner.  I'm also proud of myself for turning what started out as a random squiggle into the pointing hand at the bottom.  Oh sure, I also drew a snorting monster with a vagina ear that's about bite the hand that licks it but who cares?  Peen and hand, man!

     Heh, maybe I need to go jerk off.

teen scream

     Here's a moldy-oldy for all ya'lls.  This is the oldest drawing that I still have lying around.  It's been creased, torn and abused by time.  It expresses my teenage angst very well and I drew this when I was 17 years old.

     That was 23 fucking years ago.  My wife and I started having the hot, naked, sexors 21 years ago and if fate had taken a different turn we could have a child right now who'd be just about ready to graduate college.  And then we'd have to kill them.  Considering how college turned out less than successful for us without kids, it would have been an even bigger quagmire of despair, failure and disappointment if we had been raising a child.

     Anyway, that's enough about that.  Thanks for your time, folks.  I appreciate it.

hungry head

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Last night I just realized that this drawing is a self-portrait.  When I was perusing more of my Sharpie craze stuff, trying to decide what to post next, I noticed this drawing was immediately followed by this.  It's almost like the above work is an unconscious representation of the state of my mind that led to the crazed death porno work.

     Here it is, over 7 years later and I'm still having to figure this shit out.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #6

Everybody do The Michigan Raaaaaag!

     I went ahead and ran with the advice Gable gave me on FSR #5.  I also gave this guy a top hat but I have no clue what he did with it.  Maybe the head-snakes ate it.

culmination

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     While I do have more Sharpie craze works to come from my past and probably more new entries into that style yet to be drawn, this particular drawing is the very last entry from the initial run in my 30's.

     It's sort of a culmination of the style in some ways.  It's got the skellie hand, the sex parts, the crying, puking and drooling.  Also feathery-type stuff and crackling energy or force fields and the ever-fussy details and fuzzy bits all in one convenient package.  I remember trying to scan this bitch of a drawing years ago when I first attempted a web page of sorts for my artwork.  I just couldn't get the two halves to line up properly and it really pissed me off at the time.  Last night, however, I was finally able to get it to work.

     Anyhoo, thanks for taking a look.  Stay tuned, as I have another entry into the redux series coming soon.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #5

     Here's my latest.  Still getting Halloween out of my system...  or maybe I'm just missing it.  Yeah, I'm missing it (sigh).  Sheesh, I'm pathetic.

     Anyway, this skellie seems to be dancing.  And smiling.  And having a good time.  What the hell, man!?  I seem to be losing my morbidity or some shit.  I must be fluxing.  Meh.

art and horror

     If you haven't already, take a look-see at my new Links tab and don't forget to stop by A.D. Art and check out Aquilus' totally boss jack-o-lanterns (best viewed full size and full screen).  Now for my latest nonsensical ramblings:


     This drawing is one I could've easily used for my Octoberween efforts if my hand had taken longer to heal up.  It seems the majority of my art quite easily fits into the horror category, although it took a little while for me to warm up to the idea.

     I'd always thought of my art (particularly the Sharpie craze) as my own personal confrontation with my inner demons and emotional issues.  Not a horror movie full of screams and gore but an exploration of my most secret desires involving sex, violence, isolation, anger, regret, jealousy, etc.  When you think about it, though, that kind of content and more is the basis of all good horror.  I guess I'm just too close to my art the vast majority of the time to see it objectively.

manimal cyborg dad

     Here's some more of my drawing backstory from high school.  Strong dad influences in this one (and, for some reason, a dash of Marlon Brando).  Also some beastman type stuff going on in there, probably from watching too many episodes of Manimal.

     Anyway, my dad got one of his eyes shot out with a bee-bee gun as a kid.  He apparently had a glass eye for a while when he was younger but by the time I knew him he was sporting an eye patch.  That combined with his dark, curly hair gave him a decidedly pirate look.  Thinking about it now, he would've looked much more awesome if he'd had a semi-translucent plate riveted over his bad eye, as pictured above.  Would've given him a much cooler, cyborg, road warrior look.

pumpkin guts, beer and shadowzone

     Booyah!  It's Hallowfuckingween!  This makes my 31st Halloween-specific post this month containing original artwork by yours truly and I couldn't be more tickled with myself!

      What I have for you today is the result of my latest pumpkin carving efforts and a little amateur video.  From the makers of Flickering In The Dark, comes a new short film:



The players:



Corey Feldpumpkin


Jack "I Love My Job" O'Lantern
     I apologize for the embarrassing names but my brain is a bit fried from having to work Saturday, two beers, way too much Chinese delivery and my first viewing of the Full Moon classic, Shadowzone.  Not a bad flick, by the way.  Some pretty decent sci-fi, horror action plus boobies and wang.

     Well, my hands still smell like pumpkin guts and I'm awfully greasy from a day's work so I'm going to go stagger into the shower.  Thanks so much for stopping by and have an amazing Halloween.

the end is nigh!

     Well, here we are.  The month is all but gone and it looks like I'm going to make it.  What started out as a half-hearted, "Yeah, sure, I'll participate in the Halloween blogging festivities" has turned into quite the experience for me.

     I've thrown myself into my artwork this month.  I've learned I can apply a kind of work ethic to my art.  I've made new contacts with fellow artists, made new net friends and had a blast in general.  I want to thank everyone for their support and for the great content on your respective blogs.  I also appreciate you guys putting up with my sometimes awkward comments.  This is my very first blog and my Net Fu is rather weak when it comes to the blogging community in general.

     Anyway, I've rambled on long enough.  I just want to say it's been great and I'm already looking forward to next year.  Tomorrow I plan to carve my final pumpkins of the season with pics and video to follow!

sorority death party

     Loosely inspired by Zombie Rust's Uncle Satan, I just finished this minutes ago because I am awesome (and humble).  I can still smell the marker fumes...  and cantaloupes are walking on my eyes!

     This kinda looks like a scene from a cheesy horror movie with a floating, hairy skull demon terrorizing a sorority pool party, bake sale, wet t-shirt contest.  Written, directed and produced by Charles Band, of course.

     Holy bejeezus crap!  There's only two more days left in October.  I am both relieved and saddened by this fact.

demon bird

(click for full size)
     Here's my latest watercolor experimentation.  I actually went out and bought some 90lb. watercolor paper and I have to say it makes a big difference.  You can work a little wetter and don't have to wait for stuff to dry before adding layers.  Also, much less warping when dry.

     As for content, this didn't turn out exactly like I wanted.  I'm still quite the novice painter and a wet, soft brush doesn't lend itself as easily to the hard, fast lines I'm accustomed to in my marker drawings.  While this demon bird creature doesn't look friendly, he's definitely not as menacing as I had hoped for.  Looks more like a Mardi Gras parade costume than a voracious demon from hell attempting to devour your soul.  Oh well, I'm still learning.

     I hope Demon Bird has added a little fuzzy, feathery interest to your day as we slide into the final days of October.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #4

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Much like the undead creatures it depicts, this damn redux series just won't die (god, I hate typing that subject line!).  Anyway, thanks to God, Greyhound and Tim Thomerson my drawing/painting hand is feeling just fine and here's my latest, hot off the scanner.

     Maybe I'm just flattering myself but I think this fuzzy skellie in particular is the most badass of the redux series thus far.  I was very happy to be creating something new for the final stretch of Octoberween and I put my enthusiasm to work, giving this guy all the energy I could.

     Tune in tomorrow for my latest watercolor creation.  Woot!

skull ghosts and dollman

     This one just screamed out to be negative-ized so that's what I did.  Had to experiment for a minute to get the right shade of color that's the opposite of the nice electric blue you see here but I think it worked out well enough.  The blue makes my little skully guy look a bit ghost-like.

     Last night I gave my drawing hand a good hot soak while watching Dollman and I think the raw power and undeniable charisma of Tim Thomerson helped my hand heal up a bit.  I hope to resume my Octoberween drawing efforts tomorrow!

plantar fasciitis and hairy monsters

     Meet my crouching monster, with his winning smile, tufts of attractive hair and spiky boots.  Incidentally, this is also one of the ways to cure your plantar fasciitis, except you should be on a flat surface and not on the crushed body parts of those who would defy you.

     Thought I'd fiddle around with this one digitally to at least give it a new look and some color.  Kinda low-key tonight so I'll stop here.  Thanks for taking a look.

my mind and a flying brick

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Here's another one of my India ink experiments, including a ghoul face, a spider type thing and a, well... a flying brick.  Yeah, I dunno, man.  Sometimes I wonder about myself.

     Despite the self-mockery, this is definitely one of my personal favorites.  The way the ghoul seems to drool a stream of consciousness of disfigured shapes, vomiting mouths, tortured mini-skeletons and, of course, peen.  There might also be a slight amount of bitterness being expressed with the vomiting happy birthday creature.  Just another day in the life of my mind from the past decade.

     I have to say I'm enjoying using some of my past works for the current run of my Octoberpalooza.  I'm definitely going to set aside and save up images all year long for next year.  Makes for a much more relaxed celebration.

i'm not scared, my eyes always look like this

     Drawn during the same session as my Ghoulie Ghouls, I didn't include this one in the series since it just turned out looking more like some scared dude than a ghoul.  I guess somebody had to be frightened of all the ghouls I was drawing at the time.

destructive creation

(ADULT CONTENT BELOW)


     Draw shortly after Torso Man, this is early evidence that I was already in the habit of artistically tearing apart my previous creations.  I didn't realize it at the time, of course, but looking back it's quite obvious.  This 20/20 hindsight, however, wasn't really developed until recently.

     Earlier this month, when I posted Bone Pile, I received some very valuable input in the comments which helped me realize my tendency towards ripping apart and possibly reassembling my creations.  While the thought of destruction and creation both being parts of the same whole isn't an unfamiliar concept to me, having that dynamic illustrated to me via my own artwork was quite an illuminating experience.  In short, blogging rules.

      Haha, Octoberween!  I've made it this far.  Just nine more posts and you'll be my bitch!  Woot!

memories of feathers

     Well, the bad news is my right hand is starting to weaken from all the jerking off drawing I've been doing this month.  The good news is I dug deep into my sketchbooks and found a few more unposted past works that can be safely put into the horror/Halloween category.  They may not be new but they're at least new to you, and that's fair play in my book.  At this point in the month I'm not looking to place, I just hope to finish the marathon.  If that means I have to end up using my left hand (the stranger) to complete a few drawings then so be it.

     This work is among some of the last I completed during the initial run of the Sharpie craze in my 30's.  I may have to revisit the quickly drawn feathers on either side of this guy's face.  I'd almost forgotten how much I enjoyed that sort of thing.  Perhaps I'll try to do a fallen angel theme, building on the idea I created with dickhead.  It's a thought.

crazy bones

     First off, I'd like to welcome the new followers I've gotten his month.  It's great to connect with people of similar interests and pursuits!


     I've decided to go ahead and end the redux series since I seem to be drifting away from actual skellies (not to mention typing that thing out in the subject line every time was starting to get on my nerves).

     What I have for you today, while fuzzy, is really more reminiscent of the more general category of the Sharpie craze than anything else.  Not strictly part of the craze, this was definitely drawn in the same sort of style.  I also find it encouraging that I was able to think of the idea of the bones converging on the skull in the center before I started the drawing.  Most of the time my drawings just sort of happen and I don't know what I'm going to end up creating until it's done.

     I better stop rambling for now.  Thanks for taking a peek.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #3

     More of a skully than a skellie, Bonehead here was drawn using seventeen different types of llamas.  Or maybe it was just three different shades of gray markers and two sizes of black markers.  I'll let you decide.

     As for content, perhaps the bones on either side of the skull are depicting the self-imposed pressure that I have on myself this month.  I know that sounds a bit like whining but I'm going to keep up the pace, as I find it interesting that I am able to apply a kind of work ethic to my artwork lately.  This is something I've never really had the desire to do before and it sheds a new light on possibilities regarding my life as an artist.

     Enough about me.  I hope Bonehead has brought a little fuzzy light into your fine October day.  Thanks and enjoy.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #2

     This skellie ended up being a bit more fleshy than what I usually draw.  He also seems to be happily doing aerobics or some shit.  What the hell, man!?  I just drew this yesterday, so hell if I know what's going on with it.

     There's more to come in this series.  Stay tuned as I continue to square off with Octoberween.

fuzzy skeletonians redux #1

     Our hero, Kung Fu Skellie, leaps through the fuzzy opening of the cave and readies himself for battle!  Confronted by his adversary, he assumes the stance of his chosen Hairy Bone style!  The fuzzy opening of the cave suddenly becomes moist and begins to close in around him and...  and...

     And I think it's quite obvious what the central theme of this drawing is.  I'm nothing if not consistent.

     Anyway, here's my latest series.  It's nothing too ground breaking for me but I wanted to revisit my fuzzy skellies because I enjoy drawing them and I wanted to continue working with my new gray tones.  I'm not sure how long this current run will last but I have at least one more after this one.  I'll keep posting them as long as they keep coming to me.

color tasks me, and i shall have it

     No... Color. The game's not over.  To the last, I will grapple with thee!  From hell's heart, I stab at thee!  For hate's sake...  I spit my last breath at thee!

     I'll admit it.  Color is the great white whale to my Khan of art.  It is something that I am both very familiar with yet seem to know nothing about.  Sorta like the tag line for the Othello board game:  "A minute to learn, a lifetime to master."  What you see above is one of my Halloween decorations I threw on the scanner and added a dark t-shirt over it to give it a nice background.  While I think it turned out well, it definitely wasn't an easy or pleasurable process.  All of these colors were experimented with and hard fought choices on my part.  However, this is something I need to do more often if I am to have any hope of bringing my artworks to the level I aspire to.

     This started out as a little color experimentation and ended up what is now due to my still having Andy Warhol on the brain from yesterday's post.  I know there's differing opinions regarding Warhol, and with good reason, but I'm proud to say that I am definitely of the slant that the man was a fucking genius.  He understood the very essential, basic nature of art and artists.  He was a master of color, repetition and design.  He also exhibited an insanely firm grasp and awareness of subjectivity in his art, giving it such a global accessibility and appeal.  If I can achieve in my art even a small fraction of the scope that Warhol was able to I would be very satisfied.

     I'll wrap this up by saying that I hope my Octoberween efforts so far this month have been worth your time.  Thanks for stopping by and taking an interest.

flickering in the dark

     As promised yesterday, here's the video. Nothing too exciting, just some nice, soothing flickering:

     The roaring sound in the background is the air purifier in the living room.  I just let the camera sit there and tried to draw out the jack-o-lantern's very soul!  Sorta like one of those Andy Warhol living portrait films where he persuaded people to just sit in front of the camera and do whatever they wanted.

first of the season!

     Guess what I did.  Yessiree, I carved me up a pumpkin!  Here's the photo, as promised.  I wish I could jam this whole thing into my wireless adapter and send you all a real life copy of it so you can smell the fresh pumpkin rind and see the candles flickering.  Actually, I also shot some video tonight and as soon as I can get that bad boy uploaded to the YouTube you actually will be able to see the candles flickering!  We'll just have to wait for them to invent the Scenternet and YouStink before you can experience the fresh smell of pumpkin rind.  Oh wait!  You can carve your own pumpkin, right?  Right!?  Go carve and pumpkin and post the dang picture/video!  Go, man, go!

pumpkin patch, 3 of 3

     While using my new gray markers my mind was on the subject of color tones.  I noticed how stacking progressively darker tones on top of lighter tones was having an interesting effect and, boing!, I remembered an exercise in one of my early art classes where we were instructed to find the gray tone of a color using only pencil.  I think we used some color magazine photos to work from and our work was checked by the teacher making a non-color photocopy of the magazine images and comparing the gray tones we drew to the gray tones in the photocopied image.  All in all, a very good exercise, very memorable.

      Anyway, I got a little ambitious and thought about what would happen if I reversed that scenario?  What if I tried to see only the gray tones in colors and attempted to draw with them as though I was completely color blind?  As it was, I was stacking two or three gray tones before finishing with black on the previous images in this trilogy, therefore, two or three colors should be used in this experiment.  To keep things fairly simple I settled on the three primary colors: yellow, red and blue.  Yellow obviously having the lightest tone and blue the darkest.  I started with yellow (bad for the eyes, by the way) and began stacking, finishing with black.  What you see above is the end result.  I'm happy to say I think I succeeded.  If you grayscale this image it looks pretty similar to the others.  Yay!  Go me!

     Well, I'll stop wanking now and let you enjoy the final entry in my latest Octoberween trilogy.

pumpkin patch, 2 of 3

     After my initial experimentation with my newly acquired gray tones I settled down a bit and made these little guys.  Despite my best efforts they seemed to have turned out more adorable than creepy.

     Adorable because they seem to be honestly scared.  Frightened out of their cute little pumpkin skulls.  So often in real life fear manifests itself as anger, intolerance, stubbornness or other similar emotions that so conveniently feign strength.  People often choose to lie and appear strong, while the more natural reaction of honest fear is often regarded as a sign of weakness.

     Feh, I'll stop philosophizing and just say that's one of the great things about Halloween.  We get to go around and be scary and get scared and don't have to worry about what people think of us.  And it's fun.

pumpkin patch, 1 of 3

     I went out this weekend and got some new markers to increase my selection of gray tones.  Another purchase included my first pumpkin of the season!  Woot!

     What you see above is the combination of the aforementioned purchases.  I know it looks like I drew this bad boy from memory but I actually had my pumpkin in front of me while I was drawing.  It's just that the damned thing is so perfectly round and generic!  I'll be sure to get one with more character next time.  Anyhow, I think the gray tones worked decently and while this isn't the most inspired drawing I've ever done I think it has some merit.

     Tune in tomorrow for a more interesting use of my new markers.