Stuff I didn't feel like putting on Faceplant

Hi y'all. Just thought I'd share a bit of the geekyness I'm experiencing today. Most people know how I love to listen to the radio. More specifically 99.3 the Fox. Well I've gotten a little brave and decided to e-mail the morning show with my comments concerning a couple songs that are in rotation now. First was the new Alice In Chains tune Check My Brain. In my opinion it sounded like it was recorded on or at least played back on a turntable that had a rubber band instead of a proper drive belt. Now I'm not saying that's a bad thing, in fact I think its way cool, but perhaps when I wrote them they thought that's what I meant. If that wasn't enough I also made comments concerning the new Nickelback tune Burn I Down. I seem to remember hearing an interview where they originally thought the song would be about some girl getting kidnaped but after a meeting with the producer they decided on a extensive rewrite. Something about wanting to pump my fist in the air and crack open a beer if i recall correctly. So listening to the song cranked in the van cruising to work it seemed to me that at the start of the guitar solo there sounded like a muffled female voice muttering something. I could not help but describe it as similar to when I was a kid and I'd have friends over playing in the basement. Mom would call out outside the door to the stairway to the basement and ask if we were all ok and or let us know snacks where ready. Now once again I'm not saying thats a bad thing, but, I'm hoping that I'm not crazy and some people will agree thats what it sounds like. I guess it might simply be a result of the guitar effects in a crazy overdub or something purely coincidental. At any rate I wasn't expecting them to read my e-mail on air. Imagine my suprise hearing my name mentioned on air. SQUEEEEEEE that totally made my day.

At lunch time I also got to thinking (scary huh) what if instead of taking guitar in highschool I took drama instead. My biggest fear was how would I do in that class. I seem to think they would have an exercise where the teacher would ask the students to act like spoons. Initially I thought my spoon is an inanimate object so I'd simply lay still on the floor. Or perhaps the point was to imagine it was a living thing and my task was to personify it. I'd be sleeping soundly in my lunchbox when suddenly some guy picks me up and shoves me into some yogurt. He then is just about to put me in his mouth when I sputter and shout at him "Woah buddy you got some nasty jungle breath!". I suppose that could be used as a concept for some mouthwash commercial with the tag line "Nine out of ten spoons approve" and I'd be the guy in the spoon costume with the Don Cherry thumbs up in a cameo on the screen.

Like I said "Geeky" huh
Ok Bye now.

Azumanga Daioh vs Questionable Content fanart

Hiya. Its been a while but anyway here goes.
I did a drawing based on the concept of "What if Azumanga Daioh came to visit Questionable Content?"
Here's what i came up with. Ink Only



and also the same but colored



Laterz

New Pics From New Camera

Hi y'all. As promised here are a few new pics. Starting with the following one



This is Samantha Joan Carless. She was born August 15th 2008. I took this picture with our Fuji camera using the Potrait mode. I see how that might enhance the skin tones but the effect overall seems to add too much yellow. So the next pic was taken using the Natural light mode.



As you can see it seems to have worked better. The light source was a window that faced east but with overcast skies. And finally one more pic.



This is Renee handing Samantha to meet Colette for the first time. Of all the photos I took that day I think this one came out the best. I really enjoy how the lighting worked and the colors matched so close to how I saw it. The overall composition overwhelms me with emotion. If ever I where to enter an amateur photo contest this one would totally be my pic to enter. Well there's plenty more to come but that's all for now. G'night y'all.

OMG I almost forgot I had this

Hi y'all, as the title of this post would suggest I've almost totally neglected this blog thingy. Some things are coming up though. If you are on facebook it'll be no suprise that we are going to have a baby anytime soon. In prep for that we got a new camera and I'm hoping to start putting up pics and stuff here for the benefit of those who are not on facebook (or faceplant as Opa calls it). In the mean time here's a pic of me at the parade on Canada Day in Steveston.

This pic was taken by Kristin with our old camera (Kodak EasyShare C315). I'm holding the new camera (Fujifilm FinePix S1000fd). Its sooooooooo much better than the old one. Even though it's not a SLR camera, it has a lot of neat features. I hope to learn to use them all. I did shoot almost 4 Gigs worth that day and with a varity of settings. Most if not all of them turned out good. Like this one.

Of course I could always crop and zoom that one but its ok for posting on here. Ok thats all for now. Maybe i'll take a photography course through Parks and Rec. I leave you with one more pic i'll call after the parade....

Back the Time Machine Up Part 2

June 9th.
Our newlywed friends just got back from their honeymoon so we go out to their place to visit. We did not tell the girls right away that we were really going with them to Disneyland. When we got to Dave and Lana's we only told them we where going to a place with shopping and amusement rides. We passed Bellis Fair which had rides and shopping but when the girls protested we told them there was a bigger and better place ahead. When we passed Puyallup they really started to complain, but once again we told them there is a bigger and better place ahead. We stopped in Seattle for lunch and decided to let the girls off the hook but not until after lunch. After lunch we kept on down the I-5 then the girls where really getting upset. I couldn't stand it either so I begged the rest of the adults to stop and let them know. We stopped in Tacoma and finally told them. This is what they looked like at that point.
Kristin was in tears. Colette looked skeptical. They were fine the rest of the way there. In California we seen lots of Palm trees. Colette still the skeptic wondered if the trees where "real" so I had to reassure her..
This was a "real" tree. We had lots of fun. Only 2 bad times at Disneyland. The first was the lineup for the new Finding Nemo ride. Even with our early entry passes we had to wait 3 hours.
Worst lineup EVAR! The ride itself was really cool and worth the wait. The other thing that really wigged me out was Space Mountain. In a word it'd be "vertigo". On the last day there the girls where starting to get tired but thats probably because they where also hungry.

Mommy to the rescue.

And there you go. Thats all for today.

Back the time machine up. Part 1

April 28th, The Big Day. After months of planning the day finally arrived. It was Lana and Dave's Wedding. Both my girls and my wife where in the wedding party. The girls, flower girls. My wife, a bridesmaid. I was just there to drive them around. Here are some pics


The Chapel at rehearsal.


My girls and wife just before the ceremony.


The Bride and Groom.

Thats all for today more updates to come.

Summer Was a Blur

Well well, what a time it has been since my last post. No pictures or drawings to post this time. The board i was designing on my last post. Has since been laid to rest. I've decided its one thing to take some time and try to design something but quite another to produce one, let alone one that works. I also made the mistake of asking my manager for some lamination pouches. Thats when he found out that it was I who was making the PTHell name badges. It wasn't so bad that I did a parody of our companies logo. Nor was it bad to put cartoony versions of staff on them with nicknames. The thing he objected to was that I also included a functional barcode that they could scan to make use of systems here. Well it crushed me. That was the whole point of making them. I promised not to make anymore save for myself only and agreed to refer anyone who wished to get a duplicate of their barcode to the manager. Thats all for today. More updates too come soon.

Getting board at work (Pun intented)

Hey'all i'd like to say how busy i've been but its not really true. I have kept myself busy by playing Mr. Engineer. I've put together a printed circut board design and schematic to go with but all i need now is to write some assembler code. Here's what the top silkscreen and pads will look like.

Not much to look at now but when I can afford to get it made i'll post more including production photos.

Another One

...Whew talk about whirlwind like the last few weeks. What I failed to mention in my last 2 posts is that on New Years Eve we were headed to a friends place when our beloved "Buggy"s transmission fell apart. Now that its been fixed I can't help but be thankful. All this artwork and other stuff helped some of the time go by and kept me distracted enough so I didn't get stressed out over it. Anyway that aside i give you "Saggy" well to be fair she's not really saggy its just that her real name could be shortened to sound something like that.



...uh huh it was another photo ref one. Some people might argue that its cheating. In my defense i'd say that since I'm the one who took the photo then i have the right to alter the image so long as the people in the pictures don't mind me using their likeness its all good. Of course i'd welcome some comments on this so feel free to click on the comments link below and let me know. Ok thats it for tonight.

Dudes

...hiya. Work is picking up again and so are the requests for pics. Here are my 3 most recent ones.



...I don't have any nicknames for these guys. For the purpose of dropping a hint i will however call the above guy Kareem Abdul-Jabar and the guy below i'll call Willy Wonka.



...these were both done from photo refs. Seems that they turn out a little closer to the actual persons likeness. Compare them to this next one. I did without a photo reference.



...stuff like eye, hair and nose details are most noticeable. but after poor "El Marr" i've decided to stick with a solid skin tone. I do however like the way i've rendered hair and wardrobe. It helps to make use of plenty of layers. By the way her nickname is Souixie. More to come perhaps tommorow.

Happy New Year

...so like happy New Year y'all. Oh man my keyboard is starting to scare me. It looks like it could use a hot soapy bath. Of course i'm not shure it will work afterward so i'm afraid to try. In other news we made 2 gingerbread houses. The first one was a kit that the girls helped decorate.



...The second one I made from scratch. I used a 3 by 5 index card as a template and cut 4 identical panels. The front and back panel i still used the 3 by 5 card but cut the rooflines by hand. It turned out like this.



...i guess next time i'll make the roof panels slightly larger than the walls. That way i can avoid having to go all Mike Holmes on it.



..."i'm going to have to tear it all down" LOL

Merry Christmas

...just in time for Christmas i've done a self potrait of sorts. Here I am rockin out. I borrowed the basic shape and pose from the guitarist on Weird Al's video for "I'll Sue Ya" the differences are as follows. I don't wear glasses. I don't have a goatee. My tie is faded black or dark grey if you will. My pants are faded black or grey if you will. My guitar is red. Oh and finally I have a blue gradient fill as a background instead of the star spangeld banner and an eagle.


...more pictures to come as i also have some more people at work who have requested one of those PTHell photo ID barcode thingys i've now known at work for producing. One guy i admit i cheated on though. It just so happens he shares the same name as a recent Dreamworks animation character. So for his ID card i just used a pic of that character.(ps ie Madagascar the lion) Ok thats all for tonight.

Back to School Back to Blog

...hi y'all. No new drawings yet. I've been on a kind of hiatus for the latter part of this summer. But things are looking up. I have a few ideas together for 3 strips but haven't the time to put into them so far. Things are starting to settle into a routine here and i'm hoping to get working on the comic strips soon. Aside from that I also have an idea for the car. A while ago i scratched up the middle of the dash. On the weekend i decided to try and fix that so i took off one piece and used some wet sandpaper 800 grit and sanded it smooth. Then i let it dry. then noticed that the plastic was more grey then black underneath so i decided to repaint it. 2 coats of grey primer. 3 coats of metallic blue. Looks ok but perhaps next payday if its sunny i'll add 2 or 3 coats of high gloss clear on top then that should make it "POP". If when done i'll post some pictures. Besides i gotta fix the one vent. i think a lever came loose from the dial. The whole centre consloe comes off as one piece so it won't be too hard. Just gotta be gentle because its all plastic. Thats quality german engineering for ya. ok thats all for now.

Better Late Then Never

...As the title would suggest this post is come almost 2 weeks late. Only because i've been so busy doing other stuff. Like changing the oil in the car. Setting up some music for a weekend house party. And now i got an idea for another fan art project/commercial parody. Well enough of my drama here's "El Marr"















...i tryed to vary the skin tone to emulate the lighting effect but it didn't turn out exactly how i liked. Perhaps i'll stick to flat tones for now. Comments please. I do read them if any. OK nuff fer now.

My Niece has the Same Name

...Tonights drawing is another person from work. I'll call her "Jazzy" which coincedently is also my niece's nickname.



...It seems I've fallen behind on some other work as well. I will be working on some code and updating my other page soon. I don't want to spoil it but here's a hint. Ok thats all for now.

And now for the other one

...OK so here is the other visitor from Holland. I gather he doesn't have a nickname so I might suggest "Größermann" but only because in comparison to "Dee" whom he referred to as "Der Klinermann" to which I add "just because he's smaller than you doesn't any less of a man!" Ha I kill me. LOL



...looks as though I didn't miss them after all its just they are exploring Vancouver Island for a few days before leaving next week. So I have made for them PTH Visitor Passes using todays drawing and the one from yesterday.
Also got the car fixed. I cost me only a mere $388.95. WTF ONLY A MERE!!! I might be broke for vacation time.

Good News Bad News

...the good news is that for the past few weeks we've had some cool folks visiting from Holland at work. I wanted to give them a neat souvenir but didn't make it in time. But I have done one picture.




...and the bad news? the window on my car refuses to go up. the motor runs but there is a grinding noise. Great anyway I'm going straight to the dealership today. See y'all maybe later today maybe tomorrow.

Cropped for convenience

...I finally got something to work the way i wanted and this pic will make it neater. Only the original was way too big so i've cropped it to get the pic above. I've taken my camera to work and will be doing some more drawings with photo refs soon. Check you later

Some Recent Schetches

...I've taken to carrying 5x8 writing pad on a 9x6 clip board and a pencil tucked under the clip that makes the page 5x7. When I have time at work i've done some recent schetches. Here they are slighly enhanced via photoshop and
my scanner.








...the first one (up top) is suppost to be a co-workers '98 FORD Ranger and he was going to pose beside it OCC style but when i got that far lunch break was over so perhaps another time i'll get to draw him. The next ones of the work benches we use at work. And the last one is of Christina, driving her Honda Civic. Unfortunatly she also doesn't have a nick name that I was aware of so in this case its her "real" name hope she don't sue me. What I enjoyed about her drawing was the hair. Well thats all for now.

Jarhead Wannabe

...Well here's my latest drawing



...Its another charactor from work. He works in the stock room so it reminded me so much of one of the few times i went to cadets. There was the stores master. You could get almost anything you wanted from stores but the trick was getting the proper forms filled out. Anyway this "panel" led me to an idea for a full strip. I've done some preliminary schetches but nothing to post just yet. By the way this charactor i'll call "Dee".