This is my first attempt at a mirror. It was inspired by all of the cloud photos I’ve been taking and the work of Hokusai.

I’m definitely drawn to natural forms built with unnatural materials. I’ve seen a few laser-cut mirrors around and they all seem to stick closely to a square format. I thought I’d give it a go and see what happens with other shapes.

Moving forward, I’m going to add other cloud formations to form a group. Small, medium and large clouds. This would most likely be the large. (5 x 34 inches)

I would really like to hear what people think of this piece. Please leave comments. Or, feel free to contact me if you’d like to purchase one 🙂

Apparently, I’m not the only fan of music and/or irony.

Growing up my family did lots of camping and the highlight of every trip was always the ghost story told by my father once the fire grew low. He was a master practitioner of the art. I made his always bone-chilling stories the theme of this pattern drawing I just completed. Click the image above for a larger version.

A pretty simple Illo for Publisher’s Weekly. A writer (Pete Croatto) working at a bookstore tells how he found peace in the simple job of selling books:
“I’ve been snapped at, lectured to and dismissed, all of which could happen in an hour”.
Even after being threatened with violence, and talked down to, he found helping readers rewarding.
I am doing more opaque color on my digital paintings now. I used to give color a much more watercolor type treatment, but I am feeling nostalgic for the satisfying opacity of oils. Time to go back into the lab with my neglected copy of Painter and see what develops.
You can see more of my work for Publisher’s Weekly here.

The baiji, a freshwater dolphin known as the “goddess of the Yangtze” is extinct, scientists said this week. The latest search of the river produced no sightings of the species, which lived in the Yangtze for 20 million years. The demise is blamed on overfishing, and the construction of the Three Rivers Dam, the largest hydroelectric river dam in the world, and 5 times the size of the Hoover.

Seafaring geezer seen aboard the S.S. John W. Brown in Boston. There was also a dogfight.

This was taken while flying at about 5000 feet over Denver Glacier in Skagway, Alaska, on the way to a dog sled camp. I’m not a huge fan of planes. And, unfortunately, while we were winding down our time in Alaska we heard about a number of local disasters. But, flying in a helicopter is like riding in an elevator. Definitely, the best experience of my whole trip.

We had 10 straight days of perfect weather. Which is why we had a viewing distance from this helicopter of approximately 100 miles. Unheard of in Alaska, where the locals in Ketchikan measure their annual rainfall in feet (13 on average!) instead of inches.

This is an illustration for the Riverfront Times in St. Louis which highlights three upcoming events: a viewing of Troll 2 (rated worst movie ever by IMDB), a charity foodball game and a sumo and sake event. Click image for a larger version.