Rabbi Encounters Chapter 7

Well…after a 4 month hiatus, I now have a new page uploaded to Rabbi Encounters, and a new chapter beginning to emerge in my mind.  I’m pretty stoked about this one…but it will be very dialogue driven…not tons of action like the “surf” chapter.  Go check it out for me!

On that same subject, the first 4 chapters of Rabbi Encounters can be downloaded at Wowio for free.  Wowio is a site which features electronic versions of books..all kinds of books…including comic books and graphic novels.  If you go sign up for a free account and download Rabbi Encounters…I think it actually pays the artist/author….somehow.  Anyway…you got nothing to lose, and it could help me out, so please download Rabbi Encounters (and anything by Community Comics and Dean Rankine while you’re at it).

Batman Shreds

This is a painting done from a screen capture off a Youtube video I was watching.  I sorta’ like it.  All Photoshop

I don’t really know how I found it…but on Youtube, I saw a clip from the 1967 Batman TV show, where Batman gets into a surf contest against the Joker.  Here’s a spoiler…Batman wins.  He wins because he got 50 points for spraying Bat-Shark Repellent at a shark that was inserted into the scene.  You go, Batman!  This was one of those classic surfer stereotypes of the 60’s.  Batman and Joker paddle out into a micro-surf swell…around knee high.  Then they both take off on the same wave, paddling on their knees (old school…and ouch)….but then we cut to the blue screen where Adam West and Cesar Romero act like they’re balancing on boards…and the wave on the screen behind them is double overhead.  Like I said…it’s classic stuff.

Anyway…if you care, the here’s the video too:

Six-String Samurai

Ok…so one day off, while I was sitting at my computer with my sketchbook…and I watched this really lame movie on Netflix called “Six-string Samurai“.  Seriously, it was beyond terrible…but I used it as a sketching exercise anyway.  As I watched the movie, I drew images that caught my interest using my Pentel brush pen.  No pencil sketching…just drawing with the brush as fast as I could while I still remembered the image I liked.  Anyway…here’s a page from my sketchbook from that day.

 

On My Day Off

 I try to keep Mondays open for a day off…so yesterday I painted something to go in the dining room Robbie’s been working on to make cohesive.  For 25 years of marriage, we’ve seldom had any kind of unified decoration or decent looking room…until recently.  Now we have a nice dining room table, actual curtains on the window (which Robbie ingeniously made) and an honest to goodness color theme.  So…trying to do my part, I painted a painting that incorporated some of the major colors she has working in her china and other stuff.  My other camera broke…so I shot this one off my phone, and it’s not very good, but you get the idea.

 

This is actually the second painting on that canvas…the first one I tried to do for her I had overworked to the point of hilarity.  It had a terrible composition (not saying this one is good, but it’s better than the last)…competing styles…it was a mess.  I kept thinking “if I just do this or that, maybe I can salvage it.”  Finally, my daughter Jessica came and scrutinized it with an honest eye and said “you better sand this off and start over.”

Which I did.  And I’m glad I did.  The above took about 2 hours total (after the sanding), which I think I’m a lot more comfortable with.  If I have too long with a painting, I tend to smother it (think Tommy Boy with the muffin).

Manly Science

I love Rock em Sock em Robots.   When I was about six or seven years old, those red and blue robots of the ring were the highlight of my Christmas.  I enjoyed everything about them.  The game-play which allowed me, at times, to actually knock my big brother’s block off; the design of the robots…so burly, so masculine…no pansy microchips in those bad boys…just the two-fisted science of gears and levers and triggers.

I am the proud owner of the second generation Rock em Sock em Robots which were released at Christmas time last year.  They are smaller now, and the molds have less details than the originals…but they still hearken back to the manly science of my youth.

I took a picture of them which I used as a model for the illustration which now adorns my banner.  Kevin asked about it…so I thought I’d give more details than anyone cares about.

More Surf Art

Well…I did another acrylic painting on Masonite of a wave.  Here’s a not-so-great photo of it.

The Velveteen Rabbit

A while back I made a roll-in video for a Sunday morning teaching.  I used a section from the children’s book The Velveteen Rabbit, by Margery Williams.  I drew all the illustrations, then panned across them and lap fadded them to give it a slightly animated feel.  Anyway…here are a few of the illustrations from that project.

    

sketch of the pass

I got a chance to go surfing yesterday.  Larry Buchanan loaned me a wetsuit that is probably the most awesome, unemcumbersome wetsuit I have ever worn.  It totally changed my view of winter surf.  When I invest in a new wetsuit, it will have to be one like that.  Anyway…it was fun. 

Here’s a sketch of a painting I may still do sometime…it’s the pass when it’s going off.

Random Sketchyness

One thing I’ve been adamant to do in my mind is aggressively reconstruct my image of Jesus.  I want to completely reject (in my imagination) the blond haired, blue eyed icon we’ve grown up with.  I want to see Jesus as a Jewish person in 1st century Palestine.  So…whenever I get the chance to randomly scribble in my moleskine, I draw what my mind conjures up concerning The Hero.

The Out of Order Project

A friend of mine has a site called Cardboard Monocle.  It’s really an interesting read, and always has something inspiring going on.  One such thing is the “Out of Order” project.  I think it’s such a great idea.  Our culture is a virtual juggernaut of consuming and producing waste, it’s fascinating to look at that waste put in the context of temporary dysfunction.  Check it out, at the very least it will make you smile!