Ladies and Gentlemen, I give thee....

The odd-ball animal pals that inspire me to no end; pardon the often poor lighting or blurriness, gotta get used to this camera!

First up is mister Kiwi himself:


Otherwise(as he says it himself) known as "PeeWee"


Eating an apple is serious business.

The many sides and emotions of Kiwi:




Yes quite cute eh? He will act all cute and innocent just to get your guard down. Lurking behind the fluffy cute face is this:


He has attacked our cat(when she was a kitten, she hasn't mentally recovered since and is terrified of the big green meanie). If you ever have the chance to meet Kiwi, keep your fingers at bay----conures make a lovely, yet deadly addition to any household. ;)

Okay, now for the big ol' indoor cat---Annie! Or more commonly known as: Chubbs, Crater(she leaves these HUGE imprints on couches and beds, leaving the family to say "She's landed"), Cry-baby, and a bunch of other names---right now her new one is Butter Boat. My Mom and I have decided she's an emotional eater because whenever she's very upset(which happens a lot, anything spooks or angers her) she'll go right to the food bowl. We honestly feed our cats well, I'll post a picture of our other cat just to prove Annie is the exception to our healthy cat family.
Here are some less than flattering shots of the silly girl:

"Wanna play???"

OMG HIDE!(Yeah that's the leg of a chair)


"Woah dude, wha happened!"

And just to show her semi-elegant side, here:


So now, here's Frankie our other cat:



See quite normal(this picture was taken in late February so he still had his winter coat on, see all fluff!)
Wonder why he's called Frankie? Well he's named after ol' blue eyes himself:

Yeah, Frankie IS normal cat size this:

is NOT! Poor little emotional eater, my Mom wants to put her on a diet while I'm away, just to see if there's any change in her appearance when I visit. ;)

Well there ya have it....artwork on the way I promise, just 8 shifts left at Target and 19 days until CalArts!

Farewell for now....

Dropped Kiwi off at his new owner's house this morning....the logical side of me knows it is for the better and this new house is exactly what he needs, fantastic parrot-friendly home. He'll be a happy little fuzz-ball, however, my more emotional side thinks differently and I haven't exactly been myself since giving him away. The plan will be that he'll come live with me in 4 years, a dorm is no place for the green meanie. Still hard, having him since I was kid, I have a lot of memories of him----but since he's supposed to live into his 30's and even 40's he still has a lot of life left(he's 8)!

This day also brings news that CalArts updated their website to include the upcoming school year schedule for Character Animation, when my mind is off of Kiwi, this makes me very excited and giddy with the possibilities of what my schedule might look like come Sept! Now if only they'd actually send me my class schedule so I know who else will be in my classes and who's teaching it. =)

No artwork today, just not in the mood. Probably go put on Indiana Jones and chill.

Is your figure less than Greek?

Well this post will teach me NOT to delay scanning my little caricatures-a-day in. So massive image-heavy post ahead----ye be warned matey! The title of this post is just too perfect--makes me laugh when thumbing through my sketchbook.

So these first two are from the recent final Harry Potter book release midnight release party, I drew around 8 pages of various people, but kind of had a bad night and these two are my sole highlights:


A wee Potterlad

A really convincing Rita Skeeter

This next one is a quick study of my parrot as he enjoys a favorite past time: a finger massage and a playful finger wrestle(where the goal is to catch my finger and chew on it*not to the point of pain though*):


The rest of the lot are all Target customer studies. I know there's a bit of a gap between dates, but this is due to the cancellation of a class I was REALLY looking forward too, so this caused several days to be added onto my Target countdown so once I came down to the 30 day mark again I started the caricatures again(if that makes any sense), still 21 days left to capture the essence of southern Oregon. ;)





Okay, I promise to be better about actually updating on the day I draw one of these characters!

Dumbledore's man through and through

So I begun my Harry Potter reading at the age of 11, didn't have a CLUE as to how popular the book would become, I found the paperback version of Sorcerer's Stone at a local school book fair and was hooked after reading that description of Uncle Vernom. And now on July 21st, 8 years later, I've finished the series.....

The FINAL Harry Potter book: begun around 9:45 a.m. after a mad dash to the nearest Albertsons, and I finished it at 11:50p.m. with a couple breaks inbetween to try and digest the massive bulk of book. Many favorite bits and seeing some loose ends taken care of was nice....gotta read this again and at a much slower pace haha....

Hang around til the leaves are brown and summer's gone

Oh goodie another update! Summer is summer, full of ups and downs, stress is rearing its ugly face, but I'm putting up quite a battle. haha.....So in the dwindling days I've been working and taking care of misc. stuff while also getting away from it all and trying to hang out with people and also draw---a lot. Thunderstorms for the past 2 days have been entertaining, one at home and one at work, recorded a bit of the one at home on my camera so I can look back at it fondly, lol and enjoyed the excitement at work---this little kid was HILARIOUSLY excited yet terrified of the storm, it was sooooo cute and I automatically started logging away her actions and manner---she was the regular weathergirl she was talking about 100 mph about the poweroutages, the movement of the storm, and how this affected her sleep schedule, and as she left she reached a very loud volume and was only repeating "TERRIBLE NEWS FOR CENTRAL POINT! TERRIBLE NEWS" aww made the VERY long shift a unique one. Artwork wise ? Well I finished a commission and I'll post the blurry version of it , horrible lighting and all!



He's a big guy, 30"x40" ALL pencil, I did take nicer photos, but since he no longer belongs to me, I'll refrain from posting. I'm relieved he's done, not the best experience ever, but the finished result and the commissioner's reaction was worth it though(the person loved it and can't wait to hang it in their bedroom). I have doodles and caricatures, but I have a plan. I have 35 days left at ol' Target, I plan on spending 30 of these days doing a caricature a day, one customer who came through my lane, or dropped off film, or returned something unique, anything that left a lasting impression---so I'll draw this one person and post the result. Outta make the remaining days entertaining and at the very least go by THAT much faster, plus exterminate the rust that has taken hold of my hand(not bad, but I'll be in serious trouble when Sept. comes). So look out world, you're about to be hit with Southern Oregon's best. ;) Okay, I'm worn out did a lot today and after closing last night, I'm exhausted, time to read some more Harry Potter(8 DAYS TILL THAT BOOK COMES OUT!!!) and then sleep.

Ratatouille Review

JUST got back from a sneak screening of Ratatouille(whudda thunk they'd screen something here??? Oh well, I'm THRILLED they did). Basically, without any spoilers-----it was fantastic, a huge breath of fresh air for me after seeing some of the recent CG movies that have hit theatres(or at least now, HBO---lol). Ahhh, the animation of Remy, the Chef, Ego, and everybody else of course was sooo inspiring! More subtle animation than you can throw a stick at(or pencil, haha). As a quick geek moment, the mouth shapes and movements were so much fun to watch! That Chef and Ego were hilarious to just watch what new lip-shape Pixar would come up with. The movie was also just flat-out gorgeous! The lighting and attention to detail broke new boundaries. Finally, gotta love the camera work, some great angles and movements that I can't wait to see again. The story worked for me, some moments were a bit cliche, but honestly no complaints here...I enjoyed the overall journey the story took.Can't wait to see it again when it actually comes out in 12 days.

What's this? An update!

Well, term ended yesterday, and looking at my little countdown thing on my laptop it says: "86 days until I move into Cal Arts" and "71 days left at Target". Of course I'm excited about Cal Arts-I'm very excited to dive into that whole new world and animate every hour of the day. =D Okay so summer has started and I intend on finishing some projects, beginning new ones for personal sake of not becoming artistically rusty, and securing everything necessary before I head off on September first! Expect some more posts later answering some questions I've been receiving from the vast world of the Internets. =) In the meantime, here's a link to my 3D animation demo reel thing----working primarily with Lt. Dan though I dabbled with Lowman, I just never animated something I didn't completely hate with him so just a lot of circles.





3D is quite fun and yes I know I'm certifiably insane for saying that, but oh well. Next post will include a link to my demo reel I made in flash....it already has worn out on me, but those with fresh eyes(and ears in some cases) might like it. Overall, Flash and Maya both have their strong points and I'm becoming very comfortable in both(still have a LONG ways to go with Maya, but I know the pains of Splines and how horribly wrong things can go).

And since I started this post with various countdowns, I'll end with one: 20 days until Ratatouille! =D