yeesh, falling behind much?

well other then the fact that i've been massively spoiled by audi for my birthday and freezing my everything off working on sarah's car. i haven't been up to much the last few days laying around Omaha while sarah's at work. i figured i would make an attempt at phsydo productiveness and make a blog post. after i logged on a realized how bad ive been about posting after Novembers ridiculousness and figured it was high time i get back in the saddle... so to speak. i haven't actually a saddle to sit in while i blog.

yet.

any how i figured id just do a quick photo post. so here goes :)



trying to not post un finished work, but whatever, here is a fish in progress :)



after working on that i met up with my mom in her quest for total Christmas shopping domination.



though Christmas with her and the rest of my family was slightly delayed because i drove to little rock to spend the 25th with sarahs family. im pretty sure i missed a snow storm when i was gone, upset as i am about that it was still pretty fun.

along the way we stopped at this burger place and everything made me thing of my friend zombea --see side bar links. all the posters/ containers were people eating food very zombie-esk



after driving all night i spent the next day napping on sarahs lap with her dog cosmo :)i think he' sa boxer/ pit mix. very smart, very nice, very protective haha.



she didn't seem to mind.



since my birthday is the 24th she made me this AWESOME birthday cake. its a rainbow of colors inside topped with a lemon frosting i love :) AND she bought me tickets to James stinkin Taylor in march. so awesome. so spoiled :)



:)



it wasn't a total cute fest, i did go mess with some nitro fueled all wheel drive remote control cars with her younger brother. i took the body off for this shot obviously. i was just marveling at how so much is going on in such a tight space!



oddly enough didn't really take a lot of Christmas pix at my parents house, though i did snap this one of my new candles/frames/Buddha after i put them in my room at the studio.

it was a super tight year but we had a great time and ended up with presents i think we will all enjoy together. namely the new cable internet/ wireless/ wii/ netflix aspect. i cant wait for a huge snow storm. mother nature don't let me down!

in case you were wondering, yes i loved all the snow last year.



for new years we headed over to a friends house for a little party/ get together. Cam9000 was there.



along with the ever stylish and awesome Audi

www.audikuiken.etsy.com

:)

you should all check her stuff out, very cool.

anyhow, had a great time with cam, audi, sarah, meg and mike bringing in the new year watching Scott pilgrim vs the world.



spent the first day of the year in sub zero weather working on sarahs car while she slaved away making coffee in mall land, and had a great dinner out at PF Changs. it was our first time there but most definitely not our last.

that's not even close to all that has been going on. my brother came home for a week or so and we saw true grit with our dad, he brought his 6 month daughter over and she was beond epic cute. but i think this is enough for now, hope your new years was great and im sure ill see you all down the road!

3/3 less depressing?

I've previously talked about the amount of prep time I was trying to put forth towards my tattoos. But what I failed to note is the amount of composition drafts and piles of reference used to even get to the point of starting on a final idea.

I have not only thousands of random photos, paintings and sketches I've found and kept for some reason. Some little thing that jumps out at me. Maybe the hue of a sunset, the filigree on an old sewing machine or knife.

But also tons of self produced reference. I talk to people at the studio very regularly about not googling "flower tattoo" but rather "flowers". Using some one elses tattoo as reference is using a starting point that has already been filtered threw some one elses mind, ideas, and skill. Start as fresh as you can!

I try to take that as far as I can as often as I can by creating my own reference material. All you tattoo people out there know when you see that sugar skull girl or that battle worn skull that Josh, and Nikko, and Nate and every body that's ripping there tattoo is using the exact same reference photo. Mike D. Touches on that a little in his keeping it real book/ DVD about trying to find your own fresh reference. It'll be worth all the effort when your joker tattoo doesn't blend in with all the others.

Any how I do this a few ways all of witch involve seeing your reference in real life. Wether I make a quick sketch, cell phone photo, or a purposely lit composed photo.

From flowers to rocks, seeing it first hand unlocks doors in your mind that a pic off the Internet just does not.

Examples that come to mind, when working on drawing koi I went out to catch a great big carp to look at and photo first hand. There are differences between a koi and a carp but it's close enough. Any how, moments after pulling it out of the water I saw so many little details that explained so much of what I'd seen in Japanese tattoos. Why in old tradition japanese tattoos does the koi have these weird W shaped scales behind the head? Because they do!

Example two, I was in NYC at the met a summer or two ago and came across there display of a Japanese garden complete with giant crazy looking rocks. I had always assumed much of the Japanese tattoo style was just that, stylized. But turns out in japan they actually have big crazy looking black rocks! So many little details and things seen in real life unlock answers to questions that would have taken  hours apon hours of sketching to figure out how to make it look right. There it is right in front of you! Things you'd never have even thought of!

My trips to the northwest reveal to me dozens of new bright and amazing flowers I'd never dreamed of existed. Now in my folder of amazing flowers to add to my compositions when you just can't bare to do your billionth tiger Lilly tattoo.

My final example explains my top photo. Skulls! I've drawn skulls for decades! Referencing other artists and piles of photos, and yet when my girl friend handed me a complete skull it was like a football stadium sized light went on in my head every time I twisted or turned it! It answered questions I didn't know I even had inside of 5 minutes of looking at it. Having it to turn, pose and light has become amazingly beneficial to my current work.

So take the easy road to awesome work and go take a walk with a camera, catch a fish, look at rocks!

maybe happiness is worth the chance of a bitter end..

been working on some cool tattoos this week, in pair with the great aaaaaaalmost fall weather it's put me in a fairly decent mood :)

nothing to eventfull but i suppose id rather it be a good mood non-event then a bad one.

anyhow...

heres an example of why i love living were i do. the sunsets are completly different every night, but almost always spectacular. different shapes, colors, rays. but always i nice sight driving home



this particular night i came home to some rice and yuckani <- no idea if thats spelt correctly. its an eastern dish that is one of many passed down threw my moms side of the family. im thinking this is basicly tomato, beef, green beans and spice more or less. tastey either way :)



and turns out its preety hard to make on a grill so here it is being made in a epicly cheep electric skillet thing. until $500 apear its going to be a grilling, microwave...electric skillet kind of kitchen.

add some bread and..



* see how i used a knife and did not remove any fingers sarah? take note *

walla :) tasty




i didnt eat it but sean and kelsey got a new kitty, they named her frenchy.



now for some tattoo stuff, i like taking progress photos so theres a bunch of that going on below this.



this is the 'prep' for a tattoo i started last night on brandon our shops piercing apprentance. its not finished yet so this is all you get. all i can say is armpits are alot easyer to tattoo then id expected. thankfully.



im preety awefull and taking 'before' shots of cover ups so i went all out on this one yesterday.











turns out jason reeder isnt the only one who gets to do fun tattoos on occasion ;)

and this morning i kept the ball rolling and started this big rib koi





her only other tattoo is a teeny little foot tattoo, and she sat like a champ!



now just counting down to my 'weekend' and some painting progress, and hopefully colder weather :)