Christmas 2010

So I know I've been absolutely horrible recently about posting, but I thought I would share the drawings I did for my family (and friends) this year for Christmas. I'm cheap, I don't buy real presents.

Butterfly for Mom

Sad Baby Polar Bear for Dad

Bonsai Tree for Gma and Gpa

Baby Deer for Spencer

Calla Lily for Traci

Daisy for Sunshine

Angry Tiger Face for Travis

Princess Leia for Penny

Han Solo for Zac (of course)

Hummingbird for Rachel

I am missing a few because I haven't been able to scan them in yet, but I will post them when I do.

I really liked the way that most of these turned out, so hopefully I will continue making them. I particularly like the animal ones with lots of fine detail.

Experimentin'

Since I drew portraits of my family for Christmas I've been meaning to make more. I've been contemplating it for a while and I decided to draw them today. However, instead of just doing black and white I decided to use color this time.

This is Rachel Hazelbaker. This is Rachel Hazelbaker's portrait. In color.

I also wanted to do my own portrait. Therefor I did. I also documented the step by step process of the drawing as well.

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Step 4

Once I scanned them in I played with them a bit in Photoshop and in the process I inverted the color. It's kind of neat.

Well, at least I think they're neat.

The Real World Egypt

Oh Zahi Hawass, how I love thee. Even though this show seems incredibly scripted I still love it. Archaeology at its most dramatic.

I can't wait.

Good Morning

Another hit from the Rogue Wave bug.

Rogue Wave - Good Morning from Rogue Wave on Vimeo.

I love this music video. I wish I could romp around some barren wasteland with feathers in my hair. Can I? Oh please can I?

Solitary Gun

Rogue Wave - Solitary Gun from Rogue Wave on Vimeo.

I know I've been raving for years about how much I love Rogue Wave, so don't read on if you are sick of it because there's a whole lot more about to spew out.

Their new album 'Permalight' is sincerely awesome. I love every second of every song. Their last album 'Asleep at Heaven's Gate' was a bit of a dud in my opinion. It wasn't bad, don't get me wrong, it just wasn't what I was looking for in a Rogue Wave album. I love all of the color and depth that 'Permalight' has. There are a lot of pertinent issues that the band deals with in these songs and that's one aspect that keeps me coming back for more. I'm listening to this almost as obsessively as I listened to 'Descended Like Vultures' back in the day (and sometimes nowadays). But let's not forget the early stuff either. 'Out of the Shadow' was a great one too. There's more of a playfulness to this early album than the rest, therefore it's good in my book. But for some reason I just can't put my finger on, it doesn't have the same oompf, or pizazz, or whatever it is that 'Descended Like Vultures' and 'Permalight' do.

Nope, there's no getting around it. I absolutely adore Rogue Wave. I doubt very much that will ever change.

However, Zac recently turned me onto Freelance Whales. They're pretty awesome as well. And not only is the music that they make incredible, their website is amazing on top of that. They're almost on par with Rogue Wave in my book, and that's saying something. I really like the song 'Hannah'.

Here's a little taste of who they are...

Freelance Whales - Generator 2nd Floor

Freelance Whales | MySpace Music Videos

Boxes and Light

ENVISION : Step into the sensory box from SUPERBIEN on Vimeo.

I wish I had the know-how to pull something like this off. The fact that it seems to turn from 3 dimensions to 2 is amazing. It's best if you watch the whole thing.

PogoMix

Thanks to Faye who showed these to me. They're amazing remixes of well known movies into really interesting and cool songs.


From the movie 'UP'


Alice in Wonderland


My favorite Disney movie 'The Sword in the Stone'


And of course 'Mary Poppins'

Not only is the imagery amazing, the music is great. I love it.

Jinn

So I've been bad at posting on the blog recently, and by recently I mean in the past year. I may get around to finally posting photos of my trip to Scotland sometime (I was there at the end of May last year, so almost a year ago).

What's been keeping me busy as of late is a new film called 'Jinn' that I've been working on. I'm the Set Decorator and it's so far been a whole heck of a lot of new experiences. I've learned a lot, about the industry and the way that I work. The sets have been looking great, in my opinion, and I do feel like I've been doing the best possible work that I can. We're almost done shooting which is exciting, I will finally have some time to myself again. It's amazing how much filmmaking can take over your life.

Here are some set photos...

Kitchen

Kitchen (detail)

Home Office

Home Office

Home Office (desk detail)

Father Westhoff's Office

Church Library

Church Library

It's tiring work but there's a lot of satisfaction that goes along with it.

Million Dollars

So this is a music video that I worked on last year. It is an amazing video mostly due to the wonderful Danny Mooney. He's amazing at everything he does, and once you see the video I'm sure you'll agree. We only got to shoot about two thirds of what was supposed to be shot, but you wouldn't know that with what Danny has pulled together. Keep an eye on him, he's definitely going far.

Just so you know, this video went up only about a day ago and it already has over 20,000 view. Which is incredible.

Christmas Fun

So for Christmas I made portraits for mi familia as their presents. It was lots of fun and lots of work. I'm glad I got to work early on them, but even with that extra early start, I was scrambling at the last minute. I'm glad to know I still procrastinate, even though I'm out of school.

Derek

Josie

Sunshine

Gma and Gpa

Mom and Dad

Zac, Penny and Henry

Kerry and I

Aaaaand finally, Matt. (We call him uncle Fester)

December?

How is it December already? I've been absent recently because of a film that I was working on called MOOZ-lum. It was a lot of work but a lot of fun. I had no life, but now I do. The other day I went to the Shadow Art Fair and one of the booths was a guy doing portraits of people and it was a 'name your own price' kind of thing. I got him to agree to exchanging a portrait for a portrait, so I did his portrait.

It's pretty silly. I love it.

Drawrings

Here are a couple of drawings that I did recently.

Obviously I'm caught up in the 'Where the Wild Things Are' craze. I'm going to go see the movie sometime this weekend. I'll get back to you whether it's as good as the trailer makes it look.

London

The end of May rolled around and since my Irish work visa was only for 5 months, I had to leave the country by the 30th and come back in to the country as a tourist. Complicated as it was, it was the perfect opportunity for me to take a fun little romp through another country. I decided to go to London because I found tickets through Ryan Air for only 2 euro. How could I pass that up? So I started out my little excursion in London. I went to the British Museum, which is awesome by the way, then met up with a friend, took a tour of Westminster Abbey, walked on the Thames, and went to the Tate Modern. I had a really great time, very different from the last time that I was in London, for one, I actually went INSIDE buildings.

Oustide the British Museum

In the British Museum's Hall of Knowledge. So many cool things.

The Rosetta Stone

This is a clock

I met up with a friend and he took me to Brixton, where apparently 'Electric Avenue' is. The song is based on this area of London.

It's hard not to find an Irish pub. This was about a 5 minute walk from my hostel. Right near Kings Cross Station (yes Harry Potter).

This is the 24 hour diner that Briana and I stayed in two years ago waiting for the train station to open. We didn't have a place to stay that night, obviously.

The London Eye

This is like the Viking tour of Dublin that Allison and I took when she came to visit. It's an amphibious vehicle from WWII.

Big Ben, double decker bus, pretty buildings, it must be London.

Walking down the Thames I found this statue that had a plaque saying that the holes along the wall and statues were from a bomb exploding on the street nearby in WWI.

The British sure do love to steal from other cultures. An Egyptian obelisk? Really?

The Thames

Inside the Tate Modern

The Globe Theater where the Royal Shakespeare Company's housed