Day 58 - so do you come here often

Olives have always vexed me - they are a strange food - I have no idea why they are popular, but I suspect that it has something to do with the fact that they are always finding themselves in martinis!

Day 57 -

The chili pepper is the Math-a-lete off the food world - and the tomato is definitely on the football team - this one goes out to all those math-a-letes that probably spend high school avoiding the main corridors for fear of getting the crap kicked out of them. You will one day grow up into the indispensable spice of the world!

day 56 - Eggplants

I know a lot of people love eggplants, but I find them frankly creepy and unnerving. If they were allowed to drive, the would definitely be roaming around the city in white vans with the windows painted out....

Eggplants are just weird!

day 55 - Pineapples

Pineapples are just bad ass - in the fruit and vegetable community, they would be the ones riding old triumph motorcycles, wearing leather jackets over vintage Rolling Stones T-shirts smoking Marlboro Reds while listening to Floyd....

Day 54 - 60% Banana

Humans share remarkable sequence homology with among other things, bananas (something like 50-60%). The similarities are even higher when we move up the evolutionary tree (primates are basically dumber furrier humans). When you really consider this though, it isn't really that surprising - transcription factors, metabolic genes, genes involved in cell cytoskeletons, cell cycle regulators etc are pretty much the same....

What I think makes me chuckle is that if bananas were conscious, they would view humans with the same skepticism that cows do now.

Banana: "Let me understand you, you are going to cultivate me so that you can proceed to eat me? Ummmm not sure I am cool with that"

Day 53 - On the vine

We rarely get to choose our families - but imagine being stuck at the hip on a vine with the crazy uncle who always creeps everyone out....FYI, if you cant identify who that is in the family, a note of caution...it might be you.

Day 52 - Fruity?

With the highly variable temperatures (it was something like 55 a few days ago, and then suddenly, snow storm - 20 degree weather, and general mayhem) and spring rapidly approaching, I (and my stomach) have been thinking a lot about fresh produce and food - thus, this week will be all about food! =- drawings (cartoons mainly) about fruits and vegetables, and whatever else pops into my head.

This little drawing came to mind when I was looking at smoothie ingredients and realized that strawberries - well represented, other berries, less so - what envy that must cause.....

Day 51 - Blackroc

The amazing thing about the Wu is the breath of their appeal. There are a non-trivial number of suburban kids who are huge fans....in some of the same ways as Dave Chapelle and the Roots cross over in their appeal. As in the cases above, another key feature of their appeal is that they (Wu, Roots, Dave, et al) are generally admired by other creative people. For instance, listen to Dave on inside the Actors Studio - it is pretty amazing...

With respects to the Wu, and RZA in particular, the number of musicians that are in awe of his talent is pretty substantial. When he isn't dropping beats on the Afro Samurai animated series, he is pairing up with some heavyweights in music to do amazing things. Consider for instance, Blackroc, a collaboration with the Black Keys. I think one of the best parts of this colabo is to listen to Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney talk about meeting RZA on Fresh Air (which as a complete aside, I cannot tell you how awesome listening to Terry Gross is). Listen especially around 36:02 - "I couldn't even speak to him, I was so nervous".

I have to say that Wu-Tang week was a blast - Any suggestions of future theme weeks or things you would like to see would be great -

Day 50 - Chessboxing

On 36 chambers is the great track "Da Mysteries of Chessboxin" which was apparently inspired by (and samples) the classic kung fu film of the same name. What is remarkable is that chessboxing is an actual sport...somehow, the image in my head is less about people, and more about chess pieces beating the crap out of each other....

Day 49 - Can it be that it was all so simple

Although 36 Chambers has a really raw feel to it, there is one track that is decidedly different and exudes a kind of contemplative quality (for lack of a better word). The track, "can it be all so simple" samples from the Gladys Knight's "The way we were" but the beat and the lyrics are just ridiculous awesome - just something of this that makes me think of the mood of this drawing....

Day 48 - Staten Island Ferry

One of the standout solo albums for Wu was GZA's Legend of the Liquid Sword.

The intro, which is pretty hard to find on youtube...can be heard on Grooveshark. Young Justice, who I assume is the voice, kills it with this:

"It was the summer of '77.

NewYork was just recovering from the riots due to the blackout.
HipHop was young and growing rapidly, it was during that time when my father would oftent make journeys accross waters...... The ferry, or the boat, as most called it, was a floatin' forum, for talent especially MC's, who would often battle while in route to the city. It was on the boat, where he would sharpen his sword on neighborhood MC's, preparing for the battles that were soon to come.."

Day 47 - Ironman -

Ghostface's 1996 Ironman and Supreme Clientele were both the kind of albums that cemented Wu members' staying power as solo acts. There is a great NPR story (which is basically awesome because to hear Terry Gross say "protect your neck" pretty much makes my day) about the business of hip hop and what the Wu did in terms of artist management. I think that the business strides made by Wu members in terms of musicians controlling their own destiny is pretty interesting - and the best part is that the Wu as a business entity has been cemented in popular culture with Wu Tang Financial (is it just me or is the old woman throwing up the Wu just awesome).

Day 46 - RZA - Hip-Hop Chess Federation

RZA is apparently a huge chess fan, and wikipedia tells me he is actively involved in the hip-hop chess federation. Something about this probably traces back to images from the Ben Kingsley movie Searching for Bobby Fisher.

Day 45 - Wu Tang Week Begins - 36 Chambers

This week is devoted to one of my favorite hip hop acts of all time - Wu Tang Clan - 36 chambers was their first release (1993) and inspired by an old Gordon Liu kung fu movie 36 chambers of shaolin - Beyond the awesomeness of their beats (thank you RZA) and the absolutely original lyrical style, this album is just plain cool! The juxtaposition of the Wu-Tang style at a time when a lot of hip hop from the east coast was being dominated by the P-Ditty sound, Wu was just so original and the lyrical stylings of OBD, RZA, GZA, and Ghostface was just so distinct and original and raw....

Day 44 - Hi Tom...

One of the best showns on TV, Psych has a great episode where the main character, Shawn, "crashes" a corporate retreat - his introduction is one of the funniest thing you will see - ever - period!!!! But also heartbreaking in the way that only satire can blend the two. The scene is the essence of awkward, and I had this image of a "fish" (or in the case of the drawing, a rabbit) out of water trying to get into a conversation, but always resigned to the fringes (a wallflower) of the party.

Day 43 - Horrible art you ask -

Stress and a lack of inspiration result in ideas that seem entirely awesome at conception but turn out to be a colossal letdown at the execution stage, This is an example, I really loved the idea of green with personality, but the drawing just lacks heart and basic skill. Total bummer man

Day 42 - Collaborating on monkeys

It should come as no surprise to anyone who knows me that I have a things for monkeys - they are both adorable and hilarious - not monkeys in real life of course, which tend to be vicious and violent, but I am thinking of cartoon monkeys.

This little drawing is a collaboration I did with another artist whose is super talented.

Day 41 - Dr. Phil?

Another example of my obsession with moustaches - I am sure there are examples of people who dont look great in them, but I cant really think of any

Day 40 - Holy SNOT!

This is not for the faint of heart. Post op splints hold the reconstructed septum in place, and these things are gigantic. See here for examples. Let us just say that the little green monster deep inside my head is not longer there. He is neither green nor particularly malicious, but damn it he does have a sick sense of humor!

Day 39 - Me and Mrs. Nose

So a number of people have asked me to send photos of what my nose looks like, and rather than post a pic, I have decided to draw a flattering self portrait of my nose. Generally, I am against drawing self-portraits, unless I am using facial expressions for styling cues to add emotion to the face of an animal drawing, but I thought this compromise would satisfy the collective masses.

As an aside, somehow I totally imagine slow dancing,with my nose, listening to this (replace me and Mrs. Jones with me and my nose). Maybe a little candlelight, a bottle of champagne...

Me and my nose

we got some sniffing going on...

we both know it was wrong,

but breathing is much too strong to let it go now...

The same nostril, I sniffed everyday

10-20% air flow...no one knows she was that way

sniffing plants, making all kinds rants,

while bilateral breathing slipped away

Me and my, my nose my nose my nose....

me and my nose

Day 38 - Boogers...

One of the benefits of apparently having my deviated septum taken care of is that in addition to being able to breathe, I may not have to continue my seemingly unending war with my nasal nemesis the booger, that haunts me from about mid October to early May. Mucous, you have been a worthy adversary, but now it is time to die!

Day 37 - Deviant Septum

So a number of people emailed me to find out why there was a lapse in posting - I was detained dealing with a deviant (ok so the septum itself was a little of kilter, and I figured what better way to draw a day than to make the deviated chap a bit deviant - you can tell he is up to no good) septum. As an aside, to the best of my knowledge, this is the first drawing in the history of the world where a piece of nasal cartilage has been anthropomorphized... And to add to to the humor, not the dripping mucous - classy I tell you.

Day 36 - The Badger arrow

When one has a quiver of badgers, this is how they should be used - Every time I see this and think of the times with the 110Crew, I am reminded about how much fun, and uncontrolled hilarity can be had when creative smart people work a little to hard and then go a little crazy....

Day 35 - Quiver of Badges

The quiver of badgers came out of this idea of the kind of weapons that some titan might carry around. Although the conventional stuff (swords, bows and arrows, etc) could be the go to weapons, the idea that was really appealing was this notion of something organic. Plus, badgers are pretty high in the cute/ferocious dualism scale.

Day 34 - Snakes

Although the motivation for this drawing came out of something a bit more comical, I was thinking about art as storytelling and the ability to convey something about a character in anticipation of an event -

Day 33 - Crater

Something about this image reminds me of the Death of Superman - not so much in terms of the actual image, but the feeling - I like the idea of a single person being able to shift the ground beneath....

Speaking of which - does anyone remember the U2 work on the film "The ground beneath her feet"? This song just popped into my mind...

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro

Day 32 - Sprout

From tragedy and heartbreak, something extraordinary emerges!

As a complete aside - essentially unrelated but what the hell - I was thinking about the Jack Johnson-esque (but perhaps more appropriate for the emergence of a fighter, think this Jack Johnson) - surf films like September sessions or Thicker than Water (which is totally worth watching even if you aren't into surfing - visually awesome and the music is sick!) - and the Tom Campbell film Sprout .

Basically, this rambling was the semantic leap that my brain takes when I think about the verb "to sprout" in the context of this drawing, and then somehow end up in the noun "Sprout" that takes me into Surf films of the early 2000s which has nothing to do really with this picture.

Posit "To what extent is the way in which we break up our representations of the world (semantics - but other category systems) a way of fostering creativity by allowing us to jump from one representation to another.

Returning from this tangent, I should say that this drawing goes out to 110Crew!

Day 31 - Tears of Zeus

All Nas needed was one mic, all I needed between 2004-2006 was one whiteboard and the precursors to the Gang of Four to entertain. This week is dedicated to the 110Crew, and the unending giggling that came out of one whiteboard!

Q: From where does humanity's champion come?

A: Zeus' tear!

Day 30 - Chicken!

I am unapologetic about loving all things chicken (well ll things except eating them, which I suppose is a big thing). A potential candidate as proof that evolution has a sense of humor, chicken are hilarious (though they can also be pretty terrifying).

On the subject of chickens, giant ones are the best. People in chicken suits, plastic dinosaurs terrified of said people in chicken suits - all recipes for hilarity.

Finally, to the hand full of people around during the clucking period of 2006-2008, this one goes out to you.

Day 29 - Ninjas!

It is tough to argue with the awesomeness of ninjas! Be they mutant turtles (which incidentally, how awesome is it that Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird were sitting around one day and just decided "Dude, you know what would be cool, mutant ninjas"..."dude, you know what would be cooler, Teenage mutant ninjas"...You know what would be bananas "Teenage mutant ninja turtles") or just plain old american ninjas (Dear Michael Dudikoff - you inhabit a place somewhere between Christopher Lambert and David Carridine in my martial arts universe!), ninjas are just plan baller.

Day 28 - Tuft Envy

The handful of slice elctrophysiologists that follow this blog will appreciate the anthropomorphization of neurons and the anguish that must come from having ones dendrites lesioned because of slicing. The even smaller group of people who record from mitral cells in the bulb will find this mildly amusing. The three people that were present when tuft envy emerged among a group of bald(-ing) slice physiologists will basically loose it!

Happy weekend, happy slicing, and may your apical dendrites be intact and fully arborized!

Day 27 - Moustache

A foreshadow of things to come in the following week. I am part of a nontrivial number of men and women who thing gigantic moustaches are basically awesome. Think this, only the 2011 version.

Day 26 - Abstract 3

Another abstract piece - this one reminds me of a design I did for a yoga mat about 2.5 years ago.

Done on the iPad with Sketchbook Pro

Day 25 - Dog

As those who know me can attest, I am a huge fan of dogs - more so than the average dog love - but not to the extent of calling a dog my kid, or dressing the dog up on some outfit. I should also note that with rare exception, a dog is only a dog when it is big! And while my foray into the world of canine ownership was brief, I will venture there again. Ending this little tangent on my love of dogs, the feeling is mutual - 9 out of 10 dogs basically think I am awesome.

I really like this drawing because it captures why I think dogs are basically amazing - they have such an emotive quality, and such a willingness for affection that it is rare, even among humans.

Finally, this was passed along to me - and it seems fitting for the post - if for no other reason than because it illustrates the genuineness of a dog's emotions (and the suspicion with which I look at all cats) and the extent to which they are basically amped about everything

Day 24 - Face on another

These is something really nice about this - The half obscured eye was mainly out of laziness - didn't want to ensure symmetry of the eyes, but this really adds something.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook pro, finger!

Day 23 - Passenger 57

Wesley Snipes' legal troubles notwithstanding, he is pretty awesome. While most will remember him from this scene in Passenger 57, his acting range has really developed to include ex-CIA hostage specialist, CIA sniper, UN covert operative, ex-Special Forces bad ass, ex-security specialist, etc etc. One acquires this information about Snipes acting when the weather outside is -5 degrees and the entire Wesley Snipes film library is on Netflix.

I am increasingly convinced that the war on terror will only be won when Wesley Snipes helms our intelligence agencies.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook pro, finger!

Day 22 - Black Swan

There is a pretty visually striking moment in the trailer for Black Swan where black feathers emerge out of Natalie Portman's back. Have not seen the movie, but I suspect that it primed my mind for this image, that and a similar Sorayama image from TimeCop....

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook pro, finger!

Day 21- Rapa Nui

I have been a huge fan of Rapa Nui for a long time, but my interest in the island was rekindled when I saw the beautiful surf footage from Step into Liquid.

Plus the line about "you would think there would be some goofy ugly looking people because of all the inbreeding, but some of the most beautiful people I have ever seen in the world, inside and out." is just priceless!

A quick technical note:

My solution to copying/cloning an image in Sketchbook Pro, Duplicate it as a layer and then move the image around. Not ideal, because the ability to subselect a part of the image is not available, but as a first pass, this seems to be ok.

Tools: iPad, Skechbook Pro, finger

Day 20 - Angry Audi

The angry version of the Audi

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 19 - Sad Audi

Audi released this distinct head light LED setup (I think first with their R8, and subsequently) in all their models. The S5 has to be my favorite, but in looking at the lighting, it occurs to me that they resembled eyes - I tried my hand at making the "head lights" have an emotive eye like quality - this is the sad version, and I will post the angry more Audi like version soon.

One of the things that occurs to me is the difference in where "eyes" are placed in making cartoon cars. In the Pixar film "Cars", the eyes are at the windshield, making them really conducive to conveying emotion.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 18 - Comic book nostalgia

If you were a comic book fan boy in the early 1990s, you probably recognized Jim Lee's work, first on the Uncanny X-Men, then on the revamped version of the X-Men , and when he left Marvel to found Image where he launched WildCats. His style is really distinct, and he influenced a number of artists - I was a big fan of his work, as well as some of the other Image artists, and this quick doodle brought back some memories of that early stylistic influence.

As an aside, I think an under-appreciated part of the visual change in the way comics looked back in the 1990s was the work of Steve Oliff and Olypotics, the guys that introduced color separation and computer coloring to the medium. I think the visual quality of the first titles out of Image, specifically Spawn, Cyberforce, and Wildcats was just something stunning and so different from the work at Marvel and DC....

I will now stop my fanboy geeking out...

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 17 - Eyes

Again with the eyes.... and the ladies

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 16 - Abstract reduex

This reminds me of a set of shapes that I played around with on a previous oil painting.

There are certain arrangements of lines that I keep coming back to.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 15 - Penguins

Penguins are really overplayed in terms of cuteness. That being said, I like the idea of the penguin as a flightless bird. Consider the longing that must exist if you knew that all the others like you weren't confined to terrestrial bounds....

I just like the idea of longing...

I will try to post the original sketch also, especially because the doodle that set up the layout is somehow more compelling. I have heard other artists say that all of art is trying to capture the energy and feeling of the original sketch. True by leaps and bounds in this case.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 14 - Patches

Our aesthetic sensibilities seem by some measure to be rooted in ideas of symmetry. The eye patch is something that interrupts that symmetry, but the intriguing thing about it is the notion that behind this black is something interesting - I guess it illustrates to power of finding balance between symmetry and mystery. The tough thing is to get the rest of the proportions of the face correctly...I would say, meh in terms of drawing, but I will probably revisit this.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 13 - Abstract them revisited

There is something floral about this - I think i might be aching for spring already

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, finger!

Day 12 - Rubens

Peter Rubens' first wife - Isabella Brant adapted from a version of this image I found in a Dover thrift edition - not especially happy with the drawing using the iPad and my finger - in large part it occurs to me the difficulty in drawing with ones hand instead of a pencil/brush.

Rubens is striking in that he does mass with an incredible weight.

Tools: Sketchbook Pro, iPad, right finger!

Day 11 - I Robot

Much of the iPad art that I have done comes by way of a great app/program called Sketchbook Pro. The load screen includes this really elegant red robot in the rain, and that somehow triggered this image in my mind. As I write this though, I am reminded of this 2005 movie Robots and this image possibly shares some similarity with the main character of the film (ok... mainly in color).

A lot of human-computer interaction comes by way of how much of the computer/robot's "face" can be used to convey emotive information, and I like the idea that this robot has a spartan set of features but manages to convey something in its expression.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, right finger!

Day 10 - Lemmas

A few years ago, I became obsessed with lemmas. I imagined them as little fuzzy creatures, distinct in personality and ability.

A gallery of lemmas makes me smile...

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, right finger!

Day 9 - Silhouette

Nothing to be said but a quick exercise in green.

Tools: iPad, Sketchbook Pro, right finger!