In No Condition to Drive

Blue lights..delights!

After years of being adverse to color in some ways, I found myself drawn to blue. Blue lights, variations of blue, blue flame, blue clothing, etc. I like the way blues can be warming and cooling. In some ways the color even became totemic for me. There is a strength and replenishing feeling that comes from blue light. This picture is a manipulation of a shot taken on an iphone, of a cheap,kids fiber optic flash light with sparkly dolphin. I also got some video footage of it that has since become source material for VJ visual effects background projections with quite wonderful results. The last stage of manipulation of this image was done on an ipad using Filterstorm.

How I learned to love fashion..

Over the last few years I have developed a fondness and appreciation for men's and women's fashion and fashion design. After spending years walking down the street and passing by the clothing places on 24th St. I began to enjoy the various window displays and arrangements. I took more time to notice the cuts, the shapes, the forms, the patterns. My favorite place is Ambiance. The window displays are almost always beautifully integrated arrangements of color, pattern, and form. This photograph was taken from a dress in one of their displays. I rather enjoy the scalloped shapes and the amazing contrast of the warms and cools. I took this into Photoshop and messed around with the color and saturation levels a bit. I always look forward to their new displays. Oh, yeah the Phoenix bookstore also has fun arrangements of books based on color schemes. This is always fun from a color and text perspective.

My only lament is that there are very few clothing places for men in this neighborhood. I do enjoy dressing up myself, especially for work or work related things. I still love my Carharts, black t-shirt, and baseball cap, but I have developed a fondness for nice button down shirts, ties, pants, and shoes. I was already headed this direction, and then after watching Don Draper and Co. on Mad Men for the last year or so, I really developed a stronger appreciation for dressing up. When I dress up I feel accomplished.
On the flip side of dressing up, I have also taken an interest in finding t-shirt designs. I found a couple that I really liked at the recent Threads fashion event in SF, and ordered another from BrassTack Apparel.

Now, after years and years of drawing the nude figure, I find myself interested in spending more time drawing clothed figures and clothing. I like looking through fashion magazines for interesting figures, portraits, styles, and trying to draw them, but would prefer to work from life. I am looking for any interested models, who may have some interesting outfits, or arrangements.

Living the Second Life!

For the last several years I have logged many hours in the virtual world of Second Life. These are a couple shots of one version of myself in the gallery warehouse space I had created on land I was holding. The works in the galleries ranged from my digital work to my traditional figure drawings. I really admire all the creativity I ran across in Second Life. No one I know locally was ever a part of Second Life. I know many people are like WTF about Second Life, but it is a pretty amazing space. And hell, I've been curious about virtual reality since I saw "Westworld" and "Futureworld" as a young kid. I freaking loved those movies! Not to mention the later and often overlooked classic "Brainstorm". Anyways, one of the things I like about Second Life is the ability to take photos of your avatars, your friends, and the interesting places you can explore. I never quite got to the point of making one, but you can also create Machinima, or video productions in world using avatars as actors.