Daily Sketch #129

Figured It Out

I've been debating how to handle Page 15 in Dead Inspector, whether to go with a straight forward approach of 3 guys walking down an alley way or to vary up the shots. Ultimately I've decided to vary the shots and I'm pretty happy with the layout below.

Off to New York for a quick day trip today. Should be fun and I always enjoy the train ride up and back.

Daily Sketch #128

Sigh.... Technology

So, I've managed to restore my iTunes library. Oh, but what a pain. Even after downloading CopyTrans, a pretty neat little program that restores playlist, play counts and so on from your ipod; it still took a couple hours to manually go through the library and delete duplicate files and find some missing ones.

This combined with my X-Box 360 crapping out on me last week (hello, red ring of doom) and D's laptop being really tempermental has made me really weary on the tech front. Or more appropriately the Microsoft front. David from "Dead Inspector" by the way, shares my malaise.

Check out the latest Mac commercial for a good laugh while you're at it - http://www.apple.com/getamac/ads/

Life is Stranger Than Fiction

Submitted without any real commentary.

Daily Sketch #127

Working Some Stuff Out

Just a quick one today as I'm working out some thumbnails and thoughts for a new page of Dead Inspector. This one reminds me of that scene from "Spies Like Us" - "Doctor." "Doctor." "Doctor." "Doctor."

Except you know... "Detective." "Detective." "Detective."

No? Anyone? Bueller?

Daily Sketch #126

More Toby

Here's another quick sketch of Toby, my mom's dog. He's a cute one, no?

Awesomeness level: somewhat low.

Discovered this morning that I somehow downloaded a bug which wiped out all my files on my shared network drive including my iTunes library and all of my backup files. Fortunately all of my music files were intact. But it's still a pain in the butt to have to recreate my library in iTunes and re-back up the other files. Sigh.

And in other rambling, where did the other interns on Gray's Anatomy go? Sure Meredith's sister is the cutest of the bunch but the others literally disappeared. Not one of the main characters had to deal with their interns this past week. Was it there day off or something?

Daily Sketch #125

Toby Sketch

My mom got a dog named Toby the year I left for college. He was a sweet (if somewhat dopey) and handsome golden lab with a great heart and a protective streak. He shed hair all over the house, was scared of storms, and occasionally drooled. When he died earlier this year my mom was devestated. She asked me to create a piece of art for her of Toby for Christmas. I don't think I realized how much I missed him until I went home for Thanksgiving and he wasn't there to greet me or until I started doing some prepatory sketches for the piece. This is the first.

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Daily Sketch #124

Why?!

Why did I eat so much turkey and sides last night? Why did I agree to go to the mall on Black Friday? Why?! Why?!

A Happy Thanksgiving to one and all.

Daily Sketch #123

Happy Turkey Day, Yo

Headed to down to VA to visit the folks and for turkey and pie. I was going to do a hand traced turkey sketch, like we did when we were kids, but honestly (and sadly) last night I could not recall how... So instead you get this Pilgrim. Word.
Happy Thanksgiving, y'all.

Daily Sketch #122

Dwarven Viking



Inspired a bit by Kenneth Rocafort's sketchbook this weekend and a bit by the incredibly cheesy but bloody "Pathfinder" I watched on the flight back to Baltimore, here's a double dose of dwarven viking warrior (to make up for my lack of sketch yesterday). I like the profile shot better than than the full figure.

In other news it looks like my X-Box 360 has the red light of death flashing and games are freezing inexplicably. Here's hoping Xbox Customer Service can help me out...

And excitingly enough I found out last night that my sister Anna will appear on an upcoming episode of MTV's "Made". Pretty damn cool! I'll let folks know once I know the air date.

Daily Sketch #121

Back in Baltimore

I'm back in Baltimore after a last minute trip to the airport to catch my late night flight homw Sunday night. I'm glad to be home and it was great to see my future sister-in-law and niece this morning .

Here's a Batman drawing inspired by Sean Phillips' blog.

Daily Sketch #120

Heroes4Heroes Live Art

It's a bonus Saturday morning sketch! Today's sketch is brought to you by Heroes4Heroes which is a non-profit organization that sends portable media like comics, DVDs, music and more to our troops serving overseas. It's a very cool way that the comics community gives back to men and women in uniform. Last night they held a Live Art charity event at the Arlington Ballpark where comic artist created pieces of art while folks partied and bid on other auction items in a silent auction. At the end of the night the pieces were auctioned away. I saw pieces go for $200-$400 and even a few rare ones for over $1000. Towards the tail end of the evening I teamed up with the kickass Kody Chamberlain of Punks and Tag fame and we created the jam piece below. It felt great to be back in front of an easel!

Daily Sketch #119

WizardWorld Texas and Jackie's Back

Greetings all from lovely Arlington Texas!
Today's sketch is of Jackie Estacado sporting his new Central American look since we're giving out a ton of The Darkness First Looks at WizardWorld Texas and debuting the new The Darkness trailer.

Yesterday was a long day starting at around 3:30am to catch my flight out, but a good one. I got to visit the flagship store for Lone Star Comics in Dallas. It's an awesome, clean, and well stocked store and I really enjoyed chatting with Chris Powell, the general manager.

Daily Sketch #118

Scrubs

D and I were watching a recent episode of Scrubs last night on the ol'Tivo and I lamented that this was the final season for this hilarious sitcom. I don' watch a lot of sitcoms anymore, I tend to prefer TV that tells an ongoing story and has some gravity to it. Other than the occasional Family Guy episode I think Scrubs may be the only sitcom I watch. It may be one of the consistently funny sitcom I've ever seen. Every character on that show has some appeal and is a comedic maestro.

Funniest bit from last night - the elevation of Snoop Dog Intern to Snoop Dog Attending and the mock Emmy Award ceremony by Doctor Cox... "And the winner is Dame Judy Dorian"... "Take that Tony Shaloub".

Awesomeness level on that show - way frickin' high.

My take on JD and Turk in honor of the show's final season.

By the by, I'm off to WizardWorld Texas tomorrow, so no promises on sketches for Thursday and Friday but I'll see what I can do.

Daily Sketch #117

What Up Fellas?

Making up for my late post yesterday, here's a standard early morning post with a panel in progress from "Dead Inspector". Props to my buddy John, who by calling me during his writer's block inspired me to really focus on this panel last night. Hopefully I did the same in return.

Oh, and no - today's headline is not what Captain Miller's actual line of dialogue in this panel. JC writes better than that.

"Heroes" - damn, that was a fun episode last night. Finally we found out what happened between the end of Season 1 and the beginning of Season 2. And Kristen Bell... well, let's just say I like her and I'm glad she's part of the show. Does anyone else think that Adam might be the sire of ALL of the Heroes? In theory he's been alive long enough to have a whole litter of kids. Just a thought.

Daily Sketch #116

Raining in Baltimore

Rain in Baltimore in the fall and winter months is pretty depressing. The sky is perpetually gray and gloomy and it just puts a damper on my entire mood. Friday we had rain. Last night more rain and finally all of today... you guessed it - rain. Yuck. Today's quick sketch was inspired by the weather. Enjoy.
The weekend rounds of wedding reception sites was pretty fruitful. Here's a picture of the front runner for the reception site. We thought it was pretty beautiful.
Keep clicking on those Google AdSense links, our wedding fund appreciates it:)

It's Finally Here!

iPhone Day

The day has finally come. It's time for me to join the elite multi-media phone users of the world. They've tempted me with clever commercials, lured me in with recommendations from friends, and awoke something I did not know I had... phone envy. Alright Apple, I surrender. You have me with your beautiful design, touch screen, and the fact that I have all of my music in iTunes format. Yesterday was liberation day from my Verizon contract. Today is iPhone day.
I hope to get a sketch up later today. I have to get cracking on work this morning as D and I are taking the second half of the afternoon to look at some wedding reception sites. Maybe I'll take some photos with my... iPhone?

Here's an entertaining mock iPhone commercial:

Daily Sketch #115

Coffee Time

Another panel in progress from "Dead Inspector", this time an establishing shot of the "Turn Your Head & Coffee" shop.

In other news, it's time for D and I to get a new washer. I have to give credit to Eric at My Appliance Guy out of Parkville, MD. We had him fix the washer early in the year under our home warranty. It broke again and to his credit he passed up on the money he could have made by telling me honestly that I'd be better off getting a new one. Then he spent some time on the phone with me recommending where I should go and what brand I should buy to avoid future repairs. Honesty is a hard but valuable trait to find in a service provider and I think Eric knows he's probably secured himself a customer for the definite future. I wish more businesses operated this way.

If anyone has seen coupons or sales for national chains like Home Depot, Lowes, Sears, etc. please let me know.

Daily Sketch #114

Something New on The Blog

You may notice something new on the blog today. In the right column (scroll down) you will see some Google ads. I've decided to see if my free sketches can generate a little extra income for me (why not, right?). So if you enjoy the free sketches and drop by the blog on a regular basis, you can support me by clicking on a link from one of the ads. I've decided to go with the least intrusive option by utilizing the text only ads and only ads the relate to the content of my blog. Any and all clicks are appreciated.

I'm also toying with the idea of making some of the original sketches available for sale but haven't quite thought that one through. If that comes to fruition, you folks will be the first to know.

Today's sketch is David and Steve having a conversation over a cup of coffee (a complete panel from the current page). Quick observation - there are no good coffee joints in Central Virginia or North Carolina. It seems to be the last area in the country that Starbucks hasn't penetrated with the ridiculous saturation that is omni-present in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast. I can't remember the last time I had to LOOK for Starbucks. In Durham, NC the only one I saw was in a Barnes and Noble. There's not even a Dunkin Donuts off the highway. Just gas stations and fast food. With Maxwell House (or something equally dreadful).

Also, I watched Ghost Rider yesterday. My mistake. It's every bit as bad as you've heard. Worse in fact. I would go so far as to say that Mark Steven Johnson should never be allowed to make movies again. He's done Daredevil, Elektra, and Ghost Rider. Three strikes and you are out my friend.

Daily Sketch #113

Captain Miller Progressing



Another panel in development. You saw the preliminary sketch earlier and now here's the panel about 3/4 of the way complete.

D and I took advantage of our hi def channels and TV for the first time and skipped the Tivo option (which doesn't record in HD) to watch Heroes last night. First of all, commercials feel quite odd now days. Secondly, hi def is awesome! The colors and details are almost frightening. I'm still a bit mixed on this season but the episodes do seem to be improving every week so I'm keeping my outlook positive.

Random thought from yesterday - I'm pretty certain that if I won the lottery, my house would burn down (or something equally catastrophic). Just so I wouldn't have all that money. Hence I do not play the lottery.

Daily Sketch #111

Panel In Progress (More!)

Here's a the panel from Dead Inspector with David at a grave site coming together further. Oooo, progress!

In other news, I saw American Gangster this weekend and it was quite excellent. Both Denzel and Russell Crowe put out killer performances. I love Denzel as a bad guy because he always plays them with such depth. Another actor would have turned that role into a charactiture but in Denzel's hands it was a fully fleshed sympathetic character. Crowe also delivered a principled but quite flawed hero. The only negative I have is it was a bit on the long side. Solidly recommended.

And a great weekend retreated for writing with my boys Andy and John. It was excellent to take that much time to reconnect with them, brainstorm, and get writing done. Plus a fun roadtrip to NC and bad meals at local joints and a Cracker Barrel breakfast. C and B, boys. C and B.

Daily Sketch #111

More of a Developing Page

Here's another early panel on the new page for "Dead Inspector". I'm hoping to get a few hours in total today on the page. Captain Miller say hello to Steve and David.

Halloween - pretty awesome. D and I had a ton of fun handing out candy and comics to kids and while there was a slow start to the evening we ended up with a steady stream for about 2 hours. We even estimated our candy and comics pretty well so there was relatively little left over. Our first Halloween at our own house (last year we both had classes on Halloween). Good times.