Time for music...

We spent last night greeting the start of 2007 with friends. There was music and some dancing. This is an unrelated sketch from 2006. Happy New Year all!

May the snow goblin be your friend...

Click here for the Flash version of this little greeting with northern lights... :)

See everyone in 2007!

Frieze...

Posted by Arna in celebration of the party season. Here's a flashdoodle of nudists with their dogs and some blue fruit. Not to say that this is how WE party... :)

Too many eyes...

I'm not sure if this guy is a plant or animal. Imagine coming upon a horde of these in the woods...

Have a lovely weekend, peoples!

Sunset, quick colour rough...

Approx. 10 minute sketch posted by Arna:

This was the scene through our front window tonight. Done with Photoshop Elements as the light faded, hurrying to catch the moment:

Considering December 6...

Two days ago was the 17th anniversary of the killing of 14 women, shot dead at the Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal.

Arna's son, illustrator and comic artist Max Douglas (Salgood Sam), posted a piece on the subject, and we think it's a good read:

SALGOOD SAM's WORK DIARY

Variations on a cat theme...

Posted by Arna:

Images from morning warm-ups with our cats...

Flash girl...

Posted by Arna:

Playing with Flash using transparencies:

Unseasonably warm...

Posted by Arna:

Sculpt and doodle...

Posted by Arna:

A recent piece done in three nights at Central Technical school. The most enjoyable part of the process was slapping the figure onto a roughed-in raised slab during the last half hour of the third night. I like the contrast between the worked figure and the less textured platform she's reclining on.

This is a sketchdoodle of no one in particular, but the model for the piece above was an influence.

The Way of the Dackel...

snail in the big world...

Posted by Arna:

A snail's pace. No, this is not about how slow my current storyboard is going. That's maybe a subject for another post. Or not.

This is what I saw on a Go Train platform on a rainy Toronto Sunday morning this week. I hope the little guy wasn't stepped on. It was heading towards the safety of the brush behind the platform. Slowly.

going squirrelly...

Posted by Arna:

A small mangy squirrel is eating our house. The little rodent comes back day after day and gnaws at the rotten window ledge on our decrepit back sunporch. The thing seems to want in. Winter's coming, so maybe it thinks it can make a nest or maybe it actually wants to hang out with our cats. It's really their sunporch. They spend most sunny days sleeping there.

Today I tried to make the squirrel go away by yelling and banging on the window. It's chewing its way into our house after all! I started to growl like an angry cat. I waved around a cardboard poster tube, trying to look ferocious. The squirrel just sat on the ledge staring back at me while I went nuts. But our cat Kiki lunged and grabbed me by the hair. Guess she had enough of my shenanigans.

If you look closely in the drawing you'll see the chew marks on our windowsill. We really have to stop this critter! Anyone have suggestions for getting rid of a pesky squirrel??

Up next...

Posted by Arna:

A random collection of photos all taken at night during Bloor Street walks:

Cast in cement part 2...

Posted by Arna:

Here's the completed mold:

But I spoke too soon! I then added 'handles' of burlap to the outside of the mold:

Two instructors at Central Technical School open another student's mold to remove the clay:

Lining the cement in layers on the inside of the mold:

Here's another view of the two halves of the mold. I built the cement up a bit more, but not too thick. Then (no pictures for the next stage) I added strips of fiberglass soaked in a thin slop of cement, to make the piece strong.

The cement sculpt newly removed from the mold, with the light 'bloom' forming on the surface:

The finished piece stained with a furniture polish and rubbed with a brass barbecue brush to give it a brass patina:

All done.

Cast in cement part 1...

Posted by Arna:

I decided to do my first cement cast piece from a clay sculpture shown in this previous post. The casting process was well worth documenting, even though I only have pictures of some of the steps. It took me ten sessions to do the entire cement cast. Compare that to just three sessions to do the original clay sculpt! Casting takes a lot longer than sculpting. I made this piece at Central Technical School in Toronto.

Here's the first side of the mold built up over the clay figure:

We 'throw' or 'splash' plaster at the clay to form the mold:

Another view of the back:

More to come in a second post...

Dorothy Van Bruggen

1934-2006

Sadly and suddenly, John's mother passed away on September 21st, in her 73rd year. We can't believe that you're gone and we miss you, Mom.

High hopes...

Posted by Arna.

Here's a kid waiting for something special. Maybe a letter from Grandma, or a decoder ring...

Two Heads On Red...

Posted by John:

Here's an actual phone doodle that ended up stuck to a card advertising a fitness centre.

Through a funhouse mirror...

Posted by Arna:

While flipping through some older material earlier today, I found a few designs from a feature film project John and I both worked on years ago. These are sketches I did originally in pencil and xeroxed to 'lock in' the line, so's I could render some tone with marker. These days I might just scan and do the tone with photoshop, but I still like to work with a pantone warm grey.

Storyboard goodies...

Click on the swordplay to go to fellow board artist Warren Leonhardt, speaking about his recent experience creating boards on the television series Jane And The Dragon. We think this one covers the subject very well, with plenty of personal anecdotes and Warren's typical energy. If you haven't already done so, go there now!