Trader Joe's Cheese Tasting

Here's a sign I just did for Trader Joe's, where I work. I cannot take credit for the theme, the humorous puns, or the wording. That was done by a group of us directed by a manager. The design and execution is mine. Trader Joe's cheese really is good, and it's also lower in price than other stores. Sign is done in opaque acrylic markers on foamboard with added foamboard cut-outs. 

Cosi Eater

Those other sketchbloggers are all drawing people in subways or buses or cafe's, so I can too. Here's a Sunday evening eater I sketched while waiting for my goodies at Cosi.

Post-Modern Portico

This neo-Victorian portico, with its two neo-Vict street lamps, is the facade of a Staybridge Suites hotel in McLean, Virginia. This hotel chain's design has a kind of faux-frontier flavor complete with stone facings and railroad-station-style dark woodwork. I approve. This picture was drawn from inside a coffee house across the street.

I Try A Figure

Honestly, I've never been good at drawing human figures. One friend of mine said that all my people look like buildings. I have been "psychoanalyzed" as to why my figures look so stiff and lifeless, and no matter how much drawing I do, they never seem to get any better. But since scantily clad women drawn well are an essential for any kind of popular work, I'd better get busy and keep trying. I don't get a chance to draw them from life, so I have to work from photographs. This one is a "modest" swimsuit model from a well-known catalog. Pencil, enhanced in Photoshop.

Chilly Blossoms

It's cherry blossom time in the Metro DC area, including the famous ones downtown in the monument areas. Ornamental cherry trees are everywhere in this area, either planted as landscaping or appearing in patches of urban forest. The leaves are not out yet in the cool weather, but the flowers show up against the background of twigs.

Sketch from memory, done in Photoshop

Gene Wolfe, from 1984

An illustration from 1984, retrieved from my old color slide. This depicts a moment in one of Gene Wolfe's "Book of the New Sun" tales of Severian, the wandering executioner. I was inspired by Italian Renaissance painting as well as Italian hill town architecture. The painting was sold in April 1984 at a convention in Nashville, Tennessee. That was 24 years ago, believe it or not. 

Acrylic watercolor and ink on board, 12" x 18".

One Bright Spot

Title of this is "One Bright Spot." Can you see what it is? As always, click on the picture for a larger version. This is one of my Shenandoah country scenes which is now at a gallery in Staunton, VA, in the picturesque Shenandoah Valley. Done in a mixture of colored pencil and acrylic on brown board, 9" x 11".