Illustration: Birdhouse, Möbius Meadows Farmstead

 A rare occasion where I was excited seeing this come along. I am really happy with the painting technique I used and the realism of it. its not a complicated subject which is maybe why I think it worked out so well. 

I painted this in Krita and it really reminded  me why I love to use the program. I blocked out all the colours first on different layers and then added painted details little by little to get the aged wood effect with different colours.

illustration: bâtiment, Vieux Port Montreal

 

I love that I can draw in as little as five minute increments and get something done over a couple weeks with the iPad. I wanted to do something very "architectural" and I think this qualifies. I debated adding the  trees in front but Im glad I did. I also like the no shading all line look. 

illustration: Truro, Cape Cod, Massachusetts

 

This was a difficult project to figure out. I started it in January. I wanted to do a a landscape and took a bunch of reference photos on Cape Cod last December hoping got get something I could paint as a practice. I settled on an image of the dune with the clouds prominently featured and the shoreline far below in the distance. I painted and repainted the clouds until I did not hate them. The dune itself was lots of grass and sand - LOTS of grass.... I was really hating it until I had painted enough of the grass to show what it would look like finally filled in. 

As it went along I realized there was zero, sense of scale. Was the dune several feet or many stories high? It was, in fact, many stories high and the shoreline in the corner did not emphasize that in in any way. I also decided to let myself get sloppy with the details as I got towards the bottom of the painting so the point of interest was more towards the top of the dune. That was also not satisfying and I looked through more references and saw some had people walking up the side of the dune. I decided to add a figure on top or maybe on the right side. It was December and everyone there was in winter coats but since you also could not tell what season it was I posed a 3D character from a short film that took place on a beach, lit him and used that image to paint from, ultimately putting him on the upper left top - which seemed dramatic enough. The scale isn't far off, in reality he would be a little smaller but I did not like how that looked. 

So I think it looks Ok but it's still basically a failed landscape painting in some ways. 

illustration: Art, mais 2022 @ Mobius Meadows Farmstead

 I did a trick my friend Mike Luce uses and took some reference photos in a sneaky way so I could do a portrait of my friend Art on his farm in Vermont. Mike does it to get more natural poses and I did it because no one wants to pose for me. I still would like to have done portraits of most of my friends so this stealth method might just get me there, eventually. I wasn't going to show this if he was mad i did it or did not like it and he wasn't and he did - so here it is. 

This is in the style of a portrait I did in December of my friend Keamy and my plan is do all the friend portrait like this. I used Procreate since I can draw anywhere and when I have a few minutes. 

Illustration: granges, Colchester Vermont

 Another one I wanted to use only black line work on. These two barns are down the street from Mobius Meadows farmstead where I like to spend as much time as I can. I see them all the time and never bothered to draw them until now. I thought about putting in the trees behind the barn but I think they would have made the illustration too dense and would have taken the point of interest away. 

Illustrations: Mount Royal & bird house(Vermont)

 A structure on Mont Royal got my attention a month or 2 ago and I started drawing it about 3 weeks ago. I was able to get a lot done while waiting 3 ½ hours at the bus terminal for a late bus ride to Boston Thursday and then I did the rest while staying with my dad. Used a greyscale technique with some highlights to show more depth. 

The second drawing a bird house at Mobius Meadows Farmstead in Vermont I did a quick sketch of while there and took some reference phots and got some of it finally inked in while I was sitting with my mom in hospital a few hours Friday afternoon. I then finished it waiting for the bus to take me home. This was all pen strokes except for the watercolour splash in the background. I didn't want to use any additional "tricks" like grey areas or white pencil, just line. 

Festival nomination: Cask of Amontillado

 My animated Poe tale, "Cask of Amontillado" was nominated a the Cannes Shorts festival! 

You can see the film on Youtube, be sure to subscribe and like the film! 

Game: Myst 2021 by Cyan Games

 

I sort of promised myself I wasn't going to buy Myst again... I have bought it several times now as it got updated over the decades and was happy enough to have it on my iPad and get to play the "new age" Rime in that version. I am not a gamer as anyone who knows me will tell you but I LOVE the world of Myst and the visuals. I bought Obduction and will be getting Firmament when it is released, supposedly the end of this year.

Was it worth another purchase? It was on sale on Steam and I could not resist. The graphics were really amazing and game play was smooth and so good I don't think I can play on the iPad again because the look of the 2021 version is just that good. 

The new version has some interesting differences in navigation and some of the puzzles. This seems to be to allow for limitations in the VR version (financial note to self: MUST NOT BUY). There was a big disappointment at the end for me, however. The Rime age was not included. I have read they are planning to add it in a update so I will look forward to that, but I won't lie it was a sad surprise to see it was missing. 

* Additional note: The second Myst game, Riven, is apparently under development with a new updated version as it was maybe the best in the series I am surprised it hasn't been done already. There were human characters and strange creatures walking around in that one and I really would like to see how that looks if it is anywhere near the quality of this update. 

Photos: Mobius meadows farmstead

 After not being to the farm for  2 ½ years, I was finally able to go back and see my friends and walk around in the great outdoors. The alpacas still let me pet them which was nice and I was able to take some photos at the farmstead and at the river across the street. 

illustration: souche d'arbre

 I was inspired to try a nature drawing on my walk on Mont Royal a couple weeks ago. I isolated this stump from the millions of other details around the it and drew it in Procreate with the pencil tool and added some white and grey pencil work give it more dimension. I took my time and did this at the end of the day over the last week or so.