Evolution

I have been thinking about evolution recently. I don't mean humans and their upright apeness. My musings are more along the lines of consciousness: at what point is consciousness evolving and at what point is it merely changing? I can see changes in myself, but the question that haunts me is whether I am truly becoming a better, more sociologically equipped adult, or whether I am merely changing into a different person. Either way, while the face in the mirror is the same, the person is different and I'm not sure if I like him as much as the other guy.

Sometimes I feel my shadow has more color to it than I do.


Or perhaps my life is just a sort of washed out dream.


Maybe it's just that age changes you. Each moment is a further experience to confirm or deny ideologies of the past. Enough denial forces an ideological change. Ideally, the weak and sick ideologies die and the strong survive. Okay, so less of the philosophical talk. I'll talk about a different kind of evolution. Artistic evolution.


With this one, I drew it first in pencil and then started in with pen. By the time I got to paint, the motorcycle had driven off.


I was more secure in my abilities when I did this one so I just sketched with pencil before I started in with paint, but it's floating without a background.


This one has a background.I decided to paint this one without using a pencil lay-in.

So, besides these motorcycles becoming more motorcycle like, I just realized there was a hair on the scanner. Extra points to those of you who can find the hair in each picture! (I guess future personal artistic evolution would include examining the scanner to make sure that there are no hairs.)


Another example: this is an early drawing of one of my dear friends, Michael Montafi. It looks absolutely NOTHING like him. (30 min)


This one is a lot more like him. (10 min)


This one is more developed, but is ultimately not a great deal better than the one above it.
The gentleman on the right is Michael, the gentleman on the left is another very dear friend: Joe Raffanti. Unfortunately, this is one of my first attempts at doing a portrait of Joe and it is lacking in Joe-ness. (20 min)

So, I have decided i am frustrated with technology. I could have rendered this computer in the time that it took me to upload these images. I have to remind myself that I am lucky that I don't have to set the type for these words, but still--This post took me three hours. Perhaps someday I will have a more evolved sense of how to deal with ones and zeros as a medium of communication. Until then, have a beautiful day!

Summer Paintings

So, I definitely am not sure how to do this whole posting business! I want the text to appear on top or in between the images, yet it always appears at the bottom! Yay for the efficiency of the computer age! Trivial griping aside, I have been painting!!! It has been amazingly fun to tackle things that just scare me half to death. (from an artistic standpoint) My first self portrait in a year. In all past self portraits, I have looked young, drugged, or Asian. I am not sure why it is always these three things, but suffice it to say, this is the best I have thus far done!

I have always wanted to do a painting of a Converse shoe. I'm not sure why.


And, of course, I love trees! They represent a level of design, aesthetics, and pure scientific genius that human beings have yet to scratch the surface of!


Speaking of design, this is a P-51 Mustang that I came in contact with the other day!


This is a scaled suit of armor. All of the joints move and are put together in as accurate a form as possible. Hundreds of pounds of fitted metal armor would be strapped to the stalky folk they called Knights. On a horse, these warriors were a footsoldier's worst nightmare. Knock a knight off his horse, though, and the weight of his armor mad him an immovable pin-cushion.


My friends and I are convinced that the Armenians at Starbucks are part of the mafia.


They drive expensive cars, speak in Russian, and glare at the artistic ruffians in the corner.


(artistic ruffians in the corner)

I think the griping was in vain. I believe I have figured out how to post text between images. when I hit "Publish Post" I guess we shall find out! So, on this beautiful summer afternoon, this is Sparky, signing off and ready to paint!

Figure Drawing

These were some of the figure drawings that I submitted for the Animation/Illustration portfolio.

My First Post

This past semester, I got into the Animation/Illustration program at San Jose State University. These are some of the pieces that I submitted for the portfolio. Some of the pieces are from life, some are from photographs, and some are done without reference from my imagination. I would love any advice or critiques you would be willing to offer me.