The Taco-Matic 9000

Well, since this one is a still a bit unfinished, I'm going to just send my finger-eating monster to Monday Artday for the "favorite food" challenge. It's got all the basic parts there, but it needs a little shading or metallic texture on the surfaces of the contraption, stuff like big fans, lights and dials, and of course, a heavenly glow surrounding each delicious taco.

Midnight Snack

Monday Artday is fully operational again, and one of the word challenges is "Favorite Food", so I whipped up this little guy and his favorite food. I admit I didn't try to make the blanket look folded at all, folds still blow my mind. I actually have another idea brewing, a mundane food prepared in a much more interesting way. If I can't get that one done on time, then this little critter will find a home on Monday Artday.

Rock On, Arctic Monkeys!

I knew I couldn't miss Monday Artday's word of the week "Monkey", so I whipped up this fellow inspired by the band "Arctic Monkeys", who I've been listening to a lot lately. Looking at it now it seems I've forgotten his guitar strap, so if you were hoping for an accurate depiction of a monkey playing bass I hope you're not too disappointed. But I'm happy with the furry little rocker, I guess I'm in a good mood since I didn't have to inhale any acidic gasses at work today. And finally, a list of some of my favorite monkeys of all time:

#5 - Grape Ape

#4 - Gleek or Glook or something, the one from Superfriends

#3  - Curious George

#2 - The one I saw at a Russian circus riding a horse and throwing a ball, while wearing a cute and practical monkey diaper

#1 - Mr. Teeny

Monday Artday - Invisible

The word challenge was "invisible" - glass is sometimes invisible to some unfortunate birds. One time one slammed the huge window door in our basement and stood out there totally stunned while my dogs went nuts trying to claw their way outside to get it. So far I've experienced 3 bird on window collisions in my day.

A Mystic for Monday Artday

Here's my Mystic for Monday Artday this week, colored in Photoshop over a very loose and cartoony pencil drawing.

Monday Artday - Pumpkinhead goes trick or treating

Here's the character that combines my love of jack-o-lanterns with my love of Batman, on his way to trick-or-treat. It's going on Monday Artday for the "jack-o-lantern" challenge, of course someone beat me to the concept of a pumpkin-head kid going trick or treating, but Batman trumps everything. This little guy was supposed to just be a part of a bigger composition for that challenge, I didn't think I'd have time to finish the sketch though. I also was having trouble getting the human head jack-o-lanterns to look grotesque enough.

Monday Artday - Fast Food Farthing

Here's the colored penny farthing, cartoony style. When I saw the term bike, the old-timey big wheeled bike sprung to mind, and all I had to do was think of somewhere to put one. I'm going to try to work more on my coloring, just coloring in the inked in spaces makes it look a little flat. About 5% of the coloring was done with my fancy new drawing tablet, my early b-day present, those things are cool.

Penny Farthing - Still the Greatest Invention Known to Man

Monday Artday is closing in on the end of its "bicycle" challenge. People have already submitted cute robot on a bike, a crazy bike that looks like it's made of squirrels and antlers - but so far, there is no representation of the greatest bike ever......the penny farthing! I must admit it was hard as hell for me to figure out the spokes, and they wound up a little arbitrary. Also some of my earlier tries had pretty wierd looking legs, so congratulations to anyone who can draw a realistic bike! I was going to post it yesterday, but got addicted to Plants vs Zombies, a pretty fun game where you plant attack plants to protect your yard from zombies.

Monday Artday - Breakfast Battle!

This week's Monday Artday topic was "Cute Object", as in add some personality and cuteness to some inanimate objects. My original idea was to do a bathroom with a happy smiling toilet, sink, and TP roll - then it could double as encouragement for my kid to potty train (however, it also runs the risk of possibly making him think the toilet is alive and scare him so much he never uses one again). But I decided to animate this BreakFast Battle instead. The characters were drawn in ink, and I finally learned how to be a little more efficient with coloring them in Photoshop so it doesn't take days. One last piece of trivia - the wooden surface this takes place on is my actual table!

For Monday Artday - Big Ol' Moon

Since I've become addicted to websites that let you post art, I've joined the blog Monday Artday. It has two overlapping, biweekly challenges, where you illustrate a given word. It looks like fun, but there is some pretty great artwork on it, so I feel kind of like I'm showing up in an NFL locker room with a nerf football. For "Moon", my first thought was drunken college kids mooning someone, but I figured I'd keep it classy and do a collage. I'm kind of excited with all the textures you can do in Photoshop, either with the built in filters or by blending in a textured photo, so that's basically all this picture is. It includes textures from my ceiling, towels, play-doh, and a couple chairs. I tried to make the textured shapes all resemble moons within the big moon.

And since the picture is taking a long time to upload, I'll let you in on another artistic secret of mine........Goose Island Oatmeal Stout is delicious!