tiny island

a quiet day on the fishbone. for most of the day, i was doing everything i could to avoid the drawing table. no other reason than being lazy and easily distracted. i've heard from several good friends in the last few days, people i don't get to be with very often, and it makes me want to sit around going through old photographs and staring out the window. finally, i made another pot of coffee and sat myself down. what came to mind was tiny island. a small outcrop of rocks and pines and brush. not easily visited but always intriguing. if i knew how, i'd put this drawing on a 3D animation turntable so that i could rotate around it whenever i wanted to.

allure

this drawing is based on a lure (a-lure..allure..., get it? ha! oh, never mind) called a bass-oreno. the ol' bass-oreno doesn't mess around. i never felt right about using this lure because it seemed too much, too mean. the bass-oreno mostly lay at the bottom of my tackle box, getting scuffed and tangled up with other stuff. but the name is fun, right? just for today, try attaching "-oreno" to the end of someone's name when you see them - as in, "it's the ol' steve-oreno" or "what's the dan-oreno up to?"

evolution

today was a beautiful day. dark rain-filled clouds rolled across the sky, prodded by a cold spring wind. the sun broke through intermittently and pushed the colors of the forest to maximum for a minute or two, and then winked out suddenly, like a giant search light, turning off, panning across the landscape, and then turning on again in the distance.

i decided to do a little work on the heron - try to figure him out. he's there in my thoughts but i don't think i've captured him, yet. i drew on a smoother paper than i have been using so it had a different feel to it. nice but different. this heron is a hunter, a fisherman, and a loner. he probably speaks a language that only other heron's understand but he doesn't speak much. he watches and waits. waiting for movement below the surface. waiting forever.

blue blue heron

there's a new character on the fishbone that i'm thinking about...a blue heron. i'm going to have to research this bird more before i can work him up in color. i've never been closer than half a football field away from one and i've never seen more than one in the same place at the same time. this sketch is just an idea, not a study. i'm sure there are important details that i'm missing. eventually, what i would really like to do is make a tall, full-color stand-up that can stand on my desk or the fireplace mantel. so, i have to learn more about what a blue heron looks like and how to make a stand-up. i'll let you know what happens.

fish fry friday

it's friday! and you know what that means...fish.

i know what you're thinking...now he's going to talk about his favorite beer battered fish fry recipe served hot with salty fries and extra cold, cheap beer. friends sitting around the kitchen table after a long week of work. june bugs banging on the back porch screen door as evening turns to night and the scent of pine trees lingers in the air.

but you'd be wrong. that's not the topic. friday is the day to remember to tell your children the bedtime story about the mean fish lurking along the tall grassy shallows of fishbone lake. perfectly camouflaged and moving slowly through the edges of shadow. sharp teeth gleaming. red eyes searching. he's highly protective of his territory so be careful and don't forget about him. otherwise he might get you.

now go to sleep.

from the sketchbook

frank frazetta (1928 - 2010)

his dramatic work inspired me and this morning, upon learning of his passing, i find myself looking at his work online and considering my own drawings. while it may not be apparent in my current work, i like to think there's some frazetta there.

here's a drawing from an old sketchbook

close to the truth

sometimes i like a certain area of a drawing more than the entire drawing. here's a detail that i think makes a good drawing all by itself so that's all i'm going to show you.

dardevle

i remember a cluster of three lakes that my dad and i would visit that were like a chain of beautiful worlds, each one composed of new shapes and mysteries; each one an independent ecosystem and yet bound to the other in some way ancient. dad called them the three sisters. to get from one lake to another, we'd have to find the overland paths that connected them and portage - literally carry our canoe and gear through the woods - to the next lake. once, in the farthest reaches of the smallest sister, i hooked a big fish with my then favorite lure but after a brief fight, the line snapped and the fish and the lure were gone. losing that lure was a tragedy at the time but now i enjoy the thought that it is still there, resting in those clear, cold waters.