Glad to see the back of August

August was not a great month. Work was slow, then it up and stopped for a bit. September feels like its starting off well though, so I am excited for the possible progress the month holds. Plus, its raining today for the first time in what seems like at least a month and rain always makes me feel like there is a clean slate.

Anyhow, as far as progress! I have my portfolio website mostly updated for the first time in a year. I am going to add some sprites from the Garfield game that I worked on back in the day and then it will be solid. Also, I have made quite a bit of headway on the feature film that I shot a couple of years ago. I finished the rough edit and I am halfway through the final edit. I am impressed with how well it is flowing considering it was the first feature for everyone involved. But, even with having worked on several features since then, my first still seems like it was one of the best sets I've been on. Winter's Bone is a close second. Organized, on deadline, on budget and an incredible feeling of comradery from all involved. In thinking about promoting it I may start putting snippets of the behind the scenes video that my good friends, Juan Diaz and Nathan Shelton (the producer and one of the actors of the film), shot during their downtime on set. They have about 5 hours of footage and I think it will go a long way to show the dedication and talent the cast and crew had on that pic.

Also, I have made some headway on the effects work for Mickey Stone's film, Rain in Hell. Its a gritty gangster type of movie with a samurai twist. I storyboard'd, DP'd, directed and edited the short. It has some incredible music in it from Theolynn Carpenter and the Wardrobe Cathedral, Beth Thompson and the Shway, and Todd Anthony Mendieta. Also, the acting was top notch. I need to get a trailer together ASAP to put up on the website to start promoting that work as well.

An unfortunate side note, at one point there were four or five Geek blogs that I checked daily for empowering and in depth articles on toys, comics, sci-fi and general geek culture.  However, over the past several months the majority of those guys have had to either slow down their posts or close their blogs entirely due to new babies, new jobs or commercial success ( I know, priorities, right?).  So, I need someone to recommend some new geek/nerd type blogs for me to get my creative juices flowing first thing in the morning.

One blog I recommend folks checking out is a friend of mine who makes delightful hand sewn household items.  She discusses her exploits on her blog, then sells the items on etsy.  As an additional aside, she is one of the best video game producers around.

Before I go, just to show I am doing some real artwork I leave a teasing thumbnail of a series of paintings I am working on inspired by Gil Elvgren (you know, from back when pin-ups were still classy) and the ladies of 80's cartoons.  This journey into Corel Painter has already shown to have better results, so I look forward to showing off the final work.