Elsa - Finished!

Ah yes. Finally it is done.
We have had a lot of changes lately. Moving to Olympia is one of them. So every project was put on hold for a few weeks. But despite losing Elsa's hair piece during the move, I finally got to work on it this week. And it's finished!

I am now going to go and enjoy my best work ever - my sandwich.

It's Called Style T-shirt Design

 Because old man style is coming back. Hurrah! I do like those cars, and my husband dresses like one. So it's a win-win for us.

Check out the progress photos. We are also on Instagram, don't you know?

When I was young

This is what and how I used to draw back in the good ol' days. It's funny how after listening to other's advice, your style totally changes.

Polycrylic Fail

"What the" is right. After spending my precious time painting this face, my world got ruined. I applied the damn water-based polycrylic. Why? Because this is for a 5 year-old. And because I like to water down the acrylic sometimes to get the details right, once the water-based polycrylic was applied, it bled and smudged all kinds of details.

I tried to repaint it on top of the polycryliced layer, and now Elsa looks like every other actor on TV - caked with too much makeup. Then I tried to coat another layer of it, and it smudged again. When will I learn?? I am just going to let it set for a few days before nervously applying another coat.

Killer Whale

Whenever Dan gets board or wants to unwind, he draws. Most people (like myself) would opt to alcohol.

Here is the result of one boring evening - killer whale, doing it Native American style! It's been cut out of basswood, painted with acrylic and mounted on blue textured cardstock in a reused frame. Isn't it pretty?

Shipping

People seem to really like birds. Mailed these babies to some awesome ladies. We hope they like them.

Enoch Thompson - Finished

Oh Nucky Thompson, you look so awesome.

Also, here's a Youtube slideshow:

 And another shot of it sans the LED love:

Elsa Cut Out

Elsa from Frozen is now cut out and painted front and back. Also, I have managed to paint and cut out a few other creatures for my other projects.

Springtime

Gross.

Enoch Thompson 3

The Nucky Thompson project is another one that involved much wiring for many LED lights. It took a few weeks for all the parts to arrive for us to complete this diorama. We shall post photos of the finished product very soon.

Frozen Elsa - Progress

Many of you who know me would know that I don't do princesses. But out of pure kindness of that which is my heart I'm doing this for Emma, our niece. So we can use it as a bait for her to listen to the grownups!

I've never watched Frozen because I hear it's all about princesses. But Emma loves this Elsa character. So this is going to be a paper doll set. With a flat wooden doll.

English Breakfast 12x12

Here is another English Breakfast Cut-Out. Why did I ever think cutting out individual beans would be hilarious? And what about those grease bubbles on the bacon strips? I keep finding them loose around the apartment, like wild geese.

Anywho, this grand 12"x12" version of the vibrant English Breakfast wall art is for sale on Etsy. Dan wants to keep it, but I have about 2 or 3 different versions of them laying around that I made for practice.

Link: http://goo.gl/SU7il3 

Ghostbusters Ecto 1 Diorama - Videos and Animations

Since this diorama is an interactive piece, I thought I'd post a video of how it works and looks. We only have a very ancient camera that has video settings, so excuse the awful quality of the video.

I am also uploading gif animations of the diorama. Here you can really see the "interior" of the car.

In the Youtube video, it looks like it says "Poo" on the inside of the door. I feel obligated to mention that it says "Boo". Not "Poo".

Ecto1 - FINISHED!

Holy crap. It's finally finished. Man, that was a lot of work!! My back hurts like hell and my throat hurts from all the super glue fume. But look at it. It looks pretty awesome! Totally worth all the work.

Gaze upon the interior surprise! Boo!

Will be posting more photos tomorrow. For now, I need sleep. And Candy Crush.

Ecto1 - Almost Finished

This diorama of Ecto 1, the Ghostbusters' amazing Cadillac is starting to look pretty good. There will be a lot of cables here and there, so it'll be yet another challenge to figure out how to hide them all. But all we have to do now is groom the frame (sand, apply wood putty, sand, paint, sand, paint, sand and paint), install the LED lights, the switch and the battery, and glue everything in its place. Pretty close to the finishing line, I do declare!

Check out the progress photos.

Enoch Thompson 2

Dan's Enoch Thompson in color. Did we mention that we love Boardwalk Empire?

Cat Garland - Extended

This is a custom-made super long orange cat garland. The original garland is about 4 ft. (122cm) This one is about 9 ft long. Whoa! Now let's compare the two.

Aww. So short.

Snow Leopard Diorama for Sale

Here is the Etsy listing. We are donating 15% of the profit to Snow Leopard Trust to support their awesome work. We already have a few products from them - their calendar in particular is very cool.

To celebrate the long ass period it took for us to post it on Etsy, here is an image of the project progress. It doesn't look like it should've been that time-consuming. But never mind that. The important thing is, it's for sale.

Illustrated Presidents - Taking Orders

We are now taking orders for the illustrated presidents prints. They are 13"x19", printed on high quality matte paper. The layout was specially redesigned to fit this size. Only $20 for a limited time. Leave us comments on our Facebook page to get your own copy. Or send us notes/ emails.

Ecto1 - Slimer WIP

This little Slimer is designed and drawn by Dan. It's been a challenge to figure out the right amount of UV paint to put on it so this isn't the only thing that pops out of the Ghostbusters diorama.

Enoch Thompson 1

Play Boardwalk Empire theme song here. And please, no spoilers! We haven't watched the last season yet.

We love Boardwalk Empire, and Nucky Thompson is a perfect character for Steve Buscemi. Dan's been working very hard painting these wooden cut-outs. The painting is actually all finished now. Just waiting to install everything.

Non-expressive-post-abstract Expressionism

If you haven't heard of Non-expressive-post-abstract Expressionism, shame on you! It is just the most un-made-up, the most believable, and the most important art movement ever! In fact, I am surprised it's not on Wikipedia. What is up with that?

The best example of Non-expressive-post-abstract Expressionism by Dr. Daniel B.

But not to worry. I am here to put your mind at ease with a link. Here's where you can find out more about Non-expressive-post-abstract Expressionism. Now run along and study.

Dokkaebi 1

Dokkaebi? Dokebi? I don't know how to spell it exactly, but it's spelled like this in Korean: 도깨비. Oh my. Mad skills!
Dan had been curious about these mythical Korean trolls and designed a few characters. We are hoping to create another diorama with these things.

This photo is of a paper cut-out he colored digitally. I guess once we work with wood, it'll look slightly different. Maybe. As for me, I will be working on the background. Hopefully we'll be able to come up with another interaction idea for this too.

Ecto1 - More Details

This is for the Ghostbusters car "Ecto 1" diorama we've been working on. Dan is a really good character artist so he did the sketch of some of the ghosts for me. Here's a shot of Slimer doing his thang. The ghosts will be painted with UV paint to glow in the awesome UV LED lights.

I also need to glue the doors to the car body with the hinges. Which means I need to paint the hinges so they blend into the interior of the car.

I will be adding all these extra details for the rest of this week, and possibly next week. I can't wait to see what it all looks like in the end. Hopefully I can wire everything ok.

Pelican Skeleton 2 - Finished

Remember the Pelican Skeleton we worked on a while ago? Well, it was finished a while ago too. I just never got around to posting it on le blog, you see. But here she is! In all her skeletor glory. It looks pretty awesome if I may say so myself. I really hope we get to do more of these creepy scientific illustrations in the future.

This piece measures 9"x9"x1.75", and weighs about 9oz. Which is amazingly light. It has a sawtooth hanger on the back (which we will make sure to take a photo of before putting it up for sale) so you can hang it on the wall. Or you can just have it on your executive desk with your other laboratory experiments. I mean equipment.

 The funny thing about collaborating with Dan to create something awesome like this is he gets super attached to them. So he thinks twice about selling them. We have SO many of our original artworks because they eventually became his babies. It's really sweet, but we have no room for all our crap!

Snow Leopard Project - Finished

The Snow Leopard Diorama is finally finished! It is now in an almost 12"x12" frame. It measures exactly 11.8"x11.8"x3.5". Everything you see here is made by us including the shadow box frame.

It actually looks a lot better in the frame. I originally wanted a free-form diorama. But it didn't work as a wall art. Here's a photo of it.

I am pleased with how the subtle the markhor meat pieces are showing. I wanted more blood, but that would've been a bit distracting.

I think the frame shows just enough of the art work and hides all the ugly construction pieces - Dan was feeling very strongly about hiding those bits because he's crazy OCD.

The frame is made of birch plywood and oak craft wood. So it's not too heavy - 1.1 pounds. We will put it up for sale very soon.

From Taryn

A few months ago I had created cut-outs for a friend's wedding. She wanted an illustration she could use for her guests to sign, and eventually frame it as a home decor item. Here's where I explain it better.
She recently contacted us with photos of what it looks like now. And it looks awesome! It was such a unique way to celebrate your wedding with everyone - and to remember it! Here are her photos.

So much painting

These are just some of our current projects. We have reverted to using traditional media, so everything takes a lot longer to complete.

I am still waiting for some parts to arrive for the Ghostbusters car (Ecto1) project. The car itself is painted. Now I need to paint the characters in it, create a frame and install the lights. Piece of cake!

This is my other project, which is also incomplete due to some of the material being somewhat different than what I had initially thought. I am hoping to create a couple of wall arts with these, with hidden text. I shall elaborate further once everything arrives.

And finally, a frame for my snow leopard project. It has taken a long time to come this far. We had to custom make our own frame due to the unique dimensions of the artwork.

Ecto1 - The beginning

Oh man... This project has been delayed by EVERYTHING. I thought it would be cool to try a wood cutout, add a few UV painted ghosts with UV LED lights. Sound simple? Yes. But is it? NO!

I had trouble with the UV paint I bought. It wasn't working well with wood, and also it didn't work with a lot of UV lights. Also, the acrylic paint I ordered for this project never got shipped, so I had to find something else. So I was back to square one for a while and blah blah.

The concept was created probably a few months ago now. I am not impressed with how long it's taking for all the supplies to arrive and the lack of information I get given of each product. But I'm getting there! Still waiting for the correct UV paint to arrive, and then I'll order the correct LED lights after making sure the UV paint works.

The project goes on.