After a few too many fights with wordpress, I’ve decided to move the blog elsewhere. You can visit me now at http://zettaworks.blogspot.com/.

A tribute to doodling, the past time of preference for idle hands. Click for a better view—the full piece is twenty inches long, and didn’t scale down that well.

An appropriate word to post on, considering I’ve been blog absent for almost two months. I’ve been working on a very large commission, building an online portfolio, and generally restructuring my whole online presence. Plus…it’s summer! The official season of absenteeism, even for the self-employed. There could be pictures of my hot-air ballooning adventure in the future, if anyone decides to send them to me.

The poor shop, it’s been so neglected. I’ll start listing this series tomorrow.

Obviously inspired by a tattoo book I picked up from the library. I really love tattoos–I always said I was going to get one to celebrate graduating from college. But by the time I actually got there I was so bitter over my whole college experience (not to mention broke) that the last thing I wanted was something permanently engraved on my body to commemorate it.

But the next time some big, positive life event happens…yeah. I’m getting my tattoo.

Twenty minute photoshop sketch, for the ongoing digital sketchbook project. I’ve really had a craving for fish lately.

One of the things I really looked forward to learning when I went to college was digital painting. And guess what I never got so much as a class in. Yeah. Apparently learning to build a banana out of balsa wood was more important (All art professors are a little different, but sculpture professors are a very special brand of weird).

Sure, I mess around with photoshop occasionally, but I think it’s time I actually sat down with some books and tutorials and figured it out for real. So that’s what I’ve been doing for the past week. To keep up with things I decided to start doing 20 minute sketches every morning, so here’s one of the first entries of my digital sketchbook.

You can find surprising things growing out of sidewalk cracks.

So I saw ‘Up’ in 3D yesterday. Great movie, but if you are at all prone to crying it will destroy you within, oh, the first ten minutes (luckily my eyes were too busy freaking out over the 3D glasses and all the havoc they were wrecking on my peripheral vision to produce any real tears).

I always seem to come away from Pixar films thinking “Yeah, that totally reminds me of myself and K.” Possibly because the couples in their movies follow the same general formula. The guy is always dorky and endearing. And the girl is always slightly crazy.

Leaving the theatre (we’re the nerds that stay until the credits are done rolling, “just in case”) we passed a shrimpy pre-pubescent usher who said, in that completely flat voice that I think all teenagers have, “Thanks for coming. Hope you had an ‘Up’lifting experience.” We spent dinner debating whether it was his own line or some script the managers had put everyone up to saying—either way, it was hilarious.

I could go on a huge rant about this. I saw one of my aunts this past weekend, and she told me that, as a family, we are predisposed to long, hot-aired rants. Luckily, I’m also predisposed to laziness. So I’ll give you the condensed version: I think there are few things more self-centered than being so stuck on your art that you can’t appreciate any one else’s.

There. I’m done. I feel better

People seem surprised when they visit my apartment and the walls aren’t filled with my own work. I have one personal painting that I insist on hanging (even though it’s stuck in a god awful ghetto frame at the moment. Sorry, painting), the rest are stacked aimlessly around my workspace, or propped up against shelves. My walls are surprisingly blank, actually—and if I was given a sudden shopping spree, this is what I’d fill them with.

Love Has No Rules @ AnthonyButkovich.etsy.com

My Gift, My Prize, Your Fate, My Sword @morrisetsy.etsy.com

World Worth Saving @ WillRuocco.etsy.com

Everyday Monsters Print Art @ simpson.etsy.com

So I keep having this dream where K and I decide to take up sword fighting (Yes, his weapons of choice are giant feathered steak knives strapped to his wrists. Yes, I am in my underwear). And we have a really good time with it, until I accidentally stab him in the leg.

It’s all fun and games until someone loses a kneecap.

I have reoccurring dreams a lot. I like to think that they have some deep symbolic meaning, but it might just be that my brain is lazy and prefers to play repeats instead of coming up with new programming.

Once I get all of the shipping details figured out, this will probably be the first original painting to be listed in my shop (!). I’d like to make prints from it too, but I can’t get the colors adjusted correctly for the printer. I’m not sure if it’s actually a noticeable problem or if I’m just being overly obsessive, so I’ll be putting it aside for a few days and revisiting it later with fresh eyes.