Friday, December 23, 2011

SHARE THIS VIDEO! STOP SOPA: Revelations

Please check out this video for more information about SOPA and its supporters.  There is a lot of information here in this one video.  However, watch and listen please because it is full of reasons to fight SOPA.  This is all just another facet of Pluto in Capricorn and Uranus in Aries: revelation of secrets, societal structures, societal rebellion, new technology, transformation, sudden insights.

Check out One Candle in the Dark or CBS you suck for more information.
STOP SOPA!
Can't Stop the Signal!

Sketch: Father Christmas

This is the original sketch for the Seasons Greetings piece I just posted. I may still do another piece that is closer to this one. I like the lantern and the fact that he is dragging the bag.  If I do this one, I may eliminate the violent bits and just make him ominous.  Truly anyone who can tell if you've been bad or good and see when you're asleep or awake has got to be a little creepy in person.  I'm just sayin'.

Recommended Listening:
Northaunt
Pain is Better
The Ominous Silence

{Created in Adobe Photoshop}

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Seasons Greetings

There is a reason that Santa Claus wears red, or maybe this isn't so much Santa as what the Big Bad Wolf did after Granny and Little Red were gone. LOL. Maybe a little of both, but I did draw initially as Santa.

A little bit of tribute here to Mike Mignola to say the least.  His strong chiaroscuro style and his penchant for antique and ancient artistic elements have always been a strong influence on me.  If you haven't read any Hellboy, you are really missing out!

My initial idea behind this piece involved a much more elaborate set up, but as I began working on the piece, simple seemed the way to go. This is a functional christmas card. It is already the correct size for printing on 8.5x11 paper - justify to the right. I couldn't decide on Color or Black and White, so I provided both. Enjoy!

Recommended Listening:
Northaunt
Night Alone
Horizons


{Images created in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop}

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

From the Sketchbook Archives: Red

I did a whole series of sketchbook images playing with Sharpies...dark portraits from the other side.  Perhaps he is a distant cousin from Hellboy's Rasputin or some denizen from the outer dark.

This is another one with reproduction issues.  I couldn’t get a good shot of this one without a blur.  :-(  I gotta get a friggin' scanner!  ARGH!

Recommended Listening:
Apoptose
Asche
Schattenmaedchen

{Sharpie}

UPDATE:

Another of the Rescans.  Obviously, this one is completely changed and revealed by the Rescan.  With the darkness of this piece and the glare from the sharpies, there really was no way to get a decent shot of this one.  Once again the Scanner saves the day!  Thank You beautiful technology...although technically technology caused the problem in the first place.  Ha.  Enjoy.  Interesting note here is that despite the major blur, the color on this one was fairly accurate in the first piece as well.  With the one exception of the glare turning the blacks red...or maybe just picking up the red beneath...hmph.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Up on the Rooftop

"Later that night, he heard the jingling again.  Faintly, just as before, it circled the house like a passing car.  As before, the soft padding crunch of snow and again, the faint jingling.  He stood in the kitchen, a cigarette quivered between his enraged fingers. He smoked two more as the jingling continued for another fifteen minutes. He'd had it with those damned kids.  Ed grabbed the broom and his flashlight and headed out into the snow.

"Alright you little bastards!" Growling, he threw the door open and waived the broom in a wide arc.  The light flashed across the snow.  It was smooth.  No footprints.  He stepped out, broom at the ready.  No footprints anywhere in the yard.  His face full of confusion, his broom lowered.  He heard the jingling again, just beyond the corner of the house.  He raised the broom once more and moved to intercept. They weren't gonna get away.  The snow on his ankles tickled and burned with each step.

At the corner of the house he found no footprints, but could still hear the jingling. Something hit his arm and bounced into the snow.  He leaned over and picked up something wet.  It took him a moment to adjust his hold on the broom and get the flashlight up to his other hand.  It looked like a shredded piece of cloth from a coat, but it was covered in red paint.  No.  No, it wasn't paint.   Ed dropped the cloth and backed away from the house.  His line of vision moved slowly up towards the roof.  His mouth hung agape at the sight of the thing.  It was chewing absently above the bloody patch it made, a ring of bells circling its neck.  Each time it chewed, the bells would softly jingle.

Ed turned and ran.  The flashlight fell free into the soft snow, a small glowing thumbprint disappearing behind him. He hadn't gone that far, the door was just a few more feet away.  He heard a loud snort and his bladder emptied into his pajama pants.  Then there was a hard pinch at his neck, like when his mother used to grab him as a child.  His arms flailed as he was yanked back.   Ed screamed, but then a rough blow at the back of his head made him quiet.  He felt dizzy now.  He lurched and vomited blood as the pinch at his neck grew harder.

"I'll be good Ma.  I won't do it again."  The pinch grew harder still and he knew he was gonna get a spanking.  Then he was flying, flying up and into the christmas sky.  A trail of paint splattered on the snow beneath him. No. No, it wasn't paint."

Recommended Listening:
Svartsinn
Torchbearer, Kill the Light
Elegies for the End

{Image created in Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop}

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Gates of the 14 Aethyr

Empty,
I walk through fog and shade and rain.
A door opens within me, before me,
A space within a space.
I step out of nothing into nothing.
I step through and into myself.
I am the gate through which I pass.

All doors swing open,
a vast passage up down to the bottom top
of every no thing.
The sacred hole in the great hedge,
the womb throat of the Universe,
with a great wind singing through it.

Across this vastness,
across this great wallless infinite,
I convey the burden of space.

Recommended Listening:

{created in Photoshop}

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

SAY NO TO INTERNET CENSORSHIP: STOP SOPA!

Sorry to go political again, but I believe our rights as bloggers might be in danger here.  Dealing with adult content as I do in my blog, I fear what SOPA and PROTECT IP will mean to my freedom of expression.  If you work with any kind of previously copyrighted material, they may be able to block your site. Please watch the video below and check the link in my sidebar.  Please get involved before they take away our rights.





Also check Public Knowledge or Fight for the Future for more information.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

From the Sketchbook Archives: Scream

Looking back, I think this may be an indirect portrait of someone unpleasant I was working with at the time.  Anger and Sharpies - cheaper than therapy I guess.

Recommended Listening:
The Prodigy
Omen
Invaders Must Die

{Sharpie}

 UPDATE:

Wow.  Initially I didn't there was much change between these two, but looking at them side by side I can a severe blur and glare within the original.  The scan turned all the colors up a notch or two as well.  I cannot say it enough - Hooray for scanner!  Hmmmm...my scanner needs a name...I'll get on that.  :-)

Friday, December 09, 2011

Review: H.O.P.E. Tales of the Nuclear Family

This isn't necessarily darkness or horror related, but for those of you interested in comics, I've done a review of H.O.P.E. Tales of the Nuclear Family on my comics art blog, Wind of the Gods. Please check it out here and support these aspiring creators.


Wednesday, December 07, 2011

From the Archives: Skull Tattoo


A Tattoo design that never got used.  Grey added for a little contrast in Photoshop.  Inspired by H.R. Giger, but only mildly.  :-)

{Sharpie, Tone added in Photoshop}

Monday, December 05, 2011

GRUSS VOM KRAMPUS!

Sorry for the delay on this one. We had a power outtage in my neighborhood and I lost several hours of drawing time. Probably Uranus getting ready to go Direct on the 10th.  We also have an Eclipse / Full Moon on the 10th, so expect a bit of Chaos. All this during a Mercury retrograde (Nov. 24th - Dec. 14th). I guess Krampus is in full effect this year!

Regardless, Happy Krampusnacht! I hope you've all been good this year!  I hope that your 2012 is much better!

{Created in the Adobe Creative Suite}

Sunday, December 04, 2011

Krampus is on his way!

I'm not sure why I feel the need to jump on the Krampus bandwagon this year.  I found out about him two years ago and haven't really had the opportunity to work on any pieces involving him until now.  This year has been such a roller coaster through crap I figure it might be nice to believe a little in some cosmic force of justice.

Of course the assumption there is that Krampus won't be coming for me.  If he were coming for me, that might not be all bad though.  Cover your ears kids!  A hairy horny devil with a ridiculously long tongue kidnaps me and drags me away to do with me as he pleases.  All because I've been bad.  Hmmm...I say let the punishment fit the crime, eh!

I guess in the end, I just like the idea of Krampus.  He's a little taste of punishment to help us appreciate the good in life.  I wonder perhaps if he is some seed idea left over from Saturnalia?  Perhaps he is the last Lord of Misrule from the lost tradition of the Feast of Fools.  Perhaps not completely lost, Halloween / Samhain has taken on many of the qualities of Saturnalia and the Feast of Fools. Considering how much our calendars have changed since those times, Halloween may be closer to the correct timeframe.

I am intrigued that these kinds of festivals seems to emerge from the human psyche regardless of repression or taboo or dogma or fiat.  Close one door and the urge will find its way out through a window.  This is the cord that Krampus strikes with me. Aha! there's the reason: The repressed urge given its day in the sun.

I think we need more of that...at least here in the United States we certainly do.  Too many natural urges are repressed and criminalized.  We need to find healthy outlets instead of shoving it all in a box...or a prison.  I feel Krampus is part of that.  A little comedic S & M for the whole family!  Be good kids for goodness sake!  Only one more day until Krampusnacht!

{Image created in Adobe Illustrator}
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