First off, one complaint about Procreate; I wish the last brush selected wasn't a global thing but a document thing so I could figure out which goddamned brush I'd used for something in the past. Oh well...

Haven't done a Harlon in a long while. But an article today about how Zuckerburg, one of the worst humans in charge of anything at this particular point of history has decided that all posts made to "Meta" sites belong to Meta so that he can shovel everything we've shard into his giant AI monstrosity just really got to me. My audience is already tiny. Very tiny. And now he's saying that any time I reached out, tried to connect with one of my fellow human beings, that reach is just food for his big ol' AI which will then spew out content that takes the place of the things I was making in the first place. So now I'll have no audience but my art will be part of an amalgam that does. Gee, thanks. Tell me again why AI is such a great idea? It makes me equal parts angry and depressed and there's SHIT I can do about it. Except keep on keeping on, doing it for me, hearing the echoes diminish until I'm done. I guess. This is the most depressing Harlon ever but hey, I discovered and even more depressing one on my iPad that I never finished. So there's that. Fuck the Zuck. And the Beez. And most of all, the Musk.

 

I've felt I've been in a kind of artistic funk lately. I haven't wanted to draw...no, that's not right, I've WANTED to draw but don't know what I should draw. Sure, I could start back up with the comic, but I'm not in the mood. I'm more in a portrait mood. So, when all else fails, do a self portrait. The top one I did tonight. The bottom I did a couple days ago and forgot to post here. A friend of mine on FB really liked the bright one I did a couple weeks ago, so why not try to appease SOMEONE that actually likes the work? Besides, self portraits allow me to have some fun. So, these. And I like them for different reasons.

 So I redid the whole thing. I wasn't really fully happy with the old one and decided to something a good deal more rough, expressly chunkier, less fussy. It's still not my favorite mostly as the reference photo just has a slightly weird expression. Thing is, it does look like him. I just wish he were in the middle of something as Dan was when I did his. At some point, I'll get a better photo. I like it better than the first one I did of Max, more then ten years ago. That, too was a terrible photo. So, I guess a poor craftsman blames his tools, etc. Whatever. But now I lay this one to rest so I can get back to that other thing I'm supposed to be working on.

And...Max didn't see himself in it at all. Well, won't be posting this one. I didn't think it was bad, but when the subject can't see himself, well, that's not a good sign. It is what it is. I move on.

 I played around with that sketch a lot. And my initial feelings were that this wasn't going to work. To be fair, it's really hard to get a photo of Max where he looks decent AND he doesn't know. Like me, he hates photos of himself. I closed AD and wondered if I'd even come back to it. Then, later, I went in, turned some layers off, recolored some and...am liking it better. It's all Rembrandt browns which will have to be adjusted to give some more contrast but...I think it looks a good deal better than it did. Not finished at all. We'll see.

 Still dragging my feet on that landscape. Instead, I'm working on a portrait of my bestie, Max. Did a quick sketch start tonight. It's not the best photo of him but he's really hard to get photos of as he hates them nearly as much as I do. This is him in his natural habitat; watching movies.

 And the winner is... by an overwhelming majority, the one I like least is the winner. People liked the muted color palette better. My partner said that it helped imply her personality better and that the one I liked, greens and yellows felt too 'poppy,' which is funny as the palette came from a Van Gogh painting. This was a good experiment if only to try and learn how others see work. I suppose, as an artist, I should stand by my choices, which I have on flickr. In this case, I'm happy enough to have the engagement. I pulled a bunch of people who wouldn't otherwise comment on my work out and that's something.

 Three Judis. I did some tweaking on a couple of the layers and some of the colors. I showed them to my partner who likes the top version better. I prefer the second version, based on a portrait of Roulin, I believe. The third I made today and is from a palette made from another, much toned down Van Gogh portrait. It might be a compromise between the top two in that it has some more color but isn't as bright as the middle one. I could play this game forever, and it IS fun but it's not getting me anywhere. I think that I'm going to toss them all up and ask for opinions. At the very least, it gets me to play with colors and look  at them in a new way, which is always a good thing. Otherwise, it's done. Thanks, Miss Dench, not that you'll ever know.

 Managed to sneak in two color tests on this one. The top one is based on a color palette from a Van Gogh portrait, with some tweaking. The lower one is based on, believe it or not, "Blue Boy," by Gainsborough, again with some tweaking. I prefer the Van Gogh, my partner prefers the Gainsborough. One thing I notice is that the details of her face seem too smooth. Might have to play with those a bit. But I like the portrait so far, especially the elongated composition.

 Started a new portrait today. This time. it's Dame Judi. She was the subject of an All Star episode of Portrait Artist of the Year. I took a few screen grabs and decided to take a poke at it. I got to the black and white stage today. It's coming along. Used the grid as normal and a bit of tracing for some things I just couldn't zoom in enough for.

 This one goes back awhile. I did a few tiny touchups tonight and decided that it was done. Threw it into AD, used the Rembrandt palette, which I am in love with, and called this one done. It's British comedian, Johnny Vegas. I don't think it's my favorite portrait, but I think it's solid and nicely loose.

 While procrastinating, I threw together the first self portrait of the new year. Back to some wilder colors. Different brush and feel for the line work, though, so there's something new. I think I've drawn myself this color before.

 I had a goal today of doing the bricks, the chairs and tables. And I did get the marks done for that. The colors are not final by any means and I can see already that there's going to have to be some warmth added before I'm done, and that's fine. So far, I do like how the sense of space is coming along. I threw in the building and sky from the previous version. I don't know that the windows will make the cut as I think the details are too fine if I'm going to go for some depth. Still, progress even if it looks like a mess so far.

 Progress though it might not seem a lot. Turns out there are a LOT of those damned chairs in the photo. So I spent a couple albums sketching most of them in. But I need a break. Might get back to this today, might not. These bigger, more complex images often just suck the juice right out of me which is why they take so long and I do so few. Still, movement.

 This won't look like progress but it is. I restarted the Harvard Square image because I really wanted the bricks to be separate all the way around for that organic feel. So here we are. I have to treat fore, mid and backgrounds separately or I will never get this thing done. Will work on the chairs and tables next. This is going to take awhile...

 First design of the year, sure to cause a slew of arguments on social media! Or go totally unnoticed. I've been wanting to throw this together as a kind of badge to show that my art accounts do not use AI of any kind. I based it on the Fite Comics logo. Anyone can use it if they want. It's not some amazing design or anything but does its job.

 Didn't have a chance to work on the landscape as I was watching this week's movie (oh dear) and writing the script for tomorrow's show. But the portrait of Scott McCloud has been bugging me. Ever since I did the one of Dan, Scott's has been looking pale and improperly colored. So I opened the file, brought up the palette I used on Dan's, made a few changes and got something I think works a lot better. So THIS is the final version. I suppose, until I print them, I can mess with them any time I want. But I really would rather consider things done and move on. Still glad I made this decision.

 This one has been lingering for far too long. To be fair, it's going to be a monster. There's a LOT of detail that will have to be worked out. But if I don't start it at some point, it'll never get done. This will be a painting of Harvard Square, looking out at the Yard as viewed from the tables outside what was Au Bon Pain. It was a chance photo but it really worked well. I knew I wanted to make something for my best friend and this is his favorite place to hang out. I just wasn't sure how to approach it. Now, I think I do. So far, the part I like best is the bricks. The level of detail on the building actually seems too high to me, but we'll see. That's why I do these proof of concepts. The chair might be TOO simple and I might need to do some shading on it. Might be that most everything is 'flat' until items get closer to the viewer. Dunno. That's why I work these things out. Still, there's now some progress.

EDIT: Decided to try a little dimensionality to the chair. All I did was add a simple highlight layer and I think that added quite a bit. This means a little more detail to the bricks that are closest and to the tables that will eventually be there as well. But I think I will still refrain from putting shadows under things. It was an overcast day and there were no harsh shadows anyway and their lack will, I think, add to the image.

 Ok, so I liked. I managed to get in another quick self-portrait (like I need another one of those) before the holidays are over. It's just a quick and dirty, made from a sketch that was in my sketchbook that I hadn't used and had forgotten about. I took a photo on an angle to get some low-fi distortion in it and made some quick and purposefully messy marks to ink it. I wanted to play with some brighter colors, so I thought to make some palettes from Van Gogh paintings. Interesting thing; they're not as brightly colored as one might think. I made one palette from his famous bedroom painting and wasn't satisfied with the choices. So I made another from one of his iris paintings and was happier, but still really surprised that the colors really were more sedate than I thought.

 This is one of those meme things that's big on art sites like Instagram. Art vs. artist, eight images boiled down from whatever you did this year with a photo stuck in the middle. I don't think it really represents what I did this year, though this year was not as productive as most. I only did 9 portraits and 40 some odd pages of the comic, plus some random images here and there. Then again, I'm also in two podcasts (50 episodes of one, likely 20 of the other), I play in two bi-weekly RPGs and I work part time. So I'm pretty damned busy. Even though there wasn't as much work, I'm more happy with it than I was the previous year. Still need to keep branching out, especially on the portraits. I'd like to do some more figurative work, maybe another 3/4 size one instead of just the constant closeups. The comic also needs some visual tightening, which I will do thanks to insight from a couple folks. That all being said, engagement is down overall. Doesn't make me feel very good but I knew that wasn't likely to change. Just have to keep making myself happy, I guess.

 I never really post these video things. Don't know why not. What you can't see here is that I start out using the grid system. The grid is hidden from the video playback. The reason I do this is because it takes a lot more time. Wait, does that make sense? Yes, because it forces me to really pay attention and mentally decipher what I'm looking at, to make a decision of some kind. Tracing will not give you this information or time to think. To the trained eye, you can tell that I do indeed do some tracing near the final drawing, but just of the highlights of the jacket. And then, in the end, I end up dropping them anyway. There's also a different head originally chosen which I do away with. While it seems that the painting stage doesn't take any time at all, that couldn't be further from the truth. I try and make the drawing as solid as possible so I don't have to do as much work when it comes time to paint.

Once I get each layer down, I pop them separately into Supervectorizer so I can change all those nice organic shapes into vectors. This process will simplify and smooth out the original marks some, but that's part of the process and one I often find surprisingly good. Then, it's just a matter of assigning colors. If you look at the upper right corner, you'll see the palette I made just for this image. It was taken from a self-portrait of Rembrandt I particularly liked. And you can also see that in the final image, there are two layers turned off. They're still there but this process allows me to turn layers on and off to see what I like best. Sometimes I do a lot of work on something that I won't even use. That's ok as long as I get where I want to in the end.

 Finally had time to work on and finish this. "Dan Explains" is a portrait of a friend I got together with while in Chicago. We hadn't seen each other in over 25 years so had a lot to talk about. A good deal of that discussion was about gaming, something for which we both have a good deal of passion. I wanted to express some of the energy and passion he showed that night so used three photos to do it; one for the body, one for the hand and one for the face. As can be seen in earlier posts, his expression was one I changed radically as I did this. His response, "My hands are HUGE!" and "...I think it makes me look a little terrified." Ah well, can't win them all. I like it. I think it works. Was very happy to find that AD can make palettes based off images. As I really like Rembrandt's self-portraits, I chose one of them, adjusted the number of colors, added a couple of my own and was able to get those rich browns I love so much. I will likely play with this feature more down the road. Likely, this is the last thing I finish this year. But that's ok. It's all a construct anyway.

EDIT: As is often the case, I turned some layers off to see what I thought of less detail and...I think I like this version  better. Sometimes that's the way it goes; I have to do a lot of extra work which won't show to get where I want to. But this one feels less fussy, and more like the 'cut paper' style I was originally going for. So, there's that.

 Have to go to work soon but had time to work on this. I decided that the head pose I had was too dour and wasn't really expressing what I wanted. Luckily, I took a burst of 59 photos before Dan figured out what I was doing. So now I'm referencing three photos to make this one image; one for the head, one for the body and one for the hand.. So far, it's doing what I want it to do. The jacket looks a mess right now but that's ok as the lines and shading are only meant to be a guide for the painting to come. So far, I'm happy with it. We'll see what Dan thinks when it's done.

 Been away to Chicago this time. Traveling is over til February so it's just the holidays that will get in the way of making any kind of art. I've done damned few portraits this year, which is odd, but there you go. While in Chicago, I met up with an old friend, one I haven't seen in 25 or so years. We had a nice talk with drinks and of course I took some reference photos while we talked. Or he talked. Had some time tonight to get started on the portrait in question. This is as far as I got so far.

 And...it's done. Once I get the greyscale down, color doesn't usually take much time. Now to send it off to Scott and see what he thinks.

 I've set aside the Johnny Vegas portrait as I think the pose just isn't working for me. I need something a little more "Johnny." That being said, I got to spend some time with an old friend, Scott McLeod (McCloud is the popular spelling) while away in Cali. I got to sit down with him over some Bubba Gump and have him talk to me, in depth, about "City Silent." I couldn't resist snapping some quiet reference photos as Scott was in full explanation mode, being totally himself. That's what I want in my portraits. He's so gestural I was tempted to add some other, disembodied hands to imply more action. When I did, it looked more like people reaching in from the side and wasn't doing anything to really help. My partner pointed out, too that the foreshortened hand up front was doing enough action on its own. The top is the image in greyscale that's headed to the vectorizer and color. The bottom is the pencil drawing, all done on the iPad using the grid system. He's a tough face to capture as I don't want to make him look too old, and there are certain, important lines that make his eyes look a little sad. I've been told he looks more studious than old, which is what I'm going for. Final to come. And then a likely break from art as I'm off to Chicago middle of next week. It's a busy season.

 Finally had a day off and had time to play with this. One of the things I learned from my time with Scott was how many times I was visually de-emphasizing Silas, which is certainly an odd thing to do. So here, I made sure that he was the brightest part of the little promo image. Moving forward, I will have to make sure that his 'actual' color is really not a thing. This is a fantasy and hell, he's never even shown black, so why not purple? As usual, pencil, Procreate, Affinity Designer.

 Went on vacation so didn't draw anything for a couple weeks. Did this when I got back. Just a simple sketch but it was fun to do and I should at least ink it. We'll see. Also got some great feedback on the comic from a VERY high end source, Scott McCloud, who's been a friend for over 30 years but whom I haven't really sought out much before as I felt I would be imposing. Turns out I wasn't and though his critique was harsh, it was good and contained stuff I really need to consider. I WILL be going back and redrawing a bunch of stuff from the first half, but not now. I will instead use what he told me to move ahead.

I also saw an actual, honest-to-goodness opera while I was in L.A., "The Barber of Seville" at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, once home to the Oscars between '69 and '94. Great experience and I think, because of that, I really 'get' opera now. And I wasn't far off. Anyway, it's all progress.

 Got some work done on the Johnny Vegas but to me, it's looking so...plain. And the likeness isn't quite there. Feels rather Santa-ish in this set of greys. So I'll have to reconsider and move ahead in some fashion. Might be that I've wrung all I can out of this particular style.

 As I take a break from the comic, I thought I'd do a portrait or two. Was damned lazy today, and I needed it. Hell of a long weekend and thursday, I'm off to the west coast to visit my sister. Still, managed to get a sketch in of Johnny Vegas, a British comedian I happen to like. There's still something not quite right but it's nearly there. A lot will change in the inks.

Did some merch work a few days ago and posted these ne t-shirt designs to my RedBubble store. I don't sell many shirts, which is fine. I'm happy that I wear them. I have samples of all four coming in the mail, all black shirts. We'll see how they look when they come in.

 

 Finally figured out all the controls to get the first half of "The City Silent" available for download on my Gumroad store. I wish it could have been free but it was above their minimum file size for that. So we'll see if anyone downloads/buys it. Having gone through it, I honestly think it holds together, makes sense and is, in some moments, even beautiful. But that's me. I do not regret one moment I've spent on this project. I only wish I was tackling it more quickly. Still, progress, always progress.

 I redid the cover for the comic so there was something different for this release. It is not the final cover for the whole comic. That will change in time. While it doesn't have any of the characters in it, I hope that it's got at least enough to make someone go, "What the hell is this?" A graphic designer I'm not. When it comes time to do the final final, I will go looking into my reference library to put something much more eye catching together.

I did manage to get the pdf finished today as well. Pain in the ass especially as I resized the images for the last 65 pages to the wrong dpi. Didn't take too long to fix and allowed me to go through the pages one more time. And I love them. Are they a masterpiece? Perfect? No, but they're mine and they make me happy. They represent the best I am capable of at this time. Now all I have to do is finish it. Heh.

I didn't feel like stitching them all together but these are the grid shots for all of the first half. Man, doesn't LOOK like 174 pages or six years' worth of work, but there you are. It's kind of fun to see the colors start out kind of dark, a little dour and then have them pop when the mice show up. The greens of Howard echo, which is good. All in all, I'm happy with it. There's some real fun in there and some pages of which I'm pretty proud. Here's to another 200 pages to come!
 

 And with that, I've updated all the pages I think I need to update. Silas is there but doesn't stand out too much. There's no need to insert him into Zippa's song as his hand crumples the last flyer, implying that he was following along. Now the tedious task of going through, re-exporting all the act 2 pages that haven't been done without the copyright notices and then finally shoving the whole thing into one document so that I can release the first half.

 So here's the one page "corrected" to have Silas in the background. I think he actually makes a nice counterpoint to Digby, who is also watching the mice below.