pics up…

by on May 16, 2010 at 9:38 am
Posted In: Blog-entries

Okay… so I managed to scrape out a few sketches yesterday for SketchCrawl… I posted them on Squid’s flickr site… have a look. One of the sketches is “step one”… meaning I haven’t finished it yet and will post the finished product in a few. (I was just reminded that there should be a link on the site for the Squid Row Flickr page… yes, I do this!) update: added link… button at top of page (above toon) and also on right under heading “more of me”.

Too & also, today is day four of the 17th annual Carmel Art Festival… and I’m about to embark on a field trip… so more photos to be uploaded to the Flickr site later today! update: pics up from fest!

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Stumptown! …and new Squid Row Flickr-ness!

by on April 26, 2010 at 1:42 pm
Posted In: Blog-entries

I went away for the weekend!

Yes I did! I went to Portland to do a little Stumptowning… that is, to the Stumptown Comics Fest.

It was a super-quick trip… Me and my squid gang left San Jose Airport and flew into Portland, Oregon friday night. We checked into our hotel (the same one the Stumptown Comics Fest was at) just after 11pm.  We spent 6 hours going from car to bus to plane to train to hotel. Whew… tiredness.

Saturday we did the fest which was at the Exhibit Hall there at the Doubletree Hotel near Lloyd Center. I attended a few workshops… one on coloring (offered by Aaron Diaz of Dresden Codak) which, remarkably had no coloring in it… it was more or less a “painting in photoshop” workshop… which was still cool. Coulda been another hour though. I sat in on some of a “Teaching Comics” workshop, but it was more about teaching graphic novels in a college situation… and the most helpful workshop was given by an all girl powerhouse toonist foursome on Self-Publishing. The panel included Meredith Gran (Octopus Pie), Lucy Knisley (French Milk), Shaenon Garrity (Skin Horses and Narbonic), and Erika Moen (Dar!)… I took 2 pages of notes from this one!

The actual room of comic-ers was packed and it was loud! I wound up with 5 or 6 books… and lots of pins… I found some great bargains… I wished I had more time to sit and MEET my fellow toonsters… I did get a chat in with Raina Telgemeier… (Smile) and spoke with some fellas from Victoria, Canada… I mentioned “Perogi Cat’ to Dan (the auto-biographical tooner) and he lit up! “We’re from Victoria! We know “Perogi Cat!” I was flabbergasted! It really is a small world! Sadly, Craig Thompson was a Sunday guest, and I only had Saturday to play at the Fest… so I missed seeing him… but I saved myself from embarrassment… I would have slobbered all over him.

The weekend didn’t end there! NO! We met up with the family… and went off on cool bicycling and donut-eating adventures… which leads me to the next thing….

Squid Row has a place on Flickr! I will deposit fun pics and Squiddy things there now and in the future … So wanna go over and check out pics from the Fest and my NW Trip? This is where you need to go…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/squidrowcomics/

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Oooo la la!

by on April 12, 2010 at 10:00 am
Posted In: Blog-entries

Look! It’s The Cat in the Hat! Imagine that! but it’s a Beginner Book Dictionary in French! AND IT’S AWESOME! Ahem, C’est tres magnifique. Now I can say “Je mange huit oeufs. Il a mange onz oeufs.” (I eat 8 eggs. He ate eleven eggs…. je suis malade! … I think that means “I am sick”).

This is just before the book’s forward:

This book is based on the original Beginner Book Dictionary and was adapted into Beginners’ French by ODETTE FILLOUX of the Department of Linguistics University of California at San Diego.

Dr. Seuss (Theo), lived in La Jolla (not far from UCSD)… and so, he musta knew Odette… so I’m thinking. I don’t know why this interests me so much, except that I lived in San Diego for a number of years and used to go to La Jolla for giggles. The Hard Rock Cafe was there, and for a bored teenager, this was fun.

So I have my friend (and former French teacher), Shawn to thank for this lovely new book acquisition. She gave me this as well as a whole box of comic books in French… Lucky Luke, Tin Tin, and Asterix… tres cool!

So I already have a whole bunch of Squids written with this Dictionary as my muse. Randie, of course, finds this book at…. well, stay tooned, squidlings.

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Let there be stained glass

by on April 4, 2010 at 9:58 am
Posted In: Blog-entries

Happy Easter Everyone…

So I am sitting here reflecting on Easter morning and I wanted to share some amazing stained glass windows… These windows are in St. Peter’s, Mansfield, Ohio… where my Dad and his family are from. This is a gorgeous church… and these windows are mesmerizing… I have long loved stained glass… and I can just see Randie sitting in awe of these scenes from The Holy Book… sketching in her sketchbook.  Enjoy.

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More Stuff in my Library

by on March 23, 2010 at 5:09 pm
Posted In: Blog-entries

Artists at Continent's End

It’s probably no surprise that I have art books on my shelf. I have a good lot of them, in fact. Here’s a somewhat recent acquisition. This book, Artists at  Continent’s End, The Monterey Peninsula Art Colony, 1875-1907… accompanied a show I saw at The Monterey Museum of Art. It is a thick book with the history and art of this area. It includes the histories of those who lived and worked in San Francisco and who, because of the great quake, moved south to the Monterey Peninsula. It’s so wonderfully full of paintings and photographs of the artists themselves (something I appreciate… I hate getting a book on an artist only to find no photo of the actual person!

painting photos

Artists are pieces of art themselves). Everytime I pick up this book, I discover something new. It’s not one of those read cover to cover books. It’s almost more reference material. That doesn’t diminish it at all!

I love the style of paintings in this book. The way the use of light gives the paintings a particular mood. Late in the day, long shadows and cool yellows and greens just make me want to paint! But one artist, Armin Hansen, is a painter whose bright colors almost exhibit a fauvism-quality. At the same time his paintings have a quiet cartoonish-ness about them, which is why I fell in love with them…. excuse me, I think I’ll go pick up the book again.

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