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Halloween in the Kitchen

10/31/2015

Just wanted to post a little illustration to celebrate the reason for the season. This is a piece done for the good folks at Cooking With Kyler. CwK is a YouTube channel starring Will (dad) and Kyler (daughter) that regularly posts fun cooking videos that anyone with a whisk and the will can take part in. They're goal: getting in the kitchen with the wee ones and making some tasty food.

If you'd like to check out their latest Halloween-themed video on butternut squash soup click HERE. Btw, below is a cartoon I did for that video. Did you know in New Zealand they call butternut squash 'pumpkin squash'? Craziness.

Happy Halloween everyone!

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I Corrected Them, Sir.

10/27/2015

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The Shining without a doubt makes my top 5 favorite horror films, if not the number one spot. This is due in large part to the excellent performances of the all the actors. Right down the line everyone is fantastic, engaging and memorable. Each scene has a quality to it that makes rewatching, and rewatching, and rewatching still enjoyable even to this day.

Another of the many reasons I love this film so much is that I never feel I fully understand it. So I return each viewing trying to discover a new clue.

To celebrate the film, or maybe my own confusion, I thought it would be fun to illustrate a few of the employees of the snowbound Overlook Hotel, and in particular the smaller roles. In this case it's one Mr. Delbert Grady, the once caretaker but now eternal waiter at that fine establishment.

This scene with Jack Torrance in the "gentleman's" room lingers in the memory for many reasons (the red walls, the pacing) but for me it's Philip Stone's portrayal of Mr. Grady... "I corrected them, sir". Great, great stuff.

Hope you enjoy and I'll talk with you soon,

Doug

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"The Blackest Eyes... The Devil's Eyes"

10/26/2015

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You can't have Halloween without Michael Myers so I thought I'd try my hand during one of his brief unmasked moments. This is one of the few shots, and the only shot in the first Halloween film, of that memorable mug.

There's something unnerving about it that always grabs my attention. Obviously there's the urge to see something that's been purposely hidden from us like a secret. But there's also the way it comes off in such a sudden, realistic way. And too, there's the chance to see what Loomis describes in an earlier scene; "The blackest eyes... the devils eyes". Either way, even if the movie's running in the background I'll aways stop what I'm doing, and turn around just for a peek.

Hope you enjoy and I'll talk with you soon,

Doug

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Crazy, am I?

10/23/2015

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Being that it's almost Halloween I've found myself trying to get in the spirit of the holiday season. One of the ways I've done this is by partaking in a number of horror films, both new and classic. As you can guess the original 1931 Frankenstein made the list.

One of my favorite shots is of Henry (or is it Victor?) Frankenstein himself. I think it's likely the scene that depicts his lack of sanity the best, while ironically claiming the exact opposite. So I couldn't help but try to capture this. It's just such a great shot - and line.

This drawing is done in graphite, both with a woodless graphite pencil and a Staedtler mechanical drafting pencil. The surface is a gessoed piece of Rives BFK. Instead of using an eraser for highlights I opted to use white acrylic paint. When I scanned it the scanner warmed the paper and cooled the paint. The whites in the original are a bit more neutral, but I dig the push between the temperatures so I left it as is.

Hope you enjoy and I'll talk with you later,

D

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In The Light Of The Skeletal Moons

10/22/2015

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Hello, hello, hello fine people,

Halloween is before us which seems an appropriate time to reawaken the blog from its long relaxing slumber. Doing so with something frightening seems equally as appropriate. Gets the blood flowing.

This is a piece for the short story titled “In the Light of the Skeletal Moons” (great title, am I right?) and is written by one Mr. Samuel Marzioli (visit his blog HERE). You can find both story and illustration within the sci-fi, horror pages of Space & Time magazine issue #123.

This piece was particularly fun in regards to content (aside from that creepy, protruding eyeball). My illustrative work has a reputation for the representational. However, this time around I wanted to try dipping my toes into symbolism with respect to the depiction of the cascading light and "skeletal" moons - a more graphic, simplistic approach with less realism.

Special Insider Note: this is actually Skeletal Moons v2.0. I had some areas I wanted to work on further so I went back after publication and created what you see here. You'll have to pick up S&T 123 to get a glimpse of version 1.0 .

Hope you enjoy and I'll talk with you later,

Doug

2 Comments

Halloween in the Kitchen

I Corrected Them, Sir.

"The Blackest Eyes... The Devil's Eyes"

Crazy, am I?

In The Light Of The Skeletal Moons

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