Sunday Sign #Sorry- Comix Work!

Sorry, everyone: it's been a crazy busy week(end), which meant the Sunday Sign for this week had to be sacrificed on the altar of der Hauptmann von Köpenick. I've been cranking like crazy trying to get this comic and the Pulp Zine (like I keep saying, more on that soon) done by early Summer, so other things are having to take a bit of a back seat at the moment. Keep stopping by for updates on the comic and zine, as well as new Sunday Signs! 

BFA Moto-Madness!

This is just a TASTE of the wild stuff that I'm working on for my BFA final show! Keep yer eyes peeled for more updates!

Coming Soon! New Comic Project

I made these character design drawings into little promos for the comic project I'm working on right now, der Hauptmann von Köpenick. The comic tells the true story of Wilhelm Voigt, an unemployed ex-con in turn of the century Prussia who got creative in deciding to pull a heist. I've been wanting to do a comic about this story for several years now, and I'm stoked that I'm finally getting to make it happen. The art should be done early this Spring, with copies available for purchase hopefully shortly after that. Keep an eye on the blog ( or follow my tumblr: http://dangersartpad.tumblr.com) for updates and additional sneak peaks! (I'll also be posting soon to introduce POISON: Pulp Zine, another cool illustrated project I'm working on that you can get your hands on late Spring/Summer 2014. Stay tuned!)

Sunday Sign #10- Haircut Stuff

I got a haircut last night, and it reminded me that I've been wanting to letter something on my haircutting supplies box for quite a while. I did this one Ed Roth style, little layout and pretty fast. The vibrance of the navy blue 1shot is much more apparent in person. Unfortunately, as I was wiping the chalk from the layout off, I hit a little undried glob in the "F" and smeared process blue all over everything. I was able to clean most of it with a Q-tip full of mineral spirits, but that's what looks a little messy in the photo. "Friseur in der Kiste" is bad German for "Barber in a box".

Fun in the DDR!

Just completed this piece for Illustration 3. The assignment was to create an image in acrylics that contained a vehicle used in another time or place, and to apply some sort of tangible texture to our painting surface. The Trabant (sort of the Model T Ford of the DDR, only much more poorly made) was the first thing that came to mind, and it only seemed appropriate that das Sandmännchen (the Sandman, a very popular stop motion children's TV character who started in the DDR and is still popular all over Germany today) should be the one tending to it. For the texture, I mixed (you guessed it) sand with acrylic medium and brushed it everywhere other than in the area of the car, little elf and bucket. I fought the texture idea up to the point of actually trying it, and it turned out pretty cool.

Ott Mit Uns Finished!

Here is the final product of the Gott Mit Uns/Otto Dix mashup I started about a year ago. The border rope was touched up, and an inner circle was added, as well as the sunburst lines inside the leaves and lettering. The first post can be found by clicking on the "german" label link at the bottom of this post, which explains the background of the drawing. I have transparencies made to expose a screen and start making shirts, but I threw on a little too much emulsion on the first go around, so I'll have to strip the screen and try again. Until then, you all can enjoy the digital version.

German Fair Poster

A week or so ago, my German Phonetics professor informed my class that we could receive extra credit for volunteering at the upcoming high school German fair to take place at BYU on the 13th. I need extra credit in that class ( I don't know an allophone from a monodipthong), so I signed up to judge the video section. I guess my professor thought I could be put to better use, so he told me he'd give me the same extra credit if I did a poster for it instead. The top is my hand drawn original (done in Prismacolor markers on bristol), the bottom is the slightly cleaned up version with temperature and background color adjustments in PS. The text reads "The German Language Festival" Jawohl!

Bismarck

This is a project I've been chipping away at for quite awhile, but mainly this past semester. My girlfriend is something of an authority on imperial Germany/Prussia, and has always been a fan of Otto von Bismarck. I haven't studied as much of the backstory, but I have always loved the Pickelhaube helmets from that era. I worked from multiple photos and paintings of ol' Otto for this piece, as well as contemporary photos of the spiky helmets. I'm about 90% sure I'm done with this one, but I might go back and touch one or two things up still. It's oils on masonite. Es lebe Bismarck!

Euro Crisis Cartoon for BYU Political Review

 My good friend Taylor at the BYU Political Review asked me earlier this week if I could get a cartoon in for the next issue, and I was stoked to put something together for her. After talking to some professors who helped clear up some of my misconceptions about the Greek Euro crisis (most notably my friend Professor Tom Spencer), I was able to form what I feel is an accurate (however biased towards Germany, go figure) cartoon. The middle shows my initial inking, before cleaning up and editing some lines to increase clarity. Merry Christmas Europe!

Big Daddy Wehrmacht Projekt

I did another shirt-for-painting trade with my pal Shaky this Fall (the original being my Creatue painting for his Robert Williams-inspired Triumph shirt last Summer), in which I was to do a painting of Ed "Big Daddy" Roth in exchange for a monster shirt of me on my little Honda. Shaky sent me the Honda shirt (which turned out great!) about a month ago, and I decided yesterday (after getting the painting itch from looking through the Maynard Dixon book I just bought with the prize money from the German Week contest comic below) that I had better get moving on holding up my end of the bargain. I first did the layout/line study off of an old photo of Big Daddy in one of his "Surfer Helmets", seen here at the bottom of the pile, to the scale that the final painting will be, 8"x10". I then created a miniature version of the line drawing (middle image) to fit the 2.5"x 3.5" illustration board card that I did the quick, basic value study on in gouache (the top image). The final will be in oils, also in black and white. I'm also thinking of doing an inked version of the smaller line drawing for another art trade which is currently in the works with another hip monster artist, so that will be posted as well, if things go as planned. BIG DADDY IS OUR LEADER!

German Dept. Contest Entry

The German Department here at BYU is putting on an art contest in cooperation with the German consulate or something like that, which I had no plan of entering until I heard that no one had really entered it, and that the $100 cash prize or $25 university bookstore gift certificate for honorable mention were therefore pretty well within my reach. I threw this comic together quickly last night to have it in for the contest deadline this afternoon. We'll see what happens. The first frame reads "I had to drive up to Salt Lake, but finally I have it: my favorite german moldy cheese!"

Ott Mit Uns Phase 1

This is a shirt design I've been working on throughout the summer, one of those projects that has been worked on gradually and lazily because there's no deadline. I'm crazy about the "Gott Mit Uns" (God is With Us) beltbuckles issued to German military personnel in the first and second World Wars, and I'm also crazy about Neue Sachlichkeit German artist Otto Dix. The concept of any nation engaged in a war against any other nation with both sides believing God to be on their own side has always been bizarre and fascinating to me. This drawing combines a beltbuckle design used for the SS Totenkopfverbände (Skull Units) with a piece that Dix did as one part of a 50 (or 51?) piece anti war series that Dix did in 1924. The combination of the original SS Totenkopf with the text "Gott Mit Uns" is so absurd and sickening, while Dix's "Schädel" is equally sickening, however oppositely intentioned and brilliant. I was originally going to leave the design as you see it here, but I think I'm going to add and adjust some of the ornamental elements before I call it good. Immer gegen Kriege kämpfen! I'll post the final when it's done.

THIS POST IS FOR CLARISSA

This is my final business card design. I printed out 10 of them on Bristol with my home printer as a test and to give me a little initial stock, but I will be getting them professionally printed with a backside detailing my offered services (Illustration, Pinstriping, Comix and Fine Art) in the next week or so.

Skizzen vom Vaterland

This are an assortment of sketches I did while in Germany. I filled 6 sketchbooks over there, so I"ll probably post stuff from them from time to time. The first one is my favorite.