Amber

Last week we had an awesome breakfast for dinner meal at Ben and Amber's followed by a drawing session. Here's Amber in her living room as she sketches Danny Devito as The Penguin.

Scuffz and I had an awesome time at OMSI yesterday visiting with prehistoric friends, learning about the causes of aging, and playing with their heat sensing camera. Did you know that aluminum may not reflect light, but it reflects heat just as well as a mirror does? In other news a paleontologist has extract intact T-Rex blood from a fossil. We're this close to a real Jurassic Park, I can feel it. Hopefully Newman won't get eaten this time.

Behold! The Brontops!

I present to you one of the hosts of the Brontops and Moschops Morning talk show. I've always been a fan of this prehistoric relative to the rhinoceros, and when I came across an illustration of him in an old Life book about the history of life on Earth I had to give it a go for myself. This was drawn on my new sketchbook that I made myself out of colored construction paper and a file folder. White colored pencil on black paper.

Many props go to Antonio Petruccelli, the original illustrator of this guy. Old science illustrators had the awesome job of visualizing prehistoric creatures based on their skeletons and then drawing them doing things in their natural habitat. How does one get that job? I suppose these days it's all in CG.

Probably my favorite of these artists is Charles R. Knight (1874-1953). He was one of the pioneers of prehistoric re-creation and has developed some of the most influential images of dinosaurs and early mammals. Now I'm off to OMSI so hopefully I'll have some cool science museum sketches to post later this week. I've included several of Knight's paintings after the jump so you can get an idea of how awesome he is. Check it out.

Stevie on Braille

The basement in my old house was magical. So many people had come and gone before I lived there, that the basement had turned into a wondrous land of mystery. Sometimes it seemed that all you had to do was think of something you needed and go down to the basement; you would surely find it there. Of course the greatest treasures found down there were the things that you never knew you needed. Like a giant book of braille paper, for example. I've had this thing sitting in my closet for almost a year, waiting for the perfect opportunity to use it. So this weekend I pulled it out and did the only logical thing with it. Painted a picture of Stevie Wonder. I hope you enjoy.