Pin Up of the Week: Just Sketching

So I wont be posting pinups every single day. I want to do more well thought out artwork that speaks to my own heart so I may not even draw hot girls that often. (sorry guys.) Some drawings may not even be fully realized. I might even just draw a comic strip. Regardless of what the choice is for this day I will post some form of personal creation of some sort.

Originally I had wanted to go back to my old format where I picked a character and drew them everyday for 7 days but I think I will approach things differently. I do have a few things like that are sitting around cause I wanted to do a daily pinup, but my ideas changed. So i will post those things this week and move on to something else.

I NEED A SCANNER! May need to do something about that soon. I had to photograph this sketch so sorry for the bad quality.

~Arie

Out and about in LA: Visiting the Little Tokyo

This is my second time in little Tokyo. This time i went to Kinokuniya bookstore. Originally I was supposed to meet up with 3 other artists for a little meet and greet and maybe some drawing time.  Things didn't work out that way though. Only one person showed up. One person over slept and the other was forced to sit by the phone and wait on a call for a job.

None the less it was a fun little excursion. Only stayed for about an hour then grabbed lunch and headed home. They had a nice wide selection art books, Manga, and even artist drawing materials.  I however, don't remember the Kinokuniya in NYC being this expensive. Maybe when I actually have some cash I will buy something. In the mean time check out some of the pictures.

Being there was a weird experience. I have loved and enjoyed anime a long time but I felt a bit overwhelmed by all the material they had there. I over the years have given anime a bit of a back seat cause I wasn't seeing a huge variety books that were rocking my world.  

~Arie

                                                    I like these marvel anime characters!

               One of the friends I was with turned me on to Tiger & Bunny. Gotta check out the anime.

                                                       Smallest color pencils I ever seen!!

                                                   More manga than I have seen in a while.

                           I thought this book was hella cool! I kinda wanted it but it was like $45.

                                                                  CUTE!!! So Kawaii!

Thats all folks now Go the f*ck To sleep. lol You should look youtube and check out the audio of this book read by Samuel L. Jackson.

Universal Stories: Airbrush practice

I was thinking that maybe since things are getting slow once a week I will choose someone to paint for practice and take a picture and post it here. If you want to participate hit me up on facebook with a picture and you might be my next victim.

On the Drawing Desk: Commissions

One thing that is in my goals for this year is to restart doing commissions and doing art for people. I would like to get the commissions I have already have on my desk completed and start getting them out to people, as well. The last few years have been a huge challenge, to the point of almost giving up being an artist all together.

I reached such a low that I wanted to walk away from art completely and change my whole approach to living. It is easy to self destruct when it feels like everything is falling apart around you. A person will start making personal choices they will regret later.

 I am learning though that more than anything it is important to be myself in my art, even if the work is going to be for someone else. My mentor Dan Haskett once told me that he tried to put his emotions into everything he was creating including the things he did for the companies he was working for. At the end of the day he was still able to express himself in the work he was producing for other.

Its the only way to keep sanity and continue to love what is being done. I know I have been focusing on doing caricature a lot the last 6 months or so, but this is also about finding love in being an artist regardless of what I draw. This is about reclaiming what I thought was lost and learning to express myself again through my art, no matter what the subject matter.

In fact one of the reason I always loved drawing pinups was cause I was expressing myself as a women through them. but at some point that stopped being true in my opinion. Eventually i felt I was drawing what I thought people wanted to see and not really expressing myself anymore. Personally i think it shows.

So just give me a little time and I will be back in full swing on everything.


Sorry about the quality of these. I would have preferred to scan them but my scanner is not working so I took a few pics.

My Career in Animation: Branding

So, one of the things I think is important in an artist career is Branding. Making themselves into a marketable brand that companies will see as a valuable asset. It reminds me of a interview I saw with Bobby Chiu and Bill Plympton. Bill was talking about a experience he had with Disney where at one point in his career he tried to approach them for work and was turned down and then some years later after building his own animation business they came to him and asked him to work on a film which he declined.

He built a brand by doing what he did best and soon companies were coming to him with million dollar contracts.

I have decided that in terms of my animation career it is important to create more personal work and to focus on having that work seen by al many people as I can and create a demand for what I do.

This week I took some time and worked on some character designs. I want to do more production work for my portfolio, so I guess this is a start. I need my book to be more precise in its intent. More storyboards, character designs, and more original art and ideas.