Blue FJ

my work mate's Toyota FJ paintined in Photoshop. thanks, GC!

Jeep Wrangler in the afternoon

thanks, BP for parking your car there for me!

mazda MX 6

here's one from this morning. Photoshop.

Toyota Sequoia Part 2

the toyota sequia is neither super angular nor super round. it's this huge chunk of metal that is hard to pinpoint the correct perspective lines viewing from the second story. but gary meyer can. i had to tweak it a little using the skew/transformation tool...anyways, due to a request from a buddy, i did another life digital painting in higher rez.

Toyota Sequoia

i decided to paint what i saw outside my window again. this only took me a few minutes. perspective is a little off, or maybe the person just parked crooked. sorry after halfway through the painting, i realized i was doing it lo-rez.

Slow Day at the Office

i have a great view looking out my Sony office here in beautiful Bend, Oregon. however, it was raining all morning. thought i'd do a quick sketch from life using Photoshop.
haven't done this in a while since the Incognito days when i would paint my co-workers digitally working at their desks.

Air Filter

just got my AllerAir 5000 Exec DX from Cheap Joe's.

i felt like i needed to make this large purchase since i have to keep the windows in my painting studio closed for most of the year because the winters here are so long and cold. hopefully, this air filter will help me live a little longer and healthier. i'll let you know if it worked. or not.

Lumberjack Chop Chop

here is the before and after photos of the paintings that i chopped off. i really felt like there was too much sky. other artists like Ray Turner can pull off a good composition with a lot of sky, but not me.

Latest train paintings

Whew! just finished more train paintings for my gallery. they were all painted on hardboard because i ran out of canvas. the good thing about painting on board is that if you are not satisfied with your composition, you can always chop off the sides until it looks right. in one of these three paintings, that was the case. i started on three panels, all sized at 48" x 12". well, it ended up that the last painting didn't feel right, so i cut off the top part on my table saw to get rid of some of the sky.

Unorthodox equipment

i've meant to post this earlier, but somehow i always manage to forget. as it is no secret that my palette is unconventional, so are my tools for painting. no one has really taught me this system, but at the same time, i'm sure it's not new. my system has evolved over the years as i continually seek to set up a system that is very time saving at both ends: setup and clean up. this was very important to me as my family grew, i could not spend as much time in the studio. so i had to make sure that when i was in there, i used my time in there painting. very unromantic and non-traditional as far as the fine arts was taught to me, but yet it works practically and efficiently.

so here it is, from left to right:

• Butcher paper and cutter: i don't mix my paints on glass as i found that just rolling out the paper and crumpling it up when i was done to be a much faster and less tedious
• ZipLoc bags: any left over paints i scrape up with my palette knife and save it in this bag. i squeeze out all the air and the paint is usually good for up to two weeks. this would be my chromatic grey for future painting sessions.
• Short hair comb: i use this as a cleaning surface for my brushes. i squeeze Gojo pumice hand cleaner onto the comb and wash my brushes onto the teeth of the comb.
• the last unconventional tool in the photo is the gum stimulator. i got it at Rite Aid. i use this to scratch back into wet paint for fine, straight lines. you can also use this to scratch out your signature if the paints are still wet.