Orca

Happy birthday to Casey
felty Orca from thrift store woolies

Narwhal

Casey's Christmas narwhal. I used felted sweaters and, for the tusk, paper mache. The most fun and challenging part of these stuffed animals has been figuring out how to make the patterns - how to translate the three-dimensional shape I envision in my head into fabric reality...quite different than I'm used to when working with clay or paper mache alone. If you have any old wool sweaters I'll gladly take them off your hands. I hope Casey doesn't tire of getting little whales as presents.

Draw your pet?

This is Kodama, drawn as a paid gig for my friend as a gift for her family.
So I'd like to build a little portfolio to show potential pet portrait clients in the future. Next on my list to draw...Luka, Henry, Lewis, Frank, Freckles, the ferrets I live with. First a photo shoot, then choose a medium - lino-cut, pencil, paint?

Lightbox

This is a home-made light box I just completed.
My materials list:
1 silly box from Ikea
Balsa wood rod, enough to go around the inside of the box
3 Compact Fluorescent light bulbs
3 sockets
1 light switch
1 plug
Wire
10 tiny screws and 8 teeny nails
1 custom cut piece of semi-transparent, white 1/4" plexiglass

Each light bulb has three holes drilled underneath it for ventilation and is held in place with a bit of sticky-backed velcro. The plexiglass rests on the balsa ledge and can be removed to change the bulbs or wiring. It diffuses the light quite evenly.

drawing in progress

Here's a meerkat in progress for Eques Inc.
Sadly, after I finished the meerkat series, I have no new projects until things pick up for my employer in the zoo-gifty market. It seems that the effects of the current global financial crisis have trickled their way down to me...

St. Francis

Somehow Casey, Luka and I ended up in this New York Times web article entitled "36 hours in San Francisco, the Mission District". I had no idea our photo was taken that day!

Leaper

I've been drawing sifaka lemurs for Eques.
This one is the third in a series showing
how they jump. Drawing white fur is a
challenging task! My first try wasn't quite
right. I decided to re-draw them all -
they turned out better the second time
around.

Mikey's birthday pangolin

Even before the pangolin illustration job, I had made this one for Mickey Thoms out of cereal boxes. Originally intended to be a pinata, it is hollow and has a little door but Mickey didn't want to destroy it. At least not for a while. We were considering filling it with tiny origami animals and smashing it open on some undetermined appropriately special occasion down the line...

Dreamy job

Many thanks to my friend Erin Hamilton for connecting me with EquesInc. with whom I am now employed as an illustrator. As they own the final images, I can't publish them here so you'll have to see them in person. I do get to keep the originals for my portfolio - or perhaps someday my artwork will appear in Eques' online image catalog www.equesinc.com
My first assignment was for a gift to a pangolin conservation group in Vietnam. Most of Eques' clients are zoos, aquariums, natural history and science museums all over the nation. I'm grateful for the learning experiences and for the doors that may perhaps open in the future...
Here are a few sketches.