Daily Sketch

I've decided I'm going to try to do at least one meaningful sketch per day, either digitally or traditionally, and post it to this blog. I do not sketch nearly enough, and it is time to change that. This is a ten-minute head color and value study in Photoshop CS4. Dark environment, one backlight.

Guns and Political Rallies

William Kostric, the man brandishing a pistol outside Obama's town hall meeting last week in Portsmouth, N.H. also carried a sign that read "It's time to water the tree of liberty!", referencing Thomas Jefferson's quote: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Consider we have progressed, as a nation, in the last 8 years. Can you imagine, shortly after September 11 carrying a firearm to ANY political rally, much less one anywhere near the president? Don’t think for a moment that you wouldn’t have been shipped off to Guantanamo in a heartbeat.

Why has this man not been arrested and charged with threatening the life of the president (18 USC Sec.871)? I realize he wasn’t technically breaking any local firearm laws, but we all know that’s bullshit. Gun-rights advocates everywhere are praising this man as a true patriot exercising his 2nd Amendment rights, yet if Bush was still the president they’d be calling this guy a terrorist. The slogan he was displaying was nothing less than thinly-veiled provocation of armed insurrection.

Would this man have received the same courtesy from police if he was of Middle-Eastern descent? A muslim?

Argue all you want to me about his constitutional rights, but my point is this: when you bring a gun to a political rally you are sending a very clear message indeed.

This has also created a disturbing trend, as now more people are bringing firearms to public events with the president, like the wingnut in Arizona carrying a goddamn assault rifle among a crowd of protesters. Reportedly there were over a dozen people in that crowd carrying firearms. Does anyone realize how pants-on-head INSANE this is? What do you think is going to happen when tensions escalate and one person decides to actually use his weapon, or a car backfires? Picture it. You’re in a crowd of angry protesters, all armed. Suddenly there's a loud bang. Everyone scatters, everyone pulls their pistols and starts aiming them in all directions. You don't think anyone will get hurt or worse? A safer nation indeed.

And all this because Obama wants everyone to have equal access to health care. Oh, what an evil concept! What tyranny! Where were these "patriots" when Bush was authorizing warrantless wiretapping and suspending habeas corpus? Fight the power, brothers.

Infiltrators finished

I forgot to post the final version of this piece. Basically I added layers of detail to the building and grass.

Some CD/Logo artwork.

I created this logo for a band I was in recently, until we went on a hiatus. I had fun playing with these guys; hopefully we'll get together again soon!

Concept Art: Infiltrators

This started out as a quick speedpainting exercise but it's quickly turning into a worthwhile portfolio piece. I have 10 hours into it so far. The only thing I need to finish up is the structure in the background and maybe mess up the grass a bit to make it look not so much like it was painted with a scatter brush. I might noodle on the guy standing to the right a bit more, give him some more detail.

I like how concept art changes as you work on it. Originally it was just the one guy sitting on the ground, meditating on the mission before him, which is to quietly infiltrate this big, heavily-defended structure in the distance. Then I thought it needed more people, so I added two companions. All three people were going to be roughly the same: ninja-type intruders all with the same blade weapons, but as I worked I thought it would be neat if each person has his own specialty, i.e. the silent ninja type, the ballistic weapons/sniper expert to the left, and the tech/computer specialist to the right. Maybe their mission is to enter and grab data undetected. The tech guy is holding a device that could be a communicator, waiting for the go-ahead text message or something.

Taught myself some more Flash today.

So I wanted to figure out how to make a navigation bar in which an indicator would move in a fluid fashion toward whatever you just clicked on. This could be for a website, interactive timeline, game menu, etc. This particular example I wanted the arrow to just move to the same horizontal (x) position as the mouse at the instant of the click. I also wanted to constrain it to a range of x values, specifically, to the width of the navigation bar. So when you click anywhere to the right or left of the bar, the arrow will only travel to the bar's edge.

Just for shits I also made a dynamic text field that constantly refreshes the pointer's x position as a percentage of the width of the bar.

Here's the code:


import fl.transitions.Tween;
import fl.motion.easing.*;

trackerMC.x=navBar.x;
trackerMC.y=navBar.y;

stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, comeHere);

function comeHere(event:MouseEvent):void {
var xTarget:Number=mouseX;
if (xTarget>navBar.x+navBar.width) {
xTarget=navBar.x+navBar.width;
} else if (xTarget < navBar.x) {
xTarget=navBar.x;
}
//trace(xTarget);
var xTween:Tween=new Tween(trackerMC,"x",Quartic.easeOut,trackerMC.x,xTarget,1,true);
xTween.start();
}

addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, refreshXPos);

var xPos:Number;

function refreshXPos(event:Event):void
{
xPos = Math.ceil((trackerMC.x - navBar.x)/navBar.width*100);
positionTxt.text = xPos.toString();
}

New Prius!

I finally got fed up with driving my 12-year old pickup truck on long road trips and bought a sensible, reliable car this week. I've been looking at the Prius for some time now and couldn't hold out any longer. Work started to pick up again last month and I decided I had waited long enough. I rode my bicycle to Wilson Toyota and test drove a 2009 Prius Option 6 Touring Edition in Spectra Blue Mica. After driving it for a week I couldn't be happier.

It it's got Vehicle stability control (which is good because my rear-wheel drive light pickup handled like ass in the winter); backup camera; smart key system; Anti-theft system; Auto-dimming rearview mirror with HomeLink garage door opener. Not that I have a power garage door, but I might eventually.

Its interior features are leather trimmed seats and steering wheel; Voice-activated DVD GPS navigation system; JBL AM/FM 6-Disc CD/MP3/WMA changer with 9 Speakers, Aux audio input miniplug, Satellite radio capability, and hands-free phone capability via Bluetooth. It didn't come with a peeing Calvin sticker though.