Comic-con

Back from Comic-con! Happy to be home, but once again, I seem to have caught my yearly summer-convention-cold. Such large crowds of people seem to make it inevitable for me. It's a rather sniffly/sneezy homecoming as a result.

Shared booth space with my artist friend Sandra Santara. I have to say that the nice booth setup was entirely thanks to her, as she brought all the carpet panels for hanging our art up on, as well as all the lighting. My usual convention setup is more sparse than this. It was one of the few occasions I had to bring framed originals with me as well, since I drove the 8 hours south to San Diego with my brother this time, rather than flying as I normally do for Gencon and Dragoncon.

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A snapshot of a quick drawing I did one evening in a friend's sketchbook while hanging out at the Westin. I had left my own notebooks and things back at the hotel room, and with a room full of artists sketching away, I needed something to do to keep my hands busy. And since Allen is a goober and takes 3 years ever to scan any drawings I ever give him at shows, I took a bad photo of it.

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At every show, there's always busy times when I can't seem to pull prints out fast enough or answer the 4 questions that are shot my way at once; and then there are the quiet lulls where you wonder where everyone suddenly vanished off to and whether those garlic pita chips were perhaps perfuming the air around you.

I like to dig out my pens and work on ink drawings during the quiet spells. Once upon a time when I first started going to conventions I would actually bring paintings to work on, but I find now that those are too distracting to start and stop constantly. And having to worry about not spilling the water cup is an extra annoyance (especially so in a situation like Sandra and I had at this show where we were crowded so close we were practically in each others' laps!) Ink is nice and easy to pick up when I have the time, and set aside when necessary.

Inspired by a banyan tree I saw recently on my Maui trip whose roots were tangled around a large boulder (which we dubbed "the big ole' tree ball") I scribbled a quick sketch and worked on this for the first couple of days. There's almost a meditative quality about working on detailed line textures.

"Offerings"
7x11 inches
brown hi-tec-c gel pen on bristol board

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And then when that was done and I got tired of twiddling my fingers, I pulled out another sheet and started with some random lines. They quickly resolved into nautiluses, a few photos of which I found floating in my digital camera, which conveniently was on hand. Perhaps a bit of Cthulu inspiration as well. Hard to go to a con and not see something Cthulu. Or perhaps it was just spirals on the mind.

"Nautilus"
7x11 inches
black hi-tec-c gel pen on bristol board