WIP

Hi, welcome! I have a confession to make. I’ve been meeting puppies. I’ve been reading dog books and stalking dog reddit and trying to get “AI” to tell me what kinds of dogs these rescue pups are. Trying to see the future. Medium, or big, or perhaps extremely big? Can I picture that? Will this dog be kind to my cat? Can I know that somehow?

Meanwhile I’m plugging away at the little adventure comic and plugging away at the laundry, down in the basement, snow piling up outside and muting the light trickling in through the glass block windows.

I’ll have to get up early and shovel before I go to work, but I can only be glad. I put 50 plants in the ground in the last weeks before the weather turned, a garden hail mary. The more snow the better. One year we got so much, even the gladiolas made it.

I’ve got all the lamps on; the little 70s swivel neck I found in the basement of my apartment in Seattle near 15 years ago, the green glass bankers lamp on the bench, the silver clamp lights I paint under.

I swept and vacuumed the floors, and dusted the worst of the cobwebs, and now I’m here, brush in hand, thinking.

What would it be like if I had a dog?

Must have been thinking about it so hard when I was drawing Triangle Head’s cat in this one that I turned him into a dog. I like the effect. I’m really enjoying these; my vision is maybe beyond my ability, but I keep reaching for it and I keep getting closer. I bet it’s true what they say, about the 10,000 hours.

If you’ve never been here before, which I imagine you haven’t, I enjoy painting the video game No Man’s Sky, and also occasionally the real world. This is my blog, but you can find just my drawings sorted here, and just Triangle Head here.

I decided last year to learn to draw, for real this time, because I’d like to write a graphic novel. I’d been painting watercolor landscapes for three years, but from time to time Triangle Head would sneak in, or one of her companions.

I learned to paint on No Man’s Sky, visiting planet after planet, parking my ship on windy hills of shortgrass, and ocean cliffs, and scorched deserts, watching the sun rise and fall, and the shadows move, the colors shifting wildly.

To learn to add characters, words, a narrative, maybe I could take much the same approach.

I got a trio of POSCA markers with extra fine tips; white, and a metallic gold and silver. I wish you could see this in person. I’ll try to get some photos that show better how the stars shine, and how the breaking sunlight is catching on Triangle Head and her cat.

The sunrise is coming along. I enjoyed laying the clouds in. They came out almost as I intended. I’m in love with this combo of volcano violet and indigo for the clouds. I added some cadmium red hue around the sun on the second page, and I think I’ll use it to show where the light is falling before I add the next layers.

We’ll get to that next time. All the blades upon blades of grass. The shadowy stone monolith and lush orange-guava ferns and two tall trees, down by the water.

The cat’s in the next room, curled up on the couch. I put the space heater on for her, and I go in every little while to check on her and hang some laundry, start a new load, fold the towels.

And then I think, where would the dog be right now?

Am I ready? Can you ever be ready?