New Work...

I've been posting older pieces as of late, so I thought I'd switch it up and show some newer work. I created this angry looking rook in Photoshop by assembling his form with a bunch of photographs that I had in my personal stock of various churches and statues. My goal was to make him look as though he was trapped within his own stony architecture... furious and quaking... willing himself a new skin...

Coming Soon...

We are currently putting the new online store together...

Creative Pirates...

Every once in a while someone decides to do something really innovative with some of work that we've done here at MPS. To be honest, more often than naught when someone steals a clip or piece of the work from My Pet Skeleton... it's god awful... and it makes me angry.

Having said that, when I found this remixed bit of footage on youtube, I felt "delighted". It's true. This piece made me giggle, and I can't help but want to show it off. The original animation was created as a projection for Johnny Hollow...it's our very own Goliath Teddy Bear that stomps and tares about as Janine sings about her fantasies of burning down the houses of fallen lovers... [go to the player and listen to track 05 'worse things' if you'd like to hear the song in context]...

Anyway, this is "NOC!V's" edited piece and has bastardized our poor little Teddy for all of you to enjoy...


And while we're at it, I can't help but show this edited version by Devin Schiro. He took our reel full of animated bits and pieces and remixed it to Danny Elfman's "Serenada Schizophrana"... and aptly entitles this piece the "Scarecrow Serenada". I have really enjoyed his version as well.

The X-Files (Where's Waldo?)

I loved this show... and I still miss it. The brilliant Chris Carter would have his characters Scully and Mulder go spelunking for monsters of all types week after week after week. Every Sunday a new beast would rise from the ether and slither it's way into the 21 century urban mythos. This series has definitely left a set of dirty fingerprints on my psyche and has influenced the imagery in my work.

So, way back in 2001 you can imagine how thrilled I was to have the official X-files magazine give me a call to illustrate a spread for them. The art director at the time, Kimberly Thornton, wanted me to come up with a digital painting that represented the 7th season of the series. After reviewing all the VCR tapes that they had fedexed me (which, by the way, was the most fun research I've ever had to do for a project to date - and yes, they were VCR tapes at that time, NOT DVD's)... I found that there were spiritual undertones within the season that I could take advantage of. Scully, was having a change of faith, or rather, beginning to 'believe'. The tone of her character was moving from an unapologetic scientist, who believed that there was an earthly logical explanation for every mystery out there, to a woman who was becoming comfortable with the strange energies surrounding her. This coupled with the fact that she was also pregnant, gave me the idea to paint her as a saint inside a church full of hidden objects. At the time, they were keeping the babies Father a secret, and so the Virgin Mary pose seemed to work well for the piece.

The magazine loved the idea, and decided to promote it as a game to the fans. They wanted me to create 13 clues for 13 episodes. My goal was to create 13 stragically placed objects within the illustration, where each "thing" would be a calling card to one particular episode. Just for fun... and just to test the fans, I decided to place an extra clue, just to see if it would be spotted.

All 14 clues were spotted on the first day that the mag was placed on the shelves... X-File fans are not easy to trick...

Do you think you can find all of the hidden objects? Click here...

Johnny Hollow Radio

This has been up for a little while now... but Johnny Hollow really hasn't had much of a chance to promote it. So, for our first edition of "free stuff", you can listen to the entire "Dirty Hands" album right here at your convenience.

Pinhole Photo Tutorial in Photoshop - 6 Steps

Okay, so I thought I'd do a tutorial on how to get that kind of pinhole photography look and feel and apply it to a regular photograph. I took this photo when I was in England last year. It was rather gray and muted and, well.... boring. I wanted to emphasize the contours of the white stone to give the statue a phantom like quality...

01 First, make a copy of the image by dragging the layer over the "copy" symbol in your layers palette (bottom right hand corner).



02 Now, use the "hue/saturation" box to strip this new layer of it's original colours. You can call up this box with the shortcut CONTROL/SHIFT/U (press each key at the same time). In the bottom right hand corner add a check mark to the box that says "colorize". Then drag the arrow on the hue bar until your image has a sepia feel to it. Make sure you also drag the saturation bar to about "25" (depending on your photograph), so that the layer feels rather "dull". It's important that this layer remains muted or you will not get the desired affect once you overlay the layer.



03 In your layers palette, in the top right hand corner, it will read "Normal". Change this layer mode to "Overlay". By doing this, you will notice that you have added a lot of contrast to the photo, and that the sepia bleeds through over the original photo.



Sometimes it's nice to bring more attention to the center of the composition by adding a soft vignette...

04 Use the "Lasso" in your tool bar, and draw an oval selection around the center of your image. Then reverse the selection by using the shortcut ~ CONTROL/SHIFT/I. Then you need to make a copy of this selection ~ (shortcut) CONTROL C and paste (shortcut) CONTROL V. A new layer will appear in your layers palette.



05 From the top of the menu bar under "Filters" select "Blur". From there select "Gaussian Blur" to open the blur box. You really want to have a strong blur, so drag the "radius pixel bar" to about 20 or so.



06 Now soften the edges of your blur layer by erasing the perimeter around the 'hole'. Select the "eraser" from your tool bar, and take the opacity down to 50%. Make sure the brush is large so that you are erasing large surface areas at a time. Continue to erase the perimeter until it's no longer visible. Your image feel like it was taken from a pin hole camera.



Et voila... the image is now much more interesting having done a little digital manipulation in Photoshop.

Rock 'N Roll Church Poster

In the late 80's and early 90's there existed a Rock 'N Roll Church in New York City at a club known as the LimeLight. Every Sunday night the club would fill with rock fans (and reportedly many Hell's Angel's) to listen to the best live acts of that time. On Tuesday nights, the goth community hosted and took over the church's pulpit. The club(s) have an interesting history and an impressive affiliation with alternative music. The latest incarnation of the club has it's place at Club Circa in Toronto. I was very pleased to have been asked to fashion a poster for it's rebirth... I find that orange skeletons make great welcome wagons especially on the Sunday before Hallow's Eve.

It begins...

My very first blog post. How exciting! I feel as though I should deliver something incredibly witty in my first entry. Words that could trip the light fantatic and arouse a sea of electric applause and capitalized "LOLs" from fingertips across the globe! Words that have enough strength and courage to part the oceans, yet sensitive enough to touch the most apathetic heart. Each syllable carefully considered for its' poetic effect. Each sentence crafted with the precision of a finely focused laser. What shall I impart to the masses waiting with their heaving baited breaths? What shall I say ?

...

erm ...

ahem [clears throat]...

...

My hands smell like moth balls. I think it's because I forgot to wash them after handling some dead bugs. To everyone out there who handles dead bugs... always wash your hands... or they may smell like moth balls... or worse.