Paper Ammo

Solo Art Show

2011-11-06T22:05:00.000-08:00

I have a solo art show coming up this weekend. The notice is real slow, seems like life is in a rush at times. Squeezing in time to paint, design, teach and art shows is a real balancing act. The above piece will be part of a collection of work that I've done the past year. Here's the info for the show:

Saturday, Nov. 12th from 7-10 PM
Vanity Hair Studio
420 North Cedros
Solana Beach, CA 92075

Hope to see some friendly faces there!

Homie Support

2011-08-25T16:10:00.000-07:00

This was from an outing to Point Vicente Park, overlooking the cliffs off Palos Verdes in LA county. This is my old college homie Fitz. Getting old friends to get back into the groove of painting is always a pleasure. We paint to make peace not war.

This is my setup with the umbrella.

Microphone Checka...

2011-07-27T20:17:00.001-07:00

Test post from my Android phone.

...I'm Back

2011-07-27T15:26:00.000-07:00

Hello friends. Its been awhile since I was on hiatus from this blog. It seems like there are still visitors here so I figure its best to keep old and new friends updated on my recent artistic adventures. Here are some recent photos of my plein air outings along the coast of California.

Plein Air

2009-11-29T22:39:00.000-08:00

Hello friends. Its been awhile since I posted last. This will also be my last post on Blogger as my website is now currently setup. It has a blog integrated on there too so chime in when you guys can. Here's my website link:

www.mutedtones.com

The blog should be functional soon. In the meantime here are some plein air paintings that I have done recently. Who knows, maybe I can make a decent living off of these and travel the world doing paintings! Until next time...

Drunken Leprechauns

2009-08-24T15:59:00.000-07:00

These are pieces done for a one night show tomorrow at Bar Basic. Its right across from Petco Park in downtown SD. SO if anyone is in the area stop on by for some pizza, beers and good times. I get off work teaching at 10 so I will be there right after.

The pieces are 5" x 7", gouache on watercolor paper. The sketch was actually done about 2 years ago. I just dug it up for the theme of the show "Humorous/Funny/Drunk". Its somewhat appropriate isn't it?

Road to Winnersville

2009-08-11T02:07:00.000-07:00

Here's a recent project I just completed during the month of June. BIG THANKS to my friend Matt for tackling part of the workload to help get this project done. I wished that it would be displayed on the billboards along the freeways instead of just the main lobby at Sycuan. So if anyone wants to check out the finished piece go to Sycuan on a Wednesday so that way you can try to win a corvette too!

cafe sketches

2009-06-22T12:42:00.000-07:00

ok since you're putting me on the spot for updates Travis... here's a few recent ones.

sketch of the day, yesterday

2009-06-16T01:42:00.001-07:00

quick photoshop sketch done in between teaching classes @ coffee shop

Fresh

2009-05-19T15:40:00.001-07:00

I find it a bit ironic reading this sign upon close inspection. Enjoy the upcoming Spring!

Dear Friends

2009-04-27T00:43:00.000-07:00

Hello Friends! Its been a crazy week. I made some new friends, got reacquainted with some old friends and sadly I lost a friend... all in the expanse of 2 weeks. This image is the piece I created for the faculty show that has just passed at my school. The horizontal lines in the piece was my lack of having a Wacom pen (I lost it earlier this week) and being too lazy at the moment to get crazy with it in Photoshop. I had dinner this week with my new friends Raphael and his lovely wife Beena. I feel very fortunate that the piece has a great home and even more importantly I received the gift of new friendship. About 2 weeks ago I received an email from my old friend from high school, Lacey, whom we are friends from art classes. Its crazy how things like facebook and google can get people reconnected to each other again. As powerful as the search tools are thats created from the internet culture the aspects of friendship is even greater. Even reading her email it seems like time never passed. I also got a chance to talk with another old friend from junior high/high school too. I went to Guitar Trader last Saturday and I haven't stopped by there in years. It was the place I bought my first guitar back in '93. I was just messing around with a few guitars and talked with the sales rep there just to find out that my old friend Mike is teaching guitar lessons there. And sadly, the next day was Earth Day celebration at Balboa Park. Don't take it the wrong way, Earth Day is great; it helps makes us aware of our human connection and responsibility to this world. It was just that I saw my friend James, whom I ride bicycles with, and exchanged some conversation with just as I was leaving in the afternoon. The very next day I received a call from my friend Jeanette that he passed away. It was really bizarre. He was so full of life the day I saw him and maybe in a way it was our way of saying "see you later" for the last time. We just had the memorial today and strangely enough I saw one of the current students at the school I'm teaching at there too. I happened to sub for Tyson's class about a year ago, just one class, and we say whats up to each other at school. Just to find out later that he's been friends with james for a very long time. Crazy how the world works sometimes. i definitely believe in karma and just the recent events this past week really has me thinking a lot about life in general. To all my old and new friends, including the ones that we haven't met yet and are reading this from around the world, please take care and say what's up sometimes. I want to enjoy many simple and happy moments with you guys and gals again.

Air...

2009-03-13T01:06:00.001-07:00

...brush

i just picked up a new gun and compressor a few weeks ago and started getting back into airbrushing again. i guess this "sketch" here would be about after a week of practicing again. i tried taking pictures at different stages to show the process.

Year of the Ox

2009-01-26T09:42:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year. These are some preliminary sketches for a painting I'm doing this week. Its for the faculty art show. Have a great year everyone!

Between The Lines

2008-07-24T00:47:00.000-07:00

The monsters are invading San Diego!!! well not monsters but super-nerds dressed up as monsters and stormtroopers and the like. The Padres are really sucking right now but hey at least we have the San Diego Comic Con right now. The green monster line drawings were done in the fall of '07 but I just came around to finishing the pencil lines last night. The rest I tried not to doctor anything up in photoshop as it will take away the life of the line work. Keeping it rough for your enjoyment.

What? Art Book?? Next year???

....vrooommm!!!

2008-07-10T17:36:00.000-07:00

...and the great race has begun!

lucky!

2008-03-17T13:43:00.000-07:00

happy st. patrick's day. hope you all have a good and lucky day like this guy here!

thanks melvin!

2008-02-26T15:10:00.000-08:00

this post is in a response with talking to one of my good students melvin. thanks for motivating me dude to post up my work. this also goes out to my students/friends too, THANKS for inspiring me to push myself to be a better person.

whale riders

2008-02-12T23:23:00.000-08:00

hello friends. i just finished a month long on-and-off painting. the sketch was done awhile back and i worked on the painting part here and there for about a month. the random collection of sketches were done today to just get comfortable with "drawing" with the wacom again.

hope everyone is doing good out there.

ALIVE!

2007-12-11T18:17:00.000-08:00

Hello world. Yes I'm still alive. I've been teaching 6 classes full time this quarter. It sucks that it breaks away from my artistic momentum. I didn't even go cafe sketching for over a month (I usually go once a week). I just setup a home studio in one of the spare rooms in my house and also got the scanner connected again last week. No art for this blog posting but heres some thoughts and reflections on what I've been up to. Its for my yearly teaching review coming up. Wish me luck!

Wattana Khommarth - Narrative Statement 2007

Reflection on Teaching Methods

It’s been a full 2 years of teaching here at AICA-SD and the growth process is still continual like a tree full of wisdom. Growth and exchange of knowledge relating to both the students first and for myself as a teacher second. Even with careful tending and nurture to the tree of wisdom the fruits that bears from it are filled with its own distinct characteristic according to each individual fruit. As facilitators of the knowledge we can only sit back and hope that the random variation of good and bad seeds will grow into their own fruition without bearing the burden of responsibility for every fruit. Sometimes nature and its own laws of natural selection are greater than any man made plans. We can only hope for the best and wish for optimism.

Here is the recap of my reflective statement from 2006 with added thoughts to my methodology in the next paragraph:
My daily lesson plans always starts off with a review and critique of their homework assignments and recap of last week’s lessons. I then go into my lecture for the week and show the students various animation clips and also live action footage. Then lastly I do a demonstration of the homework that will be assigned for the week’s lesson along with allowing the students to do in-class lab work to prep them for the homework. I find that by beginning the class with a review and critique of their homework assignment allows for every student in the class to observe the good and bad of their peers’ work. This gives them additional insight into the approach of another student’s methods so that they can apply that into their own work. I also encourage the students to critique one another’s work so that they can be more engaging in classroom conversations along with helping them build up their confidence to see the rights and wrongs with positive criticism. The lecture and visual presentation approach that I present to the students is to primarily to inspire them. As a teacher I am committed to encourage, inspire and help guide the students through their artistic endeavors and goals. Lastly, the demonstrations that I do for the class helps the students see a professional approach to the animation process. The in-class lab workshop also provides the students with hands on method of learning too.

I have also been extensively working with the Foundation Studies Department. It feels really good to work with students that are fresh to our curriculum and gives me a way to help them off to a proper start in their approach to their working methods and artistic mentality. Again, I start off these classes with a review and critique of their last week’s assignment. It helps to reinforce the lessons that were covered last week and helps to segue way into the current week’s lessons. I do tend to do more thorough in-class demonstrations and also have them repeat my working methods for the in-class lab time. Working with students that come from a variety of artistic backgrounds I have to make sure that everyone is on the same page. I never want to water down lessons for the sake of favoring one major than the other so the challenge lies in making the classes fun and informative yet challenging at the same time.

Continual Improvement as a Teacher

Continual improvement has always been a survival trait of humans. This applies as well to striving to improve as a teacher because that is what drives me to want to bring the best quality learning experience to the students I work with. I do understand the nature of our curriculum as being structured for preparing students to get ready for the industry but it is also important to integrate the challenge of artistic creativity to it too. Because without the understanding of the artistic nature of the craft then the work is just pencil on paper without any conceptual meaning behind it. Having a proper respect and understanding for the work is just as important as meeting the specifications of industry standards.

I have been delving into my own personal work of field sketching, painting and film making with a greater sense of understanding for these past 2 years while teaching here at AICA-SD. Concurrently I am still freelancing illustration, storyboarding and live entertainment art and share those experiences to the students so that they can keep up to par with what’s currently going on in the industry. Having a balance of the personal and commercial aspects of art making is important as one approach is creating for the pure enjoyment of ones dreams and the other is to help others chase their dreams. We all have to live and make a living but it’s important to follow your dreams as well.

Nature and life around me is my greatest teacher. It humbles me to see the beauty of nature and observe its constant state of change no matter how drastic or subtle it may be. By observing from life it helps to feed my imagination with new ideas and dreams. It makes me motivated to continually change my lesson plans from quarter to quarter as opposed to teaching the same old curriculum will make me lackadaisical. Its just human nature to want to improve just as in its relation to helping students become inspired about life and their art making process. From seeing the smiles and hearing the “hellos” down the hall I can honestly and humbly say I’ve helped to nurture more good than bad fruits. Idealistically I would prefer no bad fruits but that’s just the laws of natural selection taking its course.

...ending

2007-09-19T00:19:00.000-07:00

here are the last sketch paintings from my moleskine sketchbook. i should've posted these a few weeks ago. guess that just means new art will be coming soon. i've been working on fleshing out my storyboards for a short personal animated film project so i will try to post those up by the end of next week.

Laborious

2007-09-03T17:52:00.000-07:00

Happy Labor Day! Are there any births today? If there are then this post is dedicated to all you newborns out there. Please enter the world safely and grow to be creative creatures. I look forward to new ideas and creativity from the younger generation. They are very inspiring.

CalArts meeting

2007-08-19T21:57:00.000-07:00

it was my good friend Jung's wedding on saturday and it was good to see old friends from school. i wished we could've hung out a bit after the wedding was over. today i went to check out some homes with my parents and i was wearing a calarts t-shirt and the sales lady commented on it. guess she used to work in the student affairs office way back during the 80's. small world isn't it?

these are some images from a few weeks back. just trying to update more "regularly".

Past Present Future

2007-08-03T22:41:00.001-07:00

hello friends. its must've felt like a long hiatus or something for not posting in a long time. i just scanned in about 20 images so that will give me some arsenal to post up for the next coming MONTHS. just kidding, i'll post the rest up later cause i want to tease you guys and gals a bit. life has just been comprised of just teaching 20 hrs and sketching/painting for the rest of the week. i haven't touched my wacom tablet for about 3 months now so it feels really really good to mess with mediums that are more tangible. i've been using a water color pallete for my sketches and am really liking the painting process. i picked up a bike about 3 weeks ago and have been riding about 3 times a week and 10-16 miles each time. its helping me sharpen my senses a lot and makes me more aware of people and cars that i have to dodge in the concrete jungle. life has been good.

...btw, the 1st image was a gouache demo i did today for my color theory class of a self portrait.

zoo sketches

2007-06-12T21:34:00.000-07:00

roar! so maybe thats not the sound that these guys make but whenever i hear of the word zoo it makes the "roar!" sound in my head. its a jungle out there! the light saber gorilla was actually a "character design assignment" that my zoo sketching buddies came up with. the theme is "Star Wars vs. Planet of the Apes" but actually its more of a mash-up approach like as if a DJ mixes 2 records over one another. so lets scratch this up, word!

actually the backstory on the previous post was that i was showing a friend of mine how to setup a blog and did a quick demo photoshop sketch of a monster. i'm quite sure there were no monsters there except for the credit card machine.

bluecrush

2007-06-03T22:43:00.000-07:00

...not really much to say. just a quick cafe sketch of a random creature in photoshop.

Brain Buster

2007-05-07T21:44:00.000-07:00

Today was so hot it made my imagination bleed.

I wish I was like this polar bear plunging into the icy water.

Grr! Grrr!

2007-04-10T23:46:00.000-07:00

Thats 2 "grrs!" for double the tigers. These sketches are from image references. My real zoo sketches has my big cats looking like pit bulls. So in order to hopefully fix that I've been doing some studies of these feline creatures. Theres this cool looking black jaguar at the zoo that was posing lying down on the extended tree branch. I'll look for that sketch and post it up.

Friday Night Life

2007-04-06T22:04:00.000-07:00

It seems like my party lifestyle days are over. I just paint and draw most of the time. Even my weekends are consisting of just hanging out at coffee/tea shops and painting & drawing.

OGapi part 2

2007-03-28T02:18:00.000-07:00

here are the last 2 okapis. you guys and gals get the butt view on these.

OG-api part 1

2007-03-28T02:15:00.000-07:00

here's the OG sketch versions. chartpack markers and prismacolor pencils. some are from a month ago.

Okapi???

2007-03-20T03:17:00.000-07:00

I went sketching yesterday at the zoo and drew some okapis. This here is a late night/morning 30-45 min sketch in photoshop. I think my zoo sketches turned out better than this.

Labyrinth

2007-03-19T22:08:00.000-07:00

Just messing with some of the textures of some photoshop brushes my friend hooked me up with. I'm going to try to explore more possibilities with this.

NEW Painter X

2007-03-06T21:25:00.000-08:00

Here's some new color studies with the NEW Painter X. The upgrade price is not bad compared to the Adobe programs. Also, I'm testing out my new 6x11 Intuos3 tablet. I sold my old one to a friend of mine. Its crazy how the new Intuos3 surface feels like paper. The buttons are a nifty feature too.

Move it B!

2007-02-20T15:41:00.000-08:00

Here's one for my friend Brian whom requested in the previous blog that he wanted to see one of these monsters move. Ok, so its not animated yet. May Allah and Jesus please forgive me. A key pose of its walk cycle is somewhat of a good start.

Don't Worry Be Happy

2007-02-18T19:48:00.000-08:00

Old sketch colored in Painter 8. I just ordered the Painter X that was just released. The demo/trial version has a few new things that makes it run smoother. I'm nt trying to sound like a saleman for Corel but they're also releasing a limited edition of the Painter X program in the old skool paint cans.

These monster sketches are done in Photoshop. Grrr!!!

Happy Valentine's Day

2007-02-14T22:52:00.000-08:00

Heres a few photoshop sketches from this evening.

Amoebas

2007-01-28T21:33:00.000-08:00

I just got this one finished tonight. Started on it earlier in the week. I titled it "amoebas" but it looks like a metamorphosis of jellyfish or something. I don't really know, I just let the pencil line flow and dance around on the paper and let things be.

Mas Creaturas

2007-01-22T23:19:00.000-08:00

Heres 3 quick sketches done with Tria markers, prismacolor and just a regular Pitt pen.

...and Just a few more

2007-01-17T22:17:00.000-08:00

Here's the last 2, for now. I'll see what happens this weekend as far as painting goes. I'm almost done filling up another sketchbook I just started last month. I should look into revising some sketches in finished paintings yeah?

A Few More Paintings

2007-01-17T22:14:00.000-08:00

Here's a few more gouache paintings. I decided to group these animals together in one post.

More Paintings

2007-01-17T22:09:00.000-08:00

Here's some recent paintings. All gouache on watercolorpaper. The first 3 are rather small comp sketches, about just 1 1/2" x 1".

Animals 2006

2007-01-09T23:53:00.000-08:00

Heres a few more images leftover from my 2006 sketches. I've been working on a couple gouache paintings this past vacation and I'll get to posting those after I scan them in.

Happy New Year

2007-01-01T23:19:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year everyone. Here's a quick photoshop new year's doodle. Which face were you after the holiday bash? I felt worse than the bottom green one looks.

Seaport Village

2006-12-27T21:15:00.000-08:00

Here's some Seaport Village sketches from about 2 months ago with one of my classes.

Happy One Year Blog

2006-12-20T23:50:00.000-08:00

So it seems like its been 1 full year to this day that I started this blog. I just didn't want to post up some birthday cake to celebrate. Instead here's a preliminary outline sketch for my planned film project I'm going to be working on. Abstract shape and color that will metamorphasize according to the music. I plan on doing an original score. Gotta brush up on my guitar skills now.

Balboa Park Sketches

2006-12-19T21:09:00.000-08:00

Here's some live sketching at Balboa Park with my drawing class. Balboa Park was built for the First World's Fair: The 1915-16 Panama-California Exposition. If you take a stroll around the various museums and building structures you will see the number 1915 inscribed onto certain structural areas. Most people don't know that its to commemorate the year 1915. Kind of like seeing the A113 in Pixar films and other animation films too. CalArts represent!

Here's the link to the park if you're interested in checking it out whenever you're down here in SD:
http://www.balboapark.org/

Sketching with my class is one of the benefits I enjoy from teaching. I gotta arrange for more onsite sketching sessions =)
...keep on checking back for more posts. I just filled up my sketchbook and am going to spend this 3 week break to paint and update this blog.

-Wattana

Birds

2006-12-18T15:09:00.000-08:00

...some cafe paintings of birds

Practice

2006-12-16T22:19:00.000-08:00

I think Allen Iverson said it best: "...its just practice."

Comp Sketches

2006-11-16T13:56:00.000-08:00

I put together a couple sketches for my Perspective class for my discussion on basic composition. Hopefully my discussion went better than these sketches.

Western Desert

2006-11-03T01:50:00.000-08:00

...just a quick sketch to hopefully get back in the swing of things.

New Sketches, New Site!

2006-07-27T22:16:00.000-07:00

Here's a couple new sketches. My new scanner doesn't pick up the colors that well. I like my old HP scanner better. I also made a new website for my artwork portfolio. It was made with the iWeb software that came with my MacBook Pro. Its pretty simple. I kinda prefer it better than having to build my website from scratch. HTML compliant and super easy to use. I don't really care much about fancy websites, as long as my images pop up ok and everything works is all that matters. Yeah, you guys do want the link right?

Here it is:
http://web.mac.com/ekg315

I'm debating if I should switch to using the blog features that integrates with the iWeb program too. Hmmm... if I do then this blog will have to go. Would be too much work to keep up with 2 blogs. I'll see what happens.

angolan colobus

2006-07-23T13:57:00.000-07:00

These creatures are way too cool. Here's a quick digital sketch I did over a week ago. Haven't gotten to posting much cause of the busy comic-con weekend.

Exquisite

2006-07-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

I wonder what robots would be feeling and thinking of if they're dabbling in exquisite tastes. This was a fun design to work with. The smoke effect was a great experimentation exercise. Til next time, have a good evening friends.

Malayan Tapir

2006-06-30T00:44:00.000-07:00

I went sketching at the SD Zoo yesterday and did this quick digital painting tonight from memory. The Malayan Tapir has these pretty cool ears that looks like they got cut with scissors. They look somewhat like a cross from a pig and an elephant along with the silverback coloring of a gorilla. I think these are my favorite animal at the moment. I wonder how they would taste like BBQed! I'll try posting up the zoo sketches tomorrow.

Doc

2006-06-25T18:06:00.000-07:00

Using a Wacom tablet on a hot and humid afternoon is very uncomfortable to work with. The tablet surface and pen gets all sticky from the sweat from your hands. Insead of gliding smoothly across with the pen stroke I get stops and studders instead. Maybe later when the night comes in and things cool down a bit more it will be a better drawing/painting experience.

Howdy

2006-06-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

Just finished coloring this one today. I was trying to go for the rusty look of old metal overall but it was fighting against the bright colors that I laid down first. So I figured I should just let the base colors work by themselves. Keep it simple right?

Bizarre

2006-06-19T02:35:00.000-07:00

Here's a collaborative work I done with my buddy Enrique. He did the line work and I did the coloring. Hopefully I can get this collaborative spirit going with other friends and artists from around the world. Its a great learning process.

Bomber Tutorial Part 2

2006-06-12T19:07:00.000-07:00

Step 5: Shading.
Next up I added in textural shading and some airbrushing to areas of the character. Working with a basic "light source" coming from the left side also gives me a basis of where to drop in the shading

Step 6: Highlight.
After being somewhat satisfied with the overall shading process I add in my highlights to the character and equipment. I was aiming for minimal use of highlight as to not detract from the emphasis that the shading gives to the composition.

Step7: Finish!
For the final steps I added in additional shading to offset the overspray of the highlights. Erasing off the highlights in certain areas gave it too much of a hard edge that I didn'tlike too much. The additional shading also gives me a chance to go back and overlay more shadows to certain areas to create more contrast from the highlights.

Bomber Tutorial Part 1

2006-06-12T18:35:00.000-07:00

Here's the step by step process that I took to create the finished Bomber piece.

Step 1: Idea.
These 2 drawings were my idea stage. The first sketch explored the possibilities of what I wanted to create for the 3rd character of the Paper Ammo mascot series. I was aiming for a robot or either a monster/creature type character to balance out the 3. Already, Gunner is a human-type character and he's somehwhat circular in appearance. Cutter is more angular/triangular. Bomber had to be more squarish in appearance to add contrast to the "rule of 3". I decided to go for the monster design because I waas leaning toward having a character with a tail. I also gave him grenades to contrast from the gun and machete weapons that the other characters have. So... the 2nd sketch was a more fleshed out prelimary design.

Step 2: Clean Up!
This drawing was done with a blue col-erase pencil and then traced over again with a 0.9 mm 2B mechanical pencil. I actually prefer the Anvil mechanical pencils because they have a built in shock absorber so that the leads have a bit more give and will not break as easy. But my Anvil pencil broke a few months so I bought a Koh-I-Noor Rapidomatic. They hold more lead and are comfortable to use. Still, I miss the shock absorbing ability the Anvil has.

Step 3: BG Color.
I converted the Image > Mode > Greyscale to elimate any blue lines. Then reconverted to RGB Color to work with the coloring process. I multiplied the image and placed that on the top most layer. I also moved the grenade thats on the far left a bit further to balance out the composition. I then gave a background color as to not work with a white BG. It gives me a sense of what colors to use in the character to bounce off from the BG colors.

Step 4: Base Colors.
The base colors is what I use first in the coloring process. This time though, for the series of the 3 mascots I decided to use a texture brush to color with first. It breaks the monotony of having to go with a flat solid color brush first then add in texture in later. I basically wanted to experiment with using texture as a color instead of flat base colors first.

Bomber

2006-06-11T02:49:00.000-07:00

Here's the last of the trio, "Bomber". He loves grenades. Ka-boom!

Gunner

2006-06-05T02:16:00.000-07:00

I was hangin out with my good buddy Enrique and Victor tonight at The Living Room coffee shop/lounge. Always a cool spot to hang out there. Dope beats, good crowd, nice location. It was good to catch up on old times and sharing new ideas with cool friends. Here's "Gunner", the 2nd character design in the series I'm working on. This character is a follow up to "Cutter", whom the original sketch was from the one I used for the paintball flyer I did awhile back. Hopefully sometime this week I'll work on the 3rd character in this series. Til then...

Cutter

2006-06-02T22:38:00.000-07:00

Here's something new that I started coloring last night and finished up today in Photoshop CS. The original sketch is also posted up too.

Hello Again!

2006-05-31T22:06:00.000-07:00

Hello friends. Sorry for the delay. Mac died a few months ago and the 2nd quarter of teaching started so I got caught up with life. Lame excuses right? Yeah, I think so too. No excuses to not post up. But anyhow, the school quarter is ending soon and I just got a new MacBook Pro!!! As the words of my good German friend would say, "Its SuperNice!"

Oh yeah, I found out that my scanner does not work with the new intel based Macs so I put in an order for a new one. When it arrives I'll scan in some new character design work I've been doing and post up soon. Anyhow, here are some new digital paintings. Enjoy my friends!

Happy 30th

2006-03-15T00:10:00.000-08:00

So I turned 30 today, right now! I don't feel older or younger, just a bit wiser. Not as wise as my father and grandmother but just a little bit. Maybe its due to my new teaching position as a professor at an art school, actually buying my own healthcare (medical,dental and vision), and enjoying creating my art more. Its about enjoying life and experiencing as many things while you can. So heres to my 30th birthday... I wish everyone a healthy and exciting life.

To celebrate it, I'm organizing a paintball game. Here's the info:
Paintball on March 26, 2006 @ Jungle Island
8 AM - 4 PM
$20 to play - own gear
$35 to play - with rental fee
Bring your own paint!!!
www.jungle-island.com

The private group name is under my name: Wattana Khommarath

Blue Creature

2006-03-13T18:58:00.000-08:00

i finished this painting from a sketch of the previous post. i need to look into developing my own custom brushes. all in all i had a good rainy day-weekend sketching & painting session. i'll try to post up my army guy sketch which i'll turn into a digital flyer for the upcoming paintball game (in 2 weeks!!).

Scanner

2006-03-11T22:19:00.000-08:00

I just hooked up my scanner and got some new freshly baked images for up for today. I've been really having fun experimenting with the pen and ink. Tried out using the dropper tool that came with the india ink cap and then adding minor details with a croquill dip pen. Hope y'all likes!

Party Like its 2005!

2006-03-07T23:19:00.001-08:00

I went to the Apple Store here in SD and found out that my logic board on my G5 took a dump, a very mean ass dump. A very expensive $1000 (parts and labor) dump!! Luckily my hard drive is still intact so I can backup all my files and use it as an external hard drive. Here are some old 2005 sketches I managed to save. Gonna use my day off tomorrow to sort things out and set up drivers (somthing macs never really had to do, just plug and play baby!) for my printer & scanner to this Dell laptop. I should also use tomorrow to set up a paypal donation for a new laptop. Think about it, send out an email for just ONE DOLLAR donation and ask people to chain mail it. I can maybe even buy a small country and buy my own private army too!

No, I am not planning on fixing my G5. I would rather invest $1000 in a new MacBook Pro WITH AppleCare this time. Anyone need 1 Gig of RAM and also an airport card? Holla back if you want it!

2006-03-03T20:16:00.000-08:00

My Mac died on me. Hopefully I can get it fixed and start doing some work on it again. Here's some digital painting to keep you guys amused til then.

Monster Ballads

2006-02-09T22:00:00.000-08:00

Here's a monster for ya. I'm constantly trying to be a better painter. I don't think this one is "quite there yet". Either way it was fun to experiment with the brush qualities in Photoshp CS. I should try digital plein air painting/sketching with my laptop.

Oh, you're probably wondering about this blog title. I'm just listening to some Monster Ballads, rockin' n' rollin' old skool 80's heavy metal songs. Yeah I know, getting all emotional and shit. But hey, gotta put some emotion into your work right? Have a good weekend everyone!

Machine Walkers

2006-02-07T20:15:00.000-08:00

Old sketchbook done! On with a new one! These were done over the weekend with Tria markers on paper.

Painter Fun!

2006-02-03T02:31:00.000-08:00

Here's some fun stuff done with Painter 8. I want to upgrade to 9 if the money allows for it.

Corpse Bride

2006-02-01T01:40:00.000-08:00

Today (yesterday actually) I bought the "Corpse Bride" and "March of the Penguins" DVDs. The cinematography in MotP was very good! Reminded me a lot of "Winged Migration", which was another French documentary that was well done. Watching Corpse Bride really made me smile, partly due to knowing that many of Huy's character designs made it into the film. If you're reading this blog, congrats Huy! The top images were done today at the coffee bean & tea leaf coffee/tea shop.

This sketch was done today too after watching "The Dark Crystal" DVD last night. The old skool Jim Henson puppetry/animatronics still kicks ass. Having Brian Froud's name as the Conceptual Designer credit really placed the importance of his work and contribution to the film. I don't think now-a-days having a special title in the main credits as a Concept Designer is emphasized as much as before.

These last 3 were done over the weekend at the San Diego Zoo.

New Links

2006-01-30T01:09:00.000-08:00

just added onto my list of links to some blogs of friends from not so long ago, from a galaxy far, far away. tonight i hung out with romali at the living room coffee shop in SD and did some digital sketching. i gotta get the images off the dell laptop and post up some sketches that were done tonight. also ran into primo and jon diesta too at the tea shop. was good times tonight, hanging out like old times back in '99 when we first all kicked it. chillin in 619, san diego style!

2nd Day

2006-01-19T14:07:00.000-08:00

Today was my 2nd day of teaching at AiCA-SD. Things went smoother today due to the fact that I was a bit more prepared than last week and also of course the lack of nervousness that I had last week too. I'm trying to draw upon all the inspiring teachers that I had growing up and also the dope animation teachers that taught me to view the world in a different way. The flag on the schoolhouse image that I designed actually has 50 stars on it! It also ties in with the mini American flag that I brought in to demo for our waving flag assignment.

I'm looking forward to next week's release by Thievery Corporation: 'Sounds From The Thievery Hi-Fi'. So its due out on Jan. 24th, that's next Tuesday!

Great Offer!

2005-12-21T22:04:00.000-08:00

Today I just got my New Faculty offer-package from AICaSD. So far it looks great for a part-time gig! I can't wait until I receive full-time status there with all the benefits and such. Also I got done with wrapping gifts for my nieces and nephews (7 runts total). Man, what a chore it was not to mention how expensive it can be. But hey, its money well spent and I'm sure they will be happy on Christmas day. I also got done with sending out Christmas cards too. I need to get more info on friend's addresses so that I can send more cards out next year. I think I'm going to paint on watercolor paper and make customized cards next time.

Let the Journey Begin

2005-12-20T14:27:00.000-08:00

So I decided to start a blog today. Lets see where the journey takes me...