Big John Arts Blog

Merry Christmas!

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 02:33:00 +0000

Merry Christmas!, originally uploaded by Thunderboot.

Merry Christmas everyone! Have a happy new year as well!

Jeff Smith Inking Billy Batson

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 00:11:00 +0000

wish I could make a brush work for me that way!

Jelly Belly

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Fri, 29 May 2009 23:48:00 +0000

Jelly Belly, originally uploaded by Thunderboot.

Been snapping photos of my oriole jelly feeder, which has been fairly active.

Direct TV

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Sat, 16 May 2009 23:45:00 +0000

Getting Direct Tv yay! I'll finally have the Sci-Fi Channel!

NCS Chapter Meeting

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 20:23:00 +0000

Had a great time hanging with all the cartoonists at the chapter meeting in Lincoln last weekend. The presentations were very educational and informative. I learned some things and met some more interesting artists. Tom Floyd, Cedric Hohnstadt, and Jeff Koterba were the speakers for the day. Cedric's presentation spawned a new character, Judge Head. One of his court room sketches was of a judge behind his desk, and with some voice overs it became a pretty funny character and gave us all a laugh.
Got to hang our with some of the guys in the hotel bar that night, had a blast. Can't wait to go to the next one!

I recently came into a truck load of instruments from some relation that's moving away. Some are pretty rough, and some are in quite good shape. I've been staying busy going through them and gauging how much work they will need.
I may be undergoing a job change where I work next week. I'm hoping it will make me happier and maybe give me some more money to pay bills and help with my artistic ventures.
Haven't gotten much work lately in the art area, but I've been trying to schedule myself some drawing time so I can get used to a pattern of drawing all the time. Usually, I have little time to practice and I want to be able to keep growing as an artist.

Well, hopefully I'll have more to blog about soon.
Later,
Scottman out.

iPhone blogging test

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 18:35:00 +0000

Hello! setup a blogger app on my iPhone, just thought I'd test it out. Nothing much going on, got a new guitar student. I finished up a logo job for a mens church choir. I've been getting ready for winter around the house.
Well 'till next time, go vote! :)

Toonfest 08

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 04:33:00 +0000

Hey all, I recently went to the Toonfest in Marceline Missouri, and had an amazing time!
I got to sit through some great presentations by Jan Eliot, Dave Coverly, Tom Richmond, Greg Evans, and Michael Jantze.
I learned a lot, and had tons of fun. I really feel inspired by the great talent at Marceline's Toonfest. The best part is that all these people are so nice and easy to hang with. I had some artwork in the gallery as well, which was kind of surreal. My art hanging next to art by so many famous great cartoonists. :)
Greatest weekend I've had in a good while, feel really good about being a cartoonist. Yay!
:)

Bow Art

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 23:22:00 +0000

I did some ink artwork on a John Marriott custom bow a while back, and the same customer wants two more now. Sounds good to me! Always nice to have work! :) The customer in Kentucky that I did flute engraving for said that there would be more work for me as well so that sounds promising.
Allergies seem to be wreaking havoc for me the last couple weeks.
The new dates for the Bahama Trip have been confirmed, and I'm looking forward to getting away from the day job for awhile. I've been floating again at the shop and it's very hard for me to sit and watch a machine run, got to be doing something otherwise I fall asleep.
Nothing new really, except happy bithday to me tomorrow! :)

Bahama Trip

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:33:00 +0000

Bahamas Trip
Well in March my sis and I were supposed to go on a cruise to the Bahamas. This was a trip my sister won in a drawing. Well, we got to the airport and we were getting all excited about our trip, and they canceled the flight because of weather in Texas. We hung around for awhile tried a few ideas, but in the end, there was just no way we were going to make it to Florida in time for the boat.
So I returned to work the day after, feeling pretty bummed that I should be on a sunny beach.
So now we are trying again in May, providing the agent gets us lined up.
So here's to second chances! :)

Flute Engraving

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 17:19:00 +0000

Just finished up a flute headjoint for a customer in Kentucky. She is sending me more work as soon as she finishes a few performances and can spare her flute for the work. Nice to see the site reaching someone in Kentucky, and nice to get work. :)
Ready for warmer weather, need to speed up the metabolism, get out of this winter pace. The finger I smashed at work in my machine is healing almost enough to play guitar again, been missing that a little. :)
Mom and Dad laptops are not working, I gave them my desktop to get by for internet. I'm stumped on what's wrong with their laptops, so will have to do some searches online. Started as a power cord problem, then they couldn't keep them on for more than 5 minutes, this after we bought new power adapters and batteries. I have a bad feeling that some stuff may have gotten fried due to wrong adapters or something.
My fish are dying off in my pond outside, I think when my heater quit me and it froze over, I didn't get it broke open in time. Some are still slowly swimming around, I added some water yesterday and I'm hoping that they pull through.
LOST is back so I have something to watch regularly again on tv. Looking forward to Jericho returning on Feb 12th, I was a late fan of the show and began liking it just before it got canceled. The fans pulled together and they brought it back, so hoping it gets a shot this time.

Lastest projects

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 01:45:00 +0000

Well I've been doing a lot of work winterizing the house last couple days. Thanksgiving was very good, did a lot of eating and sleeping. I've quite a list of things I need to work on, just got to get motivated.
I'm working on t-shirts for the bowling team I'm on, something with the theme before and after. Because we are quite 'fired up' by the end of the night and that makes for some interesting situations.
I have a gig illustrating a childrens book for a friend of mine, it's been an on going project along with some comic strips that I'm working on with him.
I have an order for some ink artwork on another John Marriott custom bow.

National Cartoonist Society - North Central Chapter Meeting

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 07:51:00 +0000

This was a very cool, almost surreal weekend. I got to hang with talented cartoonists all Saturday. All the speakers were very interesting to listen to, and I felt like I picked up a lot of great info about the cartooning field.
Going to that Paul Fell workshop in Auburn was one of the best things I've done in a while. I owe him a lot in giving me a direction to go in. First I went to Marceline, MO for Toonfest which was amazing, then I go to the NCS chapter meeting and get to hang with talented professional cartoonists! I sit at the same table as Bill Amend (Foxtrot), Tom Richmond (MAD mag), Dan Martin (Weatherbird), Paul Fell (Huskers Illustrated), Oliver Christianson (Hallmark), and President of Universal Press Syndicate, Lee Salem.
I have a lot to learn, but I'm feeling closer to gaining on my dream of doing something with my cartooning. I've learned there's a lot of different things I can do with it, as far as jobs go, which is overwhelming in some ways.
Just being around artists of this caliber and success in the field has boosted my drive and I feel I can really do this.
So Yay for me! I feel very inspired to toon toon toon! :)

Cell phone camera concert shot

bigjohnarts@gmail.com (Thunderboot) — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 17:18:00 +0000

Cell phone camera concert shot, originally uploaded by Thunderboot.

Went to concert featuring Finger Eleven, Chevelle, and Evanesence. Was a killer show! Took this with my cell camera, turned out ok.