Another (unfinished) homepage idea

 

So I just finished a weekend of working on my site and I feel like I’ve been training for a marathon. I’m all beat up. I had my ups and downs. It was a nice weekend weather-wise and I did get to walk around in the sun and went for a bike ride, but most of the time I was putting out fire after fire that kept flaming up just as I thought I was nearing a satisfactory finish. I have something up now that is good enough but I’ll use the next two nights before the final class trying to fix some sloppy parts. I feel good that this project is almost over and I can move on to something bigger and better. I’m going to do another site right away because I have some things to build on.  Can’t get lazy now. Next up though I’m moving to Portland. A couple months ago my days were much more laid back, now I’m doing a million things and haven’t had any time to paint. Taking a break is helpful sometimes. It’s been good working on that site and learning new things. 

Once observation I made while working on that site is that I’ve done a ton of illustrations in my day. I put over 60 illustrations on the site and that was just stuff I had readily available on my computer. I have stacks and stacks of illustrations. This is quite an accomplishment because illustration has never been my primary job. Most illustrations are a knockdown drag-out battle just to get through all the editors and art directors and non-creative decision makers. It’s a hard road to travel so I’ve made myself useful in other ways like information graphics and now web design. One day I’m hoping to settle into some sustainable niche in the art world. In the meantime I’ll be in Portland eating Voodoo doughnuts and jogging them off along that river. Right now I’m real tired and ready for sleep. I think all this work is making me boring and loopy so hopefully my next posts will be more exciting.

www.dbadders.com

Unused homepage idea

I’m about to spend the weekend finishing up my website for the Dreamweaver class I’ve been taking. Gary Kelly once said he’d never enter the dark side, referring to using the computer to make his illustrations. He’s old enough and successful enough to say and think such things but most of us don’t have his kind of focus. There was a day when I fought against the digital future but now I’m running to catch up with things. It’s not so bad though, kind of like learning a new language. Once upon a time I lived in Spain for a couple summers and as Spanish became more clear to me I was real excited to be understanding the sounds that used to seem so foreign. Now I’m slowing starting to understand some of the terms nerds have been tossing around all these years. The way I see it, knowledge is power and I’m adding to my toolbox. My primary goal is still to be an artist using traditional materials but artists need to understand the world they’re living in, or at least observe things and try to understand.