Dennis Jones

So Long, DJ-ART

Posted on June 11, 2012 by Dennis

Back in 2005, I coerced my nephew Keegan (with the help of a little cash) to build a custom website for me. Keegan was just starting to flash his monster design chops and I knew if I was ever going to be able to afford him it would have to be right then while he was still in high school. He build a great website for me and has since gone on to become an internet rock star. He currently works in California for Facebook.

Things become obsolete pretty fast when it comes to the internet and sadly that is what has become of the DJ-ART website Keegan built. Since it is a Flash based website, it will not work on any Apple mobile devices, (some sort of Apple – Adobe feud) and since so many people access the web now from mobile devices, DJ-ART for all practical purposes has become an abandoned island floating in a vast internet ocean.

One of the other changes since 2005 is the popularity of blogs. I personally always look to see if an artist I’m interested in has a blog. If they do, that’s where I’m going. Why? Because there is at least some slight possibility that I’ll get to see new content popping up there occasionally. You hardly ever see anything new appearing on an artist’s main “portfolio” website. My experience has been that I always get more internet traffic on my blog than I do on my main “portfolio” website.

For those reasons among others I am going to let the website Keegan built for me expire at the end of this month. At this point in time, I’m going to continue to flesh this site out with content and carry on my web presence from this location.

It was a good ride, DJ-ART.COM. Thanks for the memories.

Photoshop CS 6

Posted on May 29, 2012 by Dennis

6 Comments

I installed the latest version of Photoshop last week: CS 6. I fired it up and the first and most obvious thing I noticed was the base interface has been changed to a much slicker looking, smoked gray color. I haven’t quite got all of the newer intricacies figured out yet, but that would require reading and unless funny pictures are connected to the words in some way, I’m just not interested.

The reason I upgraded was to get the Adobe Design Package that included InDesign. I have been building iPad eBooks with the Apple app called iBooks Author, but there seem to be some limitations with it that will not work for what I am trying to do. Hopefully I can get InDesign figured out and accomplish what I want with it. I am hoping there are funny pictures in the InDesign instruction manuel.

Grand National Horse Show

Posted on May 19, 2012 by Dennis

2 Comments

One of the best things about being a freelance illustrator is you never know what you’re going to be doing next. I can be working along on a Biblical assignment for a client in the south, the phone rings and now I’m drawing wacky animals for a client in the midwest.

When I first started many years ago, I traveled more for my jobs and did some pretty diverse things. I once ended up on assignment at some sort of huge horse show in the Washington DC area. I flew in the night before, got to my hotel in the middle of the night, woke up in the morning and discovered I was in Chevy Chase, Maryland. This was just fascinating to me because the only Chevy Chase I’d ever heard of was that guy on Saturday Night Live (I’m from the midwest).

During the show I got to stand at the opening where the horses entered the arena. About halfway into the show, one of the horses got spooked in the center of the arena, flipped over its wagon, flipped over the other horse on the hitch, and they all started flailing wildly. Judging from the reaction of everyone around me, this was apparently an extremely dangerous situation for all involved. The next thing I knew I was sprinting to the middle of the arena with all the actual “horse people” to help. My help pretty much consisted of staying out of the way of the people that knew what they were doing…

…so the answer your question is, yes, I have appeared on center stage at the Grand National Horse Show.

I ran across this picture and it reminded me of that early art job I worked on so many years ago.

The Mighty Ducks

Posted on May 12, 2012 by Dennis

4 Comments

Back when I was building my foam stop-motion puppet, I wondered if there might be another way to create a moving character. I decided to throw a couple of things together that I’ve toyed around with for years… an aluminum armature and socks. I haven’t named him yet and don’t really know what he is, but he looks kinda like a duck…

Coming Soon To An I-Pad Near You

Posted on May 6, 2012 by Dennis

2 Comments

This weekend I plowed through about 90% of getting an ebook put together… I think… who really knows? Anyway, there’s a little video about it below.

It Is Finished… For Now…

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Dennis

9 Comments

Painting Magnus was a truly horrible experience… for both of us I’m sure. It finally came down to a “this is good enough because I’m not going to do this any longer” sort of conclusion.

As you can see, the paint is very glossy under light and is still quite sticky to the touch. This would not work very well on a lit stage, plus after a few days Magnus would look like one of those old time, hanging fly strips with all sorts of junk stuck all over him.

To remedy this I put corn starch in a bowl and give Magnus a good coating of it. The corn stach adheres to the sticky paint and gives Magnus a matt finish for the camera. He is also no longer sticky.

Magnus is now ready for his big screen, stop-motion film debut. All I have to do now is learn a new software program and write him a story.

Stuck In A Sticky Situation

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Dennis

In The Box… Again

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Dennis

2 Comments

My ice hockey season came to an end last night with me sitting in the penalty box with a four minute high sticking call and a huge knot on my arm from a slap shot I decided to knock down… hopefully I will remember not to do that again. And what does this blue creature have to do with any of this? Not a thing…

Background Fuzz

Posted on April 17, 2012 by Dennis

2 Comments

This was just a quick experiment to see how painting something up on a somewhat “fuzzy” brown background would work. Several years ago I made the switch from traditional media to digital. Digital art can come off extremely slick looking if you want it to. I needed to keep my work looking as much the same as I could for my clients sake, so I have always tinkered with how to keep things looking as rustic as possible.

Driving A Hard Bargain

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Dennis

4 Comments

Last week I was in a car dealership sending offers back and forth to the manager. He sent back a piece of paper and on it he had written, “I can do this deal if you throw in a caricature of the salesman you are working with”. I took the deal, and here’s the caricature.

Popping The Hood

Posted on April 9, 2012 by Dennis

7 Comments

Up from the concrete grave he arose; Magnus StormWeasel, the newest stop-motion puppet in Indiana. Next stop… the paint and body shop.

Top Chef Masters

Posted on April 5, 2012 by Dennis

15 Comments

The armature for my foam stop-motion puppet is almost ready to go…

…but the brass fittings in it will eat away the foam over time, so I seal all those areas with a healthy dose of spray paint.

Next I whip up the top secret foam recipe. OK, it’s not actually top secret, but I apparently wasn’t paying very close attention when the instructor was going over all this and I have no idea what I poured into what, when, where or why, so this is still a secret recipe to me.

I pour the foam into both sides of the mold, clamp my armature in, cross my fingers, pick up the other side of the mold, spin it around and drop it into place. There is so much foam and goo squirting out all over the place I don’t know if the armature has stayed in position or not, I will only find out when this process is through.

I strap this puppy up and head for the oven.

I have gone a little extreme as far as stop-motion puppets go. Most are small mainly because if you have a large puppet, you have to build huge sets for them to be animated in. Just to give you an idea of the size of my puppet, that is my mold sitting in between two normal sized molds.

Here is a normal sized mold in the oven.

Here’s my mega super-sized mold in the same oven. Absolutely zero room to spare.

OK, everyone keep your fingers crossed. We are about to find out if this worked or not!

Magnus… Down But Not Out

Posted on April 3, 2012 by Dennis

3 Comments

I cracked open the mold for my stop motion puppet and sadly, poor Magnus did not survive the procedure. So long Magnus…

I clean the mold out and then build an armature that is truly an engineering marvel… ok, ok, your standards for engineering marvels has to be kinda low to consider this one, but I have pretty low standards…

The armature is fitted into the mold…

The next step, the almighty casting of the foam… then I will either experience the thrill of victory… or the agony of defeat.

You Gotta Be Kitten Me

Posted on March 29, 2012 by Dennis

3 Comments

I don’t have a cat… but if I did, it would look just like this.

Building A Mold For Magnus

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Dennis

3 Comments

I have moved into the next phase of building a stop motion puppet: making the mold. First I lay Magnus on his back, prop up his arms and legs with some water based clay and then work clay all around him.

Next I mix up some kinda goop, (I hope that wasn’t too too technical for you to follow) and slop it all over the top of him.

I keep layering the goop on, mix in a little burlap for strength and work it all up until it’s flat on top.

When that whole mess is dry I flip it over and start digging all that water based clay out.

Ok, all cleaned up and ready to make the back half of the mold. (Looks like this poor guy tripped and took a face plant into wet concrete).

Time to say goodbye to Magnus. I basically repeat the entire process and create the back portion of the mold and, yes, that does look like a coffin.

My clay figurine is now gone… forever. I will destroy it as I pull the mold apart and clean it, but hopefully a newer, better, resurrected version of Magnus will emerge from that coffin and have many fabulous stop motion adventures ahead of him.