posted by Jamie P. at 12:32 am on March 31, 2009
Got a lot done with one of my side projects tonight. I was able to render out a rough motion final render for this opening sequence. I still need to do some texture work but this is slowly but surely coming together. I wish I had a team of interns to do some of the grunt work though…
Here is a screen shot of the opening.

posted by Jamie P. at 1:23 am on March 26, 2009
One of my favorite Presidents is Abraham “I don’t need no stinkin’ middle name” Lincoln. I don’t know if a lot of people know this but I studied a fair bit of history in college and often during breaks between my history class I would draw famous historical leaders in my notebook. Also I would add stupid comments or quotes from them in word bubbles next to them. While I mostly took western civilization classes I would often draw Abraham Lincoln throughout history interacting with everyone from the Mesopotamians all the way up to Churchill. Some people who would sit nearby would often ask if I really liked Bill & Ted (I have never seen either movies), which I would just smile and say no to.
Well this year was President Lincoln’s 200th birthday so I thought I would take on this small project where I would try to draw a couple of illustrations of him. I thought I would have started earlier but it just didn’t happen. Tonight I started my first illustration in what I am calling the Honest Abe series. Here is how far I got tonight in what I would call a clean rough. I was thinking of taking this into Corel Painter but I might hold off for the next illustration to do that and instead just do a very flat cartoony coloring in Photoshop.

I don’t believe I am going to draw his legs but I am holding off on drawing his hands for another night. Like Hitler, I have trouble drawing hands and it usually takes me a while to get something acceptable. Most people don’t appreciate this joke when I tell it, but it’s true that one of the reasons Hitler was rejected from art school was his lack of an ability to draw hands.
posted by Jamie P. at 8:31 pm on March 25, 2009
If I have to do any digital illustrations or extensive tablet use in Photoshop I always do a short warm up. It usually consists of a box, a pyramid, a circle, squiggly lines and a test of different pressures/line-weights.

Side question: Does anybody know of any good techniques to draw in Illustrator. I have tried multiple times but always quit in frustration over how finicky and seemingly inprecise it is when changing stroke weights. Any suggestions or tips would be appreciated.
posted by Jamie P. at 2:14 am on March 20, 2009

Every time I update my iTunes I hope that they will fix this little red dot that is created when I minimize to taskbar mode. When I first noticed it, I thought it was a dead pixel but it goes away when I restore the window and I have seen it on all the computers I use daily. It is a very small detail but it drives me nuts. Come on Apple, people don’t need a new iPhone; they need the red dot to be fixed.
posted by Jamie P. at 8:20 pm on March 5, 2009
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