in the next war we shall bury the dead in cellophane

it seems that the aptly dubbed ''hangin' wednesday'', or chillin' in the middle, or even manning with the midweek, is the best time to do nothing but wake up early with a headache and worsen it somewhat with silly-good music.

GLOOM.

petitioning the empty sky

i'm trying to update my header but it's taking an age, it'll probably pop up at some point though but until then, who knows. i'll of changed it more than a few times anyway as i'm never happy with this kinda stuff.

work in progress:

and some london sketchbook;





alot of my book has descended in made up nonsense and aimless doodling for the most part, though i did get some observational work done, though looking back through it alot of it i'm not too happy with, so it's a small selection. must try harder at this kind of thing as it's going to play a pretty important part of our second term, and our paris trip in year two, or so i hear. whatever, i'll do it on the night.

holidays going well. christmas was pleasant, more so going into it at 20 and not really knowing what to expect. i'm hesitant to say that the charm is no longer there, as it is, but it felt quite odd this year. all in all though it was a great day with some great folk and still continues to be to this day, hopefully right through till new year as well. good company, good food and some great gifts including true blood season one, flight of the conchords, star wars original trilogy (!), ghostbusters tee, some old architects ''yellow paper'' straight from the past new york, new pens, beer, chocolate and assorted novelty stocking items, borderlands for the 360 which is v. fun and tons of other great stuff. class.

probably my favourite gift is just something i got last night, the NOTHING NICE TO SAY volume one collection. i cannot recommend these comics and illustrator mitch clem enough, so go check him out over at at http://www.mitchclem.com/nothingnice/ (warning: may be difficult to follow unless a fan of punk and hardcore, though all in all it's very tongue in cheek and i shouldn't worry too much about that. just look at it as an exploration of the awesome and absurd of punk rock, which i think is what the back of the book says and i'm just copying that. whatever go read already.) i am going to enjoy reading back through all the old just like i do pretty much every few months on his site. too fucking funny.

looking forward to getting back into the fal. that is all.

cept for this: converge ''axe to fall'', ''petitioning the empty sky'', ''when forever comes crashing'', bon iver ''for emma, forever ago'', vcheka, celeste, i forget the name of the album, it's something french as they're a good crusty black metal band from france, northless, giant squid and the christmas haul.

wonderfully bitter cold

excellent. thanks mike.

i swallowed hard, like i understood

the problem with listening to really good new music is that it often keeps me to silly-o-clock on urges and whims to do something creative. the other problem is leaving half of my equipment at falmouth for obvious transports reasons, and the very core of my creative output is done through my scanner and computer, both of which are in my flat. until then... photos of  the week ''study'' trip to london. 

a to g: reflective surface somewhere in london; awesome old-fashioned coffee shop scouted out by one j. hurley and d. slice; generator hostel interior light; cheap sandwich/tinny time to combat silly london prices; drinks w/ illustrators; wonderful ceiling. 

though frustrations and bitterness of that cursed city aside, it was good fun. the agencies and publishers were very interesting and the shenanigans and banter all around was top, top times. as if my fatigue of the city couldn't of been any worse having travelled from falmouth to home, then down to wolves after a brief birthday break, then after that tiring week i was back down south to minehead for all tomorrows parties which was AMAZING. seriously... they know how to put on a fest. highlights include: messy, smoked out chalets with some amazing bellends who i usually only get to see once a year at damnation, early morning SUNNO))) set destroying my eardrums, modest mouse being everything and more than i could of imagined, battles, yeah yeah yeahs, explosions in the sky, many more but my favourite act of the weekend being the hour of distorted, glitchy, trancey noise from the FUCK BUTTONS set. it got a point where my eyes were closed for a good 20 minutes, and then someone behind me pulled my hood down, thus disturbing my lovely little absorbtion. protip: your a cunt.

but anyway, amazing. i wish i could of taken photos, but i'm not sure if i would of been able to find any time between moving about all weekend and having my eyes glued to every single act i watched. just... mindblowing. thanks ATP!

for now: HORSE the band ''a natural death'', eaststrikewest ''w o l v v e s'' (brilliant), converge ''when forever comes crashing'', nihill ''krach'', palehorse ''gee, that ain't swell'', they are cowards ''demo 08'' (as i have it labelled here...), ROME season 1, the dexter finale (holy shit?!) and long, extended dark winter rest. since being at home i have only today got my pencil case out, though tomorrow i have a schedule of work to crack on with, both uni and personal related. cool.

not for want of trying

[click for big]

for some silly reason blogspot wouldn't let me upload this image the normal, conventional way so i've had to fill the photobucket and go that way. not like it's really that important, mind...

occurrence: no country for old men, too much dr pepper, dead lines, sketchbooks, attempted allnighter, fisheye, dead swans ''sleepwalker'', this will destroy you s/t, new dexter, leaving the edge of the world for rear echelon, continuation of the continue... 

conceptual thinking / quotes.

just a quick one from our deadline today based on a brief entitled quotes. pick a quote from a list of 10, work up some rough ideas on conceptualizing it into a self-descriptive image then produce a final for crit. we've been doing this for 4/5 weeks now - going away and getting out heads around fairly linear briefs and slowly i've been introducing a few more things into each piece of work. not so much this specific final as i was stretched for time and a printer to get the results i wanted, but i'm fairly happy with it anyway. more of these when i unearth them from my desk.

upcoming; last con/think brief, finish up tone/colour work, last life drawing class for the term, progress on book then away from a week in london to visit agencies and industry folk alike, as well as galleries and the like. going early to spend my birthday doing something in the city then hopefulyl going to catch DILLINGER 4 (fuck yes!) then off to bristol, down to minehead for MODEST MOUSE, battles, sunno))), explosions in the sky, yeah yeah yeahs and many, many more. oh yeah, then home. fuck, i'm looking forward to that so much. i need a break so badly, but this month is going to be so busy with some proper class things to do so whatever, let it roll.

a u d i o: architects, *shels. bring me the horizon, junius, converge

a little bit of solidarity goes a long way

ongoing/spare time and/or otherwise. i haven't much to show because everything is amongst my clever filing system of putting things under my desk and not touching them until the end of the year during the mad rush for assessment so that i do not get kicked off the course. here's what i do have. 

a to d: i) illustrated book quick mock-up, ii) more full artwork mock-up of centerpiece gate fold image, iii) messing about with some old designs and textures and iv) something for fun, testing my scanner's dpi out.

on the non-pencil related front, falmouth is bastard ace. i have met a right standard amount of blessed folk to swear at and rant amongst. i say amongst and mean at as well as swear but whatever. illustration is tough but fair... much like boot camp. 'nam is tougher but it lacks wednesday afternoons off. 

audiophilia: rinoa, bossk, asiwyfa, ghost of a thousand, mum, dallas green, etc.

visions: too many movies, spaced and the wire season five. 

new flyers

above: two out of... five (maybe?) flyers currently in the spin for local band Little Fury (myspace.com/littlefuryuk - go listen). just a little summer project to get me on my feet a little bit, also using this ''brief'' of sorts to try out some ideas and techniques so that they all don't look or feel the same. that's the plan anyway. more on them soon.

kurrently: down; II: a bustle in your hedgerow, battlefield 1943/bad company, battlestar galactica season 1, house of leaves by mark z. danielewski, a bad cough and a rubbish cold, knut: challenger, sorting out finances/awaiting departure for falmouth, getting my head around the epic journey from falmouth to leeds for damnation festival, getting hyped for all tomorrows parties. good and bad times all around.

ongoing continuation of the continue (''an update, amadeus!'')

enough with the cryptic jibber-jabber/deely/dowhat and nonce-sense. this is summer and summer is dull, so here is some recent work. i have little to none motivation for a real time-lapse set of works, though i have plenty of ideas for what i would like to do. i miss having briefs and a fine art teacher to set me on the right track every time i strayed too far from it. hopefully falmouth gets me back into the game in a few months... can't wait.

for now, some random odds and sods from the last few wide-awake early morning 4/5 am doodle sessions. my body clock is broke and i've too much AWESOME music to enjoy instead of sleeping. here are some outcomes.

(i tell a lie... the last image is old, back from when i was putting my falmouth interview portfolio together but i found it amongst a stack of files so what the hell. i like it.)

''...and now, the end''

0018; continuation of the continue comes to abrubt/suddn halt acros warm interior of cooling hallpathways. gloss forms and frayies ignorant, othrwse acceptable.

''...wyyds off lilophane mutes''

0309; PrvtShw undrgoing finishing touch or therefore/will/is going underway roughly approx. . 1800 tmrw therebouts. glossy forms peeled and brought back across canvased boards & corners cut for wrong(er) angles than expected otherwiese oscar/ok. continuation for hotterdaynight cycles and motivational sitdowns in noons abve.

''...eschaoil lamplight for glooms''

0348; gloss forms, rollers roll, walls to attention in maze like conundrums of sweet relief and stress dismissal. continuation of Protocol ///02 continues, white-wash-walls in site for indication of end.

''...kayo contingency grapha''

drown and the first real breath takes hold

washed in a chill so peaceful, sink further

1309; spinning disc occurence arriva, ambient glow notified in stiffling condition of hicgrap moor. continuation continues.

''...the beginning,''

this is what he'd always known
the promise of something greater beyond the water's final horizon

0313; final whistle bellow f4or college rangs out upon 01ht, prep procedure launch against campaign for the waves. follow on for coordinates and/or statistics at later date(s)

''...600 000 votlz ov prssvre.''

0303; kopper vowel substituting in machinary, need for the thought of a posteng of 0001 hrads that nevr made it to FINAL(s) of developmenthell. use for anovthahr night.

''...joueniey quartz takkle mothranatura.''

0348; heartland disturbed by yellow TINT orange wheeler, documented evry but other events of the timezone.

''...dos m. freq repetae?''

0317; warmth of slow lumbering night forces hand into developing new annex for continued mining and habitation programe entitled ''summer XXXX collection''

alone, under the steady lamplight of affordable european plastic, a databank signature pings across a matrix of echoes and cities, files and folders. a steady rush of memory and a anxious wait of streamed information is unfolded and deployed across the backdrop of a darkened black space, deep and unsettled within a hive of many corners.

/