Redesigned Bond's Blog and a Spinosaurus

Spinosaurus strolling at Dusk

Welcome to the newly redesigned Bond's Blog!  As I dabble in tweaking the html, I'm sure the design will shift here and there.  But I am much happier with this new look.

To celebrate this fresh start, here is a new Spinosaur piece I created for the upcoming Prehistoric Times magazine.  It represents an artistic jump in my abilities as I began experimenting in digitally colouring!

The above piece was created using a mix of trad and digital techniques: it began as a pencil sketch, then scanned into the computer where I tweaked the contrast to change the pencil into strong "ink" lines.  Using layers in photoshop, I built up the colours and shades and details, until he ended up looking like the final product.  To finish him, I placed the coloured spinosaur into a photograph of a beautiful beach (that I took in the Philippines while traveling in late 2008.)

Zoom in to see the full effect of this digital colouring.  It's not perfect, as the black "ink" layer gets lost in places, and the general shading still needs work.  (Also, if you think about it, his left foot disappears conveniently behind his right! Yikes!)

Anyway, it's a new style for me that I'd like to continue and try to perfect.  How do you digitally colour your drawings?

In Transition

Upgrading to Bond's Blog 3.0...

Stay tuned for a more artistically focused site.
Hold my place in line,
I'll be right back!

My Vancouver Olympics Photos

Vancouver Olympics Rap-Up

Final Medal Results:  USA 37  -   Germany 30  -  Canada  26  -   Norway 23  -  Austria 16
(See the final results here)

What an amazing experience the Vancouver 2010 Olympics was!  The city had an amazing vibe with people partying in the streets and singing 'O Canada' on the seabus!  With Canada wining more Gold medals than any other country and winning the most Golds ever for Winter Olympics, I couldn't be happier!

One of the most amazing experiences was actually going and watching an event.  I was lucky enough to get tickets to the last night of Short Track Speed Skating and witness Canada winning two golds (Thanks Craig and Lady R!)   Another post will cover that soon.

But it's not the medals, not even the sport.  It' was the patriotism and the party.  It was something special...

If you haven't seen Stephen Brunt video essay on the Games, it sums up perfectly my feelings:




With the final Hockey Game won (most amazing game EVER!) and the Closing Ceremonies over, we turn our attention to the Paralympic Games!  Next Saturday, I'll be going to my first Sledge Hockey game.  I'll tell you all about it later...

Vancouver 2010 ... What fun!