Painting & Brewing

Ahhh, two of my favorite passions.. They ain'nothin' like taking a deep draft of hops, just after dumping them into a big churnin' boil, and they ain'nothin' like drafting a sketch to board, and laying on that last stroke of varnish before shooting what you know will be your next best piece.. Both take a vastly different skill set and Craft, but (like most things for me) both take a traditional approach, and a solid understanding of micro timings during any particular session.. A traditional oil painting has complex anticipation and coordination of dry times and deadlines that must be met to achieve a balanced work, and a brew can take a different flavor by changing any number of timings and temperatures during the process as well.. I recently joined the Portland Brew Crew, and got to sit in on my buddies brew session at the Green Dragon Pub here in Portland.. Green Dragon is a beautiful pub that prides itself on 30+ styles on tap at all times, it's a great place to raise the wrist, and StrongBad comes in on bass, and the Cheat comes in on keyboards, like Moop, moop, moop, moop, moop... and then I'm like, "and the Dragon comes inn the NNNIIIiiIIIiiiiiigght..!!" The brew session involved a 20gl kettle of wort, to make around a keg full of a lighter Scotch Ale (It's a pissah, too.. Brilliant!! =) Can't wait to taste the first pints, when I'll be done with the next couple MTG cards.. It'll be a nice present after these last weeks of constant hours..


I also snapped a couple process shots of my table, when I seal my boards with medium.. Before painting with oils on any porous fiber or absorbent surface, you need seal the surface, or the oil will simply stain into the paper instead of lay on the surface.. For a long time I used the exact same materials that were used by the Pre-Raphaelites, but that's when time allowed for such things.. For the last 5 years I've been using Golden transparent medium, that I water down, and put 2-3 thin layers over each board, after spraying hair spray on the printout to lock in the sketch, and hinder bleeding.. I've recently started to play with combinations of PVA (simple white glue) to seal the boards with, but I've not yet been able to paint an underpainting with water based acrylic on those boards yet..?? Dunno when these will print, so I've blurred the images to protect the lives of the innocent.. =) Cheers all, Happy Painting, and Stay Tuned.. .