Painting Glass...

My Friday afternoon was spent painting some artwork on a glass door to Lulubell gallery. This is the gallery that's hosting my exhibit in April. Amy is a very nice and cool girl who runs the gallery, and she thought that some of my art would look nice on the door to her office. I had fun doing it, and I was happy to add a permanent piece to the gallery...
...I painted the door on the inside of the glass, which was tricky because I had to do everything in reverse order... 
...I painted this window for my friends at Black Widow Customs. It was one of the most elaborate windows I've done to date, and involved lettering, pinstriping, and airbrushing. Check out the hidden skulls inside the flames

A Pair of Pinup Girls...

A few weeks ago, my friend Gary asked my to paint a pinup girl on the door of his mini fridge that goes inside his RV. He likes the traditional style pinup girls that were seen on the sides of WW2 bombers, so I painted this one with brushes and gave her that classic voluptuous look. I added the pinstriping behind her to give it more of a hot rod look... 
...and I airbrushed this pinup girl as a gift for my good friend Jay. She has an exotic South Pacific Island look about her. I painted the scroll striping to add more color and kill some space. Jay loved his new girlfriend!

Funky Helmets...

These are some old school motorcycle helmet that I pinstriped for my friends from Avenger helmets. I got loose with some scroll style on them. Helmets can be difficult to pinstripe because the rounded surface, which makes it not much different than pinstriping a bowling ball...

...the helmets had some funky metal flake paint schemes, which made them fun to paint on

Skulls...

I like painting skulls. They are one of the three staples in custom paint, the other two being flames and girls. Skulls can be painted to appear mean or scary, or given some human features to make them creepy cool. Some people think skulls are evil, and although they are usually depicted as being evil, they're really not. We all have skulls, we just don't see them, unless we get an X-ray...
...I painted the skull on the front of this Buell to appear as if it was stretching out of the metal. It's a trick that's been around for a while, but when it's done right it still looks badass..
...and this is the famous Evil Dead skull. I did this for an airbrush demo at an auto show.

More From the Brush Bash...

...the following photos are of two bikes that were at this past weekends Brush Bash. Both were painted by Mark Brodie, who is a really nice guy and talented pinstriper that I met for the first time. The pics above and below are of a bike that got the Jackson Pollock style paint job. It looked badass, and very, very different, which to me is a good thing...
...it may look like he applied the paint splatters in a random, disorganized manner, but I'm sure he was absolutely surgical in his method. And the end result was a masterpiece!
...the second bike he painted had a more traditional striping job on it, but still packed a few surprises like the gold leaf skulls on the rear of the front fender. Mark was a very nice guy who's very talented, and I can't wait to hang out with him again.

Also this weekend...

I lettered the windows at Lulubell Gallery with their logo...
...a special lady friend and I played miniature golf at my new favorite goofy golf spot, and I got 4 holes in one...not bad

...and we ate at this burger joint that boasts that their meat is never fresh...they should have worded that better

Brush Bash in the Desert 2009...

This weekend, Tony Perez hosted his annual paint jam that attracted pinstripers, airbrush artists, sign writers, and fine artists from all over Arizona and California. It was great to see some familiar faces and meet some new ones. There was a lot of awesome art being created and styles shared! I made some new friendships, and was inspired by the artwork that everyone brought...
...the airbrush pieces above and below were created by the guys at Bad Boy Custom Paint: Mo, Sage, and Tim.

...there were plenty of lowrider scroll striping panels like the two above...
...this portrait was airbrushed by Charlie "the Kid" Armstrong. I've lived on the east coast most of my life, so I wasn't familiar with his work until I moved out west, but now he is one of my favorite custom painters. We got to hang out a good bit after the meet when a bunch of us went out to a bar for food and drinks...
...this panel was painted by Bugs, and was my favorite striping piece of the whole meet...
...I really liked this panel too, especially all the varigated leaf mixed in the wild scrolls...
...the photos above and below are of a car hood that everyone left their mark on. The above pic shows Manny Cisnero's, mine, and Ron Hernandez's striping...

...later that night after we left the bar, I followed Sage and Mo back to their shop where they gave me a tour and showed me some of their current projects. I snapped a pic of this panel on the wall of the car with a girl ghosted in behind it. I love that girl!
...the above piece was done by the very talented fine artist Moises. His work has a ultra colorful and unique style that depicted traditional Mexican scenes. His pieces were HUGE, and contained thousands of colors...I loved it...
...here I am with my bro Juan "the Wand" who is a killer pinstriping artist and a great guy!
...this was just one of the many wicked custom cars in the parking lot. There were hot rods, lowriders, custom vans, and sports cars...
...here is Bugs doing what he does best, pinstriping! His scroll style is badass, and his long lines are laser straight! I always enjoy seeing his new work, and hanging with him because he's truly a nice guy...
...and speaking of nice guys, this is Charlie "the Kid" Armstrong airbrushing another masterpiece. He is really good. And if you were lucky enough to be at the SEMA Show and catch his airbrushed surfboard at the PPG booth, you know exactly what I mean!
I had a really good time, and I'm all ready looking forward to next year. Thanks and shouts to Dino, Sage, Tim, and Mo at Bad Boys, Charlie Armstrong, Bugs, the Wand, Manny Cisneros, Mike, Moises, Mark Brodie, Ron Hernandez, Jeff Isabell, Tony Perez, and anyone I forgot. See you all soon...

Pinstriping...

Here are a few examples of my pinstriping, The above panel was done for a charity auction. I used fineline tape to create the black lines and then airbrush around them, then I added lines with a brush using the same colors. I finished it off with a faux granite border and my logo...
...and this bobber was painted with some wild scroll style striping. You can get away with a lot of striping on a bike as long as the colors are right. If these lines were done in white, orange, or yellow, the design would look overdone and ugly. Compatible colors make all the difference.

Realistic Fire Done Different...

One of my close friends who has had me paint his cars in the past, asked me to spray some fire on a truck he had just bought. The only problem was that he wanted the base color of the truck to remain white pearl. For those who don't know, realistic fire is almost always painted over black or very dark colors because it looks horrible over light colors. My solution to this problem was to spray in black everywhere the fire would go, therefore giving it a dark base and a burnt look to the white pearl... 
...I even hid fire skulls mixed in the flames to make it more interesting...
...I was happy with the end result, and so was my friend.

Trading...

I received this custom painted skate deck in the mail yesterday...it's badass! It was done by Jason at NSD Paintwerks in Lynwood, IL. He contacted me a couple of weeks ago because he liked the tattoo flash set I had done, and wanted to know if I was interested in swapping my flash for some of his art. He also wanted me to design a graffiti logo for his business. I absolutely love the deck he sent! It has a heavy metalflake base, silver leaf nautical stars, flames, pinstriping, and a skull and bones! He put a lot of work into this deck, and I appreciate it very much! It will be one of my favorite pieces in my collection of art...
...here are some examples of Jason's other work. If your near Chicago and want some custom paint work done, contact Jason at NSD Paintwerks: NSDPaintwerks@yahoo.com

He specializes in painting helmets, motorcycles, race cars, airbrushing, pinstriping, and hand painted signs.

...and here is the graffiti logo I designed for him. I am still relatively new to creating art digitally, but I like the way this turned out, and I hope Jason did too!
...thanks again Jason, and when I'm Chicago, I will buy you a beer!

People I've Met on the Road...

...one of the rewards of living a life on the road is all the great, interesting, and memorable people you meet. One of the drawbacks though, is that you have to move on and maybe never see them again. I've been trying to make it a habit to take photos of these people so I can remember them better, here's a few: The woman holding the biker dog had me pinstripe her Harley in Tennessee...

...this photo is of me getting really drunk with a guy wearing a zombie costume at a Halloween party in Atlanta. He was a magician, and would perform tricks that would flip you out...that was a good time...

...I painted spiderwebs and a Black Widow on this guys Harley while in Florida with B. Papa. As you can tell from the tattoo on his head, he really likes spiders...
...and this is an older photo of my friend Jenny from Charlotte, NC posing on her pink hearse. She had me paint the pink ghost flames on the front of it, and then she took me out for pizza. I see her whenever I'm in town, but sadly it's not that often.