Nightcrawler

Kurt Wagner, aka Nightcrawler of the X-Men.

I made this from paper, basswood, foam adhesive, and acrylic paints. It's approximately 20 pieces that were cut out, painted, and then glued together. 

Steller's Jay and White-Headed Woodpecker

Here are some more bird cut-outs that I did for my ongoing series. This time it's the Steller's Jay (on the left) and the White-headed Woodpecker (on the right).

I actually did a lot of work with white-headed woodpeckers this spring, doing surveys for presence. They are one of my favorite little birds, but quite aggravating to survey. I swear that they sometimes called back to me, then hid behind a tree so I couldn't see them. We played quite a few games of hide-and-seek.

There are a few of these available at our Etsy store if anyone is interested. We also post updates about our store regularly on our Facebook page (much more regularly than I update this blog). 

I like birds!

For the last couple of years I have been keeping a life list of bird species that I have seen around the world. It currently stands at 250 species from four continents. This has really gotten me into birds, so I have been doing a number of bird cut outs.

It all started with a personal project (above) where I turned the designs into some push pins that I have scattered across my cork board. From the top left corner clockwise, the species are: Chestnut-backed Chickadee (Poecile rufescens), Wood Duck (Aix sponsa), Yellow-rumped Warbler (Dendroica coronata), and Western Tanager (Piranga ludoviciana). Now I am working on some designs for sale in our ChuckleTree store. Currently we have three species available (below), but I plan on adding quite a lot more in the near future.

Chestnut-Backed Chickadee (Poecile rufescens)

Lazuli Bunting (Passerina amoena)

Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum)

Exotic: Cabinet of Curiosities - Fiji Mermaid

A wunderkammer style Fiji Mermaid papercraft. I created this by cutting rigid bristol board which I covered with a light watercolor wash, and then I shaded each of the individual pieces using black pastels. I am quite pleased with the outcome!

This piece is currently available (framed) at our Etsy store.

And here are a couple of extra pictures of the piece:

Krampus Ornament

Last but not least, a papercraft Krampus ornament that I also made for sale at our Etsy store.

I believe there are only two of them left, so get one while they last. They are great to have lurking in the back of your Christmas tree.

Merry Christmas!

80s Monster Tiki Ornaments

Lately I have been turning my 80s and 90s tiki monster designs into little papercraft ornaments.

We currently have these for sale at our Etsy store – ChuckleTree. They can also be purchased through our Facebook web-site.

For anyone living in the Boise, Idaho area we also have them for sale at the Miss Courageous studio on the corner of Irving and Orchard. Just look for the bright pink sign. I recommend checking out the store. It just opened this month, and has a lot of fun pop-culture gifts.

Abraham Lincoln Cut-Out Portrait

I really enjoyed working on the Grim Raven in black and white, so I decided to give the style another try. This is made out of pieces of paper that were individually cut and shaded with charcoal and black pastel. It's always a bit of a guessing game how it is going to turn out, so they are quite fun to assemble.

Grim Raven (Mark 2)

I didn't like some aspects of my first Grim Raven attempt, so I decided to give it another attempt. I fixed the angle on the head, and added some more texture to the wings, which I quite like.

This piece, as well as a lot of other cut-outs and prints, are for sale in my wife and I's Etsy store - ChuckleTree.

Etsy Shop

Anna and I have recently opened our own Etsy shop. It's called ChuckleTree, and we will be selling papercraft items, and our own art and illustrations. The first item we have for sale is some skull bat magnets. They are handmade from cardstock, they have been covered with two layers of protective polycrylic, and they have a magnet attached the the back.

If you are interested, follow the LINK!

And as an added bonus, here is the new Chuckletree Logo that Anna has been working on for the store.

English Breakfast

This is a project that my wife (The Amazing Anna) and I started clear back in August and finished about a week ago. I only got around to photographing it today.

I  came up with the concept and the original sketch. Anna did the the lines, colors, printing, cutting and gluing. I'll take most of the credit for it though. 

Grim Raven

Pastel on cardstock.

I have hereby started my yearly barrage of Halloween art.

For this one I was trying to do something different with my cut-out style, using pastels to shade the individual parts, and give it more of a traditional feel.

I attempted this using a few different media, including soft pencils and India ink. The ink was a miserable failure, and I threw away the pieces after only putting together one of the wings. I was relatively pleased with how the pencils turned out though. It didn't have quite enough contrast, but I thought it still looked interesting. I will definitely be trying something else with pencil in the future.

What do you all think?

Rough draft. Pencil on watercolor paper.

Snowy Owl

Between work, overtime at work, and applying for more work (and trying, in vain, to work on my journal manuscript) I haven't had a lot of time for art. I have taken a few hours here and there to work on small projects though. 

Anna bought a Cameo Silhouette about a month ago, and to test it out I made this snowy owl cut-out. It was all cut out of a single piece of watercolor paper, and each piece was individually painted.

Lately I have been getting into birding and started keeping a life list. Counting my time in New Zealand and South America, and the lists I kept while in those countries, my count is already up to 245. Expect more birds in the future!

Christmas Ornaments

Some Christmas ornaments I made this year of Santa and his helpers.  From left to right they are Santa, an elf, Rudolf, and the Krampus.  

I have been without my stock card collection for about a year, so I thought it would be fun to break them out and make some Christmas decorations.

Happy holidays everyone.

The Vault: Treebeard Shadowbox

This project took me ages!  I think it was about a year in total from sketch to completion.  I had a long post about this on my previous blog, and have finally built up the initiative to post the process again.  You can click on any of the thumbnails for a more detailed version.

First Step:  The Sketches and Digital Color Test

   

Second Step: Mapping the Pieces and Painting Watercolor Swatches

To make sure that I constructed Treebeard correctly I had to map out all of the pieces, and then paint swatches for each of the mapped pieces.

 

Third Step: Cutting out the Pieces and Construction

To cut out the pieces I have to trace them from my “map” onto tracing paper, and then tape the tracing paper to my colored swatches.  It’s time consuming!

   

Fourth Step: Building the Box and Placing Treebeard

I built the shadowbox with some lumber I bought at the hardware store, and painted it black.  The Treebeard figure had to be attached to a wire skeleton that I glued to the frame.  After gluing in the ground and Treebeard I attached the background.  Later I had the pieces on the outside of the frame laminated (so they wouldn’t be ruined if the box was splashed with water), and I super-glued them to the front of the frame.

   

 

Ta da!

The Vault: Basil Fawlty

John Cleese as Basil Fawlty.

Another oldie.  I did this cut-out about two years ago.

I ended up giving it away as a gift, with no small amount of remorse, but luckily I married the girl I made it for, so it's mine again.

IguanoFonz

The IguanoFonz

My submission to Illustration Friday.  The topic this week was "Prehistoric".  What better than a picture of an Iguanodon and Henry Winkler?  I did this illustration about a year and a half ago, but haven't uploaded it on to my new blog yet.  This is as good of an excuse as any.

The final illustration was done entirely with cut out stock card, foam core, and lots of glue.