Recent Work

During our last exercise I debarked to observe an amphibious raid. With some of the down time I had sitting on the beach, I persuaded a Landing Support Marine (LCpl Shellito) to sit still long enough for a portrait.  With an artistic mind himself, he was intrigued by the whole practice of drawing from life and using raw light to capture strong and dramatic imagery. This 'sketch' was drafted in about 35min, and was a solid practice of proportions and values that I've been focusing on the past couple weeks. 

My focus as I move forward in my artist career is to capture the Marine. A former combat artist told me, "the Army likes their trucks, they draw trucks. The Air Force draws planes, the Navy draws ships... But Marine Corps history is based on the Marines, and it always will be."

At-Sea Periods

During our recent training period, we embarked and operated from several naval vessels off the east coast.  With the little time o had available I sketched the UH-60 Seahawk (Navy version of the Blackhawk) while some maintenance was being down in the hangar bay.  

The values on this one are not and wide as i would've liked. I decided to use ballpoint pen in my sketch and like the results!  They're cheap, dispensable and can create a wide range of values.

Access to the flight deck will hopefully be better on our deployment so I can draft up some work from there. This last one is of an LCU (Landing Craft Utility) which can carry troops from ship to shore. It's a slow but dependable vessel.

With our next training period around the corner, I hope to post some more work soon.  I'll also lay out my traveling kit and its components to show all that I work with when away from the studio.