Time is a thief and my passion is a monster.

Yes, the days slip by, becoming weeks and months.  There’s so many things I want to draw and stories I want to share, but my minutes of free time are few and I’m tired.  Nevertheless, it’s impossible to ignore desire , as nagging and vicious as it can be, and once in a while I still manage to get a little something on paper.

Here’s my little friend.  I thought he came out looking neat.  Someone else told me he’s scary, and one other said he was cute.

Exorcise goal for the new year.

The longer I go between drawings, the more it starts to really bug me.

2016 was the most-unproductive year, artistically-speaking, that I can remember.  It had a lot to do with where I am in life, what’s going on, and a reevaluation of what I want to do with my art.

All you can do is keep working, though, right?  Here’s to a new year, with new plans, ambitions, and new drawings.  Gotta work out those demons before they eat you up from the inside…

 

Dress for success.

I’m trying to wind myself up for a new project.  It involves lots of spacesuits, robots, and ruined, industrial sci-fi settings.  Really, everything I love in life… imaginary life.

One of the most-difficult ongoing struggles I face is finding enough time to draw.  The last year has been so busy, I’m thinking about not taking on more freelance commissions for the near future, at least until I’ve finished drawing a few things that have been waiting for a while now and are pounding at the door on my conscience.

Enough of that, you came here for the drawing, right?  So, here’s a little sketch I cleaned up to get the juices flowing.  It’s going to be on the table for that upcoming project.  More on that soon…

load

I’m sick.  I hate being sick.

It’s nice to get a day off of work, but it sucks to not being able to do much with it.  I have a comfy bed, though, and lots of books that need reading.  So, I should be alright.

Drawing is not something I do well when I don’t feel well, but blogging doesn’t require much energy and I do have a little drawing from this weekend that I thought worth sharing.

This is for a friend who broke her arm recently.  It’s based off a mascot that she cares a lot about, and I thought she might like a little cyber-zombie treatment to make the bull a little more interesting.  I don’t think I can transfer this to a cast (on the arm), but it might make for some good nightmare-fuel while healing.

Enjoy!

 

What are you, some kind of half-assed astronaut?

Living in San Francisco meant I was one of thousands of artists roaming the city, often subtly (or not at all) drawing their fellow citizens, especially on the BART.  It’s a little bit harder to sneak in a drawing of someone sitting nearby in Oklahoma City.  People tend to notice and get weirded out much faster here.  I guess artists aren’t quite as accepted here as they are on the West Coast…

Anyway, this guy was actually dressed quite nicely for work when I made him a quick-study subject at lunch this week.  I added the spacesuit because… well, because spacesuits are more-interesting than collared shirts.

I lied

It was a New Years goal of mine to draw more and post often.  Life has a funny way of getting in the way of even the most honest intentions, though.  Things change, circumstances are not always what they appeared to be at first, and new opportunities come about.  So… let’s try it again.  Here I am, promising myself more work forthcoming.

Here’s a cute little spacesuit to keep one from dying horribly in strange places.

The new year.

Hey!  Busy, busy, busy.  I’m determined to get more posts out, though.  Lately I’ve been working like a madman and sleeping very little.  The weeks fly by and I find myself nearly into the second month of 2016 already, with no real recollection of what happened to the month of January.  I still find myself thinking of what I’m going to accomplish in the new year, and then realizing I’m well into it.  Accomplish I have, though!  Most excitingly, the printing (finally) of issue #3 of Father Robot.  I’ve been waiting for the publisher to put out the digital version, to no avail.  I have no idea what’s going on there…

Anyway, in the spirit of all things FR, here’s a sketch from way-back in the development days of the series.  I don’t know why he has no arm.

I’ve got to get back to work, but I hope you enjoy the drawing and please feel free to drop me a line here or at sam@samgarlandillustrations… especially if you’d like to acquire a copy of the new issue!

I miss Seattle.

That’s it, pretty much.  The title kind of says it all.  I’ve sort of settled in Oklahoma City now.  I have a day job that takes pretty much all of my waking hours during the week and the freelance work takes up the rest of it.  From too little work to too much.  Ugh.  I miss rainy days and mellow liberals.  Does Seattle miss me?

To the rescue.

Just when you thought I was down for the count, here I am again, stronger than ever.  These words are brought to you by the following superhero, who I worked-up from a rejected commission sketch recently:

It’s been a busy month, relocating myself and business to Oklahoma City.  I haven’t lived in this part of the country for 20 years, and it’s been a little readjustment.  I don’t mean that sarcastically, it’s only taken a small amount of effort to be comfortable here.  It helps when there’s family nearby (I was born and raised not too from from here) and when the culture is a familiar and welcoming one.  This area seems to be exploding right now, but it’s still incredibly affordable and roomy compared to the cities I’ve lived in on the West Coast.

All that aside, the freelance work has really picked up and I’ve had to hurry to keep pace.  When combined with a new day job, I’m all-of-a-sudden out of the free time I’ve been enjoying for the past 8 or 9 months.  So, enjoy this little piece I did last night, while a bout of insomnia had hold of me.  I’ll post more as they sneak their way out.

Time for reflection

I was trying to come up with a new profile image for myself.  This sketch was done with pencil, and while it’s not an inaccurate likeness, I’m not happy enough to use it for my new representation on various social media sites.  Oh well.  I’ll keep trying.