Buttnekkiddoodles

Drawn in one of my preferred hanging spots with my dear friend, a red medium nib Visconti Rembrandt, which is currently missing. The black ink is Platinum Carbon. I spilled hot chocolate on the page and while the blue gel ink and Iroshizuku fp ink ran, the PC held it’s ground beautifully.

      

In addition to some of my favorites, I’ve been playing with a couple new inks lately. A Levenger Purple and  Diamine Red that really looks like blood when it first hits the page. I procured a few new pens lately but the two I’m having the most fun with are a see-thru yellow Duo-Highlighter with a BB nib by Pelikan. Plus a second hand, and well used at that, Graf Von Faber-Castell ebony wood Classic that I bought a new B replacement nib for. Both pens are Champs. The Graf Von Faber-Castell is a serious investment but one that delivers the goods. A gorgeous pen that writes and feels like a no bullshit tool. It’s taken me a while to climb past a certain $$ barrier but having done so with the GvFC, a Pelikan M800, and a Sailor Naginata-Togi I can only say the way these pens deliver and how great they feel in my hand has evaporated all symptoms of sticker shock.

                                                       Now that I’ve raved about the battleships of my pen arsenal, I want to talk about the trusty and much worthy pen responsible for the Prussian Blue drawings immediately above. The drawing on the left and the 2 on the right were drawn in large measure with an $11.50 Pelikano Jr. A medium stainless steel nib with a cartridge that I keep refilling with the help of a syringe. The primary drawback to this pen is the plastic used for the cap. It does not stand up to much wear and tear before splitting or cracking. Barring that, the Pelikano Jr. is a swell pen for the money. Comfortable to use, it not only is a great starter fp for youngsters and first time uses of fountain pens, it is a cheap pen that writes wet, that you can use ant of the inks for fps without fretting that you’ll destroy the feed of a costly investment. The dark blue is Noodler’s Bad Blue Heron. The female nude drawing second from left was done with a broad gel pen. The line is bold and flows nice but has a very short life.

The Man from Black Shamrock.

Putting in sketches from life, transit drawings, and imaginary ramblings from the past week and from some 28 years ago. Loads of ballpoint and some of the usual suspects, Iroshizuku, Noodlers, Platinum Carbon inks and appearances made by some of my favorite fountain pens, a Pelikan M215, a Pelikan demonstrator with a double broad nib, an ebony barreled Graf von Faber Classic, and a beat up Visconti Rembrandt filled with Platinum Carbon. The Visconti has it’s drawbacks, some appointments falling off, and corrosion around the nib collar, but the damn thing feels good in the hand and is a blast to draw with.

  

And now, for as we flip the pages of time, the year is 1984 and our young master Donald sits at his desk in his China Town loft, busily scribbling away into the wee hours of the night.

  

Well, it’s Butt Nekkid Time again. New Year’s Day finds me once more at The Palette and Chisel for their 12 hour life drawing marathon. Jumped on the Red Line at 7 AM and made it to the Palette and chisel a bit before 8 AM to a good and growing crowd. Threw in some end of the year studies about town for good measure.

   

It’d been a wile since I’d ventured into the Palette and Chisel. Didn’t get any stellar results thou I like the one of Brittany and the seated drawing of Melissa. The ledger book I’m currently drawing in was given to me by Stuart Balclomb. The preexisting ballpoint writing was done with such pressure that the pages feel not unlike seersucker fabric and are fun to draw on. At first the surface seemed a little waxy to me and I thought the pages were resisting some inks. But I’ve been using the Pitt Artist Pen, ballpoints, gel pens, and fountain pen and ink. The inks have been, Iroshizuku, Platinum Carbon, Noodler’s, and Levenger’s. I can’t tell if the sheets have been inconsistently sized or if all the handling has made parts of some pages respond to the inks differently, but there has been a touch of resistance and feathering. The paper was made for ballpoint and that stuff goes down like a champ.

   

These recent pages were drawn in a ledger book given to me by Stuart Balcomb. The book was used to enter recording session info from Universal Studio sound tracks for mid ’60’s T.V. shows. Look close and you can see which ones.

Went to the Great state of Kal-A-Forn-Eye-Ayyyyyyyyy to do a mess load of demos. Stayed with my nephew Brett in Redondo Beach right ‘ere on de water. That’s him above serfin’ the ‘net and sportin’ a tee with Mr. Lee’s not-so-likeness on it. Brett is one of the truely good humans on this planet. My 2 brothers and I must’ve drained all the rascalness outta the gene pool and all that was left by the time Brett came along was kindness.

Below left is the sketch made whilst waitin’ for Brett at LAX. Next to that a street sketch I whipped out of a pub T rider coolin’ his heels in the shade. I did a demo right after that at Nick Gallo’s  Blue Rooster Art Supply where I met my grand niece Ariel for the first time. We went to The Hard Rock Cafe afterwards and I drew this elephant head she sculpted while she knocked out the sketch, to the right of the elephant, of me.

  

 

 

Pitt Brush Pens featured almost exclusively on these pages with a liberal addition of white China Marker. I like to draw over top of grease pencil marks with the Pitt pens, especially on toned paper as it produces a contrasting luminous effect.

 

The second image above, of the dude lookin’ dazed and confused, is my boy out there in the Bay, the Deacon of Dog Patch, Michael Recchiuti. If chocolate is your thing, Michael is without doubt your Messiah.

Taking in an early mornig pastry and a cup of hot coco at Piccino, a sweet little cafe and restaurant owned by two of Michael’s Dog Patch chums, Wayne and Sher.