Ye Olde Sketchbook...

Just weightlifting.  Trying to figure out the whole digital drawing dilio.  Digital sketchbook stuff is always fun.

Ocean spray

This image inspired by an upcoming vacation to Savannah, Georgia.

Spring and Ms. Sorenson

This image was inspired by the wonderful Karen Sorenson and her joyful artwork.  Please check out this image of hers below--yah--amazing.

It might be yellow...

Yah see if you can guess what color this is...

Cold

It's hot in Georgia but still I'm cold tonight...

Traditional Animation

Back in December-January I was working on a few traditional animations.  This is Phil from Hercules.  Sorry, no audio track!


An Animation of Phil from Michael Mercer on Vimeo.

The Beautiful Jillaine

From time to time I'm asked to pick up my camera and push buttons.  I've been doing photography for Jillaine Chaston for a few years now, and a gig back in March had her performing for the Chocolate Extravaganza--a charity auction (Jillaine worked for free and paid her band at her expense) where rich people get together and have fun paying exorbitant prices on relatively normal items to help hospitalized children.

Jillaine's family basically adopted me, and I've always felt like they were my home away from home.  If you ever get the chance to see her, take it!  Not too long from now her ticket prices will go way up!  You can catch her in the Provo/SLC area during the school year, or you can listen to her amazing voice at www.jillaine.com.  But take it from me, you gotta hear her live!

And now for something new...

Expanding the repertoire.  Hi-Rez Studios is located about 30 minutes from my house so there might be more of this in the future.  For friends out there who are interested I think I've decided to settle in Georgia near the family.  And there's nothing like waking up to the songbirds of the South!

Pangea: United We Divide

So I have this idea for a story.  Tribes of cavemen roamed Pangea with early, wacky dinosaurs and other flukes of nature.  The tribes hated each other, and could be united by only one thing: their common hatred. Each tribe chooses its champion and the champions are given the task of finding a way to divide the landmass so the tribes can live in peace.

Here's a conceptual image for characters of a particular tribe...the one that becomes South America.

Ecorche - or filleted man (and yes filleted is spelled correctly)

The French like to make things difficult on Americans by incorporating their cuisine into art.  Ecorche means to filet (or skin, or remove the bones, as in fish, lots of translations apparently) and so when you do a study like this you are really just prepping for cooking.  Eww.

On a side note, this is not the best exercise to learn to draw.  I think this is a great exercise after you've learned the basics of construction...my drawings for a long time have suffered from too much knowledge and not enough basic construction.

Carpentero

This guy's a carpenter.  I thought of a new style I wanted to try and here it is!  Kind of a mixture of everything, really, but I felt it turned out.

Recent Sketch

Just doodling.