Monthly Archives: September 2021

Great Horned Owls, Autumn 2021

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Owls say, “Time to get spooky!” Just kidding. Owls say, “Hoo! Hoo! Hoo!” all night long

Aside from the logistical issue of having to use small sheets of black construction paper to make up for the weird lack of large rolls of black butcher paper (sorry, but light gray just won’t cut it for Halloween/All Souls/Dia de los Muertos season; this is the dying of the light we’re talking about here, not the general malaise of the light) this one came out pretty close to perfect.

I was inspired by the vast number of great horned owls in this neighborhood; I never see them, but I have frequently heard them and occasionally found their feathers. They’re definitely around. I’ve even heard them in a tree on the school property, although I used for my model and different, more photogenic, and creepier tree two blocks down the street.

Weirdly, none of the pictures came out great, but I did get some nice details of the owls, which I might put on Instagram. You can find me @hubris_and_smoke. It’s mostly photos of flowers but there’s other fun stuff too.

Sunflowers

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There’s a million ways to do this; this is one

Since the pandemic started I’ve made and mailed a lot of cool cards but I realized that I never took high quality photos of most of them or shared the pictures online. Ran across this image on my DSLR the other day. This is a sunflower card I made for my mother-in-law back in Kansas. Kansans love sunflowers. This is a very Kansas card.

Sunflowers seem simple but if look carefully you realize they’re so complex. I love this card but I could have made it ten times more complicated if I really wanted to get down into the plant’s anatomy. One day I’ll do one where I cut each individual little floret in the center and each individual petal on the outside.

Anyway, my mother-in-law loved it and said she’s hanging it up, which is what I hope people do with these little custon artworks that I spend hours making!

Welcome Back 2021-22, a Phoenix

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We’re all constantly rebirthing ourselves from the flames of our own destruction

Obviously this would have looked waaaaay better with a black background, but for some reason they’re not stocking that color anymore. Only gray. Gray. For an elementary school. I feel compelled to use it up so we can rectify the issue.

This should have been posted a month ago but I spaced it and now it’s about time to start the Halloween one. With no black paper. Wonder how that will turn out. There’s still construction paper, just not big butcher paper for the background.