The Flying Trilobite already receives a lot of pageviews due to a steady stream of people searching about being an asthmatic and flying (in an airplane, I presume). I thought it may be somewhat useful for me to therefore pen a post on the subject. The reason so many asthma-sufferers find this blog, I believe is because of the post I did of a drawing called, Asthma Incubus back in May of 2007.

If you are reading this blog for the first time, then welcome! Drop in for the asthma, stay for some paintings inspired by the awe of modern science. I am an artist living in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Please don't be frightened by the atheism. With atheism comes a healthy dose of skepticism, which you will need if you are suffering from asthma and don't know where to turn next. And anyway, the way I see it, when it comes to asthma relief, it just means instead of thanking god(s), I thank the fine scientists, pharmacists and chemists that have helped save more lives than prayer ever has.

Without skepticism someone may try to wave their hands over you or ask you to carry a small doll to cure your asthma, and while both could be entertaining, you and I both know it's hard to laugh when your lungs feel like they weigh 200 pounds and are made out of bags of rusty harmonicas.

So to begin: a caveat, a warning, a caution. I am an artist, not a medical respirologist. If you are looking for relief from your wheezy lungs, I strongly, mightily urge you to seek out a "Western" medically-trained respirologist and asthma clinic that keeps up on the latest advances in drugs to ease your lungs back into contributing members of your chest cavity. All I will share in this blog are anecdotes, individual stories about asthma, which is not how you should make a diagnosis! Medicines and remedies using double-blind, empirical and statistical trials are the ones to trust. Your respirologist will know which ones. I would also suggest checking out The Asthma Society of Canada for some up-to-date "'evidence-based', market-tested, " information on a regular basis.

Also to begin: some reassurance. I am a skeptic, and I will not try to sell you on the idea of water-pills, drinking urine, homeopathy, acupuncture, taking something just because it is "all-natural", or rearranging mythical chakras. If people seriously think they are helping you with this advice, I would strongly advise you to laugh, ask them to explain further, laugh some more, and do nothing they tell you to treat your asthma. If you are unsure of whether something someone suggests is pure nonsense or not, look for information that has piles of trustworthy studies behind it. To get you started, check out The Skeptic's Dictionary, particularly under "Alternative Medicine".

Oh, and get your children vaccinated too. It doesn't cause asthma, and will save their lives.

So, flying with asthma.

I have flown a number of times in my life so far, probably about 8 trips there and back again. As I said, I live in Toronto, and I have flown as far away as Aruba and Calgary, some 6 or 7 hours at a stretch. I have taken numerous shorter flights from Toronto to Montreal on a variety of airlines; Air Canada, Westjet and Porter, small planes and large ones.

My asthma has been diagnosed as "brittle", though that seemed to be a mistake; I have never fallen unconscious, even in my worst heart-pounding, suffocating moments. The most recent diagnosis was "moderate persistent asthma".

I haven't had any trouble flying with asthma. Whew! I know, all this preamble to find out you should be okay! Modern planes are pressurised so the air will not be thin as you fly up to 35'000 feet. A smaller plane, you may feel light-headed I guess. I have hiked in the Blue Mountains of Virginia before up to 4'000 feet, and I could still breathe and carry a 60 pound backpack.

Flying in a plane is exciting, and I am not jaded by the experience yet. So, sometimes I will need to take a puffer during the duration of the flight, but ask your doctor, or use your own experiences to see if this is necessary. For myself, I do not experience any sudden tightening of the chest, and I suspect I may take it in those moments larger as a psychological comfort. Perhaps the next time I fly I'll skip it if I can and see how it goes.

Most puffers are pressurised canisters, and there seem to be no negative effects on these in a plane. They do not explode or leak. Again, a pressurised cabin would give the canister a steady barometric pressure, and it will function as though you are on the ground. Take your medications in-flight with you in your carry-on luggage. Be comfortable, and relax. Get a window seat and enjoy the flight.

Currently, I take two medications to treat my asthma. One is preventative, and another for fast relief in moments of distress. A while ago, I switched away from a ventolin inhaler to Airomir, and I find I am sleeping better at night. I recommend it. (Ask your doctor!) My wife also informs me that I am not jerking my full body in my sleep anymore the way I used to once a night. There are a lot of options on the market, and you should work with your respirologist to see what works for you. A new medication, which I will not name, gave me some anxiety attacks when in combination with another puffer. My doc said it happens in a small samples of patients, about 5% of cases. So I switched.

I hope this has been helpful. Asthma is manageable, and sufferers have many options to help nowadays. If, however, I am wrong and there is some folklore I do not know about and people are finding this blog to learn about flapping their arms like Icarus and flying while suffering some asthmatic-like effects afterward, I have only one response.

"Umm."
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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.

There's a slew of gorgeous posters created by the talented members of The Guild of Natural Science Illustrators for the upcoming conference in July. Although I have not attended one of these conferences yet, I think the results of these lush, gorgeous and scientifically accurate artists speak for themselves.

If you are a new artist, up-and-coming, or established and need of some new techniques, get yourself to Ithaca and learn from these modern masters.

I often wonder if in a hundred years' time the art world will look back on pieces like these and marvel at their (sometimes) unrecognised value in the face of post-modernist navel-gazing. Their artwork is all the more relevant to anyone amazed by the vanishing biodiversity on our planet.

In particular, check out the work by Heather Ward (the coral reef begins!), Emily Damstra, Gina Mikel, Barry MacKay, and...aw, heck, prepare yourself for beauty and strangeness that only the real world can deliver by going to the Guild's image bank, or check out the links in my blogroll. Grab a coffee and croissant, and spend an hour this weekend marvelling.

And be responsible folks: these images are under copyright, and these folks earn their bread producing images to help scientists, medical professionals, teachers and students understand the world better. Be sure to contact artists about creating illustrations for use before cribbing them off the net!

Graphite is an amazing substance.

Chemically speaking, it is similar to diamond. Pencils have never been made of lead, but graphite was once known as "white lead", or plumbago which is Latin for lead ore, so that's why we have the modern confusion. There's some interesting, but not fully comprehensive stuff on good ol' Wikipedia about pencils and the magical material, graphite. Little "sheets" of it rub off and onto the paper with friction, leaving smudgeable marks. Graphite will not harm humans. Unless you do that annoying flicking the pencil between all your fingers, in which case it's game on.

The last couple of Artwork Mondays, I've been revamping an old concept of mine for a Dimtrodon Sphinx (at right), which was a detail of another drawing.

I'm using a .3mm mechanical pencil, as well as a more standard 2mm pencil for the larger areas. Both are packing HB leads; a lot of artists like softer (think B for black) or lighter (think H for hard) leads, but I like how easy it is to get a hold of HB. It's in the middle of the spectrum, and easy to shop for. The grey piece of putty-stuff is my wonderful kneadable eraser. Kneadable erasers can be shaped to erase in any nook and cranny, and leave no little eraser bits behind on the page. Brilliant. I used the same materials on the original (above), which I tinted blue using Photoshop for the sake of whimsy.

This has been a busy week for me and I did not make a lot of progress on this piece. However, I did decide to go with a slightly different reference photo than what I started with. It's always important to try different lighting, and when I took the model photos, I took two of each pose, one with the flash, and one with natural light coming from the window behind and to the right of the model. This week, I made a decision to switch to the latter.

I was reluctant at first, since this model has an excellent back, and the flash-lit photo showed that more clearly. However, being backlit can lend the piece the lighting of a full moon, or perhaps lightning which works better at making this beautiful half-human, half-dimetrodon sphinx look like a dangerous predator.

Needing a background, I started roughing in some rocks, and a scraggly tree to the left. I may try to make the sail-fin on the back partially translucent, with the silhouette of the rocky background darkening the fin near the spine.

I'm also debating with myself about whether or not this homo-synapsid will have hair; I've begun sketching a second sail on her neck and head. The sail makes her more "other" and alien, and hair makes her more beautiful and accessible for most viewers to immediately engage in. I'm currently leaning toward hair whipping in the wind.

Although the leading theories say that dimetrodon, edaphosaurus and the much-later-on spinosaurus may have had sails for thermal-regulation, I believe they must also have been there for sexual display, much like a peacock's tail. In nature, large flamboyant features with no immediately obvious use often turn out to be the result of sexual selection pressure. If this is so, what colour or pattern would be present? Since anything I choose will be speculation, there is a lot of freedom here.

In the inspiring book, The New Dinosaurs, by Dougal Dixon, artist Philip Hood depicted a creature called a Dingum, a small hopping, fuzzy creature with a spiky frill and a sail-fin on it's back. The interesting feature the artist added, was a pattern like that of a monarch butterfly on the sail-fin. As I say, there is a lot of freedom for an artist here.

Because the synapsids like Dimetrodon are more closely related to mammals than any other modern beasties, I'm leaning toward some sort of mammalian pattern to make it interesting. Perhaps an orca? Doubtful it would need that type of camouflage, since orcas, like penguins and herring gulls have evolved dark on the dorsal so animals looking down through the water at them are less likely to see them against the depths, and vice versa when looking up at their backlit ventral side. However, that type of colouration seems exciting, even if a cheetah pattern or tiger stripes are more likely. It's just that leopard print is like, so late 90's.

Orcas, baby. I'll see if I can finish this drawing in time for Artwork Monday next week.
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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.

Spring in the city! The last few days, I've stopped in Trinity-Bellwoods Park on my way home from work, and read a chapter or three of Parenting Beyond Belief, edited by Dale McGowan.

There is something satisfying about reading outdoors in the sun. I pass through Trinity-Bellwoods usually twice a day on my 30 minute walk. I've mentioned the park before, and here are a couple of even better pics of the stunning little albino squirrel, having a snack with a friend.

Parenting Beyond Belief is an excellent book I found out about backwards, through reading the editor-author's blog, Meming of Life. Dale McGowan is entertaining and informative, and also heartfelt. He knows how to mix appealing anecdotes with research, so the literary calories are not hollow.

Here in Toronto, Chapters/Indigo/Coles/World's Biggest has it listed in their system, but I can't seem to find it. A new Book City moved in, and were happy to have it delivered to the location on my walk home. Nice! The sales consultant thought it looked pretty interesting too.

It's easy for me to pick a favourite in this book. Teaching Kids to Yawn at Counterfeit Wonder, by Dale McGowan. I like anything by McGowan in particular. Even the endnotes can be entertaining.

There are science experiments you can do with kids. A beautiful letter to his daughter by Richard Dawkins, whose writing has inspired much of my painting in the past. Essays on how to deal with concepts of death with your children (and for me - this was good stuff).

This is not a ponderous, heavy book, and is not meant to be. It is a nimble conversation-starting book, a catalysing book, a deeply interesting book. It does not matter if you are atheist, Bright, religious-but-liberal-and-a-little-lapsed; a parent of adopted or natural children, an educator, or involved in some young person's life.

Never quite understood the fuss about evolution? Chapter 8: Jaw-Dropping, Mind-Buzzing Science has the easy explanation of what Darwin discovered. Order this book, and while you're waiting for it to arrive, read The Meming of Life.

There is something a little sublime when sitting below a massive, twisty old tree, reading an excellent book while the sun is shining, buds are slow-mo bursting, kids are on bikes, dogs are lolling on their backs in the grass, and you have a bottle of blueberry-green tea.

Spring is back. What have you read outside? What do you plan to read?

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Squirrel photos by Glendon Mellow. I tried not to hound the little guy; this was taken from a distance. It's a squirrel, ya gotta be respectful.

(This review was originally written for The Beagle Project Blog, and the request to review the show was made by Humble Woodcutter of The Free Range Academy.)

Darwin: The Evolution Revolution at the Royal Ontario Museum

Posters of a man in black and white, a green iguana, and bright pink orchids abound in transit shelters across Toronto. Darwin: The Evolution Revolution exhibit is on at the R.O.M., my hometown’s museum that has caused so much buzz in the past year after being “crystallized”.
To introduce myself, my name is Glendon Mellow, and I am honoured and thrilled to be writing this review for The Beagle Project Blog. I am an artist in awe of science who lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and I blog at The Flying Trilobite. Pictures were not allowed in the exhibit, so I have done my best to provide.

Exhibit
By following a chronological look at Darwin’s life and achievements, the exhibit seduces and beguiles using only facts. He was an ordinary man, albeit with the foibles, interests and intelligence that made it possible for him to think deeply on the natural world, and much time is spent on this at the beginning. The exhibit pulls no punches with evolution by natural selection later in. In that matter-of-fact, writ-large-with-no-punctuation way that museums do so well, evolution as a proven fact is stated again and again. As it should be.

As a visual kind of guy, let me give you the rough sketch of what the exhibit feels like. The exhibit is below ground, under an overhang in the R.O.M.’s Staircase of Wonders; the overhang is perfectly suited, as it displays “Mammal Weaponry” with everything from antlers to a narwhal tusk. The main portion of the exhibit features darkly stained wooden glass cabinets. Small curios featuring antique magnifying glasses of interesting construction dot the exhibit, each enlarging some beetle or hummingbird or plant or fossil. The piece that most struck me with a shiver of Darwin’s presence included a small drawing of Leptura quadrifasciata in a letter to his cousin, inscribed, “the insect is more beautiful than this drawing”. (I could go on and on about an 1840 lithograph by George Scharf of a Toxodon platensis skull fossil, but I really shouldn’t.)

To me, the importance of information in a museum is paramount, and this exhibit delivers. You can catch brief titles, or spend a couple of hours looking over everything. As I have often observed at the Toronto Zoo, it is amazing how some people have opinions on displays without first reading them. At the diorama of the Galapagos seashore, which features robustly stuffed marine iguanas and a couple of green iguanas, I over heard one young man ask his girlfriend, “Those real?” to which she replied, “Yeah, but they’re like dinosaur-age iguanas”. They then moved forward to read the placards.

There are so many things I did not know: I had no idea he discovered Megatherium; was related to the Wedgewoods; or argued his Captain about the immorality of slavery and was almost left on shore because of it. I hope the curators are quite proud of how this exhibit came together; it is a treasure. Live frogs, an iguana, tortoises, orchids, venus fly-traps, fossils of Pleistocene megafauna, skeletons of bats, primates and the homology of forelimbs feed the eyes and entice the curious.

Reactions
“I wish this guy was still alive; I’d introduce him to God.”
One stomping teenage girls’ commentary notwithstanding, the people I observed seemed to be curious and enjoying themselves. There are five short movies playing and three were well-attended, the last two being grouped so close together their sound overlapped. After hearing palaeontologist and trilobite-rockstar Richard Fortey say something to the effect of biodiversity being “…all the spiritual present in the world I need,” I overheard one patron utter, “Works for me.” A nearby wall about current controversies remained well-attended.

This video featuring Fortey was on a vertical flatscreen on a pillar near the large evolution by natural selection exhibit. It was set at an average person’s height, with the commenters’ addressing the viewers on their own level. It featured Francisco Ayala, Eugenie Scott, Niles Eldridge, Georgia Dunston and Kenneth Miller. The natural selection exhibit is clear and easy to follow. Evolution has been observed in the lab amongst bacteria, which reproduce quickly. The connection of slower, larger reproducers from eohippus to the modern horse is clearly made.

A child’s perspective
On this visit, my wife and I brought our six-year old nephew, who for the sake of his anonymity I shall refer to as Obi-Wan. An easily overlooked workbook is at the entrance, (in both official languages, mais oui) urging children to become Darwin’s assistant.

The booklet was terrific, starting Obi out by investigating the two tortoises and comparing their features. Many times our nephew Obi crouched down on the floor after figuring out what the answer was that he needed to finish another section. We received a lot of curious looks and some comments from passers-by. When Obi was filling out some true or false answers and he guessed at one, my wife pointed out that he shouldn’t guess, as he did not yet have any evidence. He was incredibly excited when he found the answer, and I feel that lesson may stick.

At another point, Obi was moved to draw abruptly, and asked to borrow my sketchbook so he could draw the dwarf armadillo on display next to the glyptodont. He spent about five minutes leaning against the angled placard, and drew this brilliant armadillo, starting with its detailed toes.

A video screen found in a few areas deftly illustrated natural selection better than my bungled attempt. It features bright orange and green bugs zipping around a background of green leaves. As the bird (clicking a button), Obi clicked the obvious orange bugs out of existence –almost! Then the screen turned the shade of orange as the orange bugs! The green ones are being eaten!

The kids’ area at the end was almost an afterthought, even with their version of The Beagle.

Conclusion
The exhibit is well-displayed and rigorous in its main points; Darwin was a normal, decent person; evolution by natural selection is true and makes sense; and though controversy remains, the natural world is deserving of the wonder Charles Darwin gave it. I highly recommend it, and hope it is indicative of the pursuit of displaying scientific truths about the natural world that we should expect from institutions such as the Royal Ontario Museum.

When I asked my nephew what he thought the skeleton of the chimpanzee hanging from the tree was, he studied it and asked, “a person?”

“Yeah, close!” I replied.

Darwin: The Evolution Revolution is on at the Royal Ontario Museum until August 4 2008.

All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.

Today I thought I would share some of the newer additions to my blogroll. There are a lot of talented scientific illustrators and realistic fantastic artists out there, and here's a sampling of a few who've made this Flying Trilobite's list in the last few months.

(After all, I can't always plug Leslie Hawes, Bond, Jesse Graham, Carl Buell, Jacqueline Rae and Nancy, can I? Oops.)

1. Druantia Art - An interesting discussion thread ensued on the Guild of Natural Scientific Illustrator's listserv a few months back about whether a blog or traditional galleried website is the more effective. And one of the delightful results is that supremely talented scientific illustrator Heather Ward began Druantia Art, a blog of her works in progress and tips for artists. The tips are brilliant, and Heather has even held polls about what animal to illustrate next! Marvel at her snow leopard, and at her musings about why there is a point to doing photographic realism in art.

2. Trilobite Blog - This is a blog I have mentioned before. This talented artist sells a line of Cambrian and prehistoric creature designs on clothing. His paleontology-based blog is an excellent read, and make sure you don't miss his interview with Sam Gon III of the excellent resource, Guide to the Order of Trilobites. You can shop for trilobite hoodies here and start your own finger-snapping gang against the anomalocarids!

3. Rigor Vitae - The artwork of Carel Brest Van Kempen, illustrator of the banner for the popular A Blog Around the Clock. This blog has some excellent insights in what it is like to create realistic art from nature. And frogs. Many awesome frogs.

4. PixelFish - and 5. Bluefooted - I came across these two talented and atheist artists on a thread over at Pharyngula where some people were dissing DeviantArt. PixelFish, who also goes by Lis Mitchell, has a tremendous gallery and well-crafted site. I'm particularly fond of See No Evil. Bluefooted has an amazing and intricate story-book style, reminscent of Dulac. Check out the beautiful and hideous Cat-Skin. Who needs more evidence that imagination is not divinely inspired?

6. Barry Kent MacKay - Lush, gorgeous artwork for your inner ornithologist. Some of my fellow Canuckleheads may remember MacKay from a children's show he hosted back in the day.

7. Gurney Journey - The blog of Dinotopia creator and master artist James Gurney. This blog is filled with tips and insights and shows you a week-to-week peek at what a celebrity-level artist is up to.

8. Basic Instructions - A very trendy sort of style at the moment, tracing photos to make a cartoon. But none of the others are half as funny as these instructions for living your life.

Anything in my blogroll is a place I try check out as often as I can. These are just a few of the other artists I admire. I'm also adding new pieces often, so please don't forget to check out my own gallery on DeviantArt!

All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.

The last few years a tiny surprise has hopped and bobbed its jaunty tail through Trinity-Bellwoods Park here in Toronto's downtown. My wife saw this resident for the first time last week, and this morning I was lucky enough to snap a couple of photos.
Trinity-Bellwoods is not the largest or most wooded park in Toronto, but I pass through it to and from work every day. The little albino squirrel, going about its squirrely business with its grey and black squirrelerific friends, is something of a local celebrity. Nearby boutiques on the hipster-filled Queen St. West scene will occasionally have messages in their window, or on their sidewalk signs. One store even had a plush one in the window.
This second pic is horribly blurry. I'd like to blame that on my kindness in not pursuing the squirrel too closely, as I'm sure it is followed by paparazzi hoping to catch a glimpse of a wardrobe malfunction more often than the other squirrels. But I think the picture may be blurry due to the icy ground, and the amount of coffee I had this morning. Blurred like this though, doesn't it look a bit like it's going to pelt an acorn at my head? It's eyeing me, like I'm just another shutterbug.

I love this park. Lots of "refuge-points" in the landscape, trees dotted here and there, trees that rustle in the breeze. Walking through there is one of the best parts of my day.

(For more great posts on albinism in animals, check out Zooillogix.)

All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.

The oil painting I produced for The Eloquent Atheist, entitled Darwin Took Steps, has found another champion today, in the form of Mike H. of the prolific Tangled Up in Blue Guy blog.

You can see the Tangled Up in Blue Guy post about Darwin Took Steps here.

And hey- he's also pointed at the banner that I produced for Of Two Minds! Any chance you're moonlighting as a scientific illustration talent scout, Mike? Perhaps if I need an agent one day...

With both of these pieces being worked on throughout February, it's been a busy month. Thanks Mike, for the comments. Feedback on my artwork is always welcome. (Thrown vegetables or muttering "derivative" are less welcome, but interesting.) In addition to the link in my gallery, you can also see my popular pencil drawing, or read the 'making of' post.

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By the way, this Friday will mark one year since The Flying Trilobite began. Look for a misty-eyed reminisce-a-thon on Friday. And cake! Maybe pie!

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(Edit: March 8 2008: Darwin Took Steps also featured on The Dispersal of Darwin ! )

Full disclosure: I signed my blog up over at blogged.com, and then proceeded to review The Flying Trilobite myself. O, wo unto desolation...the vanity, the vanity!

It could be argued that blogs themselves are a form of vanity. Some may say that artists are also a vain lot, wanting to leave a (misunderstood, unfathomable, derivative) mark on the world as they pass through it. These things are probably true, and in no excuse me writing a review of myself.

Let's take this vanity farther. Here is the review in it's entirety. (For some strange reason, you cannot read the whole thing at blogged.com...it just kind of cuts off at the end even though it let me keep typing. Perhaps this is punishment for vainglorious fools. Hmm.)
And so here we go:

Can I possibly throw my own ego around like a bigheaded pompous artiste any more than I have?

What the - Who....? That's not the pinstripe-suited pic of me with Manhattan in my grasp!

(edit: what was I thinking when I posted this? Too little coffee...)

For Darwin Day 2008, I decided to work on a surreal portrait of Charles Darwin, which is to be published today at the online literary 'zine, The Eloquent Atheist. There should be some writing accompanying it from one of the Darwin Day organisers, Dick Renfro. (Edit! Here's the link!) I always enjoy seeing another artist's process in creating a work, and I have found some scientists who read this blog are also interested in seeing the greasy nuts & bolts that go into a painting.

I am not a biologist, but I am something of a biology/palaeontology groupie. Darwin's work is so important not only for explaining a process of evolution by natural selection, but also for how it exploded the traditional chain of mythologies humans lived with as explanations for so long. The modern Bright movement and sites like The Eloquent Atheist seek to show how a life without religion and the supernatural can be intellectually and emotionally fulfilling.

In my continuous struggle to improve my own madartskillz I am also trying to create works reminiscent of Symbolist and Surrealist masterpieces replete with symbols drawn from our modern scientific worldview. Why use Odin to symbolise wisdom when you can paint Darwin?

Making of Darwin Took Steps

1. Thumbnail sketches
These were just thumbnails, showing an elderly Darwin pondering what to write next. The one near the top right has a "tangled bank" of branches floating above his head. From the start I knew I wanted to depict Darwin in his later years, as it is a more generally recognised image. I discarded both of these ideas in favour of the staircase idea.

2. Beginning the drawing.

For the drawing, I drew upon a reference from National Geographic's November 2004 issue. (Cover title: "Was Darwin Wrong?". The answer inside, almost a page tall: "NO.") One of the goals for this painting was to see how quickly I could do it, and still be proud at the end. In this instance I gave up drawing freehand and used a projector to create the sketch above, which is something I rarely do. That took 20 minutes. Refining a drawing that size without the projector can take another 2 to 3 hours. Materials: 2mm pencil on vellum-finish bristol paper. (Must perform life drawing for three hours in penance for using the projector...)

3. Staircase and a false start.

The staircase is an older idea of mine I used on a piece called Disease. It was developed as a cd cover and never published. I like the image though, and thought it would be appropriate. The column in the background is supposed to suggest the path leading unexpectedly to D.N.A, beyond Darwin's scope. I checked the drawing in a mirror a lot, to see if there were any gross abnormalities that stood out. Noticed a staircase coming out of his head. During this phase, I was listening to Jakalope in my studio, which is actually a freakishly large closet off our living room.

4. Completed drawing.

This is the drawing as complete as I decided to make it for painting. I used a .3mm mechanical pencil, HB lead on vellum-finish bristol. Love that Strathmore. In total, the drawing itself took about 3.5 hours. I jettisoned the d.n.a. column idea, and left the staircase leading up and away, the edifice not yet finished. I had fun with the little 'chi' lines in the beard. After tweaking the contrast in Photoshop, I printed the drawing out onto a couple of sheets of canvas paper from my laser printer to paint on.

5. Prepping for 'speed-painting'.
I decided to work in our living room, claiming the coffee table as my territory. I use Turpenoid Natural rather than other solvents. It smells of pine and is not full of nasty toxic hydrocarbons like most odourless solvents. The pliers are to get my oil tubes open. (Seriously, are all tubes made by people who've never had to open them more than twice? The caps are all different by brand, but they all get stuck.) I wanted this piece to have an older, sepia-feel to it, so linseed oil rather than a paler poppy or walnut was just fine. I am armed with Bavarian Dutch Chocolate coffee in my Jack Skellington mug.

My palette consisted of Naples Yellow (which I am addicted to), Quinacradone Orange, Cadmium Yellow Medium, Monochrome Tint Warm, Burnt Sienna (which I hate), Raw Umber, Payne's Grey, Zinc+Titanium White and Lamp Black. A lot of people swear you shouldn't use white or black (and you should mix your own from blue and brown), and I say, stop living in the Impressionist Era! It's so over! Lamp black is warm and deep, like pvc goth-gear in a tube.

I set the timer to stop me every hour. My aim was to finish the painting in 3 hours.

6. Results after 1 hour.

Usually I start with the eyes. I worked out the face, mainly with a cad-yellow underlayer. Monochrome tint and white for highlights. I was listening to Darude, The Chemical Brothers, and a Nine Inch Nails remix album. The faster the beats, the fresher my brush strokes. This is deep in the Ugly Phase , where I just hate how it looks. No time to fret; hour two!

7. Results after 2 hours.

Started using a phylogenetic tree in the background, painting with quinacradone orange underneath, and iridescent gold oil paint on top. Renaissance masters usually painted a red basecoat under gold leafing to add luster. I am using some micron brushes my wife put in my stocking at Christmas. They are really tiny synthetic brushes, and the filbert is now my bf4evr. Some artists say oils must be painted with rough hog's bristle brushes, and then I just yell, stop living in the Impressionist Era! Old master used soft brushes for detail, and so do I.
It's not done. I need to move toward hour 3.

8. Results after 3 hours, colour corrected.
The final piece, colour-corrected in Photoshop.

I fretted about how dark it looked on some monitors, and after submitting the image to editor Michael W. Jones at The Eloquent Atheist, emailed a second colour-corrected version, seen above.

Complete!

Assigning a number to any amount of steps would be arbitrary, but I chose 5 for a reason. Four for the support of evolution by natural selection (Darwin drew upon examples of 1. biogeography, 2. morphology, 3. embryology, and 4. palaeontology), and the fifth step for natural selection itself, or the elevation of reason over dogma, as the viewer likes. The steps of learning never end.

Please check this out on The Eloquent Atheist today, and leave comments! Constructive feedback is always welcome. I will edit this post later today to provide the link once it is up. Merry Darwin Day!

All images above under Creative Commons Copyright to Glendon Mellow. See sidebar for copyright information.

The Flying Trilobite's 1st Blog Award!

The headmistress of The Free Range Academy has bestowed upon The Flying Trilobite's humble cephalon the E for Excellent Blog Award!

This is a pay-it-forward meme of sorts, as well as an award. In accepting it, it needs to also be granted to ten blogs chosen by the recipient. This is tough: I'm adding to my blogroll all the time.

I'd love to grant it back to The Free Range Academy if I could. If you love reading about parenting, science and the myriad experiences growing up in Ontario offers to kids, you gotta check this site out. Leslie's Blog is another vibrant community drawn to Leslie Hawes, artist & personality. However, since Leslie granted the award to The Free Range Academy, I will leave them off my list of ten. Presenting in no particular order...

I solemnly swear to grant the E for Excellent Blog Award