www.tragnark.com

bomber girl belle

tragnark — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:53:13 +0000

I did a sketch of this earlier and figured I’d post the colored version. It’s based on old bomber girl art from WW II.

To see more studio work click here.

smoking athlete

tragnark — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:42:36 +0000

Someone should tell her smoking won’t help her sports prospects.

To see more studio work click here.

punker girl profile

tragnark — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:30:21 +0000

Punker girl profile. It was a design I did for work. I got some ideas for the character from pictures of Amy Winehouse.

To see more studio work click here.

tractors, old and new

tragnark — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 23:29:56 +0000

A bunch of tractors. There were a lot of strange tractors manufactured back in the day. Some of the sketches are actual designs, others are a combination of a few, but all are based off of real tractors. Yup, even that one on stilts.

Too see the image in higher resolution click here. Too see [...]

huts and various small homes

tragnark — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 21:48:16 +0000

Discovery Channel and National Geographic are neat. I like to see the specials on different cultures that showcase where they live. Here’s some ideas from projects that were the result of that curiosity.

Too see the image in higher resolution click here. Too see more sketch work click here.

xarthean explorers concept

tragnark — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 18:15:20 +0000

Learned a lot working on this one. I’ve done some sci-fi themed work before, never with more humanoid characters. I tried a different approach where I isolated local colors out before building lights and darks.

Too see the image in higher resolution click here. Too see more illustration work click here.

grwahar grwahar

tragnark — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:37:22 +0000

Not quite there yet….. Juggling it with other responsibilities right now. By this weekend for sure, it will be done.

cait the alchemist

tragnark — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 03:44:18 +0000

Turnaround drawing and a 3d prototype from a toy project a while back. The modeling for the character was done in Maya by the talented Joe Brogno. It was then cut in a 3d printer. The prototype was handpainted by myself using Cartooncolour vinyl cel paint. I had this whole mythology, numerical, [...]

xarthean explorers sketch

tragnark — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 07:31:23 +0000

Colors will be added in the next few days. They are explorers from Xarthean, ready to probe the moons of Jupiter. I’m going to make some adjustments to the droid’s angle, and other things that I think can be refined in the final image. I’ll be using a red palette with this [...]

invasion

tragnark — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 08:01:28 +0000

I’m going to try and start doing a little layout thumbnail a few times a week before I go to bed. That way I’ll be challenged to work quickly to create a scenario with broad strokes. These are visitors from the mountains, but not the kind you’d want to make friends with. They bite.

Too [...]

norse warriors concept

tragnark — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 05:49:56 +0000

Here’s the new version. I made some changes to the staff of the female warrior to echo the stern of a norse ship, as well as adding some scrollwork into her armor. I changed the male warrior’s helmet to harmonize better in shape with the other’s head symbols, as well as making minor changes [...]

holiday time and sledding

tragnark — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:22:17 +0000

Where did 2009 go?

I’m not really sure, but it feels like I’ve blinked and another decade has passed.

The wife and I packed up everything and visited the family on the east coast. For the first time in years, there was snow on the ground, and not just a light powdering either. [...]

taekwondo monkey in trouble

tragnark — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 05:43:42 +0000

Martial arts primates in defiance of their master? Oh yes, and the spot does thicken.

Lo Wung, 42, taught the monkeys so they could entertain crowds outside a shopping centre in Nshi, in eastern China’s Hubei province.

But the money-spinning primates turned the tables on their trainer when he slipped during a show, with one quick-thinking monkey [...]

skunkman with triangle head

tragnark — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 07:15:23 +0000

Skunks have faces that look like they are pushed to the end of their head, so I drew one. He can open canned food with his head in a pinch, jackhammer style. Don’t let this fellow raid your kitchen pantry, you will be left with nothing. Nothing, I tell you.

To see more [...]

blue spiral light hovers above norway

tragnark — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 06:54:36 +0000

Up in the frigid skies of northern Norway, residents witnessed a unique light show, one that had never before displayed in their evening skies. The official story has been confirmed as a Russian missile gone awry when tested fired from the Dmitry Donskoy submarine in the White Sea early on Wednesday, failing at the [...]

the matrix: 1905 starring charlie chaplin

tragnark — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 07:34:52 +0000

Silent films are something I’ve always enjoyed. The exaggerated acting and poses are what appeal to me the most.

So that leaves one to question, “How would a contemporary sci-fi picture translate into this medium?” An acting troupe from Asia has replied humorously, Russian subtitles included. That Charlie guy sure knows [...]

st. wenceslas riding an upside down horse

tragnark — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:47:00 +0000

St. Wenceslas, the patron saint of the Czech Republic, is honored with many statues around the country. But the sculpture of St. Wenceslas Riding a Dead Horse in Prague turns those monuments — literally — upside down. Hanging in the gallery of a shopping and entertainment complex, it was created in 1999 as a parody [...]

migrating all old blog posts

tragnark — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 09:48:03 +0000

Back in 2003 I humbly started version 1 of this website using frontpage and html. If you look at the dates on the right hand toolbar of the blog, you’ll see that I’ve started migrating old posts from the html days into the new website format. By the end of this weekend I’ll [...]

photosketch internet image montage

tragnark — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:34:38 +0000

Here’s an interesting piece of technology developed by a group of scientists. It’s able to fetch information from the internet to dynamically composite images. All it takes for it to happen is your ideas communicated in the form of sketching. Below are storyboards from the proposed technology, showing how input equals output.

To get [...]

sleeping grizzly bear bean bag

tragnark — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 08:04:39 +0000

Wouldn’t it be rad to sit on one of these while you played your favorite games or watched a fantastic movie? Better yet, don’t tell you family about it and invite them over for dinner. “Hey dad, check out the majestic mammal hibernating near the footstool. It keeps the robbers away.”

You are looking [...]

time to see some dinosaurs, arena style

tragnark — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:05:46 +0000

There’s a science museum close that the wife and I have had the pleasure of visiting several times. We are both geeks and love going to these places. That’s why it was totally awesome to hear about this world touring BBC dinosaur show, “Walking With Dinosaurs – The Arena Spectacular“, that was going [...]

1 million fps slow motion impacts

tragnark — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:47:17 +0000

Most everything in the natural world takes on a new personality when slowed to frame rate that allows us to focus on the nuances of the moment. Metallic objects appear as heated butter, shearing at imbalanced angles. I wonder how they were able to hit the moving bullets with other projectiles.

Germany’s Werner Mehl [...]

piglet squid

tragnark — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 03:24:11 +0000

Say hello to the piglet squid, a curious critter of the sea. Here it is in normal “piglet” form.

Mr. piglet undergoes a transformation when it fills itself with surrounding water. ….it starts to look like a certain friend of Jim Hensen, eh?

The Banded Piglet Squid (Helicocranchia pfefferi) is a small squid of the genus Helicocranchia. Adults of [...]

neurosonics audiomedical laboratory

tragnark — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:17:24 +0000

I’ve always wondered where sounds were engineered / manufactured from. Now I know.

Neurosonics Audiomedical Laboratory footage.

Fig. 1: Technical description.

Kingdom of the unreal but also a higher state of being, ultimately free of the limitations of the material world through the agency of science, technology, and imagination.

bunnies, roaches, and fleas on parade

tragnark — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 19:00:37 +0000

Here’s some character designs I did for an unamed creative project a little while back. Unamed because it is in ownership of the guy I did the work for, who was kind enough to let me share it on the website. I had a lot of fun designing the characters. The writer I collaborated [...]

kuroshio sea, the 2nd largest aquarium in the world

tragnark — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 21:53:56 +0000

This steady shot of an aquarium features small schools of fish, giant stingrays, and massive whale sharks swimming together.

The main tank called the “Kuroshio Sea” holds 7,500-cubic meters (1,981,290 gallons) of water and features the world’s second largest acrylic glass panel, measuring 8.2 meters by 22.5 meters with a thickness of 60 centimeters. Whale sharks [...]

swine flu: the biting pig bites back

tragnark — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 03:32:31 +0000

What it was, I’m not entirely sure, but starting about two weeks ago I heard some horrid coughs at work. “Holy crap..”, I thought. “Someone is hacking up a black lung in the other room.” By that evening I had light coughs, but I still thought nothing of it. By the [...]

life size gundam sculpture in odaiba tokyo

tragnark — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 05:47:03 +0000

Are you a fan of Gundam? I sure am, and wish I could see this guy in real-life. Standing at 59 feet tall at a scale of 1:1, this is an actual sculpture that will be on display in Tokyo through July.

Check out video of the installation here.

12:34pm 56 seconds 07/08/09

tragnark — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 03:39:05 +0000

In case you missed it, today’s date can read from 1 to 9, if displayed a certain way. Like this, for example. Neato.

sculpting in the eye of a needle

tragnark — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 07:50:46 +0000

Yes. You heard me right. This amazing artist Willard Wigan literally makes sculptures that fit into the eye of a needle.

It’s still a huge mystery to me how he controls his shaping tools on such a minuscule level and paints the characters. He describes losing a past work in progress by accidentally [...]

version 8 up and running, and burning robot breakers

tragnark — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 07:11:26 +0000

For a while now I’ve been meaning to do a whole revision on the website. This will be the 8th major version. After getting back from the studio on friday, I had a quick dinner, then proceeded to put a good night’s work into getting it done. By 5am on Saturday I [...]

carnival fangs

tragnark — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 06:48:11 +0000

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been racking my brains and putting together some designs for my friends at PFOM and Silent Stage Gallery.

It’s been good times looking at different source material for a new direction to take my personal work in.

the unique and bizarre world of zeno clash

tragnark — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 06:20:26 +0000

Steam had a good deal this weekend for the game Zeno Clash. My interest was originally piqued after reading Brad Shoemaker’s positive review at Giant Bomb.

The pure weirdness of the story and character design caught my eye immediately. The two day sale was enough to convince me to purchase and give it a shot. [...]

six different scifi themed thumnail sketches

tragnark — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 05:18:31 +0000

Here are six different ideas I explored in rough thumbnail format. I tried creating different dominant shapes as well as themes and lighting. The challenge was starting with the same blank space as the foundation for each concept. I’ve titled each of the sketches according to their separate stories, all scifi in [...]

sasuke 22, ninja warrior 22

tragnark — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 06:32:38 +0000

This year’s Sasuke 22 (Ninja Warrior in the US) was one of the most exciting competitions of all time. Yuuji Urushihara, the humble shoe salesman, was mere seconds away from making Sasuke history! It seems the tides are turning with the well-known Sasuke All-Star veterans being tallied out early in the first round [...]

bansula egg and crytrog doorway / gateway

tragnark — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 05:58:54 +0000

Here are some detail concepts of the bansula egg and crytrog door.

The door is ceremonial in presentation, and runs off a plasmid life-force that is held in stasis by the sacred yaggridisl stems. They power the door and allow them to be used as conventional entrances between rooms and gateways to other rooms in [...]

king of fighters XII

tragnark — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 03:56:58 +0000

SNK ups the ante of hand drawn sprites in its new 2-D fighter. This looks to be one of the best looking King Of Fighters yet. Nice artwork and animation.

chocolate milk

tragnark — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 23:41:52 +0000

This is very tasty, and is the fullest flavored milk I’ve had in a while.

I’ve lived in different parts of the country and never saw the brand before, so I assume it’s probably a local one from local farms, hence the awesome taste. The natural stuff tastes more like the food I remember eating [...]

critter crunch, a rainbow barfing good time

tragnark — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 22:23:54 +0000

I’m a sucker for awesome puzzle games, especially ones like this. The animation and game play look really fun and exciting. Who would have thought barfing rainbows into each other’s mouths could be such a jolly good time?

up: the motley crew of carl, russell, dug, and kevin

tragnark — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 02:29:41 +0000

Carl Fredricksen, an elderly man with a floating house traverses through an undiscovered world of flora and fauna, accompanied by a young asian cubscout, a technologically enhanced golden retriever, and exotically strange bird….and, it’s completely acceptable because of solid personality and character development.

I just saw UP with my wife over the weekend. This has [...]