Graduate Basterd

My buddy graduated in philosophy a couple of days ago.

But that is of little concern. The point is: he's a Basterd.

Some details:

By the way, long time no see.

The first - no, I'm not quoting Barry White

This is my very first illustration completely done in Photoshop.

It's a mess, yeah. I didn't quite know how to control composition, lights, shapes on a digital canvas, so to speak.

By the way, the picture was inspired by a lore of my land.

Once upon a time, sheperds and farmer of Sardinia were facing a terrible menace: the "Scultone", a dreadful huge lizard, which had the power to turn people into stone with a glance.

People were dying, flocks were disappearing, until one day lo! Saint Peter came, to save the day. Riding toward the menace, he defeated the evil creature with just a small mirror, used to watch the monster reflection without meeting its eyes.

Yep, it's the old story, "guy meets the petrifying creature", "guy uses the mirror", "guy kills the petrifying creature". I guess every culture has a story like that.

Wood Witch

Some time ago I had this frightening dream. Today it's quite blurry, I'll try to get some sense out of it.

I am in this poor house, with many strangers, and children too. All of a sudden, somebody burst into the house. They are some kind of baby gang, 13 years old kids with guns. They start shooting around, and two children of the house got hit by the flying bullets. I call the police and tell what's happening, asking for help, but they say "We can't take care of it, it's not our field". I'm like "What the heck are you talking about, they're shooting the hell out of us!". Somebody starts running out of the house, to call for help. I suddenly find myself with them, driving an old car in the grey, sad contry around the house. The place seems empty, not a soul.

After a long trip we find ourselves at the threshold of a scary wood. Once inside, it gets darker and darker, the trees start casting misterious shadows around us, and one says: "Guys, beware of the Witch living in the wood. She kidnap you, dismember and eat you!". If you knew it, why did we come into the wood in the first place, then?!? No time for such questions, we keep walking.

At some point I hear somebody crying. It gets so dark, we have to follow the sound of the moans without even realize we're approaching a cliff: once we reached the edge, we see one of the wounded children from the house, wailing at the bottom of the cliff. Somebody suddenly says: "The Witch took the baby down there! It's a bait! Watch out!".

The moment I turn my back, there she is: cloacked in black, the arms and hair made of dead wood, and a white, lifeless mask as a face!

Scary, huh?

Well, that was my terrifying dream, which explains my quick sketch.

Bye!

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Ok, after that moment, dunno why, I found myself in one Hell's Kitchen's episode, cooking near Gordon Ramsay! Bloody Hell, what a dream!

Some fan art 2: Darkly Drawing Dexter

What I like about some US TV shows is that they have the guts to take on screen some stories and situations that often Cinema avoid. Dunno why, maybe there's more freedom, but I'm not so sure about it.

Just think about some great series, like Six Feet Under, Mad Men, Rome, Battlestar Galactica. They just have a lot of cheek, you must give 'em that.

Dexter is one of this kind. It shows, from the very intro, an apparently normal guy; inside of him, however, lurk a monster, the worse making of the modern society, and I'm not speaking of a politician...Something less worse, a serial killer! A serial killer's serial killer.

Here lies the dilemma: what Dexter does is bad, because he kills people, and in a quite violent, wicked way; but he kills criminals, other wicked people, cheap low life. The entire TV show plays with our morals and ethics, it slaps in our face our limits and our hypocrisy, because with our brain we condemn Dexter, but with our heart we hope he doesn't get caught and eventually killed.

It's tricky. And a lot of fun, of course.

Some fan art: Kurt Wagner!

Always loved comic books. Marvel Superheroes, with all their issues, are by far my favorite, and Nightcrawler, among them, is one of the character I love to sketch the most.

Alas, it's been ages since I read some nice Marvel comic issue...

That's me

Like the title says...

Done with Photoshop, from a really stupid picture I took with my webcam.