news
what’s up at the portable city
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I’m back at my freelancing desk!
So it’s been a big year of launches and adventures and news and updates and all the rest, but I am now sitting down to plan out the fall and winter, and I’ll be looking to take on some new jobs! I’ve spruced up the portfolio section of my site and sorted it into a… keep reading
personal blog
the shel news
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one year of arm stuff – part 12 –ambidexterity – writing
For six months I had no nerve connection whatsoever to my lower right radial nerve. This meant that all of… read more
longer reads
bigger ideas and more to look at
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Project DARK Card Art Retrospective
About a decade ago I had the privilege of painting a card deck of fantasy medieval fighters, thieves, assassins, and sorcerers for Will Hindmarch. He had pitched the card deck as both a play aid (the game he was developing at the time used a traditional poker deck) and a world building tool, filling the […]
in art
Photography Blogging
digital camera snaps and thoughts
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Achievement! 1000+ Observations on iNaturalist!
In honour of taking enough photos and spending the time to categorize them and crop them and geotag them and sort them into distinct observations to have crossed the 1000 observations milestone on iNaturalist, I…
in photo -
heard you was…
…talkin shit (done in tribute to an infinitely delightful series of photos by msd on the curious quail blog)
in photo -
Camera people – what bags do you love?
I now have a beautiful new digital mirrorless camera + gorgeous telephoto lens to take on adventures! But I cannot willingly do so without a protective case. What I’d like is a very lightweight sling…
in photo -
Cellphone Photography: All About White Balance
Okay, this first in-depth cellphone photography post is going to be about white balance. One of the things that I often struggle with is getting the colors to look right on my phone. If you’ve…
in photo
Art Blogging
paintings and drawings and more
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Project DARK Card Art Retrospective
About a decade ago I had the privilege of painting a card deck of fantasy medieval fighters, thieves, assassins, and sorcerers for Will Hindmarch. He had pitched the card deck as both a play aid…
in art
Concept Art Blogging
professional vis dev work
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Murderous Mermaid Thoughts
Spent some time in my sketchbook thinking about all the amazing and kind of horrifying ways sea creatures have arranged their mouths, and seeing what I can combine with mermaid ideas and to what effect.…
in concept art
Comics Blogging
comics of many kinds
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A Brief Guide to (early onset) Wizard Puberty
A Brief Guide to (early onset) Wizard Puberty is a silly but sincere explanation for bystanders of what is happening when their friends become disabled, as narrated by a very tired wizard. This comic has…
in comics
Pocket Dungeon Blogging
system agnostic ttrpg modules that come in a cute pouch
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The Ghost Houses of Phylinecra – Pocket Dungeon Zine & Pocket Pack
The Ghost Houses of Phylinecra is a system-agnostic, story-heavy dungeon crawl about a community recovering after disaster, and how a goddess might try to understand mortal grief. The village of Phylinecra was a tight-knit community of artists and creatives, until it suffered a devastating flood. In the aftermath, as the survivors try to salvage their […]
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The Corruption of Pelursk – Pocket Dungeon Pack
The Corruption of Pelursk is a system-agnostic tabletop RPG hexcrawl/dungeon, written by Shel Kahn. The Isle of Pelursk holds a glowing, steaming, mist-shrouded secret at its heart, and once you’ve entered its clutches it does not want to let you leave. Designed to fit easily as a sidequest into an ongoing campaign or stand confidently…
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Keep on the Shining Isle – Pocket Pack
Keep on the Shining Isle is a system-agnostic dungeon featuring a haunted ruin, a mystery cult and some very tempting apples. Pick this up to send your home campaign on a memorable sidequest, or try out your favourite new system with this 1-2 session scenario. Written and published by Shel Kahn as the first of many…
Teaching Blogging
professional vis dev work
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Teaching Comics, Zine-making and Visual Literacy at OSF
In autumn 2017, I taught a four week comics course at the Oasis Skateboard Factory, an alternative highschool within the Toronto District Schoolboard. OSF has a project-focused curriculum, so our comic project was multifaceted, to…
in teaching
the feed
pinned thoughts and quick snapshots
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Style Test – fantastic skyscraper reinterpretation
Another style experiment, this time done 95% in Procreate. This one has me using a photo I took in highschool of a courtyard downtown that…
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Digital Style Exploration – Building Fantasy from a Photo
This was a 100% Clip Studio digital painting, based on a photo of mine from a visit to Hay River in the Northwest Territories; the…
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Style Explorations – Landscape with Figures Study
Another photo study, but I took this one into Clip Studio after doing the first pass in procreate, which let me use the smarter selection…
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Style Exploration – Digital Paint with Dark Inked Lines
This was reffing a photo on pinterest; I wanted to refocus on how I want to handle stylizing figures. I am slowly starting to nail…
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Style Test – Lineless Film Study
Another film still study, this one from Snow White and the Huntsman. This piece was done in Clip Studio, with a selection tool approach and…
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Style exploration – reffing a film still
Playing around with painting with the selection tool as well as relying more on chunky colourful linework. Screenshot from Space Sweepers.
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Golden Digger Wasp in Soft Pastel
A small study of my own photo of a golden digger wasp on some goldenrod flowers last summer! I primed the paper with some opaque…
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chalk pastel dragon island WIP – now with more details!
it’s coming along! while I suspect there’s a limit to how much I can do this, I’ve learned that you can use a paper stump…
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chalk pastel dragon island WIP
I’ve painted the paper with opaque watercolour ground to add more tooth and honestly it’s working really well!
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Latest Comments:
your work is wonderful! it is dreamy but it has such a clarity to it. i liked reading about the…
Whoa so so cool! I didn’t know that!
I’ve thought about this a lot since leaving Mastodon and Twitter, and choosing not to join Blueksy. Structurally, I feel…
the huntsman photos are fantastic, i’ve never looked at one close before, i like how their body has different textures…
Website Details:
This site is built to be a conversation and archive and digital garden.
Links to Enjoy:
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Artist! Chris Hüth
chrishuth.com
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Artist! Mary Verhoeven
sob-comix.com
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High Level Pencil Skills Videos
Sometimes you spend eight years of your life in post-secondary art training of various types, and then a further 14…
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Jey Pawlik Explains RSS!
One of my fav tech savvy cartoonists wrote up a huge post on what RSS is, how you can use…
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Laura’s angle on iNaturalist
I’m enjoying not only posting on and browsing photos via iNaturalist, I’m also having a blast seeing how other people…
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Shing Yin Khor’s “Make Little Guys”
https://www.patreon.com/posts/make-little-guys-112268885
These are very nice! It’s unfortunate the KS was never fulfilled and these were never printed, I would have loved…