Preview: Surreal Desert Landscape Airship Painting

Work on this piece is finally winding down. I am hoping to have this one done, imaged and shipped off by December 21st if at all possible. I would *really* have liked to have had giclees of this one ready before holiday season came around, but it was just not going to work out that way.

I have a book cover illustration (for a favorite author) to wrap up by early January (which will be yet another addition to the airships series), and a holiday trip to visit family to squeeze in there as well - so I am working away until the late hours of the morning on this, in between all the shipping duties and other such things.

Anyway, here are the latest preview shots of the upcoming painting. Clicking on any of these will take you to my flickr account where you can view larger images.

sphynx and airship shown in panned out view.
Painting of baskets and ropes has begun.


closeup view of baskets on underbelly.


Closeup view of the gondola.
The lanterns within the archway are about
the size of the eye of a needle.


panned out view of the gondola

A glimpse

This is a rather unique print, printed at 12x12 instead of 24x24 - If it hasn't sold, it is available here

It is the proof from the printers, one of four artist's prints. Two are this size, two are normal size.



It is also, were I to put preferred darkness and saturation on a percentage, at about 98% perfect - slightly lighter than I want the prints to be, but pretty much unnoticeably so.

These test prints are all a part of the process, and I am told that these slightly different from the others, being a part of my working process, are probably worth more to some people.

This is my first time stretching and mounting one of these prints on my own. I hand made the stretcher bars that hold it, though I could probably have picked up 12 inch stretcher bars for 79 cents a piece - it was late night, and I rather like making things by hand anyway when I can.



I am trying things like these, because right now, my markup is really low and I still feel guilty for not being able to make things more affordable for those who like my work.

So, I am trying new ways to cut costs: Stretching and mounting these through hobby lobby or someplace similar saves money (hence the price cuts over the past month). Not only did the printers charge me a good deal for the stretching and mounting, but the shipping gets really expensive when shipping a box that is 40-some inches by 20-some by 3.

Stretching them myself saves a little more still, which allowed me to reduce prices again this last week - and I went one further by offering unstretched prints on our etsy store for "The Rescue". That way people can purchase these for less, and - rather than paying $30+ for shipping, can pay $6 for shipping, and $24 at hobby lobby for stretching, or $8 to stretch it themselves.

If such proves to be popular, I will probably do the same for every giclee.

Hello

I am Myke Amend - strange fiction, horror, fantasy fine-art illustrator, and co-archivist for the Miskatonic Archive

This is my first blogger post - well, not really an actual post per se, but an introduction.

Soon, I will fill this thing with all sorts of Strange-fiction-related nonsense, but not today.

I do however have many, many such entries at MykeAmend.com and the Miskatonic Archive (links above), as well as a moderate collection of my artworks (example below). Please join me there in the mean time, and subscribe to this feed for what is to come.