::@:: Reality of Dreams ::@::

So, I’m back (well came back late monday, but that is splitting hairs)

It was an amazing weekend, even things I wasn’t looking forward to I ended up enjoying.

So, yeah, lets see, I managed to leave edinburgh at about 7.20am and got into Soutport about 4.5 hours later, registered, got to the hotel, where I found out I was in a room by myself… an oriental themed room :). Not long after this I was unloading at the venue and meeting the team.

I found out that I was going to be on stage, which was a bit more “up front” than I expected, but once I got started it no longer bothered me and I ended up enjoying it. I ended up creating a large scale painting over the weekend over 6 sheets of canvas type paper and a couple of other smaller ones, while trying to do one on theme during the sermon. Thankfully I had an idea of the themes before the meetings which allowed me to be able to create something on theme.

Apart from the evening sessions, I done a some stuff, mainly ink work, during the morning bible studies. What with team meetings, set up, and clean up (not that I did much apart from the stuff I used), after hours, etc I didn’t get a chance to see anyone really apart from the occasional few minutes here and there.

Overall, I was really pleased with the works I made on an artistic level, on a personal level it was an amazing time and I was extremely blessed. The team I was part of was simply amazing, they were supportive, genuine, and an unbelievable encouragement to me and each other.

So, yeah, a great weekend and one that has left me really wanting to do more like this and more confident in my artistic abilities. I guess we shall see what comes from it, while it may not have been a “business” weekend (I didn’t sell any of the prints I had printed off, but the art created during the weekend was for Roots), it was something more important, it was a weekend for meeting amazing people, a weekend for hearing challenging words and ideas, a weekend to grow and develop even just a touch more confidence.

If your interested in seeing my work you can see it either through Project365 (day 1, 2, 3, 4), of on Facebook, or even on Illusionary Constucts… well… not yet on that one as I want to clean the pictures up a bit before they go on it.

So in a very brief outline that was Roots 2008, it was very tiring on the old legs (I was standing for entire sessions :)), but very rewarding and I was honoured to have been asked.

and lo it was good…

Really quite fun movie, stay to the end if your a comic book geek or want to see a film star make an appearance… could say more but its late and I have to be up in 6 hours.

Well, its only a few days until Roots 2008 and my first ever time as a, well, its really hard to describe in a few words, I suppose “worship artist” would work, as would “artist in residence”, but really it is just painting in front of a crowd, as another part of the worship and the service.

I have bought a bunch of stuff, new paints, canvases, even an easel, for it… hopefully I have everything that I will need, or at the least if I don’t that I will be able to get it easily down there. Speaking of getting “stuff” together for Roots I am going across to my parents on Wednesday (which will probably be today when I have finished this post) for my normal fortnightly laundry trip, but this time I will also be printing off a ton of stuff from directions, to notes, to hopefully even some art prints that if I am lucky I can sell. Of course that’s if I’m allowed, but I hope so as I really need to raise some cash to cover my expenses that aren’t being covered from being part of the Roots Team (which is a vast majority of any expense I will incur, just doesn’t cover the fuel enough, but these days that’s not exactly a surprise is it?)

So, yeah, I have to admit that I am really beginning to get nervous and the fact that to be there for before 12 (which is when my info seems to indicate I should be there for) means I have to leave Edinburgh at around 7am, which should get me to Southport just after 11am, so that allows 1 hour for delays… which is not much room for error, but any earlier and I will be overly drained. Mainly as I will be seeing a 9pm showing of “Iron Man” on Thursday night :

Anyway, its all slowly coming together, I have lists of things to do, things to take, and I am sure that it will be an amazing weekend and despite my natural fears I really can’t wait for this, its such a privilege and opportunity.

Oh and of course I will be putting up as many photos of the weekend as I can… which reminds me, for the one or two of you who actually follow my Project365 I sorry for the sporadic updating this month but my printer is still bust and that is not only my printer but also my scanner and also main camera card reader.

So, I better go, I will try and update the blog over the weekend, but I somehow doubt I’ll either have time or be able to find somewhere to upload stuff, so until then… laters.

Yeah, so as many of you probably know (or at least if I think you can put up with any of my geeky ways) I have started playing “World of Warcraft” (wiki, official site) a MMORPG so huge that the number of players worldwide outnumbers many countries (I think its around 6million players).

Firstly some background. Basically WoW (to use its short name) is a computer game which you have to pay a monthly fee to play (around £8-10 per month) and you play online in a “world” populated by other players. If you have ever played Balders Gate, Neverwinter Nights, and even Final Fantasy you have an idea of what a computer RPG (role playing game) is and the concept of “levels” and the such. In short you create a character of a particular race (10 to choose from), split between two factions, the Alliance (goody goody… ish), and the Horde (not so goody goody, but not quite evil) each with 5 races. You then select a “class” for that character from the list for that race. I mainly play a “Blood Elf” “Mage”… which really means nothing unless you know more and to be frank going into the subtlety between races and character types is for another time.

Read more…

After nearly 4 years of (sort of) loyal service, my ipod has died, completely and utterly, 5 restore attempts could not revive it since it uttered its last garbled sounds last Thursday evening. It has been a good friend and will be missed*.

* (well, at least until I save up and get a new one)

What a day… I had the amazing blessing of attending the wedding of two friends, and what happens, I suddenly get hit by an extreme case of being self conscious combined with my general dislike of being in a crowd of strangers. Managed to suppress it well enough, just didn’t feel great. It kinda bubbled away, mainly kept at bay by being with friends and having a laugh, then at the reception it suddenly came back in vengeance when even after asking not to be photographed I was. Normally that would just irritate me but I would then let it go but all it did was make me feel so self conscious that even being with friends just didn’t help. I pushed on but it just stayed there and when the ceilidh started I just left early, needing to get out.

This annoyed me on the way home. I left early, from a friends wedding! I had given in to my basic flight instinct. I should have just went outside got myself together and stopped being such an idiot and then went back in and enjoyed myself as much as I can at a ceilidh even if its an event that at the best of times I feel very self conscious at. My problem is that when I am being overly self conscious that tends to mean I am aware of my size (in every dimension), my general awkwardness around people (which is amplified when I have to hug/dance/etc), the (apparently) different way that my mind/humour/etc works, it all just cascades until I feel completely alienated even if I am with friends, basically I can just feel very disconnected.

This doesn’t happen often (certainly not to such a massive degree), I have learnt to live and accept who I am… most of the time. I am just furious today was a day when despite myself I couldn’t. I just hope I did not detract from my other friends who were attending enjoyment of the day.

I have tried to analyse why today, and I can pinpoint key things which separately are never usually a problem and thing I can easily deal with but since I hadn’t really thought it wasn’t prepared for. I turn 30 in just over a month, and I am not where I wanted to be, either in my work life, spiritual life, and most definitely not my romantic life (which really should just be pronounced dead). As previously mentioned I don’t really like crowds of people I don’t know, and in particular walking into a place full of them. Then there was that whole photograph issue (which I didn’t handle well at all), I hate having my photo taken as I in general don’t have much of a great opinion of the way I look, especially not when I am feeling down. Also I was very drained after this last week, although to be honest I really don’t know why.

So, yeah, if you were at the wedding and wondered what was up, that is basically it and I’m sorry I wasn’t more like my normal (well abnormal) self.

Either way, don’t get all worried about this post, this is just another in a long line (REALLY long line) of me needing to write down things so I can get them sorted in my head (it gets messy from time to time), especially since I have devotions to prepare for tomorrow evening and I still haven’t been able to focus enough to make them… oh and I think my ipod has at long last given up the ghost (its nearly 4 years old)… trust me that is devastating to me.

On the positive side (yes there is one, there always is, that is one truth I have learned in life), the wedding went well, the bride and groom (who are amazing people by the way) were simply glowing with joy and love. The food was good, I made a mistake and thusly didn’t get as much as I would have liked (stupid me), and it sounded like the band for the ceilidh was going to be a good one. It was also funny to see the staff being a bit puzzled why most of my table were refusing alcohol, ah the joys of being in The Sally Army

Oh, and on a complete tangent I got confirmation about Roots and have even now received the staff pack, which made me happy.

I better go, this post is probably going to be one I regret writing in a day or so, especially since as usual I am now feeling better for writing this all out

Laters

Wow, I can hardly believe its April already, at any rate here is my usual monthly retrospective on my Project365…

• “The Tree” and “Examining the Cross” - Both of these were created for the Easter Convention, and annoying “the tree” didn’t show up very well. The examining one is all right but I am really quite pleased with “The Tree”
• “Easter Convention Kids Venue Images” here and here - considering the time spent on them they turned out really well, and Kevin was happy with them, which is good.
• “Risen” - Yes, ANOTHER Easter Convention images (it did take up alot of my creativity this month), I never got to see this one of the screen so I have no idea how it looked there but I liked it.
• “Fire Mage” - I really liked how this one developed, its another photomanip in a similar vein to “Black Eyed Angel”, and just liek that one it can be purchased through redbubble. As for the inspiration, I started playing World of Warcraft again and my main character in it (pic) is a Fire Mage.
• “((deep)) - March 2008” - a leaflet design for ((deep)), I was certainly happy how it turned out.

I am hoping that through April I will be able to start creating sketches and ideas that I can use while at Roots… but since my printer/scanner is currently offline I am not sure how upto date it will be

Laters.

Well its Easter again, the time of the Christian calender where we pause to reflect, remember, and rejoice in the events that took place about a couple decades short of 2000 years ago.

To me there are only 3 major dates (yes, there are other days but really without these three the rest are meaningless dogmatic ritual) in the Christian calender, Christmas, Easter, and Penetcost:

• Christmas, obviously is the birth of Christ, but also represents to me the humanity of Jesus and the knowledge that God took the first step to take on human flesh and walk amongst us.

• Easter is the death and resurrection of Christ, displaying his humanity, love, and majesty. The time to rejoice in our redemption through his sacrifice and our hope in his resurrection.

• Pentecost, a lesser known festival outside Christendom, this is when the Holy Spirit came to all believers, not just a select few as prophesied in scripture so that all men, women, young and old, everyone and anyone, basically this to me is the churches (and I mean that in a global sense not as one “denomination”) birthday.

Now, I HATE Christmas, well, I don’t hate Christmas, I hate rather what it has become, a glorious celebration of excess and materialism… even in the church! The mere fact its at the wrong time of the year most of our imagery is nicked from the “pagan” (I use that term a loose description) festival it was placed on. We have lost our way with “Christmas”, it has become too secular, not that I think it wrong for non-Christians to have a time of the year of celebration and family I think its a fantastic idea. Which is why I get annoyed at Christians getting up in arms at “Winter Festivals” instead of “Christmas Festivals”, I do believe there are bigger issues within our own churches at that time of the year which are more against the TRUE meaning of Christmas than some politically correct nonsense.

Anyway, Pentecost is quite often over looked in some churches, which is a BAD sign. If your church doesn’t celebrate Pentecost go up to your church leaders, take a copy of the book of Acts and smack them about the head until they “have a divine moment!” … I jest of course… maybe… Pentecost is an important day and one I believe that should also be used to reflect on the unity of the body of Christ, or as it is currently the disturbing disunity. No one denomination has got it all right, the Salvation Army certainly hasn’t we have a whole raft of problems, many of which I have ranted about at length before, and no doubt will again.

Of course this is Easter, and kind of the reason I am writing this. Again secular culture and materialism has invaded this time, in a variety of ways. It all starts with the eggs (don’t start, I love my chocolatey goodness as much as the next person, just hear me out on this one), you can argue about where and when we started using easter eggs, my thought its probably an extension from the Passover feast where they are used to symbolise new life (get the link), quite how it turned into a massive chocolate egg which is terrible value for money I have no idea, but they have and in many ways they no longer represent properly what they once did. Of course from eggs you get chicks… which have no real purpose, that I can see, outside a tenuous link, in a Christian Easter except to look at go “aw, ain’t they cute” and then get a hankering for a roast chicken.

So, where does this really leave us, should we be annoyed that people, just as with Christmas, celebrate a time of the year called “easter” as we celebrate “Easter”, no. Get over it. We have a big enough problem with people in our own faith forgetting the true meanings of these celebration’s, lets get our own houses in order first. If we celebrate these times as they should and tell those who want to hear about it then I am sure more people will know about it than if we stand on our soap boxes and shout!

We are above such things, we are called to love, and serve, and save, I believe Francis of Assisi got it bang on when he said to go out and preach the gospel and in needs be used words. We live in a time of where there are lots of words, lost of information, politicians spout rhetoric, televisions blare warped versions of world events, we are asked to accept lies from our leaders as truths (both in and outside the church), perhaps its time we tried a different approach, what if we tried leading by example rather than by standing and shouting our directions. How about we said, come, follow Him, and let our following of the Master be the guide for people to follow and not the booming sound of our own self-indulgent voices!

Ok, that went slightly of tack but I think you should get my drift, these are our celebration but lets make sure WE celebrate them in a good and God honouring way before we even think about looking at others, in fact I seem to remember Christ saying something about specks and logs!

Have a blessed Easter, and if you don’t celebrate Easter then may you have a blessed and refreshing long weekend (see religions can be of some good, they get you time off work :)).

Sir Arthur C Clark has passed away (news item , obituary, wiki).

Through his various works he not only wrote fiction but speculated about the future, and his speculations were some among those that have sparked the imagination of many scientists (geostationary communication satellites for example).

So in a way to remember him, here are “Clarke’s three laws”:

1. “When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.”
2. “The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.”
3. “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

Another month flying past faster than the errosion of our civil liberties and freedoms… ahem… anyway, here are my picks.

• Fluffikans of Borg - and why not he’s cute, in an assimilated kinda way - you can get a t-shirt here if you want one
• Paintings - I’ve almost finished the one of the left now, looking quite good… apart from I got the proportions wrong, but never mind. The two part heart piece (which I really need a name for, I kinda like “Love Divided”) I realy liek especially since you can just see the previous image underneath it which adds an odd edge as on the left its a skull and the right its a face.
• The Burn - done for a CGTalk Daily Sketch thread, my first since December, turned out quite well for an hours work.

And that it. Not many this month as its been a month of random stuff and sketches and not much note worthy material. There is always next month especially as I try and get ready for Roots at the beginning of May… I’m still really excited (and terrified) about that.