After seeing the image below of a buried crab claw the movie, "Princess Bride" popped into my head. In the movie Mandy Patinkin plays Inigo Montoya, a man out to avenge his father's death. Just before starting a sword fight he proclaims in a polite, but serious tone, "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father prepare to die." It seemed logical that a seagull would eat a crab, and that one of that crabs offspring would one day grow up with a huge claw to avenge his father's death.

Two external images were used from my portfolio. The bird I used actually went over the top of where a different gull used to be. This birds mouth was opened up. The extra parts of crab leg were painted in Photoshop.

Moon Dog wasn't preconceived. He started out as nothing more than trying to blend a dog (see image below) face into that of a bald man from istockphoto.com. I removed the man's eyes, replacing them with a rooster's eye from istockphoto.com. The moon shape is the result of messing around with Photoshop's liquify tool. The background image is a shot I took of fireworks in downtown Seattle of this year.

You may be asking yourself, "What on earth inspired you to make that thing?" My response would be, "the plate of sushi seen below and lyrics from 'The Dead of Night,' by Depeche Mode." The head shape is from istockphoto.com. The eyes were removed and replaced with a dead fish eye and a woman's eye. Sushi parts were brushed into the head. The entire body below the head was lovingly made with sushi.

This image started with the image of leaves going through change seen below. The ant was painted from reference, no underpainting. I'm quite pleased with how the ant turned out. It would have been so easy to just use a photo, but one must constantly challenge themselves to keep growing. Woman is from istockphoto.com. Foreground created with a grassy brush in Photoshop.

The inspiration for this piece began with the image of the hand seen below. Originally the idea was going to be something about the hand of God being guided by little hands, with big mouths, blowing up Tinky Winky. In the end I almost gave up doing anything because the hand didn't have the right look. With a deadline fast approaching I opted to turn the hand into a rocky mountain in silhouette, which was combined with an image from istockphoto.com. I painted in the organic beam. I then overlayed another image from my personal collection, a shot of a leaf with water drops to create the planetary-like orbs.

I enjoy kidding people about their invisible friends. Even I have one: The Flying Spaghetti Monster, FSM. But the difference between my invisible friend and your invisible friend is measured by how we invoke them in our daily lives. I do not pray to FSM, nor does FSM act like some supreme being lording over the earth, picking who lives and who dies, and FSM doesn't answer prayers, unleash hurricanes, tsunamis, or earthquakes because of how people try to live their lives.

We are all used to seeing the familiar icon of a red circle with a red slash denoting "don't." Only this time there's nothing there but the invisible friend. Combine this with a list of the truly horrible things said and done in the name of one's god provides all the more reason why common sense must prevail.

I set out to create a wacky image by adding all sorts of images to the image below. All external photos were shot by myself.

The challenge to myself was to create something out of a perfectly formed flower in under two hours. I was going to turn the center into some kind of face sore, but then I thought of substituting an object for a falling petal that would symbolize death. Finding a white casket would be the answer. The whole idea also appealed to me because the flower image is bright on top and blurry and dark below, which would complement the symbolism of life and death. I removed one petal through painting and cloning. The original flower image doesn't extend much beyond the bottom petal so this extended area is a combination of painting and cutouts of the top greens, enlarged, blurred and blended together. The upper greens were also manipulated to accommodate the new format

Time to complete: 45 minutes

This is a particulary nasty creature which latches onto the male species until insemination is complete. Once done she kills the male and stores him deep inside her body, beneath the earth. Once the little ones hatch she regurgitates the father for them to eat.

The image was from the manhole lid shown below. It was duplicated, rotated, and sized until I had about 15 copies sitting on top of one another. I then painted this object to create depth. Eggs, leaves, and teeth were all painted. One image I shot of a slug was overlayed and brushed in to create the wet look.

Pleasure Probes was created by clipping out just the woman statue from the image below. It was duplicated, manipulated, outlined, and colored. Probes were painted in. additional linework and effects.

I carefully positioned the statue character, which was cut out from the image below, to create a strong composition. Photoshop was used to paint the figure. Background image found here.

This image was made from various parts of the image below. Painted in Photoshop. The title is open to interpretation.

Used Photoshop to turn a dingy boat into the new and beautiful "Little Red Boat."

Close Encounter came very close to never happening. I had a terrible time trying to come up with an idea using the image below. It finally came together after browsing my personal stock of images and finding two additional images, one of some white berries, the other, a rock. Lots of painting and color adjustments to get it where I wanted. The image is purposefully ambiguous as to location and identity of the objects.

A larger version is available in the Twist of Lime Gallery.

Only At Night was made using a single image, a closeup of prickly cactus. The characters were formed with Photoshop's clone brush and a semi-hard brush. I cloned the cactus skin area at different opacities until I built up some rough shapes. Even the strange green dusty air was made from the skin of the cactus, as well as the moon.

A larger version is available in the Twist of Lime Gallery.