California Winter

It's that season of the year again...the one where the sky isn't gridlock grey or oh-crap-what's-burning-this-time brown.

Although I have to admit, those do make for some killer sunsets.

Nevertheless, this picture was taken from the backyard of one of our abodes out here in Southern California. Citrus and blue sky in December. Despite our spiraling housing prices, surprise earthquakes, and annual wildfire celebrations, this is one of the reasons we here at Maple Table Design really don't see ourselves being based anywhere else.

Well, until we have multiple offices spanning the globe, of course.

Happy Holiday's Y'all.

Happy Holidays Everyone!
Now get back out there and face your well-intentioned uncle.

Jeff Soto at RAM

The show's main attraction was a full-wall installation (detail pictured). Overall, Jeff's work retains its graced balance of splash and measure, darkness and comedy. Brushy unfinished elements lean up against precisely articulated lines. Daggers pierce clouds or houses, but there is no obvious effect, and the daggers look less like weapons and more like homages to scrawls in high school text books.

The thing that held back my ever-love for the show was the occasional sense of incompletion in a piece. Sometimes after an initial dag! or nice! I'd notice an element that just looked unfinished or the abandoned for lack of interest. Granted there are striking and satisfying elements that would appear to have resulted from boredom, but the unfinished elements sometimes left me feeling like I didn't need to pay that much attention to the piece after all.

Over all, it was good to be in a room full of Jeff's work.
And a follow-up of fish and chips on a rainy day was nice too.

Rain and Graphite

This time of year is normally pretty slow in the collective office. It's a great chance to catch up on all the research, development and drawing that gets shelved during HTML build-outs, project management, client relations, etc. And when the rains and 'cold' come to Southern Cali, it's just that much easier to play the life of the mind for a while.

MT Lab Project 2 : Rough

lab.mapletable.net/3D_2
Updated to the most recent PPV3D, and it broke everything. After some growling and gnashing of keys, I got over it and dug into the new cool stuff.

Also, did some refining on the FPS navigation but am still not happy with the up/down look action.

Quick and Mediocre Portrait

Graphite on paper

Rough Sketch for 3D Navigation

[ view ]

Sketch of Student

Student at Augie's afraid of due dates.

Current Inspiration

First non-artist/non-designer source of stoke in a long time.

The Power of Design (2008)
by Richard Farson

Woo Lab!

Set up an MT lab at lab.mapletable.net.
Just one toy there currently.
More to come.

Book Sandwich

I love waiting for things to come in the mail as much as I love
getting things in the mail.

Today, I got my new book and TWO Netflix movies.

So I made a book sandwich.

OMG, Why does this take so effin' long?!

The backup that takes a brazillian hours to complete.

Drawing : Ocean

ink and graphite on paper

The Morning Preference

How I'd like to start most days.

Movie Night at Shannon Fang's

Yup. That's a 40 foot inflatable screen. By the time it was dark, the
yard was full of blankets and people. Shannon's neighbors love him.

detail of piece by Ian Francis

Rick and Kelly and I took a trip to Culver City for some art infection.
Good work all around, but I was particularly into Ian Francis' stuff at Kinsey/DesForges