Art Monday: Science Checkmate

A couple of days ago, I used Photoshop to edit my painting, Science Chess Accommodating Religion. I want to try changing the relationships of the pieces, and making the image more graphic and cartoony so it could appear on a t-shirt. I am thinking about captioning it "Science Checkmate".

Michael Barton, of The Dispersal of Darwin suggested placing the pieces around the fallen bishop. Great Idea, Michael! It changes the way they appear utterly. Finally, I will need to punch up the whites and reds so it can be printed on fabric with more vibrant and clear colour.
I have to say, I'm working with Photoshop Elements these days, a program that came in in the box with my Wacom Intuos 3 tablet. I didn't use it on my old computer, but Elements (so far) appears to be superior to me old Photoshop CS. The selection brush is one of the coolest things ever. I thought it was just for tracing and it took a moment after selecting the outline of the Mendel piece to realize it simply expands the selection field to wherever you've brushed! It was a magic moment.


I'll post the final cartoony image and t-shirt another day, once it's in the repro shop.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery *** Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ***

Science Checkmate

Using my oil painting Science Accommodating Religion, I've been noodling around with the image.

This might look good on a t-shirt if I punch up the colours to a less painterly, more graphic cartoony look. Hmm. I saved the image with all the pieces in separate layers so I can move them around and resize them easily. Now that I look at it, perhaps the pieces should not be so evenly spaced.

Looking for opinions: how should I tweak it for a shirt in my repro shop?

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery *** Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ***

Contest winner!

Winner of my first contest:

Coturnix!

Bora, you will receive a signed print of Science-Chess Accomodating Religion some time in the next few weeks.

Holy Monkey that was close.

I had to call in a second judge to weigh in accuracy factors and the timing of entries. I've also already, (appropriately, I think) tweeted the winning announcement.

Here are my original ideas, and a breakdown of how Coturnix won the print:
Pieces in the back, left to right:
-Darwin's tree of life drawing
-Wave-particle duality
-Kekule's dream of an ourobouros representing the benzene ring
-Mendel's peas
-Copernican heliocentrism
-Red bishop as religion, transparent, cracked, alone and with a halo, the halo being a symbol that most religions incorporate into their visual iconography
Toppled in the foreground, left to right:
-Stem cells
-Needle representing vaccines

But dude, this was close.

Basically, by mine and my second judge's tally, Scicurious actually had all of the correct answers - but the last after contest closing at noon today. Sorry Sci! I had to draw a line.

The piece representing wave-particle duality was the toughie - some of the answers had me scurrying to look up science concepts or history I was unaware of! Anonymous-Trish had it almost bang-on, but if I am looking at the difference between Coturnix's "radioactivity" answer and Anon-Trish & James' "Curie's theory of radioactive decay and using it for carbon dating", I chose the earlier answer.

Thanks to everyone who played along - this was fun. And I like Bora's suggestion to see this on a t-shirt. And I think I need to send Greg Laden a Mr. Bill made out of plasticine.

Thanks everyone!
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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery *** Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ***

"Science-Chess Accommodating Religion"...contest!

"I'm thinking scientific accommodation of religion is akin to letting someone take your King's Rook off the board because you're winning."

This painting was originally created due to the above Twitter tweet I made, inspired by the writing of Jerry Coyne, Ophelia Benson, PZ Myers, Mike Haubrich, Stephanie Zvan, Greg Laden, Jason Thibeault, Russell Blackford and Richard Dawkins. This painting is an homage to your writing, and the other atheists out there unafraid to speak up (I am sure I have left many out). Mike liked it enough to add it to his rotating quotes, and that got me thinking about how I would visualize it.

Since I began blogging my art, I have struggled with themes of secularism and atheism without being cartoonish or overly mocking. Science and my surreal riffs are fun and fascinating for me, but atheist painting concepts have been a challenge.

The contest: identify all the pieces. I will give the first person to figure them all out a signed print from my reproduction store. Blog comments here at this Flying Trilobite post only to qualify (not Twitter or Facebook at this time, please, it will be hard to see who was first). A higher quality view of the image can be seen in my Reproduction Shop.

Let's say...in order of left to right, with the two toppled pieces in the foreground following the red piece in sequence? I will be away for my usual Art Monday, so let's leave this contest in its stead.
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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery *** Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ***

New items in the Repro Shop

Mythical Flying Trilobite Fossil III is now available as a greeting card, matted print, canvas print (my favourite!) and more. The quality at RedBubble is great. Just let Scicurious at Neurotopia tell you. (Thanks to Mr. Sci too!)
Darwin Took Steps is possibly my most popular image right now. I've added a few new selections of the pencil drawing version of the shirt, below.

The colour portrait of our man Charles is also available in a variety of colour shirts, as seen on Open Laboratory 2008. The shirts are sweatshop-free and a portion of the proceeds go toward the Beagle Project. V-neck, girl-fitted sleeves, short- or long-sleeves.

You can find the rest of the items in the shop here.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery ### Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ###

Secular Nation Podcast featuring Flying Trilobite

***Edit! Scheduled date and time have changed! Watch the sidebar for details. (We don't want to overshadow Obama in that timeslot. He's a nice guy.)

In an upcoming podcast, I'll be speaking with David Driscoll on the Secular Nation Podcast.

My Darwin Took Steps image is featured on the current issue of Secular Nation magazine, thanks to editor-in-chief Tom Melchiorre.

Check it out, it should be fun. I'll have to gargle and speak in a whisper until then, but if you missed me at ScienceOnline '09 last weekend, you'll be able to hear my heroic tenor tones wax philosophical about art and science on Friday.

If the Darwin Took Steps oil painting is to your liking, don't forget to check out the reproductions available in my online shop. I think there's still time to pick up cards, prints, canvas repros and sweatshop-free t-shirts in a variety of colours to give to your evolution-loving and rational friends for Darwin Day (Feb 12th).

And half the proceeds from the sales of my Darwin Took Steps swag goes toward helping build a reproduction of the legendary Beagle that took Darwin on the voyage that changed everything. These Beagle Project people are serious, committed and inspiring. Why not help build an educational and scientific mission to resonate in our day as Darwin's voyage resonated in his?
Catch you on the podcast!

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow under Creative Commons Licence.
Flying Trilobite Gallery ### Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop ### 2009 Calendar available for a limited time

2008: cake smashing fossils

Looking over my shoulder at the trail of scientifically-induced paint spatters I have left strewn in my wake, I'm gonna share. Here's a glance at handful of The Flying Trilobite's 2008 images.

This year, I've put up 36 artworks, 26 of which were new (the remainder pulled from my pre-online portfolio) and 17 of which were in colour. I began this blog as self-promotion, and I've also dramatically increased my output. The icy sorbet next to the smashed cake is the amazing and fascinating bloggers and commenters I get to interact with.
January 2008: some incorrectly-assembled arthropods clung to the walls of the interwebs. The debut of a new banner.

February: The Charles Darwin portrait no one asked for. It debuted originally on Darwin Day over at the online literary 'zine, The Eloquent Atheist. It later showed up (by my count) on over half a dozen other blogs in English and Spanish, and remains popular in my DeviantArt gallery and Online Reproduction store. Darwin Took Steps will also soon be appearing in print, possibly in more than one venue! I can confirm that it is featured on the front cover of the current issue of Secular Nation.

March: The Flying Trilobite debuted on Facebook, in both the Pages and Blog Networks, keeping me in touch with many readers who I would otherwise be unaware of. I have refrained from sending Facebook fans Zombie attacks and Garden Patch decorations, though I have made Flair.

March was also my first cake smashing anniversary.A new blog banner launched in time for the inaugural post of the Scibling-melded blog, Of Two Minds in March.

April: Began Art Mondays, reviewed Darwin: The Evolution Revolution at the Royal Ontario Museum for the fine folks at The Beagle Project.

May: Wrote Flying & Asthma based on faulty searches that find their way here. The conversation continued with the insightful and thoughtful Zach of When Pigs Fly Returns and Jeff of Blue Collar Scientist.

June: New tattoo.

Hosted The Boneyard and focused on a small portion of the amazing paleo-inspired artwork that finds life online. I promised bunnies this year, and I delivered a creationist bunny on Haldane's Precambrian Puzzle when it was still wet.

July.

August: Lost a blog-friend at the beginning of our friendship. I'm not the only one who misses Jeff Medkeff, The Blue Collar Scientist. He managed to inspire me with the story of his brave last days. Jeff's death shook me for some time, though our comments had been brief.

I wrote about Inspiration and Drugs.
Completed the blog banner for The Meming of Life, the free-wheeling wonderful parenting blog by Dale McGowan.

Launched The Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop through the wonderful Redbubble after some advice from artist-illustrator Heather Ward. Proceeds from the sale of the Darwin Took Steps image reproductions will go to The Beagle Project.

September: My good offline friend, artist Christopher Zenga took his Walking Tedd paintings and drawings online at The Day After.

October: donated some studio time to The Centre for Inquiry - Toronto lecture featuring PZ Myers of Pharyngula. Got to meet and shake hands with PZ, Skatje, Larry Moran, Geoff Isaac, Amanda Peet, Monado, Gary Roberts, Katie Kish and Justin Trottier and many others. Great weekend.

November: Began to plan for attending and moderating at ScienceOnline'09. I'm pretty freakin' excited. Ahem.

December: Launched my most successful reproduction, the 2009 calendar, and added a Darwin t-shirt to my store. Jointly posted holiday trilobites with Marek of eTrilobite. Emails regarding publication began to float my way...

A special thanks to all those who made it such a great year. I know I'm missing many, but here goes anyway: Mo, Eric J, Traumador, Craig, Bond, Leslie, Sean, Chris, Marek, Stephanie, Mike, Dale, Shelley & Steve, Carl, Michael, Heather, Brian, Jeff, Zach, Lim, Kristjan, Betül, Emile, Karen, Eric O, Jeff H, Raptor, Bora, HW & the Captain, my Facebook fans, Atheist Nexus peeps, DeviantArt freaks, Redbubble watchers, my family, my friends, and most of all my wife Michelle who gets to watch me freak out at each paintings' ugly phase.

Merry 2009!

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my blog, gallery and reproduction store.
2009 Calendar available now!

Calendar peeky-peep

Here's some more peeks at The Flying Trilobite 2009 Calendar.

March.This is the original Mythical Flying Trilobite Fossil painted on shale. There should be a new one gracing my blog banner early in the New Year.

May.

June.

The calendar is available by clicking on the back-cover image in my sidebar, any of the images above, or by clicking here.

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my blog, gallery and reproduction store.

Art Monday: hadrosaur sketching at the museum

Some museum sketching pics from November, taken at the Royal Ontario Museum.

My nephew and I sketching a Corythosaurus skull he found interesting. He's part of the Explorer's Club there, and received a nice treasure for all the visits this year.
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Comparing my Gryposaurus incurvimanus drawing to the original. I like the interesting reflections of the new Crystal architecture on the glass in this shot.
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The Gryposaurus skull drawing is also featured as one of the dozen months of 2009 in my 1st-ever calendar, on sale for about 23 bucks. And there's still time to get it for the New Year.- -
All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my blog, gallery and reproduction store.

Darwin on a pink tee!

In time for the festive Newtonmas to Darwin Day season, there's new items in The Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop! Personally, I'm giving some for Krismas.
The popular Darwin Took Steps image is now available in colour on American Apparel shirts. As before, a portion of the purchase of my Darwin-tees will go toward supporting The Beagle Project, so you wear a surreal image of the controversial biologist-adventurer with pride.

Darwin Took Steps shirts are available in a wide range of colours, as well as four styles of shirt. Just click the t-shirt button and take a look at the choices.
Sweat-shop free, and starting at $23.94 U.S.! RedBubble accepts Australian, U.K., American and Canadian currencies too.
This year I have also put together a calender, a first for me. If you're a fan of my artwork, or surreal scientific illustration, this is the best way to pick up a dozen prints of my work in one place. Here's a some shots of the calender, $22.99 U.S.:

Hmm. I'm kind of digging that white background. Maybe a re-design in the New Year? You can also visit the RedBubble-hosted store and click through to see every month.

Order soon to guarantee it in for Christmas and New Year's!

I've also added cards, prints and canvas-reproductions of my popular Haldane's Precambrian Puzzle in each configuration!

With such a dizzying array of holidays coming up, give the gift of Flying Trilobite.

(Product shots from RedBubble! Thanks RedBubble, you're super-keen!)

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my blog, gallery and reproduction store.

Make your holiday special...

...say "I love you" with extinct arthropods.

"But honey, all the atheists are doing it!"

The original Mythical Flying Trilobite Fossil painting on shale, is now available as a greeting card, matted print or canvas print in The Flying Trilobite Reproduction shop. My shop is through RedBubble, and they accept 'Murican, Canuck, Bloke, and Mate funds, so that's nice and easy for about half of my readers. I'm mighty pleased with the reproduction quality.

Here's a shot of a few of the cards. Purchase of any prints, cards or shirts of my Darwin Took Steps I hope will make for a memorable Darwin Day 2009 and a portion of the profits goes to helping The Beagle Project. Nifty!

- - All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my blog, gallery and reproduction store.

Darwin kickin' it on the Edge...r

Darwin is my Charlie!

Yesterday, I spotted our energetic and vigorous friend over at The Edger.

Tyler Handley has written a terrific post taking a stab at defining types of atheist art, with his article The Art of New-Atheism. Tyler has included a link to The Flying Trilobite art gallery over at DeviantArt, under the heading, "Art that is made for the purpose of representing a passion for science and its promotion".

Hmm, is that a decent description of what I do?

Later, under the heading, "Art that is made for the purpose of iconically depicting giants of science, skepticism, and atheism", Mr. Darwin and his stairs made an appearance.

I'll quote my comment on the article here for discussion, (and a bit of promotion for The Beagle Project and the support I'm offering from my Reproduction Shop), or please follow the link, and see the rest of the images Tyler has compiled.

Here's my comment:

Thank you for including my Flying Trilobite gallery and Darwin Took Steps piece
in this important post, Tyler.

I hope you don’t mind if I add that proceeds from the sales of Darwin Took Steps shirts, prints and cards goes to the Beagle Project in support of their noble and educational work.

This is an interesting topic I wrestle with daily. I am sorely tempted to create some overtly atheist art; for me, I find it hard to think of anything other than satire or horror of religion. So instead, I focus on the wonder of science. Do other artists have this problem? (emphasis added)

It's pretty exciting for me that my Darwin Took Steps was included on the same discussion as Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot photo. It'll sink in eventually.

Even Jesus riding on a dinosaur can't take that feeling away.

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details. Please visit my

blog, gallery and reproduction store. Support The Beagle Project!

Support The Beagle Project with Flying Trilobite Reproductions

The Flying Trilobite Reproduction Shop is now open at Redbubble.com.

Following in the footsteps of the stellar Diana Sudyka, I will be donating a portion of the sales of a re-scanned Darwin Took Steps to The Beagle Project. Let's get this boat in the water, eh?!

I've re-scanned the image (originally it was still wet - oil paints can take months to dry) and added a bit of text. Here's a sample:


Darwin Took Steps is currently available as a gator-board mounted print, and as greeting cards. I thought this would be nice to send as a Darwin Day 2009 card. More formats may appear in future: Redbubble.com has some nifty-keen stuff, so drop me an email or reply if you would love to have a staircase-headed Charles in another format.

(Edit: I've added a variety of t-shirts based on the original pencil drawing, as well as cards, matted prints, and the colour image without words.)

Purchasing this image will also save me from having to hang-glide to The Beagle with cucumber sandwiches with crusts cut-off for the crew. No one wants that, right?

The link for purchase (in multiple currency choices!) is here. Jokes about "flying trilobite reproduction" may also now ensue.

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All original artwork on The Flying Trilobite Copyright to Glendon Mellow. The contents of this blog are under a Creative Commons Licence. See sidebar for details.