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A Big Bee

When my son was just over a year old, we'd argue about the flying trilobite tattoo on my arm.

"Can you say, 'tri-lo-bite'?"

"Bee," pointing at my arm.

"It looks like a bee, yes. But it's a trilobite."

"Try clapping out the syllables for him," Michelle, the educator, suggested.

"Okay, Calvin,"(clapping each syllable)"Tri-lo-bite," I enunciated.

Random clapping. "Bee."

Again, clapping each syllable. "Tri-lo-bite". 

An exasperated look for his father, the toddler touched my winged trilobite tattoo, looked me in the eye and said:

"A big bee."

Now he's two, and can say it just fine. After saying it clearly for the first time, holding the fossil above (minus the wings: I found the wings in the years once years ago and snapped the pic - birds had eaten the rest of the poor monarch).

After saying "Trilobite", he laughed, refused to give back the fossil, and a chase scene ensued. 

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
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Ceratosaurus Science Ink

Another dinosaur tattoo design!

In March of 2012, I posted a bit about the process behind paleontology author and blogger Brian Switek's Allosaurus tattoo design, which he commissioned from me and had inked at the Heart of Gold Tattoo studio.

Brian Switek is the author of Written in Stone and My Beloved Brontosaurus and the former blogger at Laelaps on Wired, and Dinosaur Tracking on the Smithsonian site.

Recently, he's taken his Laelaps blog to National Geographic's new "science salon" blog network, Phenomena. 

You can read more about how I personalized it with hidden Easter Eggs in the design to make it specifically for Brian in the original post.

Brian liked it enough, he needed another carnivore.

Ceratosaurus!

Sketching the horned beastie in my Moleskine. Ceratosaurus was much like Allosaurus but with a wicked horn, and devilish ridges over its eyes. 

My work in progress, inking using ArtRage Studio Pro. The inks in ArtRage are pretty phenomenal. In this case, I mostly stuck with the technical pen. 

Illustrators out there can see why I enjoy Artrage so much. It's like working on a desktop in realspace. Reference photos pinned, all my tools on the quarter-wheel to the left, all my paints in the palette on the right. 

My first proposed final design. 

You can see one of the differences I made from the Allosaurus in the top image in this post:  The allosaurus had hollow, outlined vertebrae and ribs, with solid black limbs and skull and the Ceratosaurus has the reverse. The dinosaurs are similar enough (and I was proud of my skull linework on the Cerato) that I thought this might be interesting.

Brian made the call, and it was the right one to have both matching: outlined vertebrae and ribs, solid limbs and skull. The two predators are, after all, side-by-side on his arm and so the similarity strengthens the design. 

From left: Allosaurus, revised Ceratosaurus, initial Ceratosaurus. Click to enlarge.
Yeah. The middle one matches the Allosaurus much better, and the skulls have more impact in solid black. 

Brian visited Jon at Heart of Gold tattoo in Utah again, and here's the final result!  

Brian's arm photo by Tracey Switek.

It was amazing working with Brian Switek again and boy oh boy - I want a dino skeleton tattoo now myself.

You can read more about how the two skeletons I largely worked from for the Allosaurus and Ceratosaurus are related over on Brian's post on the new Laelaps!

If you'd like to see more of my science ink designs, check them out at my portfolio at glendonmellow.com under the science tattoo header! 

Thanks Brian!

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
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Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Creative Depression And How I Got Rid of It

When I die one day, my biggest creative regret will likely be all the artwork I didn't have a chance to finish. Headlines marketed at artists and illustrators like "How to Increase Your Creativity" and "Get Your Creative Juices Flowing" never make sense to me.

Ideas aren't the problem. Time to execute them to my satisfaction is. 

Not every idea makes it past the sketch phase. 

So it may seem strange when I say that looking back, I was in a creative depression for much of last year. I was almost locked-up, I could barely act. Everything seemed too difficult: opening the research files, choosing digital or paper sketching, creating process templates, setting up the easel, dealing with my dismantled studio - it was all too much.

I think I know why, now.

I quit my full-time, 10-year, well-paying job managing an art store the day after I found out my wife was pregnant back in 2010. One friend put it, that he, "nods approvingly at the madness of it".  The final few months of my wife's pregnancy had me working from home, getting a steady stream of small revenue but exciting science-art projects. When Calvin was born, it was great, all three of us together. 

I completed this commission, Tylosaurus Reef around the time of my son being born. 

It was the best time of my life (being a dad, being freelance, blogging for freakin' Scientific American is a dream come true) but barely being able to keep up financially was hurting us. Michelle and I have weathered tough times before - we've been married for 9 years - but it was just us. The weight of responsibility for my son to have what he needs was all-encompassing. The cafe job felt professionally like dues I've already paid as a younger man, but ya do what ya gotta do. 

When Michelle went back to teaching, this was the state of things. I worked those 4 part-time jobs while being a full-time stay-at-home dad. Being a freelancing dad was a process I never finished learning how to do.

I painted this small oil on my first day of full-time freelancing. "Freelance Leap". I never did figure out how to fly all the way to those freelancing fairgrounds in the distance. 

The depression really set in for me last fall after my son started daycare. It was the right time for him to go: he loved it almost immediately, running around, learning like an exuberant, friendly and hyper little sponge. 

The new expense of daycare and the empty house/studio brought it all home for me: 

• With the publishing market being where it is, 
• With scientific funding being so small, 
• With science-art as a field barely crawling on the periphery of cultural awareness, 
• With my history growing up with one parent struggling to keep my sisters and I going,
• With my experience going from job-to-job in a steady stream since I was 14 years old, 
• With my amazing wife and amazing son being here in my life, 

I realized something.

I am not cut out for full-time freelancing.

I sent out resumes to a very small number of studios around Toronto that do work I respect and might be good for my fine art/science/social media/management background, and you know what? One of 'em hired me, and it's fantastic. 

My energy is back, I'm excited to go to work (the team there is brilliant, welcoming and fun), and I'm excited to get up at 5 a.m. to blog or sketch again. And we have groceries. 

The fallout is, there are a few people who have commissioned me I owe apologies to for being later than I ever expected. Three of those projects are still in the works and I hope I make them kick-ass and worth the patience that's been given to me.

I lifted the creative depression by starting to become part of a team doing work I believe in, and by bringing my share into the household. Never underestimate the impact that 

• supportive people, 
• new influences and 
• livable income 

can have on your creativity. 

Okay, so it's not all perfect. For example: my face. 

Art is no longer a grind, and in 2013, I think it will be an adventure again. 

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
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Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Latest Fashion From Paris

Coloured this pencil sketch using the Sketch Club app on my iPhone. The original is owned by Morgan Jackson of Biodiversity in Focus.

We're having a light family day at home after staying up late with good friends to ring in the New Year.

I'm going to try posting quick sketches more often. 2012 was my lightest year of blogging here on The Flying Trilobite, though not of blogging in general considering my posts on Symbiartic.

Last year was fantastic and I did some of the most important illustration artwork I've ever had the opportunities for to date.

Can't wait to see what 2013 brings.

New Year's Goblin

New Year's Goblin © Glendon Mellow

Happy New Year to all my friends, families and supporters of my art and The Flying Trilobite blog!

Next year, may all your goblins be small-ish and cheery.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
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Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Field Guide to the Jewel Beetles (Coleoptera: Buprestidae) of Northeastern North America

Cover photo of Buprestis rufipes by Ted MacRae

Buprestis striata field guide page showing colour variations.

Sample key to genera page. All characters used in the key are illustrated with either high magnification photographs or simple illustrations.

Trachys generic page from Field Guide to Jewel Beetles featuring original artwork by scientific illustrator/artist Glendon Mellow.

(*All above image captions by Morgan Jackson.) 
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Last summer, I had Beetle Week here on The Flying Trilobite, to show a series of Ontario jewel beetle paintings I was commissioned to illustrate by entomologist and insect photographer Morgan Jackson, blogger at Biodiversity in Focus. 

The book is now available - including limited copies for FREE, and its a beauty!

I'm so thrilled my illustrations get to share the same pages as photos from Ted McCrae, Morgan Jackson, and many others.

My thanks to Morgan and his co-authors, Stephen M Paiero, Adam Jewiss-Gaines, Troy Kimoto, Bruce D Gill, and Stephen A Marshall.

For another look at the book, and details on getting a copy, check out Morgan's announcement post at Biodiversity in Focus. Make sure to read how this book came about, and learn about the changing beetle landscape.

You can also find merchy-merch on sale in my online store  with the illustrations I created - greeting cards, framed prints, iPhone cases, tees, 2013 calendar and more.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Black and White Trilobite iPhone Case

New iPhone case in my online store!  A sophisticated black and white trilobite for those moments in life where you need your glowing device to make a statement: "hey, I don't need hundreds of colours".
There's more cases available than are pictured here for iPhone 3,4, & 5 as well as iPod touch - and coming in the new year, iPad cases too! 

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Interview with Legendary Illustrator James Gurney

"Inspiring New Realities: interview with James Gurney"

Check out my Symbiartic interview at Scientific American: http://t.co/tvYotjaw

Beetles + Trilobites 2013 Calendar

It's here! And marked 10% off!

http://www.redbubble.com/people/flyingtrilobite/calendars/9728704-an-inordinate-fondness-for-beetles-trilobites

RedBubble print quality is fantastic, and there's no more economical way to get your hands on some surreal science for the new year.

Gamers for Godlessness 24 Hour Gameathonapalooza!

Lousy Canuck (Jason Thibeault) and JT Eberhard are currently engaged in a 24 hour long video gaming marathon, with guests Skyping in! Money raised goes to the fine people at Camp Quest and Women in Secularism.

I'll be joining them for a chat (and to help keep them awake) starting at about 1 am tonight!  Probably talk about atheism in comic book games, and I'm hoping to discuss Mass Effect and Assassin's Creed.

Oh - the little banner I whipped up, above, was made on my iPhone using Sketch Club with some lettering a cloning done in Photoshop afterward.

Visit them here!  You can comment and join in the fun.
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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Arthropod Meeting

Sometimes I forget just how useful warm-up sketches and painting can be. Enjoying taking old pencil sketches and digitally watercolour painting them with ArtRage to get my engine running for commissioned projects. 

I tend to build up a lot of neurotic "all conditions must be perfect in life, studio and mindset" hang-ups before I get started on things. It's good to visually slap myself out of it by working on pieces like this that are already decent drawings, and just play loose with the colour. 

I like this enough I made prints available in my store. - - - - - - - -

Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Art On The Wall

As much as I feel satisfied when I create something(satisfied the twitchy itch to draw or paint has been sated temporarily, that is), I feel excited about seeing that someone is enjoying the finished art.

Here's journalist Tyler Dukes' (@mtdukes) art wall, featuring a print of my Darwin Took Steps, an image by Alex Wild, and many others:

Tyler Dukes' science-art wall.

Entomologist and insect photographer Morgan Jackson (@BioInFocus) of the Biodiversity in Focus blog has my original drawing Latest Fashion from Paris now framed and sitting among his fly genitalia diagrams in his lab: 

Morgan Jackson displayed Latest Fashion From Paris in his lab, and on Instagram.

Anyone else out there have some of my artwork displayed? On a wall, an iPhone case or sitting on a shelf?  I'd love to share some more pictures of Flying Trilobite art in the wild.


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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Get Your Hands Dirty To Do Important Work

Sowing Seeds & Fossils © Glendon Mellow

Get your hands dirty to do important work. 

Dive in, take chances, don't expect shortcuts. 

Be driven by dreams and sweat through labour. 

Like sowing seeds with fossils in the earth. 

Sometimes something astonishing will grow. 

Ammonite Flax Flower © Glendon Mellow

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Prints available. - - - - - - - -

Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Halloween with a Turtle

Our son is almost 2 and loved Hallowe'en. Even ventured up to a couple of houses on his own while we waited at the walk.

My wife read him "Goodnight Goon" to send him off to bed.

Happy Hallowe'en brave turtle!

Illustrated Five Word Stories

Last Friday, I was messing around on my iPhone while waiting to see my respirologist. I became fascinated by the #FiveWordStories hashtag on Twitter, masterfully being played around with by comic book writer Gail Simone and many other people.

I decided to try a few of my own, and attach some past artwork. I wasn't sure at first if attaching the art was cheating, but judging from the favourites and retweets, I kept going. 





It was a lot of fun and a nice creative challenge. Maybe I'll try that again.

Most of the images above are available for sale in my online shop as prints, cards and more. You can find me as @flyingtrilobite on Twitter.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

9 Years

High Five

High Five - Flying Trilobite and Tiktaalik © Glendon Mellow

This high five goes out to my bloggy buddy-cop policing science-art, Kalliopi Monoyios. Kalliopi and I co-blog on Symbiartic, the art + science blog on the Scientific American blog network.

For the month of September 2012, we set out to post 30 pieces of science-art, in a SciArt of the Day feature - and we made it. At times it was a bit of a marathon, but the wealth of art out there and the graciousness of the many fine artists, illustrators and creators we tapped on the shoulder was amazing. Thanks everyone!

We showed art by a viking blacksmith, horror illustrator, abstract expressionist, trompe l'oiel, superhero comic artist, cartoonists, fermented bacteria clothing, steampunk Renaissance rhinos, polarized micro-thin rocks, concept art and much more. The attempt was in part to challenge perceptions on what effective science communication can look like.

What does the future hold? We have more plans, lots of long and short posts on the go, and we'll continue to showcase creators and their images relating to science communication, education and entertainment.

You can see them all at the SciArt of the Day label on Symbiartic. We also have the whole first year's worth of science+art posts indexed here.

And Kalliopi: props. 

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

There's a Trilobite loose in the App Store!

That's how this oil painting:

© Glendon Mellow

Became this:

© Glendon Mellow

Using Manga Camera, Halftone and Instagram, respectively. I love seeing my images in different versions.

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!

Two-Headed Mutant Ammonite

© Glendon Mellow

I mentioned on Twitter I was drawing a two-headed mutant ammonite. 
Here's the discussion. 

. @flyingtrilobite's tweet makes me wonder: are there any fossils of two-headed animals?

— Ed Yong(@edyong209) August 29, 2012

@edyong209 @flyingtrilobite Yep. A two-headed reptile hatchling:news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/12/0…

— Mary Beth Griggs (@MaryBethGriggs) August 29, 2012

I LOVE SCIENCE AND TWITTER AND THE WORLD RT @marybethgriggs: @flyingtrilobite Yep. A two-headed reptile hatchling:bit.ly/RmKx5s

— Ed Yong(@edyong209) August 29, 2012

@edyong209 See rsbl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/3/1/81… in Biology Letters - 2-headed champsosaur from China's Cretaceous

— Andrew A. Farke (@AndyFarke) August 29, 2012

@edyong209 If you believe in yourself, one day *you* might be a two-headed fossil, Ed. Make your own dreams come true.

— Glendon Mellow (@flyingtrilobite) August 29, 2012

@edyong209 @flyingtrilobite SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY.

— Brian George (@brianggeorge) August 29, 2012

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Original artwork on The Flying Trilobite © to Glendon Mellow
under Creative Commons Licence.
Portfolio
Blog
Print Shop

Find me on Symbiartic, the art+science blog on the Scientific American Blog Network!