David Barr Kirtley

Science fiction author and podcaster

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My First Painting with My New Tablet

December 14, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Recently I came across the website of artist Goro Fujita, who does really appealing artwork that frequently features robots. His site also has some tutorial videos. I watched these and thought to myself, Hey, that could work. I haven’t really tried to do digital art since the days of DeluxePaint II, and I was struck that someone could do such beautiful, natural-looking artwork entirely on a computer. (I’ve been thinking about teaching myself to paint or something, and I was just in the university art store the other day looking at supplies, but I quickly realized that even if I had the time, space, and/or energy to set up an easel, clean brushes, etc., there’s no way I could even afford the paint.) Goro apparently uses some fancy gizmo that lets you draw directly on the screen. That looks awesome, but at $1000 or so is way out of my price range, but the same company makes much, much cheaper versions for hobbyists. The cheaper version doesn’t let you draw directly on the screen, but it does let you wield a pressure-sensitive stylus. I decided to splurge and get myself one.

During the time it took for the thing to arrive by mail, I poked around and watched a bunch of other tutorial videos on YouTube, and I learned about such paint-program functions as “layers.” Well, the tablet finally arrived yesterday. Unfortunately, I spent all evening trying to get Photoshop Elements (which came with the tablet) to work with my computer. Finally I gave up and installed a different piece of bonus software, Corel Painter Essentials. I fiddled around with it for half an hour or so before heading off to bed.

This morning I got up and started painting. Here’s the first piece I produced with my new drawing tablet. I call it Arr, This Island Be Aptly Named:

David Barr Kirtley art illustration pirate

I can’t believe how well it turned out for my first attempt. Seriously, if you have any interest in drawing whatsoever you should really think about getting one of these tablets. (I ordered the medium white Wacom Bamboo Fun.)

Here’s the development process for this image:

I just started fooling around, having no inkling that I would be spending all day on this piece. I wanted to do something dynamic and aggressive, where an arm was reaching out toward you or something. After I drew the sword, I decided to make him a pirate:


I started shading and doing some details. At this point, I was imagining that he was climbing over the rail of a ship and was about to go all Napoleanic on someone’s ass.
I decided that I was going to do a background, but drawing a ship’s railing seemed like it would be a real pain, so I decided instead that maybe he was crouching over some treasure. Here I was able to use my newfound knowledge of layers:


And then it was just a matter of figuring out some of the different tools and doing a lot more detailing.

Filed Under: art & animation

The Skull-Faced Boy YouTube Video

December 2, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Here’s a YouTube video I just put together for the first scene of my story “The Skull-Faced Boy” (similar to the video I did for “Save Me Plz”).



 

Filed Under: art & animation

Trailer for Zombie Anthology The Living Dead

November 17, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Here’s the trailer for the John Joseph Adams zombie anthology The Living Dead. (This book includes my story “The Skull-Faced Boy”.)



The trailer was produced by Living Jacket Studios. I offered feedback on a couple of rough versions of this trailer, so it’s fun to see the final product, which I can feel like I played some small part in. (Among my suggestions were that the zombie imagery should be arranged in a narrative order of outbreak -> chaos & terror -> zombie victory, that there should be some laudatory blurbs, various small edits to make it clearer what the book was and what was in it, and that the far side of the zombie girl’s face should be all gory and messed up when she turns to look at the camera.)

Filed Under: art & animation

My Political Cartoons from College

September 27, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Someone recently requested that I post some of the political cartoons I did when I was an undergrad, so while I’ve got the scanner out anyway, I decided that I would. (The strip pissed off enough people that I didn’t really want my name on it, but the editors insisted I be given credit, so we went with my initials, hence the “by D.K.” thing. Also, I redacted the names because I’m a nice guy.)

During hockey games against arch-rival school Bowdoin, it was a tradition for students to hurl objects onto the ice — objects such as oranges, tennis balls, and in one legendary (and perhaps apocryphal) case a decapitated cow’s head from a local slaughterhouse. Security became really tight for these games, and here we have a student who’s been caught trying to sneak in a few oranges under his coat:


I still remember walking into my first hockey game, which was like something out of Hieronymus Bosch. Everyone in the audience was screaming, gesticulating, and massively intoxicated. The alcohol-laden exhalations were so thick in the air that they practically knocked you over. Students were leaning over the boards, yelling and gesturing and throwing stuff at the opposing players. One guy behind me yelled, “Hey goalie! I’m in your head! I’m in your head, man!” continuously for over two hours. There was much taunting, threats, and speculation about the sexual proclivities of both the players and their mothers. I was in awe of this. It was a spectator sport that was actually fun, since I’ve always enjoyed shouting at people a lot more than watching sports. Sadly, with school admissions getting tougher each year, the students became more and more studious and less and less wild, and by my senior year the hockey games had become sedate affairs, with students sitting politely with their hands folded in their laps. I tried to rally the troops, to bring back the grand old days, by doing all the trash-talking myself — one lone obscene voice piercing the night’s complacency, and I got thrown out. It was the end of an era.

This next comic involves a political scandal at the school. As I recall, it came out that one of the student body presidents had been in his office late into the night making phone calls to everyone he knew on planet earth, with all the charges going to the student body. This was in the wake of the Clinton impeachment (which seemed absurd even at the time and seems infinitely more so now that we’ve had a president who seems determined to do six impeachable things before breakfast each morning). Anyway, that’s why the two things are tied together here:


This next comic appeared in the winter of ’99 and played on the then-current fear of calamity caused by the Y2K bug. (“Jan Plan” was a special one-month, one-class January semester.)


And finally, here’s one involving the dean of students, whom we hated because of an incident in which he chewed us out over a party we’d had. The background for this strip: A TV had gone missing from a dorm lounge, and the dean suspected that a particular group of students had moved the TV into their private suite, so over break — while the students were away — he instructed security to search the suite. This search was a violation of school policy, which required that room searches be done only after the students had been informed and with them present.


I was really proud of how this one turned out. The first stormtrooper I tried to draw, on the left, looks a little screwy, but I really nailed it with the stormtrooper on the right. Unfortunately, the editors cropped the image in such a way that they cut out half my good stormtrooper, but whatever. We were sure that the dean was going to flip when he saw this cartoon, and that we’d be visiting him again real soon, but actually he loved the strip, and I heard that afterward he got a Darth Vader statuette or something that he kept on his desk. You can never tell with some people.

Filed Under: art & animation

Sketches for My Short Story “The Skull-Faced Boy”

September 26, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley 1 Comment

I thought I’d post some of the doodles I’ve done for my short story “The Skull-Faced Boy.” I used to (and may again someday) do “concept art” to help me think through a story. Back in the summer of 2000, I wanted to write a zombie story, but I didn’t have any ideas. So I started just sketching zombies, such as this:

The skull-faced boy by David Barr Kirtley has appeared on the pseudopod podcast and in the anthology the living dead

I liked how that one came out — with the pieces of skull showing through his face — so the next zombie I drew had even more of just a skull for a face. For whatever reason, I imagined this next zombie as wearing a military uniform and leading an army:
The skull-faced boy by David Barr Kirtley has appeared on the pseudopod podcast and in the anthology the living dead

That drawing inspired me to dream up a whole sequence of events to explain who this character was and why he had an army. A few days later, I knew what the story’s climax would be, and drew it. If you haven’t read the story, this next picture is a monumental spoiler, so I’m going to put it behind a link:
 
“The Skull-Faced Boy” Image #3 SPOILER
 

When “The Skull-Faced Boy” went up on Pseudopod, at least one listener complained that it wasn’t plausible for a skull-faced boy without lips to be able to enunciate clearly, and that this totally ruined the story. (Though apparently the part about everyone on earth simultaneously rising from the dead wasn’t a problem.) Since then, I’ve spent hours trying to see how well I can talk with my lips pulled back, and I seem to be able to manage pretty well, in fact. (I’m reluctant to actually carve off my face in order to do a really meaningful experiment on this, but if someone else wants to give it a go, let me know your results.) And anyway, I went back and checked the story, and it never actually says that the skull-faced boy is missing his lips. The only parts of his facial anatomy that are specifically identified as being missing are his nose and cheeks, so maybe he’s still got enough flesh around the mouth not to suffer any kind of embarrassing speech impediment, which I’d imagine could be really socially debilitating for a living corpse who’s missing most of his face. Anyway, if you’re one of those people who just couldn’t get over how a guy without lips could talk (do the creators of He-Man get these complaints?), I drew this last sketch of the skull-faced boy with lips, so you can picture this while you’re reading or listening to the story, and hopefully that’ll set your mind at ease.

The skull-faced boy by David Barr Kirtley has appeared on the pseudopod podcast and in the anthology The Living Dead

Filed Under: art & animation, the skull-faced boy

My Colorized Version of Nick Greenwood’s “Red Road” Illustration

June 29, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley 1 Comment

Just for fun I decided to see if I could colorize Nick Greenwood’s spectacular illustration for my short story “Red Road.” I’d never done this before, and wasn’t even sure I’d be able to. I futzed around a bit with Paint Shop Pro, and quickly discovered that the lasso + adjust RGB functions make it surprisingly easy to colorize a black & white image, and that this renders surprisingly good results. Here’s how it’s turning out so far:

David Barr Kirtley art illustration red road nick greenwood orson scott card intergalactic medicine show

Filed Under: art & animation

Illustration For My Short Story “Red Road”

June 27, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

WOW! Check out this superb illustration by Nick Greenwood for my short story “Red Road.” The story (and illustration) will be appearing very soon in Issue 9 of Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show. (To get the full effect of the art you really need to see the super high-res version.)
 

David Barr Kirtley art illustration red road nick greenwood orson scott card intergalactic medicine show

 
If you’re just tuning in, “Red Road” is an animal quest fantasy / political allegory (think Lord of the Rings meets Animal Farm). I recently posted a short essay about the process of writing this story.

Filed Under: art & animation

My Comic

April 24, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

When I was in high school, some guys I knew started a comic book. Since I was known as someone who could draw, they invited me to contribute something and provided me with some comic book paper. I gave it a shot, but my whole idea was way too ambitious for my first-ever comic, and I ran out of steam after only a few pages. If I had had any idea how much of a pain it is to draw and ink a comic by hand, I would never have set my first scene inside a completely dark bunker. I used up all my black markers (and all my patience) inking just a few panels. Though I do think this panel turned out pretty cool:

Filed Under: art & animation

More Doodles

April 24, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

A few more newly-scanned old doodles:


 

Filed Under: art & animation

Some of My Doodles

April 21, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Over the course of my life, I’ve spent a lot of time sitting in class and doodling, and I’ve saved some of the better doodles. For a while now, I’ve been thinking that I should start scanning them into my computer, in case something ever happens to the originals. I just had to fire up the scanner for some business-related stuff, and while I was at it I figured I’d scan in a few doodles. Here they are. These were all executed with Bic pens on notebook paper. (I digitally removed the blue lines.)






Filed Under: art & animation

New Artwork for My Short Story “Blood of Virgins”

April 18, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

 
I was just perusing the website of artist Huan Tran, and I noticed that he’s posted a newly-tweaked version of the artwork that he did for my story “Blood of Virgins.” This new version has a different background, some additional details, and some fancy computer-generated lighting effects. I now have both versions up on my “Blood of Virgins” page.
 

Filed Under: art & animation

Illustration for My Short Story “They Go Bump”

January 31, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Here’s my illustration for my story “They Go Bump.” I wrote “They Go Bump” at the Odyssey workshop in 2001, and the story appeared in the anthology Empire of Dreams and Miracles, edited by Orson Scott Card. The story is a science fiction/horror hybrid involving invisibility suits and freaky aliens. Since all the characters in the story are invisible, I had to use some creative license in order to actually have anything interesting to illustrate.

David Barr Kirtley art illustration they go bump invisible soldiers

Filed Under: art & animation

Illustration for My Short Story “The Skull-Faced Boy”

January 29, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

It’s an unfortunate fact of life that not all published stories receive illustrations, but it occurred to me that I’ve become pretty good (or at least facile) at producing animation-style artwork of the sort I did for my “Save Me Plz” video, and that I could do similar artwork for my stories that are sadly bereft of visual complement. First up, my offbeat zombie horror story “The Skull-Faced Boy,” which appeared on Gothic.net back in 2002.

David Barr Kirtley art illustration the skull-faced boy zombies
 

Filed Under: art & animation

“Save Me Plz” Scene 1 YouTube Video

January 24, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

Here’s a video picture book adaptation I did of the first scene of my short story “Save Me Plz”:
 

Filed Under: art & animation

“Save Me Plz” Scene 1 as a Video Picture Book

January 23, 2008 by David Barr Kirtley Leave a Comment

EDIT: The “Save Me Plz” video picture book described in this entry in now available at YouTube.

For a long time now — over two years — I’ve been thinking that it would be cool to turn one of my short stories into a sort of “video picture book,” like the show Reading Rainbow, if anyone remembers that. Not really animated, but sort of a slideshow to accompany an audio reading, with a new image that pops up every so often. Then I could post my stories on YouTube. But I didn’t know what sort of software I would use, and I figured that even to do a short story would take weeks, so I never got around to it. But recently it occurred to me that I wouldn’t even have to do a whole short story. I could just do the opening scene, to pique people’s interest, and then if they liked that first scene then maybe they’d go and read the story or listen to a podcast of it. So two days ago I decided to quit waffling, and I just downloaded the first free animation program that came up in Google, and taught myself to use it. I did the first scene of “Save Me Plz,” which takes up about three minutes in audio, and which took about thirty hours to render as a pseudo-animated cartoon. Man, animation is hard work. I can’t imagine how long it would take to actually make the characters, you know, move. I don’t have any special art equipment — heck, I don’t even have a mouse — so the artwork is necessarily pretty basic, but I think it looks pretty good. (Incidentally, drawing spiders is really hard. Seriously, try it.) The whole thing is basically done now. I’m waiting on a few things before I can post it, but here’s a sample of the artwork:


Meg & Devon


Brant

A sexy, half-naked elf woman.
Leena


spider


dorm

Filed Under: art & animation

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Geek's Guide to the Galaxy is a podcast hosted by author David Barr Kirtley and produced by Lightspeed Magazine editor John Joseph Adams. The show features conversations about fantasy & science … Read more

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My grandfather Roger Barr passed away early this morning at the age of 98. He was my mom’s father, and was my last surviving grandparent. He was being cared for by my uncle Steve (his son) and aunt Denice — both medical professionals — and was still sharp and good-humored in his final days. Yesterday […]

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David Barr Kirtley

David Barr Kirtley is an author and the host of the Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy podcast on Wired.com, for which he’s interviewed well over a hundred guests, including George R. R. Martin, Richard Dawkins, Paul Krugman, Simon Pegg, Margaret Atwood, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Ursula K. Le Guin.
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