I finished this months ago but haven’t had time to post it.

Prompted by the news reports of Somali pirates, Tommy penned this masterpiece.

Here’s my execution :

Here’s another groundbreaking collaboration with Tommy Long. Behold, the friendly carnivorous giraffe ridden by a dead eyed koala with arms reminiscent of Plastic Man.

Tommy’s Original:

My Painted Version:

Below the black eyed gaze of the sharp toothed giraffe a multiple amputee hippopotamus is further victimized by the fierce attack of a mythical Rainbow Turkey.

16x20” Acrylic on Masonite.

Behold Tommy’s original. The pig on the right is using the wolf’s vain huffing and puffing to fly his kite. But the lupine wind cannot penetrate the brick house, so the pig on the left delights in building a house of cards, which he could never do in his other drafty houses.

Using a combination of Illustrator, Photoshop and ArtRage, I attempted to capture the fury of the wolf and the tranquil security of the pigs from Tommy’s original dramatic masterpiece.

Here are a few details of the characters.

Another Masterpiece, penned by Tommy and brought to vivid life by my humble self. Here’s Tommy’s Original Marker Drawing :

And here’s my interpretation:

It features a polar bear fishing, King Neptune pulling in a Leprechaun who is barfing gold, a cybernetic pig fish, and an anteater and a penguin.

Notice the polar bear - he is not saying “ror”, he is thinking “ror.”

Tommy’s only criticism is that I made his second penguin look like an anteater.

Special thanks to seneschal for his scan of a brown paper bag. It was a great texture overlay.

So a couple of weeks ago, Doug had an accident involving his wheeled garbage container. I would call it a ‘trash can’ but to me, ‘can’ implies something made of metal and most trash bins today aren’t.

Tommy drew the above to depict and reinterpret the actual events. Because I was in a rush, I scanned my version of the drawing and finished it in Photoshop.

What exactly happened to Doug’s fingers? You’ll have to ask him yourself. Tommy’s version gets the big picture correct, but is off in some of the details, like what Doug was wearing.

Tommy has drawn a lot over the past couple of weeks, but I haven’t been able to keep up with the paintings. But here’s a unicorn Tommy drew recently :

And here’s my painting :

Obviously Mr. Unicorn has had some rough times. Maybe he was kicked out of Unicorn land because he was too old and his receding hairline the frightened young visitors away. But he’s got a new gig now, and things are turning around! Yep, things are turning around, and around, and around . . .

Thanks to Kimi, we have video of the unveiling!

So Thursday was good ole’ David Rose’s last day at Red Storm. As a token of our esteem and appreciation, Dave commissioned a special drawing from Tommy Long, which turned into a very special painting by Old Man Foltz.

Behold Tommy’s masterful original whiteboard artwork :

Notice the column of buttons going up Mr. Norris’s chest. Since there is no collar or cuffs, I had to assume that the buttons were for Chuck’s skin. Note also the fiery power in Chuck’s deadly eyes. The speed and force of the Round House kick has disentegrated Mr. Norris’s right boot. That is real ultimate power!

The painting had a lot to live up to. It was a daunting task to depict Chuck Norris, as experienced by the Karate Kid, who is so unimportant in the drawing that not only is he half Chuck’s height, but he is also bald. There was a similar convention in Medieval art.

After about 11 hours and many individually painted chest hairs, I rushed some varnish on the painting to call it finished.

Tommy and I unveiled the painting and presented it to Dave right before we headed to Torero’s for David’s farewell lunch. An excited audience composed of friends and fans of the weird and fantastic gathered to behold the force of a Norris Round House kick captured in acrylic.

Observe that Frog and Rabbit are referenced in the post Karate Kid used for his doomed Crane Kick.

I asked Matt Turner to help decorate the frame, after supplying him with a frame, a cowbell, and an odd assortment of toys, eyehooks, and epoxy. He engraved some boisterous phrases on both sides of the cowbell. This frame needs no more cowbell.

Here are a few details of the odd knights, pirates, ninjas, and monkeys paying homage to Mr. Norris.

Consider the bowlegged Knight, and the ninja/pirate with a lumpy pointed stick thing. Clearly they intend bodily harm to the mysterious pink creature, but does he look worried? Certainly not. With perfect calm, he awaits his fate.

In this second detail, a pirate with a Star Trek style phaser guards a treasure chest. On the left side of the chest, a Muscle figure wards off a greedy dinosaur intent on eating the treasure.

So today at work, not only was the room empty of a fabulous Chuck Norris painting, but our robot and monkey quotient was severely depleted! Good luck out West, Dave! We’ll miss you here in the East!

The saga continues, although it took me two nights to finish this one.

Tommy’s drawing assignment Wednesday was to draw an elephant. Not only did he draw an elephant, he drew TWO elephants, and integrated several of his other doodles into the scene.

Tommy’s Epic Elephant Scene

This was a direct challenge. Up to this point, I was able to complete a painting the night after Tommy made the doodle.

But I couldn’t keep up. Here’s the completed painting.

Is it possible? Of course it is! Witness the following process as proof.

On Monday, Matt and Tommy (an engineer) were arguing about something and the result was that Tommy was going to draw a frog.

Tommy’s Whiteboard Drawing of a Frog (left) and a Rabbit (right).

I was so inspired by the long necked frog with ears, and the rabbit with no right hand, that I made a quick painting. I probably had Dave Devries wonderful paintings in the back of my mind.

When I brought this painting in on Tuesday, the entire process was such a hit, that Tommy yielded to our pleadings for another drawing.

A Horse, by Tommy Long

The little sausage horse was also worthy of a painting.

So when I brought “Wilbur!” in this morning, it just upped the ante. Today Tommy drew a big scene with TWO elephants. It’s going to be a struggle to finish that painting tonight!

But it just goes to show that engineers and artists really CAN work together!