my feet on the dash

This medical illustrator just had a surreal 'woah' moment

OK... I am cognizant of the fact that I do illustrations that go out into the world and people see them & use them for studying or whathaveyou. Despite that, I've never seen anyone literally studying from a textbook, etc. with one of my pieces in it.

Well, I just witnessed one of my illustration being used... randomly... and it's FREAKING ME OUT. I was just strolling through a cafe here at Eastern Michigan University (where I'm taking classes) and I glanced at a fellow student's computer screen as I passed (tsk! tsk!). Lo and behold - I see an illustration of a pituitary gland on the screen of a CD-ROM I worked on back in '02!!

I literally stopped, interrupted this poor girl from her studying, and asked to take a closer look. I am so lame!! Anyway, she didn't really understand what I meant by "I drew that!" I had to elaborate and when I did, she was kind of stunned. People really don't think about the professional of medical illustrator all that much and this was proof.

Cool random happening, right?? :)

Save Indie Media (The Nation, etc.)!

"Teresa Stack, The Nation's president, explains the crisis this way: Postal regulators have accepted a scheme designed in part by lobbyists for the Time-Warner media conglomerate. In short, mailing costs for mega-magazines like Time-Warner's own Time, People and Sports Illustrated will go up less than other magazines or even decrease. But smaller publications like The Nation will be hit by an enormous rate increase of half a million dollars a year."

Bandage Scissors & Spleen-i-cons...?

Drawing-A-Day: May 22nd, originally uploaded by redmeg8.

The Red Cross is increasingly becoming a great place to sketch! I love drawing medical instruments... there's just something about the drafting and shading involved that I find immensely appealing.

Now, on to another topic at hand... I love the spleen. You may not have known this about me, but it's true. Honestly, I have no idea why... maybe it's the word and how fun it is to say... maybe it's because of its function as the body's blood cell graveyard. It's probably all of that and so much more.

Anyway - spleen-i-cons. Er... I don't even know if I'D go this far.

Some are pretty cute, though.


Then again, some are downright disturbing...

An Embarrassment of Riches?

I thought it'd be fun to examine a list of items that I've illustrated recently for a myriad of projects. Are you ready for the randomness??

condoms • a syringe • conjoined twins • the aorta • fungi • a rat • file folders • a hamburger • E. coli • viagra™ • shampoo • the blood supply of a fetus • vitamins • a telephone • the loa loa worm • appendicitis • a passion fruit • a bed bug • the spermatic cord • gangrene toes • oral cancer • a cockroach • a water bottle • shingles (the skin disease) • a goiter

Wow. I've never really contemplated a list like this before. There's much more than I've listed (I'm pretty busy these days), but this definitely gives you a good idea that my artistic life lacks tedium...

The Ads v. Reality Project

Genius. Pure, unadulterated GENIUS.
http://www.thewvsr.com/adsvsreality.htm

It's so simple, yet so eye-opening if you don't pay attention to advertising and how insidious it is. I personally count marketing & advertising amongst the most deplorable of jobs (in general) out there and find most of it sneaky & conceived to deceive. We don't have any idea how susceptible we are to it all.

This guy (girl?) is taking photos of fast food as it's purchased and posts the "advertised" version next to it for comparison.

hee hee

The thread that didn't start it all, but is close...

This is the thread that inspired Eric to email me for the first time back in 2003. Eric knows it was another one, but, I'll be damned if I can find it. Look for my handle 'redmeg8' and his, 'fograsher'.

Oh, and no, the message boards don't typically look like that - ack! That's an archive of 'old' messages.

It's pretty cool to look back at that... :))

And you thought they were cute in still photos...

(created with iDVD)

New site stuff!

If it's not super-apparent, I changed a few things around these parts today.
I wanted to add a selection from my obscenely large bookmark collection, so now you have the pull-down menus to the right. They should give you a new window to view the link in each time.

Art I Love: self-explanatory... my favourite artists (that I've located thus far)
Pals: online and in real life
Places I Go: a variety of my favourite sites in general; stuff I find interesting
Music: sites to buy and listen to fantastic music; reference sites too
Genealogy: a selection of what I think are the most useful general genealogy sites on the web
IndieShop: shops I love, support, and plain think are worth seeing
You'll Find It: total miscellany; fun and funny sites; curiosities; DYI; kitties; you name it

Also, I popped in a Last.FM "quilt" there to the left that displays my top albums.
I hope the animation isn't annoying. Lemme know if it drives you crazy.

Lastly, I've posted a link under "Stalking Material" to my genealogy website. It's totally not complete or as media-rich as it will be, but, it's time to add it. I've found more distant cousins on the web than you can imagine, so, never say something isn't worth the time. :)

By the way, clicking on the genealogy link will probably reveal that I have some OCD going on. Just a warning ;)

Enjoy!

Bad Tattoo! Bad!

We've got an awesome "bad tattoo" thread going on over at woxy.com
I just thought I'd share :)