A recovered ACEO
I had mailed this ACEO (Art Cards Editions and Originals) off to Somerset Studios almost a year ago along with ACEOs from another 7 artists from my collection. I JUST got them all back last week along with a nice little rejection letter from Jenny Doh that this material is not fitting in with their current subject matter. Or something to that effect.
When I did my mailing last year, I sent in two different sheets of ACEOs for their consideration. Somehow the batches got separated and sent to different divisions at Somerset Studios. The other batch was also rejected and had been returned to me within 3 months. I wasn't expecting to ever see the rest of my submission and had thought my original artworks were lost forever.
Although I was disappointed that the ACEO subject matter had been refused by Somerset Studios, I must admit that I was pleased to get my art collection items back! It was only a cost of $100-150 for those other artists' works, but I bought them because I loved them so much.
Now they are safe and sound again. So if you plan to submit anything to Somerset Studios, be prepared for a loooong wait. They must have a humongous backlog of submitted artwork to look at by now! Everything was in perfect condition when it was returned, so they obviously value our work. Nice!
Doodles 124
This is an ACEO (Art Cards Editions & Originals) in the 2.5 x 3.5" standard size format. It is done in pen & ink, pastel and colored pencil.
6:30 am on a Sunday??
What am I doing up this early on a Sunday morning? Tour de France. I am hopelessly addicted to bicycle racing and in particular this one.
While the TDF officials struggle valiantly to eliminate doping and addictions from their race, myself and many others like me continue to watch faithfully. This has been my favorite sport for years and years and many of my other blog posts have contained info on the race. The highs and lows of this sport become an emotional involvement for me.
I can't even explain why this sport is my favorite. It all began with a little 3-day bicycle race called the Red Zinger in Boulder, Colorado back in the 70's. When Celestial Seasonings sold the race to Coors, I was incensed and indignant. How could a beer company be good for the sport?
Over the years, Coors pumped vast sums of money into this Colorado based race until they finally pulled their sponsorship around 1988 or 1989. By then I had moved from Colorado and was no longer following the race day by day in person....standing out in the hot sun for hours waiting for my favorite racers to pass by. The race had grown to 11 days and I was expecting the US to embrace the sport and make it a national pasttime.
Well, that hasn't happened. We do still have some large races here in the US, but no longer in Colorado. I will never ever forget those summer vacations when I was at each and every stage of the Coors Classic, screaming my lungs out and shooting thousands of photographs. Those were pleasure moments that I will take with me to my grave.
Cycling has grown in popularity here in the US, largely due to Armstrong's success in the sport. Many American companies have sponsored teams in the TDF in the past 20 years. I'm ever hopeful that it will continue to gain followers in large numbers and more races will spring up around the country. Television coverage now has made a huge difference and many thanks are owed to Versus for making this possible.
Florida 59
This painting was completed and videoed last weekend, however today I made some changes to it and photographed it. One of my YouTube friends said this: "You captured the feel of a tropical night with the warm gulf winds!"
I was thrilled to hear this because when I was making this painting I was trying to capture the view as it would be from a balcony with this palm tree just a little removed from the balcony. You are almost looking down on the palm tree because of the height of the balcony. So when he made that comment above, I knew I had depicted the image in my mind. YAY!
Viacom vs Google
The big news on YouTube at the moment is the Viacom and Google debacle. We all knew this was coming at some point and several geekazoids predicted it over a year ago, but Viacom sued Google for copyright infringement on the YT site.
$1 BILLION dollars. And Viacom won. What is interesting is that this is a similar situation to what Napster went thru years ago with people's copyrighted music downloads being free and all that. Napster said they couldn't be held responsible for what people did and the courts disagreed. So why Google thought they could pull a fast one and do the same thing, I don't know.
The $1 Billion is chump change for them, so that isn't even a biggie. They should be policing their website more frequently and ensuring that people aren't copying other peoples' videos and music and stuff. The bitch is that very often those types of videos will get Featured on YT's front page! And they get millions of views. Maybe now they will act more responsibly towards peoples' copy rights.
The bad news is that because of this and the court ruling, YT now has to turn over the private information of all of the YT users. This has people up in arms since it's a complete violation of our privacy. People are boycotting Viacom's tv channels and such and raising a huge ruckus on YT.
But from my viewpoint, we have long ago given up our privacy rights when online. It's very simple apparently, for people to capture your info and hack your computer and do whatever they want to do with that information. A friend of mine was at his computer the other day and noticed that the cursor on his computer was moving when he didn't even have his hand on the mouse. And it clicked on something! So he emptied out his computer and had to redownload all of his programs and stuff again.
I think this happened to him once before, if I remember correctly. And supposedly I had a trojan in my computer in the past, too. there is always going to be a risk involved in these activities and you just can't escape it. I have a router and other gizmos hooked up to shut down my computer should anyone try to enter, but nothing is foolproof.
Heck, eBay had a huge scandal last year and videos were showing up on YT proving that hackers had busted their system.
Besides, I just don't get too worked up over these political situations anymore. I'm too tired to care most of the time! LOL
Tour de Chaos
This year's Tour de France is very unpredictable but that makes it interesting. I had been wondering why last year's 1st place (Contador) winner and 3rd place (Leipheimer) racers were not in this year's Tour. So I visited the VS/OLN website today to read the bulletins and posts from the viewing public.
I am never disappointed in the viewing public because we all have so much to say. When Discovery pulled their sponsorship on their racing team, the riders and manager went in various directions. The manager did end up taking on another team, Astana, and he got Contador and Leipheimer to join the team.
Astana had a couple racers last year that got publicly busted for drug abuse, so that team was not invited to participate in this year's Tour. Sadly, this kept 2 of the top guys out of this year's race. Leipheimer is racing in a Bend, Oregon, race currently. Okay, it's not fair...but the cycling officials are trying to change the doping trend which has blighted this sport for many years. Team owners and managers are being held responsible and accountable.
Will this stop the doping/drugging? Nope. As in any sport, athletes will continue to use performance enhancing substances so long as they can get away with it. Cycling is the only one that seems to air its dirty laundry openly. If drug testing were used in the main sporting events here in the US, we would have major scandals. So they don't do it.
Back to the Tour. The live in-car coverage during the individual time trial created a huge stir when the team manager used the F-word on the air live. It was hilarious. VS will be fined for this surely and there is some doubt that they will try the live in-car cam again.
Phil Trautwig has disappeared from being a commentator, and I miss him. Some other people do and some don't. It can't be an easy job to be live on the air and trying to keep up with the action and never make mistakes.
The guys that post on the VS website bulletin board are a wealth of information for the most part. I usually rely upon a few of the guys there to keep me informed on what is happening in the cycling world. I don't miss the days of Armstrong and I like the fact that we now have an opportunity for other people to win the race. The lead this year has changed hands several times already and that makes it fun and exciting.
I don't have any favorites.
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Redo of Florida painting
A new technique
I need a bailout
A recovered ACEO
Doodles 124
6:30 am on a Sunday??
Black & White image
Florida 59
Viacom vs Google
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