I've been drawing since I was a kid. I guess it was my brother and mother, my mother has artistic abilities, and my brother and uncle drew a lot. I was always into comic books so I would copy what I saw. I wanted to be a comic book artist but it's not as glamourous as some people think, I prefer to do the kind of art I do now.

I really enjoy drawing them, it's something that I related to as a kid, especially the classic horror films, fantasy and science fiction films. I'm a huge fan of the classic Universal Monsters genre, and gothic horror, movies like Conan, Red Sonjia, Battle Beyond the Stars, Ice Pirates. I grew up on Hammer Horror as well, so their influence is there in my work. A lot of people draw comic characters, and that's great, I think it's awesome, it's something I personally love doing myself, but I really wanted to do something different, something I knew people love and I myself love.

I'm heavily influenced by Drew Srtruzan, Don Bluth, and Frank Frazetta, Basil Gogos (Famous Monsters of Filmland Artist) I grew up admiring all of Drew Struzan's movie posters as a kid, Indiana Jones, etc. I was totally blown away at it's realism, the same with Frazetta, it was fantasy but looked so real. I always wondered how they were so accurate, then I found out they actually used referrence and even used a projector, so after that I didn't feel so bad. Don Bluth was someone I admired because I grew up playing Dragon's Lair, and watching movies like The Sercret of NIMH, also the animated segment in the film Xanadu. Anytime you see a Don Bluth animation, you know it's him. Basil Gogos is a huge influence on me as well, he was like the Van Gough of Horror art. He did a few of the Misfits album covers and a Rob Zombie cover.

I have used airbrush, markers for caracature art. I've used some oil paint. I currently use color pencils, markers, and graphite pencils.

I usually jot down ideas of characters or subjects I want to do, sometimes my wife and daughter will throw out ideas. Then I'll look for referrence, since I can't remember everything about the subjects I'm doing. I'll take an image, and project it, and do a very light sketch. Then I'll go in with a mechanical pencil, and color pencils, I often use light grey to dark grey, then end up with black ultimately, and to go darker, I'll go in with marker. That's usually how I do black and whites, if I'm doing color, I'll go in with a colored marker and lay down a base, once that dries, I'll go in with color pencil.

I use Fiber Castell, I used Prisma Color but I just like the way Fiber Castell feels, they just feel comfortable to me. For markers, I would love to work with Copic's but they're very pricey, so I work with Chameleon's and they seem to work very well, they have a great blending gradient, but it's kind of a learning curve since you have to work from light to dark, and as an artist we usually work from dark to light when were shading. I draw on Bristol Cardstock paper, very smooth, and it's always 11x17. I do use other paper colors as well.

You have to think of it a little differently depending on the art. When I'm drawing on white, and making a black and white, I use the white paper to my advantage by using the white as part of the skin tone. When I work with black, it's like drawing a negative, so it's a little different. But I enjoy using both.

I'm working on many things, drawing more original pieces, and I'm working on some sketch books, that will be available for sale. I'm getting more horror themed ideas, so the first book will be filled with horror art ideas, little sketches etc. I may convert some to digital. They will be a limitted run on them, and they'll be signed and numbered.

I do listen to music, but it has to be music that doesn't take my mind away from what I'm doing, but inspires me. While my prefered music is Metal and Rockabilly, I actually listen to David Arkenston, movie soundtracks like Ed Wood, anything from Danny Elfman, I also listen to chill out music, and Yanni, or Sarah Brightman. The closest I've gotten to listening to metal when I draw was The Birthday Massacre. I'll also put on some Bowie. But music does inspire me to draw often, when it comes to drawing horror, or writing something in that genre, I'll listen to the Messer Chups, The Ghastly Ones, The Coffin Daggers,The Moon Rays, The Bambi Molesters, The Von Drats, all those bands.

I have many, Megadeth, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Martin Denny, I'm a HUGE Herb Alpert, Brian Setzer and Tiger Army fan. I've got all of Herb Alpert's albums and Tiger Army's. I've been listening to a lot of Opeth, Arch Enemy, Jinjer, Groundbreaker and surprisingly old Genesis music, they were very progressive back in the day. I've also been listening to Pink Floyd a lot.

I absolutly love to read! I love anything from Tolkein, and I have most of his books. Also anything from C.S. Lewis, to his theological books, to his fantasy and science fiction, they're all very interesting. I really like the Harry Potter books as well. I also love George MacDonald. He was a Christian man who wrote a lot of incredible fantasy books, he died in 1905.

I have a lot. I usually have them in catagories. Drama, Comedy, Fantasy, Horror, and Science Fiction. But my favorite movies of all time are the original Star Wars Trilogy. I remember seeing those in theaters when I was a kid in '77, it was incredible. As for T.V. shows, I love anything I grew up with in the 70's and 80's, Knight Rider, Airwolf, the Dukes of Hazard, CHiP's, The Twilight Zone, The Munsters, Magnum P.I. , T.J. Hooker, Home Improvmenet, I love anything with Tim Alen in it, tv or movies. I like modern shows like Last Man Standing, and Stranger Things.

Draw all the time, and always look to improve, remember you're your own worst and best critic, becasue only you can know how much better you want to be. Everyone can tell you.."Hey that looks great!" when deep down inside you know you can do better. Just becasue someone tells you how good you are, don't settle on that and think, "Well, I've made it." Always keep learning, and you will soon discover you're better than you were before. Take some of your old drawings and redraw them, you'll notice where you improved.