Arte Especial

INSPIRATION

A lot of my inspiration for art pieces that I construct over a long period of time comes from a constant source, such as another person's blog or my own collection of digital and analog photographs. The project above illustrates the focus that needs to be present when I am creating art pieces, with attention to detail and and eye for organization.

MECHANICS

I went about placing each of the unique skylines close enough to each other so that they blend into a infinitely growing city, stretching miles past the horizon. I next made sure that the differing shades of grey, black and white would go together well, in that the clouds covering the cities are casting shadows.

AESTHETICS

Strictly for aesthetic reasons only, I placed a private jet in the sky, overlooking all of the many microcosms below. I also made sure that the clouds were reverse colors.

MUSIC

Recommendations:

Zion-I feat. The Grouch- Silly Puddy

Jurassic 5- Jurass finish first

Dilated Peoples- Ear Drums Pop

Moondog- Minisym #1

David Axlerod- The Warnings Part 1

PEACE.

Nuevo Exhibición Artistico

Hey whats up?

Making progress on my new edition to my magazine, with all sorts of interesting stuff to view, read and fill in the blanks. I've just been going to class and making art at all times of the day and/or night, playing disc golf here and there, as well as DJing in my free time. I like to display whatever kind of art I can whenever I can and pretty soon I'm thinking about doing a little live art while music is played by a DJ or band. My goal is to get a reaction, any reaction to the art and music that I like to make. Enjoy the post and KEEP IT REAL.

ART

INSPIRATION

This piece of art displays yet another interpretation of my taste for music illustrated through my art. As you can tell, I wanted to get rid of the square picture edges, so I embellished the image with a couple different stylized brushes with vines and leaves.

MECHANICS

I used multiple records, including one broken into pieces and with blend modes I melded the pictures together. I replaced the outside corners on the centered turntable image with vines and leaf brushes for a more dramatic look.

AESTHETICS

I made sure to maintain the original vintage look of the centered turntable image and by doing that I kept the surrounding objects in the same general color scheme. Just for personal reasons I didn't change any of the contrast, although I did add some saturation for a vignette type of look.

Continued..

Nu Art (3 of 3)

INSPIRATION

I am a part-time DJ and in my spare time while making art, I am sometimes influenced by different ideas that I have while DJing. This piece is a good demonstration of what DJing feels like to me when I do it live, in front of an audience. 

MECHANICS

I was having a rough time getting used to the patch tool so I instead started working with the clone stamp tool to recreate portions of the city (Seattle, WA). I made sure that it was authentic looking enough to where I could successfully display a DJ setup over the view of this city at sunset.

AESTHETICS

For aesthetic purposes I decided that the color of the setup have blue undertones to establish the cool blue mood. I next made sure that as the viewer looked at the city below the DJ setup, that there was no distracting parts or anything drawing attention from the entire image, 4 corners, center and all

MUSIC

Music Recommendations:

Moondog- Frog Bog

Miles Davis- Move

Yesterday's new Quintet- The One Who Knows

Herbie Hancock- Sly

Moondog- Surf Session

PEACE.

.

Continued (2 of 3)...

INSPIRATION

Infusing different types of media is a specialty of mine, and in this image I was able to incorporate a very natural group of leaves, vines and flowers into a circuit board.

MECHANICS

Little by little, over the course of a month I put layer styles over the outlines of plants that I drew previously. Originally I had no idea where this piece was going, although now I am glad I still kept it. The circuits behind it represent a larger computer which encases the plants in the center of the image.

AESTHETICS

I always like to add text to decipher the when and where of the art projects I make. In this one image I used a unique font I discovered on the internet as well as multiple different hues going from pale leaf green to dark emerald.


Continued...

Wildebeast from the east

Whats up?

Making progress getting used to my new portable DJ setup, I finally figured out how to record my Kaossilator in Virtual DJ. Thanks to my partnership with my band mate, DJ Adsynth, we can now collaborate and create  original beats.
Moreover, The magazine Culture Aficionado (Issue #2) is scheduled to be released in the first week of June. I have a line up of 5 issues to be released throughout every 2 week interval, this summer 2011. Please stay tuned to this blog and other blogs like this, for new updates on art, including how to make certain types of art in Photoshop CS-CS5. I will also be including new music links and/or recommendations in each post.

ART

INSPIRATION

This piece came from myself watching too many Twilight zone episodes, reading too much Ray Bradbury or possibly watching 2001: A Space Odyssey a few too many times. It is reminiscent of a computer of the future, although the tribal-looking intricate patterns scrawled behind it add a touch of visual distortion. 

MECHANICS

I was in somewhat of a daze when I made this piece at 3:30 am, although that may have worked out to my advantage. I used a couple different gradients to synthesize 3 large optical scanners and in addition, the markings behind these have also been filled with a gradient.

AESTHETICS

I wanted this art piece to look as if you could not tell what year it takes place in. I was attempting to create a photo that was not only futuristic but also modern.

Continued...

Mega blast from 1989

Hello all,

So now that I have a good amount of art posted on my portfolio blog, I have decided that it is time to expand my abilities into other fields, such as a media-based magazine titled Culture Aficionado, a clothing line including T-shirts and Boardshorts and also a mixtape as well as future studio album from my band, Standard Deviants. For now, enjoy this mega-sized post of art and music recommendations from none other than myself, Abstract Thought.


ART

INSPIRATION

I like to make art with instruments on occasion, this is a good example of a recent idea of mine that I embellished into an art piece. Guitars are just plain awesome in my opinion and with what I've learned in Photoshop, its always fun to manipulate and create something from something else.

MECHANICS

I started by keeping the guitar centered within the surrounding paint splatters and grungy edges of the image. Next I shredded the top part of it and played with the color and hue options a little bit. Finally I added more grunge layers and colored renders shooting out of the strings. 

AESTHETICS

Solely for aesthetic value I added a different layer on top of the original guitar layer to incorporate them both into an eerie off-white color guitar that blends better with gradients under blend modes. This image was originally meant to look less gritty and more neat, although that soon changed.

INSPIRATION

My girlfriend has an awesome lenovo laptop and sometimes wen I am bored I like to use Photoshop CS5 and make a background for her desktop or a little art piece she can look at whenever she wants. This piece was too cool to let go, so I saved it to my email and downloaded it later.

MECHANICS

Using different liquid brushes and a set of brushes I saved on my 16gb flash drive, I lined the corners with several watery looking renders. Some of the text in this piece is upside down or modified, while others are just layered with other shapes. The greenish looking cloud in the middle came from a smudged gradient oval.

AESTHETICS

This image was originally going to be much more subtle at first, although I enjoyed distorting the different shapes of various hues. A good portion of the images on this blog are very reminiscent of the project above.

INSPIRATION

Space art is definitely a hobby of mine when it comes to the types of art I make of a daily basis. This piece is an outstanding example of a star in space with an emerald hue. I like to sometimes go online and look up different types of space art and then attempt to make my own variation.

MECHANICS

Most of the stars I make come out to a specific style. No matter what color they are, they appear to be fluid and plasma mixed together inside of a large sphere. I strive for this effect and I also make different effects similar to the fire inside of a star.

AESTHETICS

For good measure I added some abstract looking splashes and sprays of green as well as a lightning bolt or three. I was aiming for a realistic looking small star with a ring and vivid outer glow.

INSPIRATION

One day I was looking online at gadgets and I viewed a couple online images of circuits and microchips and immediately I wanted to create or make art with similar intricate lines and patterns interlacing. I took that idea and decided to start in Photoshop and see what I could do.

MECHANICS

Certain parts of this image, you might notice stand out and in addition to creating a group of rectangles with glowing edges, I also added circuitry lines and dust on the other parts. I made sure to keep all of the layers organized with a grid and guide lines.

AESTHETICS

This image was made on my girlfriend's lenovo laptop and probably sometime at around 2am on a weekend night I completed it. I started using more detail when it comes to illustrating shapes and images by hand. I like the way that an image can be more subtle and less intense if I spend more time on it working out the kinks.

INSPIRATION

This image is another piece I produced in the middle of the night on a Saturday on my girlfriend's lenovo laptop with Photoshop CS5. I wanted to experiment with the grungy looking brushes I picked out for my flash drive and also the paint splatter ones I downloaded just recently.

MECHANICS

Lettering and objects with gradients are fun to work with and juxtapose about an image. For the most part I use text for my lettering from a font book, although sometimes I like to create my own letters from scratch by drawing them  by hand or pen tool.

AESTHETICS

Brushes, stamps and tire markings were added in the distance to take out the plainness of the white background. For aesthetic value I also added a couple area codes that I have lived in.

INSPIRATION

This piece was created because of an intense dream I had. In this dream I was surfing a massive wave, although I had no idea where I was. It looked as if I was surfing a wave which happened to be off of an island full of junked surfboards. This is the image that resulted from that dream.

MECHANICS

I made sure to blend the different layers of the wave, and the top crest, a separate layer entirely is also displayed with a outer shine and inner glow. The surfboards were drawn by hand and placed all around the sand bar in view. 

AESTHETICS

I made sure to keep an eye on the amount of waves visible in this image, incase it might look too repetitive or boring. The wave layers were drawn with pen tool then applied to look as natural as water flowing in an ocean.

MUSIC




GENRE: Hip-Hop

Binary Star- Reality Check

Gang starr- Moment of Truth

Slum Village- Reunion Feat. J Dilla

Living Legends- Black Glass

KRS-ONE- MC's Act Like They Don't Know



Big ups to LBizzle and Butterkn!fe Beetz

PEACE

Atomic Art Apocalypse!

Hey People,

Hows it going? Now that my art is starting to fill up this blog, I have decided that I am going to expand to a website in the future. I have started working for a company which produces boardshorts! Hopefully in the future I can get a collection of my art of clothing going and possibly be able to sell it on my blog. As for now, enjoy the new art pieces! And Music!


ART

INSPIRATION

It takes me a good 2-3 hours to complete a piece this complex, although a lot goes into why I designed it the way I did. I started with pen and paper, drawing a very abstract looking composition of angles, lines, shapes, even machines. I then added a cityscape on the upper part and gemstone at the center. These represent the focus I took on this piece, which was abstract renderings.

MECHANICS

Drawing is almost as much fun as the part where I get to fill in the pencil markings with color. Little by little, I filled in each part of this picture until it was full of color. I also added a sun and my alias as a logo.

AESTHETICS

For reasons unknown, this piece looks a lot like another drawing I scanned. The direction of this particular piece is more skewed towards an abstract perspective. In doing this, I have created another grouping within my own art of pieces of this nature. I can now say that I have multiple pieces in my collection which are similar.

INSPIRATION

Upon looking through a list of Google images, I stumble across a nice looking red dodge challenger and a gorgeous picture of a mountain next to a road. Next thing I know I am assimilating multiple part of different pictures to achieve a realistic looking scene in which a can is racing through a stormy road.

MECHANICS

In order to achieve this idea of making different pictures all come together and look natural, I needed to gain insight as to what it looks like to drive in a storm. Well luckily for me the last week was full of rain.

AESTHETICS

Some of my more surreal looking artwork containing cars has been, well more fictional. In this piece I started to include the surrealism of driving in stormy weather with the realism of driving a fast car on a mountain road. The reflection of the landscape on the car and the rain bouncing off the car augment to the scene to that effect.

INSPIRATION

I've always liked the way that some digital artists will, without fail, create everything you see in their images from scratch. In most cases, something like this would take a long time to detail and perfect. However, I have taken it upon myself to find a faster and more effective way of doing digital drawing or painting without the use of a pen tablet or special tool.

MECHANICS

Occasionally I like to design plants, trees, simple foliage and bushes near and around houses and temples. As a factor in the over atmosphere of the picture, I feel that without these elements it would not be as convincing to view. What I have done is include textures and patterns of abnormal size and dimensions and attached them to some main parts of this piece.

AESTHETICS

In bringing this artwork to life, I was going for a more subtle look, not as abstract and random. I wanted to make the viewer feel as if they are standing in the midst of a small civilization not too far from nature and mother earth.

MUSIC

Leakage/Whiskers.mp3

Lo Fizzle.mp3

50 Cows Starring at you

Whats good?
Got some new gear, new art and tunes for you to check out.

Life is good! Got a new netbook and been working on projects with Standard Deviants. What do you think today's post is going to feature? How about another serving of abstract art, brought to you by Abstract Thought AKA DJ GenerRuss?!?!!?



ENJOY!



PEACE!


ART

 

Flaming Artifacts, twisted orange stylizing with gradients and layer styles intertwined over a brushed background.

 

Made this one on my new netbook, took about 6 1/2 minutes to compile, only I didn't realize that Photoshop CS5 requires a 1280x900 screen resolution. Fuck em, CS4 will do.

 

An older background designed on a friend's PC for his desktop. Originally I put his name over it, then I decided to change it and keep the new copy.

MUSIC

Counter Stricken.mp3 DJ GenerRuss


Late Night Coffee.mp3 DJ GenerRuss

What it don't do?

Sup,

I am living it up in Santa Cruz, practicing djing and making graphic art and media all the time. I have yet to establish a solid line of communication with my bandmate(s), although things are going great for Standard Deviants. The team of producers (DJ Adsynth, DJ GenerRuss, DJ Prescription, Butterknife Beats) have been working hard on a new mixtape, due this March. It should feature MC Cydah, Phraction Kontraction, LBizzle and possibly a guest appearance by MC Checkmate, but I'm not making any promises. Here is some art from past, present and future:


ART

Ghostly trails of commets and meteors, with gaseous pillars and nebulae.

Good background for cell phones, iPod Touches, PSPs, etc.

Funny story: this took only 15 minutes

MUSIC

Noisia- Groundhog

Blakroc- Dollaz N Sense (feat. RZA and Pharohe Monch)

Devin The Dude- Zeldar

Living Legends- Anything You Want

Jurassic 5- Canto De Ossanha

PEACE OUT WORLD.

ABSTRACT THOUGHT



Bhudda's sekund cuzin

Hey what's up?

It's been almost 3 months since the last post, although I do have a bunch of new art to upload. I moved to Santa Cruz just recently and am no longer living in an overcrowded house. My new roommates are way chill and my sister and cousin live nearby. I have been experimenting with some new ideas lately, sop let me know what you think. Check out some fresh new art pieces:



NEW ART

This is a piece I made the last time I visited LA, on my cousin's macbook.

I like to make space art and this one in particular I attempted to recreate some nebulae. I like to use color conjugates as well as parallel hues.

Just recently I made this piece for my girlfriend Salena, I included pieces from forests, waterfalls and bamboo gardens. She really likes it!

MUSIC

As of mixtapes, right now I am working on a new series of beat tapes I like to call "Kutz Volumes 1-3". Expect some new music in my next couple posts!

D.A.N.K. (Dynamic Absurdity Naturalizing Knowledge)

What up yo?

So I have decided to share with you guys some different Photoshop art that I made a while ago. This includes some art pieces with actual photos grafted into the artwork. I do this in a couple different ways, so be prepared for something unusual.

MUSIC

DJ Sets:

DJ Prescription (Samson Simpson Suite)

TRACKS:

Le Castle Vania- Tigertron (The Toxic Avenger Remix)

Yesterday's New Quintet- Daylight

Walter Murphy - A Fifth Of Beethoven

The Cataracs featuring Dev -Bass Down Low

Fukkk Offf- Black Phantom

ART

In This piece I tried to illustrate the presence of E-40 on the Oakland Hip-hop scene, as an influential Rapper/Entrepreneur.

I enjoy listening to all sorts of music, including Jazz, Blues and Funk. This picture was meant to be a contrasting album cover for a series of jazz instrumentals that have yet to be released.

I created this art piece to convey the meaning of a flow or a freestyle from an MC. To me, this illustrates everything that goes into a flow and how a microphone acts as an instrument of conversion, capturing thoughts and transforming them into lyrics.

Peace,

Abstract Thought

Standard Deviants

Whats up?

Just moved and there is no internet yet at my new place. I'll keep you updated with new art and tunes though.

New Art:

New Music:

Genre: Experimental

The Roots- Rhymes and Ammo/ Thirsty

Booka Shade- Redemption

MSTRKRFT- Paris

DJ Krush- Stormy Cloud with Ken Shima

High Biscuits

What it do?

Yo heres some new different music:

Dorian Concept- Fort teen

Flying Lotus- Rest EZ

Nosaj Thing- 1685Bach

Juju- Mogera

Ras G- Sketchbook

New Art:

Likwid Funk

What it do?

Its the holiday season, so here are some new pieces of art and also some tracks to check out:

New Artwork

New Music

MRK1- Sensi Skank

Phturistix- 551 Blues

Loefah- Voodoo

Skream- 2D

Rufage Kru- Shanghai Nights

Chilling sounds

Hey whats up?

Just finished putting a music player up, and I've got some new art!

Ch-ch-ch-check it out!

Your own personal Bhudda

Hey whats going on?

Just moved for the 2nd time this year, and I turned 20 recently. One ore year until i can legally drink. Hope you've had a good November, I definitely did. In case you're wondering why there hasn't been any streaming music or anything other than Art and song titles, this is my test blog, my real blog will soon be dedicated to a magazine I am compiling. Hope you like everything so far. Peace.

Russell Xavier
A.K.A.
Abstract Thought


Sick Tracks

DJ Distance- Night vision (Skream Remix)

Virus Syndicate- Talk To Frank

Mala (Digital Mystikz)- I Wait

Skream- Too Much Sushi

Artwork- Round Sound

New Art:

Flying Hibiscus

Hey whats up?

Heres some more cool art and some more of my favorite tunes.



Dubstep:

Rusko- Woo Boost

Benga- Dominion

Scuba- Twista

Eskmo- San Francisco (the rhythm)

M.R.K.1- Slope