love of my life!

I just spent the evening having long conversations with the love of my life... a five year old named Zeke. Seriously, this kid is awesome. We talked about dinosaurs, the moon, and the world that everyone has in their nose, called "Nose World."

new site!

I'm in the process of building valerietracy.com, my freelance website, and it has a built in blog! So I'll be posting all of my sketches there from now on! :) I put a few of my old favorites up there for now.

Baseball slang

So, every year at my office everyone decorates according to a theme for the new staff tour. This year's theme is Baseball, so my coworker decided to have the communications department decorate by illustrating Baseball slang visually! Some of the slang, like "can of corn," "high cheese," and "golden sombrero" (look them up. it's ok, I had to as well) are visual puns that we'll have physically represented in the office, but others will go on posters. These are a few that I did:

Some Finished Videos

About a month ago, I was a part of a film crew sent to document the Price of Life campaign at the Ohio State University. The completed projects have been put up on vimeo! Check them out:
Time-lapse documentation of the mid-week edit we did on site (unprecedented in 2100 history!):
http://vimeo.com/11935285

mid-week edit:
http://vimeo.com/11135330

Full-Length final edit:
http://vimeo.com/11820743

Enjoy!

storyboarding!

a rough mock-up of some storyboards I've been working on.

::edit:: now they're bigger!

best monday morning ever

I stroll into work today, passing my little mail slot on the way to my cubicle. Nothing there, which is sort of unusual after a long weekend. I'm dissapointed in passing, but by the time I get to my cube I'm over it.

THEN I approach to see a sizable package sitting on my desk!! Filled with Phillies stuff. and candy. and tastykakes. and other native-to-the-philly-area awesomeness!! Now, had I gotten this on Saturday (after a painful Phillies loss to the Mets), it still would have been awesome, but not as awesome as getting it TODAY, after our 11-5, and subsequent series, win. A win which was sweetened by finally getting my laptop to stream the commentary from the am 1470, the sports radio station in Allentown, and not just having to read about it the next day!

So, basically my Auntie Bean is awesome.

So are tastykakes.

a few recent(ish) sketches

TV personality

Nature

Fun at Work

Since my last post, I have been back to Atlanta to do another week of work with Samaritan's purse. I have also lost those mittens in my second-to-last post. I've moved to Wisconsin. I've started a new job.

I've also drawn some more, but I can't scan things out here yet! Man, it's not like I'm exactly technologically inept. I scored a whole 6% on the Geek Test! I should be able to work the fancy technology here at work.

So, my first week of work consisted of meetings. A lot of them. Also workshops! Like, how to light an interview! and How to use a fancy camera! My schedule was basically hour-to-hour. completely full.

My second week has been quite the empty slate, however. I have watched more animations than I care to admit on vimeo, spent hours drawing on scrap paper, and brainstorming for an epic sea-voyage animation to show how awesome it is to be a missionary! ...that might not get used. Our clients get to pick which idea they like best out of 3. the sea-monster one was my idea. Anyhow, all of this is in the name of creative development!! I can do basically anything I want that's "artistic" and it counts as work! I'm really looking forward to having more tangible projects to work on though, there's only so much brainstorming I can do for a project without overthinking it. And I'm only working on two projects at this point.

Also, my car died. and so did my brother's car. the brakes actually went out on that one, while I was driving on a pretty major road.

Also, I saw a dorney park mug at work today, and had a weird moment where I forgot where I was. Turns out the owner of the mug knows people from PA? but was never there herself. sigh. although I have met a few girls from Philly and Pittsburgh! neither are phillies fans, tho. sigh.

Atlanta

Samaritan's Purse is one heck of an organization. I met God in a powerful way this week...

My heart's desire is to serve people in a capacity like that for the rest of my life.

I wish I could have spent more time with the people of Atlanta. It stinks that at this point I can only give a week at a time to physically serve those who severely need it. You can bet your britches that I'll be more focused on meeting the needs of others here at home, though! I'm SO excited to go back to "normal life" with the assurance that God is guiding me into countless opportunities to share him with others!

"Direct my footsteps according to your word, let no sin rule over me." Ps 119:133

comings and goings

As of Sunday, I'll be embarking on a journey to Atlanta, Georgia to do flood relief with Samaritan's Purse.

I've been working on a painting, which has been pretty awesome. I haven't painted in a while! and also, I just finished knitting a pair of mittens!!

yeh. and yes, that is a transformers sweatshirt from the little boy's section.

the creative juices are flowing?