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Deviation Spotlight
Artist // Professional // Artisan Crafts
- United States
- Deviant for 20 years
- www.ironphoenixmetalworks.com
- She / Her
Badges
My Bio
I grew up in Arizona till the 7th grade, then my family moved to Utah, where we've lived ever since (minus those 2yrs I moved back to AZ).
I have been an artist my whole life. I was a voracious drawer as a kid. I would always sit on the floor, hunched over a book with a piece of paper and a pencil, drawing up whatever crazy creature popped into my head while watching TV.
In high school I began to try new things. Took ceramics for a couple years. Did a bit of wood working. Did some computer graphic and design. And of course all the usual drawing and painting goodness of the drawing classes.
In college I decided to give Graphic Design a try... and suffice it to say, one semester of 8am Basic Line Drawing for 2hrs, 4 days a week burned me out so bad I didn't even want to THINK about another drawing class for over a year. So, I ended up going into Biotechnology (which is a fancy term for a flunky lab assistant).
While working on that, I tried out a few different things. Scuba diving. Jewelry. Then I took a Basic Metal Sculpting class... and absolutely LOVED IT!!
From that moment on I was hooked. I took the class ever semester for about 2yrs. Then I spent a year working for an awesome local artist named Fred Conlon, who was a tremendous influence on my work. I probably wouldn't have gotten into recycled art if it wasn't for him.
Then, I moved to Arizona for a couple years. Took metal sculpting down there for a year, as well as began schooling to earn my welding certification.
I then moved back to Utah, got my own equipment, and started up my own business!
The Iron Phoenix
I have been an artist my whole life. I was a voracious drawer as a kid. I would always sit on the floor, hunched over a book with a piece of paper and a pencil, drawing up whatever crazy creature popped into my head while watching TV.
In high school I began to try new things. Took ceramics for a couple years. Did a bit of wood working. Did some computer graphic and design. And of course all the usual drawing and painting goodness of the drawing classes.
In college I decided to give Graphic Design a try... and suffice it to say, one semester of 8am Basic Line Drawing for 2hrs, 4 days a week burned me out so bad I didn't even want to THINK about another drawing class for over a year. So, I ended up going into Biotechnology (which is a fancy term for a flunky lab assistant).
While working on that, I tried out a few different things. Scuba diving. Jewelry. Then I took a Basic Metal Sculpting class... and absolutely LOVED IT!!
From that moment on I was hooked. I took the class ever semester for about 2yrs. Then I spent a year working for an awesome local artist named Fred Conlon, who was a tremendous influence on my work. I probably wouldn't have gotten into recycled art if it wasn't for him.
Then, I moved to Arizona for a couple years. Took metal sculpting down there for a year, as well as began schooling to earn my welding certification.
I then moved back to Utah, got my own equipment, and started up my own business!
The Iron Phoenix
Favourite Visual Artist
Hyung Tae Kim, Wen-M, Heise, a bunch of other ppl on devart I can't remember right now
Favourite Movies
Pirates of the Caribbean, X-Men 1-2, Iron Man, Spiderman 1-2, Lilo and Stitch
Favourite Bands / Musical Artists
Linkin Park, Evanescence, Nickelback, Backstreet Boys, Sixx AM, Owl City
Favourite Books
The Bazil Broketail series, Drizzt series, Raptor Red, The Hobbit, The Relic, Fatalis, The World of Warcraft series
Favourite Writers
Mercedes Lackey, R.A. Salvatore, Michael Crichton
Favourite Games
X-Men Online RPG's, World of Warcraft, Dungeons and Dragons, board and dice games
Tools of the Trade
Pencil, Pen, Paint marker, Steel, Recycled scrap, Beads, fabric, marbles, spray paint, acrylic paint, brushes, welder, plasma cutter, power and hand tools
Other Interests
Anime, Fantasy, Comics, Super Heroes, Sharp and Pointy things, Cats, Travel, Conventions
More Gallery Cleaning
0 min read
Whelp... I'm not much for journal writing, as you guys can tell. And I see the last time I wrote anything, I was 'cleaning house'.
Which... is exactly what I'm doing again! XD I guess I'm picking up where I left off before.
At the moment I'm going through my 'Animals' gallery. I've removed a ton of old pictures, and I've updated several others, as I've been working on improving my designs.
Cleaned out a few more old, ugly, outdated images from my Fantasy folder, and I straight-up deleted the Home and Office folder, since there really wasn't anything in there worth noting.
I haven't touched the 'Ceramics' or 'Drawing' folders. I don't rea
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ZOMG!!! Cleaning teh Galleryyyy!!!
0 min read
So, with my Walking Tree Man getting a DD earlier this week, it got me looking at my gallery, and I realized just how much old crap I had in here!
A lot of it is old, out dated, terrible looking stuff.
Some of it is me playing with designs that at the time I was proud of, but now I'm just... meh.
Other stuff can, and should've been, complied into group images under one deviation, since they're all related.
Other images are just redundant.
So I went through and deleted a bunch of stuff. And there's a few more I think need to be fixed up or reorganized, which I'll have to get to at some point.
Oh!
Also, thank you to everyone who visited
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I'm Entering a Contest!
0 min read
That's right! For the first time ever, I am trying my hand at entering a contest here on DA! I'm pretty excited about it, though the competition is intense! There are some amazing designs, so while you're looking over these guys awesome gallery, you should check out some of the fine work by other artists who're also participating.
Below you will find the information about it.
This contest is being hosted by the amazing duo Worms and Bones. If you haven't seen their awesome sculpted horrors, you need to check it out:
http://wormsandbones.deviantart.com/
Below you will find the Journal with details about this contest:
http://wormsandbones.
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Profile Comments 93
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![Panda Emoji-31 (Hello) [V2]](https://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2014/170/e/5/panda_emoji_31__hello___v2__by_jerikuto-d7n4wi9.gif)
and good evening wonderful stranger! 
Thank you so very much for the watch, ![Bunny Emoji-72 (Kawaii) [V4]](https://fc02.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2014/170/b/6/bunny_emoji_72__kawaii___v4__by_jerikuto-d7n4whh.gif)
I really appreciate your support in my endeavor to become an artist. 
Have a most marvelous day!
Holy mackerel, I am absolutely floored by your work!! 
here is the updated version fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/i/201… I think I'm going to do one more round of changes, and then I will be done with it. I still need to start on my sculpture for the Wounded Warrior Project raffle. I do a lot of charity work.
Hmmm.... My initial thought when I saw this was that the smoke clouds look very... compact and solid. You don't get much impression of 'lift' like you expect to see with smoke. Your current design definitely has improved in that regard. I was actually gonna suggest making some little cloud 'clumps' in various sizes, with thin, short posts on the bottom. You could then mount the cloud-clumps in various places. Don't make the posts too long, cuz you wouldn't want them being visible... but doing this would give the smoke clouds more visual variety, as well as giving the impression of 'floating clouds'.
Not sure if doing this would work so well with your current design, since you've expanded further on the clouds already, and it might make the design a little excessively top-heavy. But something to think on if you do future projects.
My only other suggestion would be to clean up the base. It looks... kinda messy. You can clearly see big gaps around the bottom of the square piping where it meets the base. Maybe fill in those gaps, or add some simple ground texture
Not sure if doing this would work so well with your current design, since you've expanded further on the clouds already, and it might make the design a little excessively top-heavy. But something to think on if you do future projects.
My only other suggestion would be to clean up the base. It looks... kinda messy. You can clearly see big gaps around the bottom of the square piping where it meets the base. Maybe fill in those gaps, or add some simple ground texture
thanx for the input. It carries more weight coming from a respected metal artist like yourself. I agree with your ideas, and I would have done that, but it wasn't the look I was going for. I didn't want it that intricate, I wanted it to look simplistic and untidy, so you could tell it was made from scraps. I did, however, get a little carried away with the smoke. I'm sure you have had the same problem, where you are making something simple, and you get to one part of it that you obsess on too much, then you realize that you have spent hours on that one part, and its a lot fancier than you wanted it to be. to be honest, at this point, I might have to change the intended style, and fix up the rest of it to bring it up to par with the smoke.
Yeeeessss... I have started on projects that were suppose to be 'simple'... and they ended up not simple at all.
I do like the smoke a lot better though. It FEELS more like drifting smoke, rather then thick, too-dense, and too small. And I find that if you end up over-nice-ifying a sculpture, it's best to just keep going with it until you're satisfied. You will be happier with the end result.
I do like the smoke a lot better though. It FEELS more like drifting smoke, rather then thick, too-dense, and too small. And I find that if you end up over-nice-ifying a sculpture, it's best to just keep going with it until you're satisfied. You will be happier with the end result.
I love your work. I wish I had put up all of my art before my hard drive crashed, but I just kept putting it off.