Real Long Time No Blog….What Happened?
In the middle of scanning the images for my new book, 50 Legends of the Blues, my computer died.
I mean dead. I couldn’t even turn it on.
So, once it was determined that fixing it was not an option, I got a new IMac. The Apple folks, bless ’em, transferred everything from my old computer to my new one — for free!
So why no blogging on the Stout Journal for so long? Well, computer semi-illiterate that I am, my old computer was set up so that I just had to go to a bookmark to access my Journal. All of my bookmarks disappeared when I got my new computer. My webmaster, Brian Gaughan, just set me up again with an easy access to my Journal, so here I am.
One would expect that during all of this off-Journal time I’ve been doing stuff. You would be correct in that assumption.
Let me catch you up.
OK. My latest book, William Stout – Prehistoric Life Murals, is selling like nobody’s business, I’m happy to report. So, you might ask, why should I order it from you, Mr. Stout, and pay full retail when I could order it from Amazon at a lower price? Lemme tell ya.
Reason #1: If you order it from the William Stout Bazaar (on my website) I draw a sketch of your favorite prehistoric animal in your murals book FOR FREE! Heck, I charge more for those sketches at conventions than I do for the book! Think of it as buying a piece of original art and getting a brand new book wrapped around it for free.
Reason #2: If you buy more than one copy (or buy a murals book and some other stuff from my online catalogue) you don’t pay any additional postage — I only charge you the postage for the first item in your order and no more (unless you buy posters or prints; I gotta charge extra for that massive industrial tube I send them in). As it is, these mural books are so heavy (my publisher used incredibly expensive heavy paper stock for the book), I’m shipping them at a loss. Call me crazy — I just want to get these beautiful books out to people!
On a related subject, I just turned in a new book to my publisher, Flesk Publications. It’s titled The New Dinosaurs A to Z – Dinosaur Discoveries of the Last Two Decades. It features 60 newly discovered dinosaurs, each illustrated by Yours Truly in full color. It’s very up-to-date; it even features a dino discovery announced just a couple of days ago! At least 45 of the pictures have never been published. I drew and painted over twenty new ones in just the last couple of months. There are some pretty bizarre dinos in this book. John Fleskes has it scheduled for a Fall publication — just in time for Christmas.
Except for some lettering on the cover, I’ve finished my 50 Legends of The Blues book. I’m just waiting to hear whether or not Ry Cooder is going to write my introduction. I hope to have the original art tour the African American museums of our nation.
The big news in the Stout household is that I’ve been hired to production design a wild action-adventure comedy. More on that when I get my first check from the production company (and it clears the bank). The shooting schedule will mess up my convention appearances (I might have to fly in for just Saturday & Sunday of Comic-Con), but c’est la vie, as Chuck Berry said, it goes to show you never can tell. I’ve already started putting together an incredible Art Department crew.
My oil portrait of legendary bluesman Robert Johnson is currently on display at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. I also have two of my prehistoric Antarctica paintings on display right now at the Maryland Science Center. There is an exhibition of paintings of Malibu coming up at Pepperdine University soon; I’ll have a plein air painting of some pelicans on Malibu rocks in that show.
OK; I need to get back to completing all of my freelance assignments so that I can totally focus on this movie.
Good Day, Y’all!
Bill