awesome people in my life and a painting

 JOE AND ABBY I MISS THEM, I HAVE SOME OF THE BEST FUCKING CLIENTS IN THE WORLD, these two light up my work week, not day, week, when they come in, they are the best people to hang out with, and if your not doing that with them, its because your stupid, and you suck, basically.

crab head creature crawly thing oil painting

crab face painting, had to make its online presence more offical then the instagram, was stoked on this, mainly because i photo painted with eric S while doing it, was a fun, technology way of "Like, being there" also a good guy!

LIFES BEEN PRETTY FUCKING GOOD LATELY, NOMORE FUCKING WALKIN DAYS I HATED THAT BULLSHIT! WOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTT, AWESOME GIRLFREIND, AWESOME FREINDS IN FAR PLACES, I HAVE MY HEALTH AND A GOOD JOB

Jinxi of Out of Step Books shoutout

"Out of Step Books" owner's with vulture painting by David Ekstrom

i mailed this painting to jinxi and steve of OUT OF STEP BOOKS, for theyr feather (or wing?) of inspiration book, along with crow mouth lady, so pleased to see it made its way home, and also, to see it among its care givers...

out of step books is giveing new artists a voice, diamonds in the rough, and basically anyone who makes it past the first screening process of being published, measureing yourself to being published in a book is a fantastic thing, feeling immortalized in a time periode on a book that might some day be a collectors item on someones shelf.

i would go as far as to say theyr the tattooing industrys paired to the spectrum books, that i so highly endear, just in a more specific catagory, opposed to a wide variety of diffrent things, both, with awesome imagery, amazeing artists, and wise editing skills.

seeing this picture as i woke up from the bed of my new girlfreinds house made my fucking week. oh, and shes pretty fucking rad too (marie) ... i havent felt this way over a women since iv started tattooing, things are going good in david land.

i have a good job, im respected as a local artist, i have health (mostly) and im learning one of the coolest persons iv know, for awhile, again, meeting again for the first time, a poison the well song, speaks so closely to the situation at hand in title.

Bulk oil painting update

 OKAY! oils are fucking amazeing, this is a portrait of a beautiful person that iv been getting to learn, and im pretty sure im in a relationship with her names marie, and shes cooler then you, i havent connected with anyone on the levels that i have been with her in years, im a cold hearted fucking bastard, and she pryed some goopy droolie feelings out of me, and it gives life hope. anywase, PICTORIALs are always fun, riht? progress shots... and shit, well there it is, 2 layers is about all i can give for attention with oil paintings, no idea why... maybe its the wait time? idk. was totally thinking of the shawn barber painting he handed around the room he was working on at the paradise tattoo gathering in keystone colorado... portraits are no joke, especially when your big dumb face uses sharpie underneaith, but oh well, gave me some glazeing opportunitys to explore.. need to do more of those... super fun..

 creepy 2 hour painting i popped out, because i wanted to paint, and work a idea out in my head, i think i might do a follow up, more time consumeing concept of this one, where a human is being manifested out of a river of blood being vomited out of some sort of demons mouth.. mmm.. evil dark goodness.

vulture surprise skull oil painting for "Out of Step Books"

 

The two submissions i have for jinxi and steve of "out of step books" for theyr upcoming publication of "feather of inspiration"... this would be the 3rd book iv been published in by them.. sort of just gives my life a little more spunk to do something i know is going to get published other then on the fucking internet, which i just vomit out bullshit and turn on back on it right away...  but a book? super awesome, id reccomend all artists to give it a shot, to try and get in with her current projects.. oh, yeahd i had a skull painting i did for another book of hers.. so.. maybe this is thr 4th publication? idk, just gets me outside of my box :D

cant say id ever paint a lady with a fucking crow comeing out of her mouth for any super special reason... but it was fun! :D had alot of clients mention that they really like that one, AND one client said theyd totally get that painting tattooed on them, which would make me poop on myself, let it get dry, and super itchy and turn into a festering rash of excitment.

little before after going on her, sort of pictorial esk... i wanted to paint a screaming demon, or satan of some sort, theres alot more to this painting that isnt shown, but this is the good stuff :D might even make a 3rd layer out of some parts of it... mmm. a goof glaze or 6 could defintly help... mmm... glazes...

but yes! hes going to be opening a gateway in his chest that sort of looks like aold greek pillared hallway, billowing out fire, and maybe haveing a key floating in front of him ,in all his anger.. idk.. im getting tired, but ye.. iv been painting... alot.. apparently..

Buddha chakra tattoo, and paisly skull tattoo

 zen Buddha statue with color chakras arm tattoo

 This Buddha, and chakra combo running down the side belongs to a girl named Lela (spellcheck), she is one of the small amount of people that can make it on my "genuine people" list, super awesome gal who had a lot of shit going on in her life when she came in to get this marked into her flesh, she actually visited India, when it was halfway colored,  and was inspired by the Buddhist temples, to add onto the back side of her forearm, making this more of a sleeve-ish tattoo, right now its just on the inner right forearm... was a awesome tattoo to do, Buddhist imagery is so fascinating, seems so much older and wiser then Christan bullshit imagery of some curly haired guy on a torturing device..
she originally wanted it to be the full image of Buddha, but i talked her into doing a more zoom in of the face, and a "meditation hand" that isn't pictured here so well, both her and i prefer how it turned out opposed to original thinking, she was super rad to work with, please more clients like these? kthanks.

paisley injured human skull shoulder cap tattoo

MOAN-Y Tonys shoulder cap! we have one more session to go, but i couldn't help but update his paisley beaten up skully goodness, this poor guy did the same rendered injuries depicted on the skull to his own head.. he said the blood that came out of his nose was pink brain mattery lamesauce.. survived to tell the tale tho! another awesome client :) of course, but who doesn't like skulls? he was also super free-minded in the sense of layers, and that tattoos of higher calibers take a few layers in different places to really polish them and make them shine. SKULLS

Digital concept sketch

tormented prisoner dark ART by DAVID Ekstrom

Digital concept creature face sketch i did whole on the phone for about 5 hours recently, was pretty stoked how it came out, starting to enjoy the ipad and the sketchbook pro (which is the app i used and apparently prefer) with one of those "stylist" pens or whatever, regurdless, pretty fun, no idea what the web stuff was around the tormented looking guy, whos, not too happy apparently in his prison of spider web collar-y bondage

"spooky" haloween arm sleeve tattoo

Spooky Girl AMY K's Halloween Pumpkin night time arm sleeve tattoo by DAVID Ekstrom

"spooky" Halloween arm sleeve i did on the wonderful Amy K, it was a total pleasure tattooing this woman, she was so well mannered, and easy to get along with, one of those clients that makes being a tattooer worth it, this was taken  INDOORS after the final "go though" so this is florescent lighting people -___- i fucking hate florescent lighting for tattoos, much-less a sleeve, it was dark by 4-5pm at the holy mackerel by the time i wanted to take pictures, so i was forced too inside, stupid, indoor, light... blah!

regardless, starting from bottom up, around her wrist, were some ghosts and candy corn and bats and stars, by some other artist, i mainly left them alone, did a little blending, then, huge crow, some pumpkins, because everyone loves jack-o-lanterns :D mossy gravestone with a crow, spooky skeleton roaming the graveyard at night spooky pink mouth tree, whose apparently angry, probably because of all the bats flying around, and yeah, generic scary full moon in the background showing the hills of the buried dead. pretty stoked on this tattoo, like i said, mad props to Amy, she was awesome to work with, learned a lot doing this

creature oil painting, and collaberative

monster concept art painting progress by DAVID Ekstrom

 A little before after of a creature i drew on beforehand with marker,  fix-offed, and acrylic matte sealed the marker below, and used oils over the top, one session, one "layer" so to say, could probably benefit from another layer, but im calling it done, still highly enjoy painting creatures, monsters, and all of the like. I get a "genie" feel from this guy, maybe something about his "i know something, that you might not know" grin, and his "third eye" could pass as like, a eye-Gem thing, his round head sort of in a turban shape as well... hrm.. gotta love creativity

Biomech abstract collaborative painting with Jeff Marek, and David Ekstrom

had my ex co-worker and friend over for some collaborative oil painting action, we used the same procedure as above, but with charcoal instead of marker, because its easier to erase, i mainly worked the left side, as Jeff mainly worked the right, we did switch it up here and there, a good exorcise, even if i dont end up completing a bunch, i always feel like i walk away with something new when i do collaborative paintings, of, and the abstract form of biomech, which id say me and Jeff are not noobys at, is probably the best criteria for the sort of stuff, or just general things tattooers are into, maybe a half and half skull next time, who knows,