With just a few minutes to spare to get in today’s sketch (Easter) I’m thrilled to share this portrait of Oliver Giller. Oliver is the person to first introduced me to the concept of Open Source. He is easily the largest philosophical influence on my life, and helped to form what I list amongst the most important beliefs that I have. I lost touch with him after he graduated from Rider University about 9 years ago, but always remembered the things that he introduced me to, including the GNU Image Manipulation Program, Linux, and the GNU General Public License.
Withing the last 2 years or so, though, we’ve reconnected, and I’m happy to say that we are even doing a project together, which I’m doing this sketch for. I’m less happy to report that Oliver had to undergo brain surgery recently which left him with a scar, and in Oliver’s work to recover he donated a picture of his new stitches and asked that I do something creative with it for our project, essentially a journal of his recent health issues.
In Inkscape, I did a bitmap trace of Oliver’s face, in which you could clearly see the scar and stitches, but without explanation, it looked only as though he had a bad haircut on one side. I decided in the interest of clarity and also of not offending anyone with the graphic nature of the subject to take a highly stylized approach to the scar and stitches. It was fun to stitch a pattern using the Bezier tool, and I think I may use this technique again.
I’m of the firm belief that Oliver has all the best chances to make a full recovery, including a beautiful wife and family, parents who have supported him forever, and a strong network of friends. Thanks, Oliver, for all you’ve given me in life, now go kick this thing’s ass, so you can get back to the important stuff.
