GPCP AUCTION PIECE: DOG

This is going to be a large-ish canvas that I am planning for the GPCP auction benefit. Of course, it's a play on the whole Obama/Shepard Fairey image that was so ubiquitous during the campaign. Iam thinking a bigger canvas--nothing too huge. I basically found a stock image of a dog and did my own little paint-over in Photoshop. It doesn't make me Duchamp or anything but I thought it made for some pretty nice satire.

Anyway, what I plan on doing is to basically create a pasted collage background and then paint over that on canvas... We'll see. Not really sure how it will come out. You never know with these things, you know? They kind of take on a life of their own. Stay tuned!!

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: INSTINCT

I love to eat them birdies. Birdies what I love to eat. Bite they little heads off. Nibble on they tiny feet.

SKETCHBOOK DROPPINGS: NEW STYLE

I have been adapting a style lately that more accurately reflects my personality and how I work. In the past, I have tried so hard to polish my style--to create works that are "gleaming" in their finished appearance. The ironic thing is that those pieces generate nowhere near the positive reaction that my looser, less polished pieces generate. I have shown my portfolio to people, watched them flip past all of the pieces that I was so proud of because of their polished finish only to have them stop at gaze at some sketch. I don't know what that says about me but I think I am going to explore this for awhile.
Here is another piece from my sketchbook...

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: CELEBRATE

Pretty much all I have had time to blog about these days are Illustration Friday topics... I have been busy with work and taking on other projects... It's been hard to stray too far from the work stuff. But I was able to knock together a fun sketch for this topic...

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: TIME

This is another loose color sketch for the Illustration Friday peeps. I don't know what I'm really trying to say here. Maybe nothing. Honestly, some of my sketches lately have seemed a little out there. They're not really anchored in anything except nonsense--which, oddly, I kind of love. I love the organic nature of sketching for fun... I think I need to embrace the nonsense more.

MORE SKETCHES

Some more deposits from the sketchbook. I thought this was a funny sketch. Not really sure why. I just think it's funny...

The other one is a sketch depicting a scene from Rumplestitzken for a series I was planning a year ago on Grimm's Fairy Tales. I never finished it because I don't really think I am saying anything "new" with this image. It's sort of too familiar. I kind of abandoned the whole project due to my inability to stretch... Time permitting, I like the composition though. I might noodle around with it some later...

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: FLAWED

This is my latest entry in Illustration Friday. I noodled this out last night. It's a "flawed" snapping turtle/dog. Of course, the inspiration is definitely Michael Gagne's Insanely Twisted Rabbits.. His character designs are truly twisted and beautiful and look like nothing I've ever seen. Check out his site for more examples of his wonderfully insane art and designs.

I truly need to spend more time sketching. It's so hard when I am staring down the barrel at daily deadlines and other projects, but it's so important to keep those muscles honed and fit. I can really tell when I have been too long away from the sketchbook... My draftsmanship gets very flabby.

TALES FROM THE SKETCHBOOK

Lately, I have been taking a break from work and other stuff to look at old sketches and came across some from a while back when I was thinking about The Jungle Book. I was wanting to create a Shere Kahn design that is less Disney and more "Terry Gilliam." Anyway, I like these tigers a lot. Big cats are a lot of fun.

I posted this on conceptart.org in their critique center and got some amazing feedback... One of the major points was that folks felt that there needed to be more variation in the colors overall--that is, adding more warmer colors, browns, golds, oranges. Others felt like it needed some more atmospheric touches to the background--maybe add some more cooler greens. I even desaturated some areas in the background to provide more of ma feeling of depth. One artist did me the honor of doing a brief "paint-over" on the image to better demonstrate his suggestions. I loved it so much that I tried to recreate the wonderful touches he added--though, of course, I added my own spin.

I attempted to do a "do-over" of this image--basically to flip the axe with the blade down (one critique was that the axe looked a little unnatural posed upright). I also did some revisions to the figure as well. I ultimately felt, however, that this piece was, overall, much stronger. Anyway, I had some printed today and they look amazing. I am pretty pleased with this--although, I see a lot of changes I want to make already. I am most likely going to be doing more pieces on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight as time permits. Stay tuned!

Just finished this illustration that I've been picking at since before the holidays. I really do love fantastic art and have long wanted to try to tackle some more challenging subjects... The above image is my depiction of the Green Knight from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. I read it many years ago in Medieval Lit class in college and always thought it would make an interesting illustrated text.

Overall, I am pretty happy with the illustration--although I would like to try and re-work the character a little bit. We'll see. Time permitting...

LAST ONE

I did this animation test using Lightwave about 4 years ago. I was messing around with doing Inverse Kinematics--a term used in 3D animation which just signifies a particular method for animating a character's arms, legs and body. It actually sort of works the same way a marionette works.

SOMETIMES I AM SILLY

Me being silly...

I ILLUSTRATE. SOMETIMES, I ANIMATE.

This is a rotoscoped animation I did a few years ago when I was producing a documentary for South Carolina Educational Television about the American Revolution. Wavy Davey, my co-producer, and I had toyed with the idea of doing several rotoscoped animated sequences to serve as visualizations for key points in the story. What we didn't realize was how truly TRULY time consuming it all is. This, coming from an illustrator--not an animator. An animator will tell you, "Well, Duh!" But still. I thought this looked pretty cool--and not bad for about a day's work.

This was another rotoscoped shot with some particle simulated sparks and smoke courtesy of Lightwave 3D. Crude in some ways but I was learning so much. I would video myself and then import the files into Premiere. I can't remember how I output the files to facilitate drawing on them in photoshop but... Anyway, then I converted the Pshop files into vector images and then colored them in Illustrator. I think I used Flash to animate and then AfterEffects to compose? I can't remember. It's been awhile. Of course the person bears a striking resemblance to me:)

This is the exact moment where I decided I was losing my mind and had to stop... It was taking way to long to get up to where we needed. Of course I was on another deadline at the time.

Anyway, I'll publish some more as I go through these...

MORE MOVIE SKETCHES

This was a quick 20 minute photoshop sketch I did of a scene from Last of the Mohichans--one of my all time favorite historical movies. Below is a detail/closeup:


When I say 20 minutes, that is to say I was really screaming fast and didn't even try to capture Wes Studi's likeness. Had I been trying to get a likeness, I would have spent much more time working on the drawing. This is really more of an exercise to try and nail down some lighting and value issues I have been having lately. Being largely self-taught as an artist, I am constantly realizing how little I actually know about color/value/composition. I have been sort of faking it--intuitively feeling my way through. Most of the time it works out but I often find myself struggling with some basic stuff as an illustrator--stuff most artists probably work out in art school.

Of course, the trick is to keep drawing. I am going to plan on doing several of these--as many as I can, a week. We'll see...

MORE PROJECTS I CAN'T TALK ABOUT

It's frustrating but I can't post anything about the cool stuff I am doing right now. Hopefully, I'll be able to soon. In the meantime, be on the lookout for some sketchbook stuff in the near future! Happy Palm Sunday...

TOO MANY PROJECTS

It's funny how the old wheel turns around. A little over a month ago, I was ready to swan dive off the nearest overpass due to the SEVERE lack of any meaningful freelance work. As many of you know, my fulltime job is fine, but let's face it, it's not what I want to spend the rest of my professional life doing and I've been doing it for eleven years. Of course, in that time I have been very lucky to branch out here and there with several side projects like the CHASING THE SWAMP FOX documentary and subsequent picturebook... Still, those projects have been few and far between and last fall was terrible. I was considering going back to school--which to me, felt more like an act of desperation than anything else. I mean, what would I study? And I'd be in exactly the same boat when I got out of school, only this time, I'd be in A LOT more debt! It was really starting to scare the ever living holy hell out of me. The idea that I was going to be this sad, bitter 50 year old scraping together one little gig after another... When faced with the alternatives of either shitting or getting off the pot. I chose to get off the pot and get moving. I can shit later...

Now I find myself awash in cool freelance projects and am even turning some down here and there. I am bound by a confisentiality agreement I signed not to publically discuss some of them but they are pretty cool and I am hoping some of these projects grow into something bigger. We'll see. I also submitted some Illustrations to the Spectrum Fantastic Art annual. We'll see if I got in or not... I should know this week whether I made it. I am hoplessly hopeful that I made the cut--but I won't be disappointed if I don't. It's a very presitgious annual and you have to really bring it if you want to make it in. I'll just keep submitting and see what happens...

Anyway, hopefully this trend of business will continue and I'll be able to post some preview images soon!

POLITICS

I am for Obama this November. I think he represents the best hope for our country to break the cycle of destructive "dynasty" politics. I also like the fact that he is, at once, critical of where we've been as a country--and yet is openly and genuinely optimistic about our country's potential. That is a most progressive virtue.

One thing that is getting me riled though is how he is being attacked as being "unpatriotic" for not wearing a flag lapel pin. This is a talking point that originated from the orifices of the right wing media and some of the festering lie suck-holes at CNN. All I have to say is this: If George Bush's little play-time dress-up photo-op on the deck of the aircraft carrier (mission accomplished!) is the measure of a patriot, I think we could all do without that kind of patriotism for awhile. Obama is hadling it very deftly though, by simply refusing to dignify those attacks with any sort of substantive reply.

Here's to Barack rocking on to the nomination...

OOH ROCK ME AMADEUS!!

Some fellow parents at my wife (and son's) preschool and I are currently reforming our cover band, The WIpes, for a May gig. It's a chance for us to play some cool tunes and generally act silly in front of a bunch of small children--who, in turn, look at us like GODS. For those of us who never played in a band, it's a chance to live out every fantasy we ever had about being a real ROCK STAR. And, by fantasy, I don't mean the ones where you wake up in a vomit caked hotel room with a four day hangover and a vicious case of the clap.

Well, tonight we had our first rehearsal--well, meeting. We didn't play much. We basically just talked about some of the songs and tried to figure out who's playing what and whether we're going to have a bassist and whether the gig is going to be outdoors and whether children will get all of the nuanced sexual innuendo in Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot." It should be great. We have a good little set so far. I'll post it later as we get it honed and pared down.

Personally, I would love to do an all country set. It would go like this:

Mama Tried by Merle Haggard
Still Doin' Time by George Jones
Hickory Wind by Graham Parsons
I Walk the Line by Johnny Cash
The Winner by Bobby Bare
Feelin' Better by Hank Jr.
He Stopped Loving Her Today by George Jones
Whiskey River by Wille Nelson
Help Me Make It Through the Night by Kris Kristofferson

Rounding out the set would be Willin' by Little Feat

But, I don't think the kids at the preschool are ready for that. It might be a bit much.

DON MUECK SCULPTURE

A friend sent me a series of images depicting the work of Australian sculptor Don Mueck. I have been a fan of his for awhile now--ever since I saw his sculpture of the Pope being crushed by a meteor. What I love about his work is both its hyper-realism, and how he plays with scale. It's more than just "making it large." It is taking something familiar and removing it from it's familiar space. The above sculpture is just a simple representation of a young boy. Nothing very remarkable about that in and of itself--but when seen with the small viewers in the foreground, the scale creates tension and drama.

I am pretty determined to spend a fair portion of my summer sculpting. It is something that, in truth, feels more natural to me than drawing. I feel better able to let go of the world around me when I am sculpting--more apt to disengage (in a healthy way) from external stimuli. It's the closest I've ever come to true meditation. Sculpting is, to me, much purer. My illustration work seems, at times, to be weighted down by my insecurities and my self conciousness. I don't have any of that with my sculpting work. I am sure that would change if I were to ever sculpt for a living... Maybe that's a can of worms I am happy to leave closed--for now.

THINGS I CAN'T TALK ABOUT...

Because I signed an NDA, I can't talk about these projects but I did want to post this terrible-quality montage to give folks an idea of what all I have been up to. I have had a couple of good freelance gigs lately--which is great. I also had to turn a couple down, which sort of sucks, though in some ways it doesn't... It's always better to be too busy than to be curled up in the fetal position chewing my toenails--in mental agony because nobody wants to hire me and I'll be lucky to be designing urinal cakes when I'm 40 which is only four years away... Oops, my internal monologue slipped out a little didn't it? Anyway, it's good to be busy!