Mixed Bag Mythography

Fox & Phoenix Released

2011-10-13T20:32:00.001-07:00

Just a quick post to mention that Fox & Phoenix was released today! The cover illustration was a pleasure to do. Beth Bernobich crafted a richly detailed and inspiring world with compelling, complex characters and a unique vision of magic powered technology that hooked me from the beginning. The fine folks at Viking Press did an amazing job on the jacket design and it presents the illustration very nicely. It's a brilliant book all around and I'm proud to have been a part of it!

I'd hate to post without some art, so here's a little sketch from the other night. I'm still following random inspirations and procrastinating settling in to long term projects!

New Life

2011-09-29T14:56:00.001-07:00

Whoa, Fall already?!

I've been working on a few projects over the summer...some graphics, a picture book and sketching/conceptualizing for a new body of personal work. It's about time for an update so I dusted off an old sketch and spent a few nights on it.

Before I get too dug in to some of the long term projects I'll be working on over the winter, there may be a few more of these fun pieces coming...

Wereworld Cover

2011-07-05T12:48:00.000-07:00

Here’s my latest book cover for the North American hardcover release of “Wereworld”, an awesome novel written by Curtis Jobling and published by Viking Press. I’ve been anxious to post this for a while and since it’s now available on Amazon and cropping up here and there, I thought I’d put it up!

I really enjoyed the creative process on this, particularly since the Art Director wanted to develop a new look for the North American release. He wanted something more graphic and atmospheric. I also really enjoyed the wide composition the wraparound allowed for and there’s few things I enjoy painting more than a dark, foggy forest with a shadowy mythic creature and a hero thrown in for good measure!

The book will be on shelves in September and I enjoyed it cover to cover. Plenty of action, a richly detailed world, interesting characters and a story that hooked me from the beginning!

* Edit, August 10th, 2011 - Well, it looks like this won't be the published cover for the NA release of Wereworld after all. The AD let me know the publisher went with a different approach for the cover. This was still a great experience and the AD was happy with my work, so that's good...I'm just a bit disappointed that my work won't be out there on the shelves.

Mixed Bag Mythography III

2011-06-20T00:29:00.001-07:00

I’ve finally managed to update after a few months... been busy on some projects that I can’t release just yet. What I can show is this piece I did for fun during the down-time in between jobs.

I love African masks and thought they'd be great inspiration for a Mixed Bag Mythography piece. This mask is mostly inspired by the styles of the Igbo culture from Nigeria. The character is a kind of priestess or shaman inspired by Obeah, a form of folk magic and sorcery practiced in the West Indies of Igbo origin. What exactly she’s doing with the mask I’m not sure of, I'll leave that for you to decide.

As far as updates go... I'll have a piece published in Spectrum 18 due out in November. I always feel honoured to have any work selected to be shown amongst so many talented artists and this year is certainly no exception.

I'm a little late on posting this news, but I've also got a few pieces in the "Gorilla Artbook" published by the fine folks at CFSL Ink. Gorilla Artfare is an online community of artists that I've been a part of for over 5 years now. It's an incredibly talented group and I've made many great friends there. Last year, the talented Aurelie Neyret spearheaded a book project with work submitted from all the GA artists and the Gorillas went all out on making it happen. Thanks in particular to Aurelie, Victoria Maderna, Federico Piatti and the folks at CFSL. The book is beautifully designed and laid out and filled with awesome work from start to finish. You can check out a preview and order it online at cfsl-ink.com

That's it for now, thanks for looking, I’ll be posting some more work and projects soon...

Chromag Bikes- Bear Rider

2011-03-14T23:44:00.000-07:00

Chromag Bikes is a Whistler B.C. based manufacturer of high end mountain bike frames and components. I was recently inquiring about some parts for a new bike I'm building and ended up talking with Ian Ritz, the owner. He saw some of my work and thought I might be able to bring an idea of his to life and this graphic is the result.

I did the graphic based on Ian's idea and then worked his existing branding in to ground the image. This version has been printed on 24"x36" posters and a simpler 2 colour variant of it using halftones for the shading was screen printed on T-shirts.

I've been a lifelong mountain biker and it was great to have my obsessions of art and biking come together like this. Ian was great to work with and it was a fun project all around.

Isis

2011-01-25T02:40:00.000-08:00

Here’s a new personal piece that I’ve been working on sporadically over the last few months. I started it way back in June and although I initially put it down, after getting swamped with work and life it ended up being my go-to piece for the shorts breaks I’ve had in between projects when I was too burned out or uninspired to start something new.

Although I kept the working title of Isis, it’s not too firmly based in Egyptian mythology. The figure takes some inspiration from the classic depiction of Isis but from there I mixed up the symbolism a bit and tried to evoke a visceral sense of the cycle of life, death and rebirth.

Fox & Phoenix Cover

2010-10-20T19:41:00.000-07:00

Well, after an extremely busy few months I'm really excited about this post - a cover for a brilliant young adult novel titled "Fox & Phoenix" by Beth Bernobich.

I was approached by Jim Hoover, an art director at Viking Press who thought I'd be a great fit to illustrate this southeast asian inspired world where the people have spirit animal familiars and the technology is powered by magic flux.

The concept was to have the two main characters and their familiars entering a bustling city filled with people, lights and magic and being a bit overwhelmed by it all. I put the characters into a dark, narrow alley that almost feels like it's going to close in on them, played up their distinct personalities and brought the city to life with lots of atmosphere and bright neon signs.

I really enjoyed getting my head into this world and bringing it to life and working with Jim was a real pleasure. This was a super fun and rewarding project from start to finish and I'm really happy with the result. It's scheduled for a Fall 2011 release and I can't wait to see it on the shelves!

Gallery Page Added

2010-05-17T19:51:00.001-07:00

Hey hey...I've been crazy busy at work for over a month, so I haven't been able to finish any personal work lately. I did, however, put a selection of my finished work from 2007 to present into a Gallery page. I've been adding alot more work-in-progress stuff and sketches lately, and it's bogged down the blog a bit for anyone who'd like to get right to the goods, so now it's all in one place, HERE.
You can also access the Gallery by clicking the Gallery Link in the top right corner of the home page.

This image is an old one that got tweaked a bit before I submitted it to Spectrum. Turns out it's the one they chose to publish in Spectrum 17.

White Widow

2010-04-23T14:25:00.000-07:00

For some reason, "White Widow" got in my head, so I did a sketch inspired by it over a couple nights this week. I may take it further, but would probably end up liking the rough better as usual, so we'll see...

Finished Up...

2010-04-13T09:03:00.001-07:00

Spent the weekend finishing up and tweaking a few pieces.

Hard to know when to call this one finished... it's a bit minimal in tone so I didn't want to overwork/ overtighten.

I put this one away a little too early to feel good about it for long... now I think I've done all I can do with it.

I was okay with where this was at, but while I was in the finalizing mindset a gave it another hour or two to fix a couple things that were bugging me.

click the thumbs for a larger image from Flickr. That's all for now...

News and Art...

2010-04-04T13:38:00.000-07:00

Happy to say I'll have some worked featured again in Spectrum 17. Not sure which piece or pieces yet... I submitted 3 images this year. Can't wait to see what made it in.

I've been finishing up this image for the last week or so. I had tried this idea out last year with some pretty mixed results... mixed meaning, well.. kinda shitty and overworked...so here's another attempt.

A little something I wanted to make note of involving the process on this one...

When I sat down to draw this, I grabbed a blank sheet to scribble on a bit to warm up my hand. What I ended up doing on it was blind contour drawings of the reference I'd printed out. I just focused on the contours in the ref and felt them out on the paper getting a feel for the rythm and flow. It ended up being a really enjoyable exercise and I think it'll become a regular thing. I loved the feeling of just putting down the lines without getting all tight and overworking them.

When I'm warmed up for the real drawing, I've absorbed the contours and have the reference images more in my head - my lines are then more likely to keep some of that looseness. I'd recently read Itten's Design and Form and thought his thoughts on warming up and preparing for work were gold.

From Johannes Itten's "Design and Form"

"My first morning periods in class begin with relaxation-, breathing-, and concentration exercises to establish the intellectual and physical readiness which make intensive work possiblee. The training of the body as an instrument of the mind is of great importance to a creative person. How can a hand express a characteristic feeling in a line,when the hand and arm are cramped..."

There's a few other real pearls in there too. I found his Art Of Colour to be a worthwhile read as well.

Solace progress

2010-03-22T08:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I worked up a thumbnail posted a bit earlier. I really tried not to overtighten and to maintain the value relationships...

click the thumb for a bigger size...

And I did up this thumbnail...another angle of the "Well" thumb - also posted earlier. Glad I experimented in the thumbnail stage for this one. If I'd gone ahead with my first thumb, I would have ended up with another passive compostion/boring angle. Funny how I'm such a passive observer in life and how that translates to how I compose images...at least until I finally break the habit of framing a scene like I'm just documenting it.

Character Sketch

2010-03-15T13:35:00.001-07:00

So this is a sketch for another character from my wife's novel-in-progress. I think this guy is going to take some further development before I really get to know the character. Inspiration so far is a rouge-ish young guy... a rebellious, anti establishment type who's also a bit of an inventor/ engineer. There's a bit of victorian and turn of the century wild west influence going into the costuming, and he rides a cool vintage motorbike, too. Speaking of the bike, this is a painted over design from a 3d model I blocked into the scene. I've changed the design a bit to resemble a modern made, but vintage styled bobber.

...I tweaked this later in the day and refreshed it.

Carry On...

2010-03-12T09:19:00.001-08:00

Well this turned out a bit awkward all around, but whatever...I'm pretty much done with it. I dropped the overall saturation - except for on the bird to pop it out a bit. I also changed the lighting a bit to cast it up on the baggage and the dude's face more - those things both helped it out.

Sunday Thumbnails

2010-03-08T09:17:00.000-08:00

Still more of these...

More Thumbs and Progress...

2010-03-06T15:11:00.001-08:00

Here's a couple colour thumbs from the last week. The one withthe tree shows how great these are for idea development, as I think it improves on the previous version in a few ways... more story, more interesting mood, more compelling.

This one came out of some interesting ref. I like the small hits of light.

and here's the progress on this one. It's just about there...

That's all for now. I hope to wrap the last one up this weekend, and I've got a few more pencil thumbnails that I'd like to throw colour on... just need to find the time.

Some Progress

2010-02-27T13:11:00.000-08:00

Just been working this one up for the last few days...

More Thumbnails and Sketches

2010-02-23T10:25:00.000-08:00

Here's a few more thumbnails and sketches from the last week or so. I'm definitely seeing the value of these in terms of evaluating whether or not a composition is going to work. I've always enjoyed experimenting with these, but now I think it's getting to be a must-do stage of my process.

experiment with the comp...

Here's one from pencil thumb through a more worked up stage...

Here I've printed out the photoshop sketched lines and cleaned them up in pencil on heavy watercolour paper, then scanned and added them back in. With the value blocked in, I'm better able to see how the drawing needs to be, rather than going to far too early and needing to change it midway through the colour stage. The pencil and paper texture is subtle, especially at this size, but I think it adds a certain something.

And another.. this one will stay in greyscale for the final. This has been worked up from a previous thumb... you might be able to see that I've comped in a 3d model of the motorcycle to help with the structure. It'll get all tweaked and painted over for the final... just need a little help with all that complex machinery and perspective.

Last but not least, a character sketch for a project, this has been pulled back from a version that I went too far with and overtightened... I'm slowly learning the value of staying loose... still have to force myself to do it.

Death

2010-02-17T10:21:00.000-08:00

Here's one of the sketches from last post that I worked up. I tried to keep it loose overall and only tighten up a bit more in the focal areas.

Colour Thumbnails

2010-02-05T10:03:00.000-08:00

This week I've been drawing loose thumbnails sketches and then doing quick colour and/or value passes on them in Photoshop. It's a good, fast way to see if compositions or ideas are going to work before I go ahead with them. If the thumbnail doesn't read or look good, it's likely a bigger version won't either.

Gorilla Artfare's Second Birthday

2010-01-27T19:47:00.000-08:00

I'm lucky to be a member of a really great artist collective by the name of Gorilla Artfare. It's an amazingly talented group of artists. January 24rd was the second anniversary of our blog and we all decided to celebrate by riffing on another Gorillas work. The pairings were done at random, and I was lucky to get Sergio Lopez - aka Main Loop. I thought his series of Hip Hop portrait paintings were really inspiring, so I did my own take on this one. I would have liked to give it a little more attention, but as usual I've been busy with lots of little things cropping up to eat away at my personal time. Anyway, I had alot of fun with it, despite being a bit rushed. Here it is...

Cody Tilson covered my Wolf Girl piece - I was really stoked to see what he did with it. On the 24th, there was a huge post on the GA blog with all the pieces - and all the work was incredible and inspiring, check it out!

Thanks go out to all the Gorillas for the insight and inspiration they've shared with me over the years, and a special thanks to Victoria Maderna for organizing the 2nd b-day event.

Neon Dragon Final

2010-01-17T12:21:00.001-08:00

So here's the final version of the Neon Dragon piece I've been chipping away at for the last month or so. It actually turned out to be much more of a learning process for me than I had planned, and the piece really benefitted from getting workshopped a bit. During the process I got some great input that helped me make up for some poor planning the piece suffered from in the early stages and highlighted some areas I need to focus on to push my work forward. It showed some promise as far as process and technique goes as well. There's more on that after the image, which will link you to my Flickr account where there's a larger size as well...

Back in December when I started it, I began thinking about major areas in my work and process that I'd like to work on for the coming year, I've been meaning to make note of them for a while and now that this is done, it's a great example of what is working and what isn't for me right now.

So here's a sort of manifesto/ art resolution for me going forward.

1 - Theme.
I need to always clearly establish a theme for any given piece I start...even for fun, personal work. My personal work in particular has often started with an image in mind, and gone from there, working in or just hinting at theme as I go. Instead I need to sort out exactly what my theme is first, or right after my initial thumbnail or idea, and then decide how I want the piece to communicate that. This should help keep the work focused and cohesive, as well as help make decisions for everything from composition, colour and design details to gesture and expression. It's what will make work compelling, rather than just an interesting image.

2 - Reference
In the last year or so I've really learned alot about how important good reference is, and I've loosened up a bit about how much I use and how necessary it is - even for less realistic work. Getting the right reference for a piece and using it without being a slave to it is key. I've been shooting my own for a while now and it's helped tremendously. I need to carry on with that and take it further - really spend the time to get what I need to serve the piece, not make the piece according to the reference that I have available. That means getting the right acting, costuming and lighting. I'm hoping this will help with some anatomy issues that seem to continually creep in to my stuff, I need to know how poses look in reality before I tweak them. Lighting and details in reference will also help to push my work into a more immersive, compelling reality of it's own.

3 - Posing and Expression
This ties in with the Theme and Reference points but deserves mention on it's own as it's really important. Once theme is established, the first thing I need to do is decide what my characters are communicating, and how to express that through gesture and expression. If I have characters interacting, I need to make sure they actually look like they're interacting, and compose the piece accordingly. This means making decisions and not trying to show too much sometimes - which is what I didn't do early on in the Dragon piece and it was a major setback.

4 - Tones
I've been starting to become more aware of tones and the relationship between tones. I've read from some really impressive artists that tones and tonal relationships are really important in creating realism. Using more reference and doing some studies will help with this.

5 - Saturation
I do like working with bright, vivid colours, but that can lead to over saturating the entire image sometimes. With more attention paid to contrasts of extension and balance in my colour work I can have areas of colour pop out more and the piece can be more realistic and dynamic. Working up from desaturated backgrounds to the foreground and hitting areas of interest with the highest levels of saturation and contrast will help.

6 - Perspective/Compostion
This goes along with not making decisions and trying to show too much - I sometimes end up defaulting to safe angles and compositions. With theme established, I need to decide who or what the primary subject is and choose an angle and compostion that best communicates that - in a way that is fitting with the mood of the piece, be it dramatic, static, dynamic, etc.

7 - Texture and Materials
Also tying in with reference, paying more attention to rendering texture and materials will help make my stuff more plausible and immersive. Really paying attention to how highlights break up and falloff is key. I'm not happy with my mark making as well. The right brushes and materials will help, but it's probably also just something I'm going to develop over time as I work at it. Like anything, the more experienced, comfortable and confident you are at something, the more style and expression can come through.

I think that's all I have on my mind for now - it's plenty to work on. Hopefully by taking the time to write all this out, It'll be more firmly established in my mind, and I'll refer back to this to remind myself once in a while.

Thanks for looking...

-Nigel

Dragon - Settling on values and hues

2010-01-06T19:09:00.000-08:00

Okay so here's another minor update. I've just been tweaking hue, value and saturation levels on this for the last day or so... trying to get everything balanced nicely before I flatten it out and start the final rendering and details.
It's been tough trying to get the neon to look convincing but not too blown out.

Dragon Progress

2010-01-04T16:07:00.001-08:00

Well the holidays are over, but this piece still isn't done. I didn't get as much art time as I would have liked over my 2 week break, but that's often the case during a holiday. So I've lost a bit of momentum on this, but I'm hoping to get back into it this week and get it done asap.

I've recomposed the background and dutched the angle a bit for a more dynamic shot, and I've started to render the girl character a bit more as well. I'm close to flattening it and doing the final painting pass, but first it needs a few more lighting adjustments.

Dragon Rework

2009-12-23T15:50:00.001-08:00

DragonWIP15Small, originally uploaded by NigelQuarless.

I've gotten alot of great feedback on this image, and based on a real concensus for the girl's pose and expression not being convincing or compelling, I've reworked her and I think she's working much better now.

Thanks to Tony, Derek, Barret, Nonie, Vic, Min, Aurelie, Bjorn, Kan and Scott!!!! I really appreciate the feedback on this (and my work in general) You guys rule for taking the time to help me out!

Some of the feedback I got on this has hit on some points I need to address in my work going forward, I'm going to address those in my next post, but right now I'm getting ready to head home for the holidays.

Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays everyone!

Dragon colour wips

2009-12-09T19:42:00.001-08:00

Here are some rendering stages for the Dragon piece I previously posted the linework for. I'm hoping towrap this up in the next day or so...

originally uploaded by Dead Mello.

Dragon Linework

2009-12-01T09:09:00.001-08:00

DragonLine_NigelQuarless72dpi, originally uploaded by Dead Mello.

Here's the linework finished up from the previous sketch.

Drgn Sketch

2009-11-27T13:56:00.000-08:00

So here's a sketch for an upcoming piece...I'll try and post progress as I go. The final will be a much more involved image with a city night background, lots of neon etc... this is to sort out the posing of the 2 figures in the comp. I'm going to render this with graphite and white pencil on some tones Rives BFK and see how that will integrate with some digital colour.

Also, I've started a flickr account so I can upload decent quality images here... I'm over having blogger crunch my images down to crappy looking thumbnails!

Colour Sketch

2009-11-05T12:59:00.001-08:00

Here's a colour sketch I did for an illustration I've been wanting to get to for a while. These always turn out the best when they're rushed... no time to noodle, just broad colour. This one was about 15 minutes one night with a 10 minute tweak session the next evening.

regenerate

2009-10-26T10:14:00.000-07:00

Got the cast off my arm last Wednesday...
Here's what I've been working on...it's a bit of an experiment. I started off with graphite, watercolour and acrylic on Rives BFK but didn't end up keeping any of it in the final. I liked what the analogue stuff added but that step needed a bit more attention to hold up for the final. Good to know for the next one though.

Fall Update

2009-10-19T13:21:00.000-07:00

So it's taken me way longer to update than I'd hoped for...
Shortly after my last post I dislocated my left wrist riding the Whistler Bike Park... I was ripping down In Deep on my way into Captain Safety, clipped a root or something with my bike, went flying and WHAM!

After surgery and about a week of doing nothing I got back to work and being able to do personal art and since then I've managed alright, fortunately it's my left wrist so I can still hit the hotkeys with it while it's casted. Without the bike riding to distract me for the last 7 weeks I've actually gotten a fair bit of work done...mostly for a really cool short project at work, but I've done some personal work too.

I also just finished reading a really cool book about J.W. Waterhouse. I wasn't too familiar with his stuff before, but I found his myth inspired paintings very interesting in both subject and technique, so I thought I'd pick up the book. I ended up reading it pretty much cover to cover and really enjoyed learning about the historical and social context for his work and his symbolist, mythic, occult and pre-raphaelite influences. He based alot of his mythical work on writings by Ovid, Shelly, Keats and Tennyson. Definitely a very inspirational artist for me, and it's cool to learn more about the history and inspiration for his work... paricularly the symbolist and mythic influences as I think they are a good traditional foundation for where I'd like to see the direction of my personal work go.

I'm still juggling a bunch of personal projects that need more attention if they're gonna go anywhere, but while I was recovering I wanted to work on something fun and straightforward so I worked this new piece up. The original inspiration came from Sabbath's Supernaut,(I've been on a bit of a kick lately) and somehow turned into this...

Anyway, the cast comes off in two days and I'm super stoked. I've got a design for my right shoulder sleeve to finish before November and a few unfinished things and experiments to get to, so hopefully now that it's fall I will be cranking some stuff out and posting work more often.

Boy Soldier

2009-08-23T20:09:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy summer... despite just having 2 weeks vacation, I haven't found much art time for actually finishing any major pieces.

I have been working with my wife on a picture book though. It's about a Boy Soldier in Africa and here's a current sketch of the main character.

Thumbnails

2009-06-24T09:14:00.000-07:00

I always start out with a thumbnail. Here's a comp of some of my favorites from the last 3 months or so.

Spring Update

2009-06-22T10:05:00.000-07:00

It's been a really busy Spring... literally the day after my last post I got involved in what turned out to be a fairly lengthy freelance gig. I was quite a long process and after that project was finished there was a bit of burnout downtime and some rest. I've also been thinking alot about where my personal work is heading as I'm gearing up for a couple of personal projects I'm going to start this summer. As a bit of a break I did this quick piece over a few nights this week. It's no real departure for me as far as style goes, but I think some of the thinking I've been doing about my work is starting to show in a more cohesive, inspired look. I'm figuring out how to represent my themes and inspirations more, where my influences fit in to that and starting to develop more of my own personal visual language.

Colour Thumb...

2009-04-21T14:27:00.000-07:00

I'm going to try and update more frequently, even if it's just little things like this...

...a small colour thumb I did up the other night. These are such good practice for composition and colour... I love 'em. Started with a blue green sky colour for the jungle night sky and worked towards the foreground laying in bold silhouettes in solid colours first, then pushing some back with atmosphere, then hitting some spots with a brigh, warmer moonlight. Really tried to keep the strokes purposeful on this...

I am reading Moby Dick right now, thanks to my current interest in classic, dark fiction and Tony's emphatic recommendations... Melville's thoughts on the inherent terror inducing qualities of white, especially when found in nature, were why the snake ended up white...more interesting than the green I was thinking of for sure.

Spectrum 16 and Mixed Bag Mythography

2009-04-15T00:17:00.001-07:00

Well, it looks like I will have some work in Spectrum 16!

I was super surprised to make it in to say the least. I sent submissions in this year as a due dilligence kinda thing, with no expectations whatsoever of having anything accepted and I think I'm still in a bit of disbelief!
When I find out what piece or pieces got in and get an official correspondence from them it will probably sink in a bit more.

I am really, really flattered to be in a volume with so many incredible artists and I know that seeing my work amongst the many truly great pieces will be humbling but it will inspire me to work harder too. It's great to feel like the hard work and focus is paying of somehow, and I'm more inspired than ever to keep pushing myself, be more focused and work even harder. I've been looking up to the artists published in Spectrum since Volume 3, and this is a huge milestone for me.

So not to post news without art...

When I wanted to come up with a title for this blog, I wanted it to somehow relate to my personal work that is eclectically inspired and varies in subject a fair bit, but is still unified by my own influences and Personal Mythologies. I came up with Mixed Bag Mythography.

I wanted to make an illustration to serve as a visual interpretation of this title that would represent some of the inspirations and subjects of my personal artwork. I chose to personify the theme with a female character to represent creativity. She’s kind of a vagabond – wandering through the world much like how my inspiration will wander with no set purpose. She’s collected all kinds of trappings and artifacts, some of which represent my cultural background and inspirations, and others that I just think are cool and add interest.

All the pseudo-intellectual artistic descriptions aside: this is a character I thought would make a cool illustration for my Blog, with lots of interesting things to paint and opportunities to play with expression, colour, texture and lighting.

I hope you like it…

- Nigel

Big Ol' Grizzly Bear...

2009-03-08T23:34:00.000-07:00

I haven't had much to post for the last month or so... did a couple submissions for Udon Darkstalkers book, we'll see how that goes...

Anyway, as fun as the fan art was, it's good to get back to my personal work. I made a bunch more PS brushes last week. Some rough textured ones, bristly ones and some different chisels. Here's a sketch I painted up a bit using some... the bristles worked out great on the fur.

...updated this march 23rd... fixed a part of the tree on the right that was bugging me.

Colour Thumbs and a Sketchpage

2009-02-11T10:57:00.000-08:00

I've just been sketching and messing around a bit for the last few weeks.

Here's some small colour thumbnails I did. I'm forcing myself to work on these small without zooming in, trying to keep it simple and just use the right colours and values to make them work without rendering. It's a really good exercise, and when you do lots at once you really start to notice the compositional and lighting cliches you fall back on. These are a great way to explore ideas for bigger pieces, if they work this small they will be great in larger sizes...you've also got a pretty complete colour palette after an hour or so.

And here's a sketchpage...

Steampunk CGTalk Challenge

2009-01-20T18:45:00.000-08:00

Been a while since I updated...I've been pretty busy wrapping up my entry for CGTalk's Steampunk Myths and Legends Challenge. I'm not really into Steampunk but I am really into Mythology, so I thought it would be a good excuse to do up an illustration.

I started by brainstorming some myths and thumnailing what I thought might be interesting compositions.... Icarus, Gawain, Valkyries, Cyclops, Giants, etc...

After settling on an Icarus theme,I did more thumbs...

I had a pretty hard time finding a composition and pose that showed everything I wanted to show but was still close up enough to show the expression on Icarus. The one figure was going to be center of focus for the comp, so I wanted him pretty close up. I did this thumbnail up into a slightly more involved sketch, and then did a quick colour pass on it.

After this point I was pretty burnt out on the piece. I was so unhappy with it that I came super close to deleting all the work off my hardrive just to be done with it. I was happy with the decisions I'd made, but the art I had generated was pretty poor. Too much quick sketching without a real commitment. After a 2 week break I started the piece over again, sticking to the decisions I'd made, but with more focus. I started with some design work on the character...

Then after the holidays I started the work on the final comp. I was never really happy with the poses I had come up with, so I sketched a few more dynamic one out that had a struggling, grasping emotion to them, rather than the helpless resolve of the previous look and it really made the piece start to come together.

A rough block in of the comp with the colour scheme I had established before, but moved the light source to the bottom...

and went from there...

Did some design work for the airships and Steam Labyrinth after I'd roughed them in.

Then I did some rough 3d modeling to help block them in for the painting...

Got the 3d integrated...

and then pretty much just worked at it until the deadline to come up with a final.
I got alot of great feedback along the way that really helped the piece out, so thanks to everyone who gave input. I learned alot through the process and I felt pretty good with what I ended up with, but I'm really glad to be done with it.

The Fairy Jar

2008-12-18T16:48:00.000-08:00

I worked up one of the sketches from my last post into this...

More Sketching

2008-12-05T09:14:00.000-08:00

I thought it would be good to put up some rough stuff from this week. These were done over two nights.

Robot Apocalypse

2008-11-22T12:13:00.001-08:00

I've done alot of sketching for some ideas over the last two weeks. Here's a page of thumbs and two options that came out of them worked up a bit. Based on the feedback I got from a few people I am going with the last one. Working on this image made me think it would be cool to develop a Heart of Darkness interpretation set in a distopic future - Apocalypse Now with killer robots I guess.

Valley of Heads

2008-11-17T19:35:00.000-08:00

A pretty quick (by my standards) sketch from last week... maybe 3 hours altogether. This was pretty inspired by a couple photos from my trip to Botswana and Tanzania last summer and some Benin mask designs.

Hope

2008-11-09T11:44:00.000-08:00

Something fun and light I did over a couple nights this week... I think Obama's election win has lifted spirits all over the world, mine included.

Halloweeny

2008-10-31T09:14:00.001-07:00

some Halloween fun...

More Street Wars

2008-10-30T19:30:00.000-07:00

Having not done a set of these from scratch for a while, I went back to have some fun with eclectic design elements and guns again... I managed to cut a few stages of overlaying out of the drawing process for these - just roughing in the figures with blue pencil and then tightening with graphite, then doing an overlay of the costume elements. Took me one week total with some work on other stuff in between. It was more of the quick and fun process these were supposed to be from the beginning.

Tweaks

2008-10-18T19:59:00.000-07:00

I originally did this last April, but there was a couple things that always bugged me about it, so I spent a couple hours fixing it up last week.

Another thumb...

2008-10-13T12:09:00.000-07:00

...worked up in Painter. I've been liking that of late... I may keep working it, I may just leave it as is.

Close Encounters

2008-10-08T20:45:00.000-07:00

Something I recently went back to after a while. I took an old colour sketch and spentlast week working it up in painter using some art pen tools, then finished it off in CS3. I think I'm getting better at a more painterly approach. I did most of the work on one layer, which is a much simpler approach than I normally take. I tried to keep it loose in areas and not overwork it.

and a detail...

Long time no post

2008-09-15T09:11:00.000-07:00

So finally here's a small update. To anyone who actually checks this thing for new work - my apologies. It's been a great summer, but I've had almost no time for personal work. Anyway, I worked up one of my colour sketches a while back. I used Painter for this and really liked the way the Art Pen brushes actually update the cursor with the brush pen, unlike photoshop where you have to guess at the angle as you rotate the stylus.

Anyway, I hope to be posting more often as the weather gets worse and I start doing more personal work in the fall. Thanks for looking.

Vent

2008-05-24T13:43:00.001-07:00

Hey hey,

Still really busy these days, not much to post other than this piece. Click the thumb for a bigger version.

Stuff from the last while...

2008-05-09T08:56:00.000-07:00

I haven't made quite as much time for personal work for the last little while in favour of more bike riding and getting some stuff organized, but I've been chipping away at a few things.

Another page of colour thumbs...

A paint-up of the character sketch from the last post. This personal project is definitely gaining some momentum in my head...more to come.

This piece is from a sketch done in 2006. I had the idea a couple years before that even, so I'm pretty stoked for it to finally be done.

Miscellany

2008-04-05T12:59:00.000-07:00

Here's a few things from the last week or two.

A sketch of a character I've been thinking about from a new personal project that's starting to formulate in my head... Thnis was kind of a nice break for me because normally I have a very iterative design process, and with this I just tried to work it out on one sheet of bristol.

a girl with a little yeti pet, kinda goes with a series of characters I did last year...

and some more Street Wars charaters. Kind of eastern european/russian/skinhead/punk inspired hatebreeders.

Colour Sketches

2008-03-19T15:32:00.000-07:00

After seeing some really inspiring Colour Sketches from Hethe Srodawa I was inspired to try some out... mine aren't nearly as good of course, but they're super fun and I think they'll be a good way to get me to loosen up and try ideas out quickly.

Nothing Much

2008-03-14T12:13:00.001-07:00

Just another random idea...

Street Wars

2008-02-28T14:32:00.001-08:00

This has been a personal design project for me for the last year or so. I'm thinking of it as a very loose framework of an idea for a video game to just give me some direction and help design choices.
Inspiration for it is very eclectic and includes things like street fashion, the Blood Brothers (the song Streetwars/Exotic Foxholes and others on the Young Machetes album), weapons from around the late seventies to preset day, urban decay and whatever random things cross my mind...

I've been designing character classes in pairs of male and female. The idea is that it would be a co-op game something like Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, where a dude can play with his wife or girlfriend, you get to upgrade your character with cool weapons and tactical stuff and your better half has fun dressing hers up in funky clothes.

It's been a really self indulgent project as far as design choices go, so it's not necessarily going to make sense or appeal to everyone...trying to do that is my day job.

Anyway, here's the latest characters. Some resistance characters inspired by the Black Panther party in the 60s, and a bit of the Blacksploitation movies from the 70s like Superfly.

and the characters I've done so far for some context.

DeathDiscoDancePunk

2008-02-26T12:14:00.000-08:00

Another random idea...the girl's outfit was inspired by a VICE DO, and for some reason I thought she should be 80s dancing with a skeleton.

Some Touch Ups

2008-02-10T18:43:00.000-08:00

Just a couple of pieces from last year that I wanted to touch up.

This one I did last September, I thought it was missing some final touches, so I went back and added some texture to the robot, made the girl's eyes less buggy, made the windmill thingy in the background a bit more apparent and added more colour to the flowers.

And one I started around November I think. Added texture and tweaked some values...

Monster Pack

2008-02-07T21:04:00.000-08:00

Here's a character I finished up from an old sketch last weekend. It was a pretty quick one, maybe 4 hours altogether.

and the sketch for it...

Aether Machine - about context

2008-02-02T13:24:00.000-08:00

So, here's one that I had an initial idea for about a month ago... a koji morimoto inspired girl inhaling out of a steampunk/vintage gas pump inspired Aether vending machine. I ended up just scanning a thumbnail and doing about a 4-5 hour colour pass on it.
I think I learned a little something about context with this one. I wasn't motivated to finish my initial thumbnail until I thought about placing the girl and machine in a distopic future city with acid rain and the whole blade runner feel to it...
I'm all for random ideas, but I guess it's good to do a little more storytelling and put things in context sometimes, it seemed to help this come together for me.

Old Tree

2008-01-28T10:54:00.000-08:00

A piece I just finished after chipping away on it for months, and the initial sketch for it.
I sketch last April. It was a one off sketch with no tweaks or overlaying, which is new for me. I think sometime around November 07 I banged the colour and lighting in really quickly, and then put it away until early January again. I picked it back up and painted right over it, which was another first. Anyway, I liked the process and I was fairly happy with how the painting went, I wasn't as laborious as my process usually feels, and I think it came through. It's a bit looser and there's more edge variation than I usually have. Hopefully it can be a benchmark process going forward...

First post...

2008-01-28T09:06:00.001-08:00

Okay, here goes... how about a mission statement, I guess???

Well, hopefully this blog will be a way for me to record my thought process and artistic development, both of which move forward very slowly, so.. you know... don't expect too much.