ILL 602: Concept, Technique & Illustration

I just finished submitting all of my final revisions for my illustration class projects.
The instructor (the inimitable George Pitcher) gave us till the end of the semester to do a
final round of alterations, and I'm pretty darn pleased with the semester's output.

Project 1, Book Illustration: Collecting From The Clown

Project 2, Children's Book: Benjamin Bear

Project 2, Children's Book: Chef Crocodile

Project 3, Song Illustration (Album Cover): The Dangling Conversation

Project 4, Advertising Illustration: Hawaiian Tropic

ZOMBIE BUS OMNIBUS

IT'S OVER!  My final assignment for Drawing From Imagination.  We had two choices of "storyline" to use for our final illustration.  Obviously I had no choice whatsoever...

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Complete an illustration, 12 inches x 16 inchesor larger, to accompany one of the passages below. Your image must be as realistic as you can make it and very detailed.
Grades will depend on:

• Narrative.
• Drama.
• Imagination.
• Proportion.
• Drawing.
• Value.
• Accurate perspective.
• Reflection plotting.
• Shadow plotting.

It is your responsibility to ensure that your illustration demonstrates ALL you have learned during this course.
The Passages
Your illustration will accompany one of the passages below. The choice of which passage to use is entirely up to you.

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Snow White set the seven dwarves to work spring-cleaning their tiny cottage. There was a lot to be done. The dwarves swept the floor, polished the windows, washed the linen, and made the beds. There were seven of everything and everything was half its usual size. Meanwhile Snow White prepared a delicious feast for her seven little hosts.
Later that night, when they had finished supper and every dwarf was round, full, and contented Snow White danced with the seven dwarves to the jolly strains of the fiddle. The little men stood no higher than her waist.
No one noticed the ugly old hag watching them from the window.

2. School Trip

Miss Blake dragged herself out of the twisted school bus, stumbled across the waterlogged street and collapsed. Her thoughts were snarled by the collision. What was that decaying, faltering thing she had swerved to avoid a minute earlier… and where was everyone from the town, and why had no one come out to help?

The rain had finally stopped. She looked around her. The lifeless bodies of her students were scattered about the wreckage like rag dolls: some strewn across the asphalt, some hanging from windows, some hidden inside, but all were broken and still.
Was she the sole survivor? As the town clock struck twelve there was a shifting from inside the bus. She froze - the children! Miss Blake watched in terror as the ruined corpses of thirty eight year olds pulled themselves from the school bus and began to limp hungrily towards her…

Sergeant Frank Drebin, Police Squad

My name is Sergeant Frank Drebin, Detective Lieutenant, Police Squad. There'd been a recent wave of gorgeous fashion models found naked and unconscious in laundromats on the West Side. Unfortunately, I was assigned to investigate holdups of neighborhood credit unions.


I started this portrait of Leslie Nielsen as a demo for my students in Advanced Drawing for Animators - i asked them for a suggestion for someone to caricature, and this was the first name I got.  Really had a blast working on this, he had such a great deadpan face and recognizable features.  I worked on it a few hours in class, and a few hours later in the week.  All told, a pretty quick monochrome Photoshop painting, 7 or 8 hours total.  Enjoy!

NYCOCOMOCA - HOLY CRAP! Best blog post EVER.

Holy crap... I have some great big good news to share.

As many of you know, I painted a digital caricature of Conan O'Brien back on New Year's Day for a sort of open fan-art competition, where they displayed people's submissions on the show, between commercial breaks.  My piece was chosen and aired on Tuesday, May 17, 2011.  It was an incredible and important moment for me.

Yesterday (October 5) I was contacted by an agency on behalf of Conan's show, to let me know that in coordination with his upcoming week of NYC-filmed episodes (http://teamcoco.com/video/conan-coming-to-nyc), they are putting on a gallery show of Conan Fan Art at the Time Warner Center on Columbus Circle in New York.  My piece was chosen as one of their favorite 50 to be exhibited at the event!  It will be printed and framed, and in this gallery show for 11 days starting October 24th. :O

Apparently the show's staff kinda liked my painting, as it was selected to appear on some of the signage advertising the show as well.  SO EVERYONE - watch the Conan show on TBS all week starting on Halloween, and you just might see my picture on the show again - but bigger this time!  I'll keep everyone posted as I find out more details, Brooke and I are definitely going to figure out a way to make the trip up there to see the display.

Here's the original piece again,  in case you haven't seen it, or just want another glimpse.

Like I said... holy crap.  NYCOCOMOCA for the win!  Somebody pinch me...

In-Flight Sketches, Part 1: Tom Hanks

Every time we take a trip anywhere, I always bring art supplies, and then always end up reading books or playing stupid angry birds or something.  But this last trip, to Washington DC and Baltimore, I actually spent all of the plane flights (2 each way, with stops) drawing my butt off.  I stuck with the manila paper, brown and white china markers, and really got kind of a groove going.  Since I ended up with exactly 7, I'm going to put up one per day for the next week, and share the turbulence-tossed goodness with the world.

Promotional Mailer: Let's See If Anyone Wants To Buy This Stuff

So... I'm going to sink a little money into some "mini-portfolios" to mail out to some Art Directors and other potential clients, to see if I can drum up some interest in freelance work for editorial illustration. It will be a cute little 4"x6" spiral bound flipbook, had to get BRUTAL to narrow down which pieces to include, but above is who made the first cut.