Help Me, Obi Wan...

Here's a new sketch I did in an effort to capture some Star Wars work in the future. I'm thinking of doing a montage of Obi Wan through the years, so I figured I'd do some study drawings of both Ewan McGregor and Alec Guinness. I find that it is always good to make the hand familiar with the subject by drawing it a few times. So cheers to what the future may hold. And Happy New Year, my friends!

Holiday portrait work

This year, I was fortunate enough to have a few portrait commissions come my way. I love doing portrait work as it is a nice change of pace artistically and helps me hone my skill even more. This is one that I had recently completed. It was commissioned as gift for my client's spouse.

Illustration Friday: Hatch

Hidden behind the couch, the brother and sister duo could finally hatch their scheme to see Santa Claus.

Just in Time for the Holidays

I haven't done a holiday-themed illustration before. I had so many avenues to explore - some of which I made note for use later. But the idea I decided on was the excitement of seeing Santa in one's home.

Illustration Friday: Unbalanced

The Hatter in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is often considered a bit unbalanced - perhaps even mad. But what I like about him is his seemingly random stream of consciousness. "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" Random thoughts, for me, break the monotony and stimulate creativity. Call me mad!

Illustration Friday: Flying

Free as a bird,
it's the next best thing to be.
Free as a bird.

Home, home and dry,
like a homing bird I'll fly
as a bird on wings.

Whatever happened to
the life that we once knew?
Can we really live without each other?

Where did we lose the touch
that seemed to mean so much?
It always made me feel so...

Free as a bird,
like the next best thing to be.
Free as a bird.

Home, home and dry,
like a homing bird I'll fly
as a bird on wings.

Whatever happened to
the life that we once knew?
Always made me feel so free.

Free as a bird.
It's the next best thing to be.
Free as a bird.
Free as a bird.
Free as a bird.

– the Beatles

Me and My Munny

I decided to take this Munny toy that I've had for years and paint it. But my dilemma was WHAT to paint it. Was it to be one of my favorite comic book characters? Perhaps a movie character? Or something conceptual? Well, after days of thought and deliberation, I decided to make it a self-portrait. Considering the amount of self portraits many artists have done, I figure I have a lot of catching up to do. BTW, I am guessing that the conspicuous bulge on my backside is supposed to be a tail.

I Sense a Vergence in the Force

Yeah, I know. I have an obsession with Star Wars. Here's another sketch I did working on the likenesses of Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor and Jake Lloyd.

Lost Sketchbook Found

Digging for more art supplies, I found another sketchbook. It's a little 5" x 7" book that I used for thumbnails (some of them were layout and logo designs) and small quick sketches. Sometimes it's fun trying to figure out when and why I had done certain sketches. This thumbnail was the basis for the Darth Maul painting I had done in '99 (check it out in my portfolio).

Illustration Friday: Welcome

As he wandered into the trees, Jacob was welcomed by the local night life.

A Sketch, A Pencil and a Baby.

Cleaning up my studio area, I found a few forgotten items from the past. It vexes me when I don't remember drawing or why I drew certain things (the pencil). But I do remember drawing the baby. That was me as an infant. I used it in the first iteration of my website. And the gesture drawings were from a day in 2002, when I was watching my son play. He was about 3 back then and I was challenging myself with the proportions of a toddler. What fun it was to just sit, observe and sketch. And how challenging it was to draw my kid as he was moving around at light speed!

Illustration Friday: Strong

Sometimes strength doesn't come in the form of muscles. Many times it can come to us in the form of friendship and endurance. When we feel defeated or weak, it may take the love of our family and friends to help make us strong.

Illustration Friday: Magnify

There are moments in our childhood that we will never forget: Christmas morning, your first bike, an event at school. But for this child, it's looking at the full moon with his best friend. It's when we are adults, that we see the little things that remind us and even magnify those moments in time. As an adult, a full moon will hold so much meaning for him.

Comfort in Fairies

This is the last sketch I did before school started. It's already transfered to board and ready to paint. Just hadn't gotten there just yet. It was supposed to be for last week's IF topic: Wrapped. But I think I will save the painting for another topic.

Illustration Friday: Caution

For this topic, I am using an illustration I did for a kids science magazine called "Odyssey." The article discussed the outcomes of living forever: the good and the bad. This image reflects the possible bad effects: Would we prolong our wars and hatred throughout the centuries? What are the consequences to society? The article gives us cautionary descriptions to think about when considering immortality.

Illustration Friday: Impatience

Have you ever been that student who just knew the answer but felt like it was taking an eternity for the teacher to call on you? This student may be a little impatient, but he is sure his endurance will pay off!

Illustration Friday: Modify

Ah, the imagination. Where all you need to modify yourself into a superhero are a sheet and some goggles.

Illustration Friday: Idle

These two have had quite a time setting up camp. So they decide to use their idle time near a pond and sit for a moment. Brother decides to make the best of it and sketch.

Illustration Friday: Tango

The twins are ready to pummel each other. Lucky for them, Mom is around to keep the peace. As the old saying goes, "It takes two to tango!"

This piece took a while to do. I tried using virtual models to pose for me using a program called Poser. However, I didn't anticipate how long it would take for me to "move" and "pose" the models to get the right shot. I think, in a pinch, this may come in handy (if I learn how to use it better) but in the meantime, I prefer the live models!

Warm Up Between Projects

I don't always use the sketchbook to concept new ideas, draw character designs, or do rough/tight pencil drawings. I also use it to "exercise" my skills in a way. The other day we were out at the Aquatic Center with the family. And if you know me, I'm not particularly fond of the sun or pools. So, I had my sketchbook and pencils handy and just set up shop in the shade. (And at this time of the year in DFW - shade temps were probably around 100º or so!) What I like to do every now and then to loosen up is to do gesture drawings - where you draw from life quickly. Most times it is of the human figure in motion, which at a public pool, there were plenty of figures in motion. These exercises help me to draw more loosely and to learn to capture form with simple strokes. Of course, the designer in me can't resist tightening a few things up (like the pipes and structures) and add a little whimsy here and there. Just to portray the searing heat!

A New Sketch

Well, for some time now, I wanted to do a new self portrait. I constantly depict myself as a child, but this time, I wanted to do something a little different. I tried to imagine if I were a children's literary character, who would I be? Some of you who know me well may have a variety of answers, but I always likened myself to the Hatter from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. As I worked on the sketch, I did not want to be influenced by any of Tim Burton's images that had been recently released from his upcoming feature based on the book. Besides, as much as I like the look and the design, I did not want to portray myself as "scary." And as I was drawing, I became aware that I looked very ... well, "up to no good." So I added my hands holding the teacup and saucer. So here's my sketch. I have begun painting and will post it soon - I hope. :-)

Illustration Friday: Hollow

In this illustration for Red RIver Kids magazine, our main character is looking at a picture of her dad filling a kid pool for her and her sister last summer. This year, he is not home. She has a hollow feeling, like something is missing and she doesn't know how she will handle this summer without him.

There's a Dinosaur in My Backyard!

Finally. Complete. Not the book. But my personal assignment of illustrating three scenes. I had a lot of fun doing these pieces and hope to work on more dinosaurs in the future. Maybe even some dragons!

Illustration Friday: Shaky

Molly finds herself in a shaky situation. Having found the dinosaur bone in her backyard, and making a wish upon it, she has apparently conjured up a large intimidating new friend.

Workspace

I've been reading a lot of articles lately on artists' workspaces. I find it very interesting the difference from one artist to another. I seem to be more like the one whose work space is fairly utilitarian and worn. I also like clutter and trinkets looking over me. However, I have seen artists' who keep workspaces immaculate and totally presentable as a formal room of their homes. One artist has labeled and categorized his materials, papers, paints and even water! So, here's my drawing table as I was painting the 3 illustrations for Red River Kids. Since it was just 3, I worked on them simultaneously - to keep a consistent palette. The iPod kept me company as the room I'm in is isolated from the rest of the house. For a closer look, click on the image to embiggen!

Illustration Friday: Worn

This is a departure from my other work. It was a personal piece I did many years ago. It depicts moments in my life where my thoughts and emotions have left me feeling worn and sometimes desperate.

Latest Work

As I mentioned in my last post, I was contacted by Red River Kids Magazine to produce a few illustrations for a story in their summer issue. The story centers on a girl who is beginning her first summer without her father. He is in the military and was stationed overseas. The day leads to a small adventure with her sister. As soon as the issue is published, I will post a link to the site.

Here are the final sketches. A few tweaks were made as I painted, but it pretty much stayed true to my sketches. The important thing was to portray the emotions experienced by the characters. I felt pretty sensitive to this story, so I knew what i wanted to see in expressions. Thanks to my children for posing for me. I hate to embarrass my son like this, but he posed as the older girl. The fun part was to get him to look panicked. I had to act out the scene with him to help him understand and we just went back and forth. I am very happy with the work and I will post the final paintings soon.

Illustration Friday: Drifting

This is part of a series of illustrations I did recently for Red River Kids Magazine. The story centers on a young girl as she begins her first summer without her dad. He is in the military and has been stationed overseas. This illustration takes place at the end of her adventure as she is drifting to sleep thinking about her father. Stay tuned as I will premier these illustrations in the coming days.

Illustration Friday: Unfold

As soon as he heard the noise, he immediately donned his "SpaceBoy" astro helmet and grabbed his "SpaceBoy ray gun. What adventure is ready to unfold?

Illustration Friday: Craving

I'm digging back to my Photoshop experiments for this one. I think one day I'll probably go back and play in Photoshop, but illustrating in the computer just doesn't compare to actual paints and brushes – even though I used pencils to do the base drawing. I'll let the illustration tell the story, but I think we can get a sense of what each character is craving.

Illustration Friday: Adapt

SCBWI had an illustration contest last year at around Thanksgiving. The theme was "Thanks but No, Thanks!" And for me, instead of showing a family serving up some hefty helpings of things children would definitely not like on Thanksgiving (for instance, liver, brussel sprouts or even canned cranberries) I wanted to show what it may be like to serve up something we consider delectable to a pair of out-of-towners - specifically two aliens from space. In this particular "story in my head," these aliens are stranded here and have to adapt to stay undetected. In this scene, the family that is hiding them serves up turkey for Thanksgiving. Little did the family know but what some beings consider delicious may be disgusting to another.

Calligraphy

Recently, I took on a job doing calligraphy for wedding invitations - just the addressing of the outside envelopes and the inside envelopes.

I jumped at the opportunity since it is rare that I get to use my calligraphy pens. I learned to write in italic when I was in junior high and high school. And as an illustrator, I think I neglect the wonderful possibilities a calligraphy pen has to offer - the lyrical thick and thin scrollwork and filigrees. But I decided to keep this job fairly simple as I had to address 130 invitations (which translated to 260 envelopes total). For each envelope, I measured guide lines to use. I set my "x-height," ascender and descender with these guides.



I may feel confident to do this with only a baseline one day, but not today. Without going into specifics on what each term means, I had basically set the guides to show me how tall my capital and my lowercase letters could be. Next, I began the process of inking.

I spent many hours inking. I had to take frequent breaks as my eyes would tire and when that happened, mistakes would too. Then the last step was to erase all the guide lines.

Real simple. As I am not a full-time calligrapher, I think I will leave that work to the pros. And for more info on the technique itself, just give Google a visit. There is a world of information on the techniques and the many styles of calligraphy.

Illustration Friday: Cracked

I realize that the protagonist in this illustration is not yet cracked, but we all know his demise. When I did this, I had seen what it looked like before the fall and after, but I imagined something in between. I don't know, I guess I enjoy a little tension in some of my illustrations. This I call, "Humpty's Predicament."

Illustration Friday: Contagious

There are times when laughter can be contagious. These two tiger cubs considered each other enemies at one time, until they survived a life-altering adventure. Upon returning from their journey, they wondered, "Do we resume the ridiculous hatred we had for each other before?" Then the laughter of friendship broke the silence and caught on quickly throughout the pack.

Mother's Day Portrait

I was contacted by a friend of mine earlier in the week. He wanted me to do a portrait of their son for his wife to give her on Mother's Day. Of course, I obliged! It was a nice change of pace from the week I had previously. And it was to be done in pencil, which I rarely get to do these days. The great thing is that he had a wonderful photo for me to use as reference. It captured the joy and energy of this child. I just hope the mother likes it as much as I did. I almost didn't want to part with it!

Illustration Friday: Hierarchy

I've posted this image before on my blog. It's one of my first serious Star Wars illustrations. It depicts the Skywalker family tree: Darth Vader (Anakin), Luke and Leia. I plan to revisit this idea to include many of the new characters introduced in various Star Wars fiction, including Han and Leia's children, and Luke and Mara's children.

Illustration Friday: Theater

When pondering the theater, I immediately thought of the "butterflies in your stomach" - the moment of trepidation before walking onto the stage. I saw this pic I took of my daughter and was immediately inspired. I thought about defining the thoughts in the character's head, but decided to leave it up to the viewer.