Deep One Female

Hello again gentle viewer.  I have another in-progress piece for you to have a look at. I know it must seem as though I have painted quite a few of these horrid fish-men this year, but please note I come from a very fishy town in Massachusetts. Doing these abominable batrachian monsters often helps me get a feeling for the hometown I rarely get around Seattle. Hmm, I re-read that sentence and on retrospect that could seem like a negative. Trust me I have only love for my birthplace, but anyone from that lovely New England town should be able to admit it's got some fairly fishy overtones. Thanks to a longstanding longing for my town's beaches and a persistent request for art from a certain good chum of mine for use in his card game, I present the next in the fishmen paintings: 

She's not done but I figure I should be finished with her by the end of the week. Let me know if you have any suggestions for the background!

Humming Bird UI test

Hello again! 

I have had a humming bird game rattling around in my head coming on a few months now. You might recognize the idea from an earlier post: http://sketcheveryday.blogspot.com/2013/04/humming-bird-vector-character-concepts.html . I am still quite interested in developing it further so my task last week was to make a fairly simple and stripped down version of the game view-port. I started by drawing a page or so of flowers to obtain some reference and work out the mood. Rather than keep drawing for weeks on end I went ahead and just got down to some quick layout/design work done. This was the result:

First I used illustrator to sketch out a few vector flowers and some assets.  Once I had vector flowers as close as I wanted I imported them into PS to add some tones, I think it gave them a bit more of a soft, and happier feeling.   

When the tones were where I wanted them I brought in the other assets: a time clock, score toast/label, and life/energy bar.

Once everything was laid out I thought it needed a little something to give it a bit more depth so I threw in a bit of shadow. Overall I'm fairly pleased with where it is at the moment but that just means I now have to design menu screens, items, power-ups and a few level backgrounds.  For now, I like where it's going. See you next time!

Sketch Dump Day! Now with more goats!

Ok, so it's been a few weeks since my last post. Fear not, I am still getting at least a few sketches out each day and even a concept piece now and then.  After my last post here (Goats and Gardens) I found a hitherto unknown love for drawing goats, more specifically their exceptionally odd face structure. I am not sure why I like the lines on these animals faces as much as I do, but this has resulted in a sketch log for the past 1.5 weeks of almost exclusively goats. Today's post is a cross section of that log.

I've taken the pages, pared down the ones I was least pleased with, and condensed the remaining into three pages.  I think it gives a good overview of the week for me; a long somewhat obsessive struggle to understand how the strange animal's faces work.  What I need to do is go to the zoo and look at some living goats, maybe get a bit of life drawing in.  For now, let's just go with the sketches I have at the moment, shall we?

The crazy thing with these faces is I still have about 3 pages I haven't included. I often find when drawing something like this I should give myself an arbitrary limit, lest it eat up all my sketch time for the week. It's very hard from time to time not to return to familiar lines once you've drawn a face 20 or 30 times. If you don't stop and move onto the next project or sketch, you could easily fill a sketch book within a month. As for my current next project in the queue, this week I should have time enough to finish a painting for a friend as well as maybe post a few more sketches. Until then please enjoy the goats. As a side note, does anyone have any ideas for an icon set? I have become bored with my current graphic design self challenges and would like to to another icon set.  Hit me up with any fun or weird concepts that might make for a good group of icons. I'm thinking my next icons should be cutesy but we'll see what strikes my fancy.

Goats and Gardens

A good friend posted on his facebook feed about wanting to start a landscaping business using goats. I loved the idea and got a bug in my ear to make a little logo for it.  For some reason I have wanted to draw a goat for ages and this little project gave me a chance to practice. I'm not sure exactly why I've had this desire to sketch a goat for a while but it sure was fun doing a concept page to figure out which type of goat I liked the most.  In the end feel as though this turned out well, although now that I've finished this one I might do a few more later on for fun. For the time being however, this should work.

The Birds, version 02

So I kept working on adding some more bird silhouettes with additional positions and beak types. Overall I like the result. It's funny how you can come across something that really adds to the design just by taking a break and cruising the internet. I stumbled across a few images that gave me more ideas for the background and the shape the bird flock should take. Once I had all the shapes I wanted I exported a jpeg, pictured below:

 I thought this looked much better overall and the way the red acted with the blues was much more interesting. I wanted to see how the image would look with an overlay of a texture though. To do this I did a quick search for a free stain texture. I found a great one here : Flicker texture. Once I did a quick alteration to make it more solid red the overlay gave me a great idea. Rather than the blue and red I would desaturate the background and overlay the texture on the shapes. The end result is pictured below:

My wife noticed the bloodspot and said it might look a little better without it, in the end I think she was right so I output a version without it. I think a red border works better overall but if I'm super honest I kind of missed the blood drop, so because I couldn't help it: 

I think this is as far as I'll take it, maybe next I'll try another short story. The most dangerous game maybe? Or maybe even some H.G.Wells?

The Birds in-progress

I re-read the short story The Birds a few days ago and happened to be making some vector birds for a little design practice. I thought it might be fun to do a book cover for it and gave it a go. I didn't really have the time this week to take it as far as I would have liked but for now I feel alright about it. I'm thinking this weekend might leave me enough time to work it to completion but for the time being, here is the in progress piece.

Used some reference from the old Hitchcock with Tippi Hedren as well as google image search for a bunch of birds I could make vector silhouettes. 

Post Apocalypse Merit Badge

Done for an art challenge last week.  Finished it off the other day, I'm not 100% done with it, I think it could use a bit more refinement and maybe a little bit more detail... Either way, for now here it is:

Just remember everybody, duck and cover :)

quick sketch

I've been a bit down in the dumps the last week or two and have not felt very artsy fartsy.  While I've got a project in the works, I don't have a piece ready to show off, a finished looking piece I mean. What I do have is a quick sketch I did while thinking about H.G.Wells. He has this great quote "man had thrust his brother out of the ease and sunshine. And now that brother was coming back changed!". I've always dug that one, anyways here is a quick sketch just to keep this blog moving :).

Angel's Dad

A chum of mine asked yesterday if I would draw a picture of his friend's dad as a gift. It was kind of last minute and I was already working on a few things but figured it wouldn't be moving mountains to do a favor for a someone. Due to time constraints, I was only able to get down a very rough sketch done but I'm fairly pleased with the result. I've got some merit badges coming down the line this week but till I have them designed as well as I would like I won't post them here. Here's Angel's dad.

E Pluribus Unum

****EDIT****So I didn't realize it was armed forces day and for the record this wasn't meant to be a comment on it, sorry if anyone took offense. Carry on.****END OF EDIT****

I've never really tried good old fashioned propaganda so I thought I'd give it a go. Overall I'm happy with the result although it might be a little much... I wanted to get the feel of something painted on an alley wall but I'm not sure it worked in the end. Either way I feel like to much more alteration will push it over the edge, so for now here's the result:

Looking at it now I think I might play with the levels a bit more, or at least pull the whites a bit more up, hmm well maybe pull the whites AND reds up. GAH, for now I'll leave it be. That is of course unless anyone has a suggestion or two?

Holy Family Logo Fix

So many of you may or may not know I'm an atheist, but I was raised catholic. My mom's parish, Holy Family, had a logo that made my heart hurt. Here is that logo:

Now I'm not one to make presumptions about whether or not I should just force my designs on folks but I took some time and cleaned it up/remade it in a way that did in fact, not hurt my heart's design center.

After I sent these off to my Mum, she said her preference was the middle one on the bottom row. As you  might imagine I said, "Sounds good, I'll send you a higher res version." and totally did not continue designing... Nah. I sent her the one she wanted and this color version, because I likes me some blue and it felt a bit happier. She responded and asked for a maroon one, as that is the parish color. Now I could have just sent her a color version and said, "All set Mum, I'll call this weekend. Love you.". At this point you know I did not do that. in fact I wanted to fool around with the design a bit more. I finally ended up with a few options I liked. 

But my favorite was the last one:

You might ask, and rightly so, why did you stay so close to the original design? Well to be be honest, I wasn't sure how much leeway I had with it, and since I was doing this more just to fix the old design I didn't feel like I really had the right to completely redesign their logo. Welp, that's it kiddo's. Always remember, when a family member sends you an email, don't address the topic in the email, tell them their logo is sad and you're set on fixin' it.

Angry Jamie Kilstein Portrait

I had a bee in my bonnet the other day so I painted this up in photoshop. I found a reference online for Jamie Kilstein and used it to make an angry Jamie. He and Allison Kilkenny run the podcast Citizen Radio, a super-mecha-vegan lefty podcast. I don't always agree with them 100%, but I really appreciate what they do. If I had the cash, they are on the list of independent radio shows I want to be able to send some monetary support eventually. Till then I'll just keep makin with the pictures.

Orb Weaver Logo Redux

A while back I put together a logo for my wifes blog, Orb Weaver. I liked it at the time but the more i looked at it the more I felt like she deserved better. In service of this I put these together for her:

In the end she liked 6 the best, I agree but I do like the simplicity of 7 too. Thoughts?

Cats of Ulthar pages 9-10

This is the last update on the picture book for a little while, or at least until the next couple of pages are done. Looks like a busy month too so... WOooOOOoo.  Anyway, I am pretty please with the way these pages came out and can't wait to continue along with the rest. Till the next update!

Cats of Ulthar Pages 7-8

Got a few more pages yet. But I really feel like I've gotten a good handle on charcoal again at this point. The levels and shapes are much closer to what I meant to get on the page.

Got

Cats Of Ulthar Pages 4-6

Yep, more pages from the picture book. It's coming along rather nicely don't you think?

Cats of Ulthar Picture Book Pages 1-3

So this is an ongoing project I've had for a while now. I've been meaning to post them here periodically but there has been so much going this way and that.  I have been more focused on setting up a new portfolio site (again), and hitting the graphic design stuff hard again. But since my weekend will be an out-of towner I thought I would start posting these guys for funsies and to get them on the blog. This is an adaption of the short story "The Cats of Ulthar" by H.P. Lovecraft. It's a great little piece of writing and really draws one into its world. The whole book will be in charcoal and white pencil. Overall, I'm pretty happy how it's coming along but hoo boy, I want to just rush to finish it so I can do a print run. No go though, gotta take it steady and slow. Let me know whatcha think.

LifeUI In Progress

Still working on the UI Project but got sidetracked by some fun graphic design projects I've been meaning to knock out for ages. This should give you a bit of a better idea of the kind of "Active" and "Inactive" look I am going for. Still not done for a bit yet.

Phoenix Jones

My wife and I super dig our city, Seattle. One of the many reasons for this affection is our local superhero movement, the Rain City Superhero Movement. No Shit. Anyway, I love makin stuff so I thought it would be fun to make a poster to encourage his crime fighting ways. I think I'll probably make some more of these using the colors/emblems of his other team members as well for fun.

Skull Art Test

So I had a Graphic Design Art test for a motorcyle/auto design company recently. It ate up a bit of my day yesterday so I thought I would post it. Overall I am pretty pleased with it and like the end result. (I went with a wolf skull)

First I did some quick rough sketches and a concept for the final design once I found an orientation I liked. 

In Illustrator I made a vector version of the design, and added a little more to make it more interesting, (drip from the eyes, nose and mouth).  Once I finished the main design based on the initial concept (the left at the top), I tooled around looking at different colors and gradients to see what worked best.

Overall I think with the vector designs the red gradient seemed to look the best.  I converted the file to a psd to see if some touch up in Photoshop would be worthwhile.

Once in Photoshop I applied a pavement texture from one of the free texture sites online and did some brushwork to add some detail. I think this could still use a bit of work but I'm happy where the design is. Too much more fiddling might be a bit much and I would hate to guild the lily, or skull I guess. Oftentimes with a design it's good to know where to stop before overdoing it.

Everyday HUD

Long have I wanted for something like google glass. I thought it would be fun to design an everyday HUD (heads up display), and got started a few weeks ago to designing assets. I've worked on other art stuff in the meantime but I kept coming back to it little by little. It's almost at a point where I can post a pic of how it would look in use but till then (likely sometime tomorrow) here's something to hold you over. I have a few icons and assets that I'll post tonight so you have an idea of where it's going:

From top to bottom: Music App, Web Browser App, Digital Library App

From top to bottom: Podcast App, Movie App, Maps App

These are items for a collapsible "contacts" ribbon, overall I like the design and the icons remain readable even at very small sizes. 

Jackie and The Biters

Something cutesie for a change :). This is my wife with her childhood cat "Biters" or "Night Biters". Felt like jumping over to illustrator for a quick cutie drawin', all vector, might bring it into photoshop for a touchup but we'll see how I feel later on.

Inner Harbor Deep One Final Painting

After spending a bit more time with it I think this is the last time I'll touch it. Overall I think it came out pretty good but to be honest I kind of feel like I've drawn enough of these fishguys  for a while. Next entry will be CUTE. Super Promise, (better than my normal promise, for realzies).

Inner Harbor Deep One repaint in process

Thought I'd come back to this guy and give him a repaint. He's not done but he's coming along

Ink tests, Forest Watcher and a lady

I did these a while back as an ink test. It had been a while since I had last used sumi-e ink and thought I'd give it another go. The first one is just a cartoon sketch I had kicking around and the second is my Forest Watcher. I have always liked sumi-e ink and think the test worked out well. Thoughts?

Deep One, the inner harbor

I drew and painted this guy earlier in the week; not sure if it's done or not. I may yet go back and work on it again later today or tomorrow but for now I like where its at. It was a quick one but not necessarily a bad one.