People don't come to me for my pinup ladies. And I'm not saying I want them to. I'm just saying I do have a couple more tricks up my sleeve than you think.

Last of my digi-illustrations this week. Most of them stirred up some useful ideas. I will definitely paint the turtle picture in earnest, in good time :D

Postcard-ish

Ha! Two in a day --although I spent only minutes on this...



Inspired by the "tree birds" in Marjatta Kurenniemi's kids' books.

Bedtime

He's afraid of spiders too.

Bananas

My current portfolio leans heavily towards traditional art. This week (gotta give myself a deadline) I want to digitally refine and colour at least five of my quick ideas from my sketchbook of the last month or so.



She's a little bananas!

Kinda lost my idea of what I was doing with this one in the middle of colouring. I will need to get a colourbase down faster next time. Definitely time to move on...

Underwear ad

I was recently commissioned to *draw* the press release for a spunky (ahem) local enterprise called STUDbriefs.com! This was fun, not to mention educational.

Ghostly

These characters were originated by Bevan Thomas as start-from-scratch "reinventions" of established names from superhero comics (Nox The Dweller in Darkness and Immortal Man, respectively) -- it's part of this character origin&design challenge/excercise/thingamajig called Name Game at Cloudscape.

And "21 Journeys" is out. Order print version here (or get it from me), or buy e-book here.

Buncha knights

Frog Knight.

I decided to take part in the current 30 Days Project with the peer support of Cloudscape. On a whim I set "Knights" as my theme. (30 Days of Knights, geddit HAAHAA?!!)
I have been (and will be) drawing a knight, or a knight-related illustration, every day this June! These are some of my favourites so far -- if you want to see my every single knight check out my dA & Tumblr.


^Coal Knight -- I think I read about this guy in a creepy kids' book once... I think.


^Um... Jedi Knight


^Marionette Knight with neon accessories



Guess I should have chosen horses as my theme instead of knights. Well, more ideas for next time!

Fired up!

My scanner was too tiny for these and I had to photograph them: I am HORRIBLE at it. But I'm real happy with the lighting on her form!
(Pastel and conté.)

These characters were originated by Cloudscape member Bevan Thomas as start-from-scratch "reinventions" of established superhero names (The Human Torch and The Sun Emperor, respectively) -- it's the first part of this character origin&design challenge/excercise/thingamajig called Name Game at Cloudscape.

"Suspicious" + calendar comics

This is an acrylic painting on a cradled wood panel (8x8 inches) that I did for the "21 Journeys" fundraiser. I was going to write that you can buy this at the Cloudscape Etsy store, but to my colossal surprise, someone has already bought it. Thank you to whoever you are! You have just greatly helped our publishing effort, and I guarantee you will find this painting even cuter in your hands than on your screen.
And thanks to Jayleen (Guru) for getting the word out on Twitter. :D

Check out our Etsy page to see other 8x8 panel paintings by Cloudscape members. Proceeds go towards printing 21 Journeys. (I'm sorry, Japan.) I'm working on another one as well. And again, if paintings don't interest you but you'd like to pre-order the book or donate, you can do that at IndieGoGo.
We also have this 24-hour webcam jam coming up on April 1st that I'm going to take part in. As soon as I find out what the hell that means, I'll let you know.

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Now, here's some more Calendar Comics... This is fun.
(Whoops! PROFANITY WARNING.)



Yet another totally favourite self-portrait:

Want to preorder 21 Journeys?

(Sorry to repeat myself, but since selling time is now upon us...)
I collaborated on a comic for Cloudscape's fifth anthology 21 Journeys. To give you a taste, here is a page (though not the beginning) of said story:


At the 21 Journeys IndieGoGo page, you can preorder the book itself for $25 (CAD) -- and if you're feeling generous, for more sizable donations you get more and more goodies with your order. For example, a $100 gets you the entire Cloudscape "library" of all the previous anthologies and a few of the members' publications on top of that (including Xeric grant winners "Lotus Root Children" and "Lords of Death and Life"). So if you're interested, check out what all you can get for a donation that suits you.

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Today I venture to work for the first time after being bedridden for an entire week. This is the longest I've been sick since I was two years old. I feel awful for the wasted time but if I could get through this, I guess nothing's really gonna shake me after. Now I'm on a medication for people with ulcers, which is actually kind of -- kiiiiiind of -- hilarious.

"MAYBE IT WAS THE TROUSERS!"

This post has a couple of things...

I have neglected everything lately BECAUSE for the last few weeks I've been slaving over a contribution to Cloudscape's anthology 22 Journeys [Edit:] 21 Journeys. The comic's finally done! (Although I'm still working on the speech bubbles, digitally...) Here's a little sneak peek.



I'm not sure what the collective policy is about artists giving sneak peeks about comics that are going to be published and hopefully bought, so for now, I just thought I'd put up this collage of how the art came out. It's like a WIP from pencils to inks to colours. (Omitting a huge amount of thumbnails, sorry... Those were the crucial step.) Although the colours still need some tweaking of curves and levels and whatnot before printing. Anyway, bear with me.

I find inking just nerve-wracking. What is wrong with me that my hands start to sweat incessantly as soon as I've inked a couple of lines?! I never have that problem with animating and definitely not with life drawing. The colouring was a blast, though, and I'll elaborate on that later. There was a theme with the contributions that they had to look like they were done with natural media AND a limited colour palette -- I coloured it with watersoluble markers.

The story was written by another Cloudscape member, Bevan. I felt incredibly lucky that during my very first Cloudscape meeting (wow, it's already been like a year) I ran into a writer looking for an artist. I have such a hard time coming up with stories, that it was staggering to have him hammer out countless scripts and stories in such a short time. Without a writer I simply wouldn't have a story in this anthology, plus he gave me free reign in the visual storytelling side of things --for better or for worse ;)
Still, I have to say I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. And with everything I've taken note of, the next one's going to be ten times better!

I had The Rutles 2: Can't Buy Me Lunch just on a loop for pretty much the whole time I was working on the comic... Go ****ing figure.

I really love it though (everything except Robin Williams). Jimmy Fallon is actually hilarious there, delivers probably my favourite line reading in the whole thing. Neil Innes is awesomeawesomeawesome. It's less of a sequel than a very eclectic bunch of 00's celebrity interviews, and deleted scenes from the first movie, and Force knows why they were deleted in the first place, because they're equally funny. You can't watch just one Rutle movie, they're a package deal.

* * *

HAHAHAHAHAHAAAHAH SHASHHDHASDFCHFJGKHLJ
CONAN, Thank you for the jeggins

Kind of a funny coincidence considering Conan's "testimonial" in The Rutles 2, about how he buttered his legs to be able to wear women's extra small trousers.
And, I loved the band's expressions. Between this and Broadway-Spidey spraying Green Goblin's crotch, this may be my favourite episode so far ...Who'da thunk it about an episode with the Kardashians as first guests?! :l

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By the way, thanks to all three who voted in the poll :P The public has spoken! The old crap is staying!

Real Unreal

"Right -- everyone stop f**king crying, this is supposed to be a rock'n'roll band for chrissakes."

The short post:

I saw Nowhere Boy and then absolutely had to try to draw some early Lennon-McCartney. The suits are not stage garb but funeral garb. Enough spoilers (LOL SPOILERS FOR LENNON'S LIFE), The End.

THE LONG POST (skippable:)

Yay, I finally got to see Nowhere Boy *yeee!* I was eager for this movie because a] like approximately 3/4 of Earthlings I am a Beatles fan, and b] I especially love early Beatles history. Somehow it just can't seem to get old no matter how many times I read about it :) (...Which is a good thing for this movie considering that nothing about it can really surprise the viewer.) They are a unique ...um, myth. A world unto themselves.

Nowhere Boy is more about Lennon's relationship with his mother Julia and his aunt Mimi than forming the band, but that stuff is equally fascinating, and a perfect vehicle for the type of life-affirming drama that the Brits whip up in their sleep. Nowhere Boy didn't disappoint.

Very few movies other than the "actual Beatles-movies" have been made about the band, but the one Nowhere Boy can be compared to -- favourably, I'm glad to say! -- is Backbeat.
What Backbeat has going for it, is that it focuses on Stuart Sutcliffe, whose mannerisms and appearance have not become part of the public consciousness like The Beatles themselves have, so the viewer can enjoy Stephen Dorff's very capable performance without being distracted by an inner voice nagging "this is so far from the real thing."
Since the same is true of Mimi and Julia, who are the two most important characters of Nowhere Boy next to Lennon, and since the script's dramatizations of oft-documented events from Lennon's boyhood are very confident and unflourished, there's hardly anything to make you doubt it could all have happened exactly in the manner that the film portrays.

Inevitably, the kids portraying the young Beatles don't look or sound like the originals, but they are excellent actors -- and if the movie is more about finding your mom than finding your future rock icon buddies, what matters is whether you have the emotional acting chops. In that respect the whole cast delivers. Some reviews had claimed that the other cast members can't keep up with Kristin Scott Thomas, but I thought the performances were amazing throughout. I confess that when I first heard about the film I was confused about why they had cast Aaron Johnson as Lennon, because -- shame on me! -- I mistook him for an American since he'd been chosen for Kick-Ass!
Johnson was actually the film's surprise, because even though it's a little hard to imagine him as Lennon, the compact, charming script combined with his moving performance makes you buy him as simply an (for all intents and purposes) orphaned, insecure kid.

Of course knowing about the future ahead spices up the experience considerably, but still, I'm willing to bet that even if you don't know a thing about The Beatles (in which case, Congratulations on your first day back from cryo-freeze!) or don't find the band interesting, you will still think "What a relatable and captivating story" after watching this. Made me cry a ton too. OK, so I cry at many movies, but this was the biggest cry-fest since Toy Story 3.

In fact the quote at the beginning of this post came right on the heels of a big upheaval in the movie, where a couple of the characters teared up as well (with me leaking silently in the audience). Johnson ordered everybody to "stop f**king crying", which was one of the most characteristic moments about this movie: laughter through tears (oooh dammit I'm sorry about the cliche!) and all such...

I will so see it again and am recommending it to you. :)

Recent Things

This post has many things!!


Bored to Death is back, I'm glad. I was doubled over during the pay phone sequence.

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I couldn't let the little boy on the bus go! I scribbled him an imaginary friend too.

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The ruffled-looking bird is imaginary, the ibis I drew at the Aquarium.

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If you absolutely have to make a bird movie, by all means, make it about owls and not penguins.
Yes, owls are pretty cool.
Are they cool enough to wield medieval weapons in battle? Yes.
Are they cool enough to withstand Zack Snyder's overuse of slo-mo (which is a parody of itself at this point and actually also much earlier)? Yes.
Are they cool enough to be subjected to both at the same time?
NO THEY FRIKKING ARE NOT.

Check out the owl movie if you want a hearty chuckle.

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Mostly done in comics club meet. The knight's not a character of mine, just another fandoodle (for "7 Soldiers of Victory" that I've mentioned somewhere along the way)

soundbite

Finally something that isn't lifedrawing ;)



(This conclusion of a long, one-sided Q&A session between a little boy and his grandma that I happened to overhear was permanently inscribed on my mind -- to say nothing of the boy's forlorn face.)

I dropped my crab puff in the hot tub

I did this as a pageview gift ("kiriban") for someone on deviantArt. It's Drake, Josh and Helen from Drake and Josh -- the Nickelodeon program to come out of Dan Schneider's warped and dirty mind before his iCarly. Needless to say I love the show.

Anime enough? & Spaaaaarrrrrk

Bear with me.



Yup. Anime Evolution badge illustrations. Cloudscape Comics is participating in the convention in August and I promised to help man the table for a while. Also, Cloudscapists were asked if we'd like to have our art on different convention day badges. Sure, there's no money in it, but I figured it was exposure for a minimal effort, since I had been planning a watercolour experimentation romp in any case. Now, I don't really watch anime or even play a lot of video games, because I'm a lame person in general, but if anime is in the convention name, I should at least try my hand at a somewhat anime-ish illustration.

Both of these illustrations were actually painted on one large piece of paper (see below), and with my crappy little scanner, I had to piece the final illustrations together in Photoshop.
Like I said I used this as a playground to try out certain techniques. What is missing is actual colour coordination, that would have required some more pre-planning on my part. But luckily I had tremendous newly-resqued-from-a-final-sale Winsor&Newton large pan watercolours that I had never used before, and they are pure power. I was much more "WOW LOOK AT THAT BLUE LOOK AT THAT YELLOW LOOK AT THAT BROWN" than "ngyaaaaare these colours gonna go together?" (Then, of course, my scanner ate the best colours. Oh well.) They're also beautiful to look at - smooth slabs of colour, it took a lot of mental strength not to take a bite out of them. Anyway, their magic qualities made my lack of planning much less evident. (Hmmm. If I DID eat them, would I develop magic powers too..?)


* * *

Speaking of conventions and the like, I'm really considering buying a conference pass for the 2010 SPARK animation fest. Usually (well, I mean, for as long as I've lived in Vancouver, a surprisingly short time actually) I just go to some of their movie screenings. But since SPARK attracts many like-minded people from this industry, and I've always had a blast at SPARK-related screenings, I thought this pass might be a pretty enjoyable way to go out there and at the very least observe how other people network, even if it doesn't come very naturally to me yet. The sad thing is the pass doesn't cover my favourite part of the festival: movie screenings... But since I'm probably going, let me know if you want to hook up or something. (Not like that! ...Unless you're like serious nerd candy :P ) Might be easier for me to get a few words out if there's at least one familiar face.

* * *

Oh I forgot, there's more I wanted to say! I know nobody ever looks at my blogroll, so I'd just like to bring Nathan Fowkes' and Stefan Marjoram's blogs to your special attention, they're mostly environment/layout oriented and very inspiring, especially with interest to watercolour. Fowkes is a concept artist at Dreamworks and his beautiful environment concept art is this close to actually making me want to see Shrek 4.

Blast from Ze Past

If you want to see some of my (and my wonderful Opus colleagues') artwork check out our staff show, in the North Van Opus classroom. Starting... well, starting today, pretty much. It's only up for a couple of days.
Everything that I have there has already been posted on my blog though, because I haven't had time to draw anything new, but just in case you're interested in seeing it in all its lively vibrancy...

I found this when choosing lifedrawings for my bit of show wall and I had COMPLETELY forgotten about drawing it, but I found it pretty cool. This is for an old illustration homework assignment, subject "Crazy Old Zebra". This is what I scrawled in lifedrawing class:


...and here's the homework I actually turned in, which I also quite like:

This time, the umbrella's MAGIC

Sometimes a funny sentence (funny to me -- rarely to everyone else) gets put together in my head and I get inspired by it. This picture was also more than a little inspired by Lori (one of my amazing classmates) and a Finnish illustrator called Hannu Taina.

It was supposed to be another version of Mayor Poppins, but I gotta think of something else to call these umbrella guys that I keep seeing... I just found out somebody already named their stupid Broadway play or something "Mayor Poppins."
Pfffwh. Fine. My Mayor Poppins would have been totally better - with his twinkly moustache and fancy blue eyes :D

Cloudy Jellyfish

Cocoa puff salad

Ok, he's obviously not making salad, but it was a funny snippet of a conversation I heard somewhere and the whole inspiration for this picture, so...