"BLAG!"

This poor beast even with a model can't seem to make a good drawing. BLAG!

Here's a quick photoshop break from Oxford work. I've been pounding through a ton of roughs the last few days (20 to be precise) for Oxford University Press and so far I've got about 16 knocked-out. A head of schedule but much work remains to be done.

And so I say "BLAG."

The Great Mythical Flying Beast

Old college Illustration class drawing. Senior year. Final drawing; first sememster. Why do I post this? I can not say.

Illustration Friday

He Suddenly Remembered the Ticket

Haven't entered the Illustration Friday for a week or two. Work has been very busy and all of Fridays in the office are now focused on internal story development.

These are very busy, very productive days.

The Illustration Friday theme for today is "Broken." Hoping to not fall into the obvious hole this topic presents, my post is about breaking out, not being broken and despairing.

Despairing never fixed one broken thing.

More Blue Goblet

The Blue Goblet has little to do with rain except for an atmospheric moment once or twice. This was a little side doodle that I liked. In anycase, things are developing nicely. This morning marks the completion of stage one of the Blue Goblet; the finishing of part one of the rough thumbnails for the story.

This afternoon involves fitting those thumbnails (18 pages full of work) onto a frame of the actual book layout and set number of spreads and such.

In other Blue Goblet related news, I've been commissioned to create a "Blue Goblet" font based on my hand-writing by a designer in Savannah, GA. Here's a sample. More to come on this later. We'll see.

Where on earth have I been?

Jack Patch

Where on earth have I been? Gracious goodness knows and lots of other places.

Deadlines at work and a 103 degree fever, for starters. This past week has been spent mostly on the couch at home with a fever and tomato soup and white grape juice. I like soup and white grape juice when I am ill. Somewhere along the way I picked up strep throat. I am not sure where. Probably off the floor. I am not sure.

And work has been full and busy. But there is always time to draw Jack Patch.

The Society Of Illustrators (edit)

(detail)

Digital is such an intuitive medium. If you think of something, oh that would be cool if, you just do it and see what it looks like. If you did the same thing in watercolor you'd have to start over most times. Not to say one is inferior or superior, just different ways and means to tell the story. And the story or feeling is what moves people.

I'm still learning the medium. I spent college working with oils and watercolors and didn't start doing anything serious with digital til the very end of my senior year and I'd caution people to do something similar. For me, I needed the understanding and framework I was able to gather from oils especially. It would have been a lot easier to get caught up in the medium, rather than understanding colors and compistion and what is going to make a good painting.

With this piece, it took a long time to go from idea to sketch to finished. I spent a long time gathering reference for all sorts of birds (you can see earlier posts for more on this) and spent quite a while developing what I wanted. The ideas went through lots of changes and seemed like each one I came up with had about 5 rabbit trails, which was good but also drove me insane.

In the end I settled on a parade of sorts which evolved into the battle. The Final March.

Couched deep within The Blue Goblet mythology, the The Final March of Queen Anatolia, recounts the long forgotten myth of the Great Beast in the Second Great War for The Blue Goblet.

(original sketch)

The Final March of Queen Anatolia in the Second Great War for The Blue Goblet

(detail)

(detail)

(screen shot)

(detail)

All's well that ends well, or some old thing like that. To be mailed off to S.I. in NYC this Friday and we'll just see.

Here's hoping.

"Restore Gore in 2004 - - it's the will of the people!"

This doodle cracks me up big time. I mean this guy's hunting butterflies for goodness' sakes.

GINGERBREADMAN

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GINGERBREADMAN: GUNSLINGER


The door swung open and in walked the gingerbreadman.

The bar was smoky, not at all the place you would expect to see a gingerbreadman. As if on cue from an unseen conductor, the music shifted downward. The clientele became noticably uneasy. But these were not who he was looking for, these here were the usual lot; the everyday thugs, the crooks, the lawless. Most were drunk into oblivion. His business was not with them.

A man at a table in the back regarded the newcomer with untrusting eyes and pulled down the brim of his wide hat. He smacked his dry mouth and looked down the way you do when there is trouble .

The gingerbreadman strode over to the bar. *His face was a grim biscuit of ash.

The bartender was a nervous man struggling to keep poise. He was generally calm but his nerves were tense these days. He had seen things.

“It’s been quite some time since you crossed this threshold, Clarence. The usual?”

“No, Charlie.” The gingerbreadman said.

This deviation from the expected threw the bartender a curve.

He casually mopped his brow.

“Well, what can I get for you? I’ve got a nice import from Mexico, it’s new.” said the bartender as he reached for the big bottle behind him.

“I haven’t come for a drink, Charlie,” said the gingerbreadman. “What I am looking for cannot be found in a bottle.”

The bartender turned around slowly. Sweat slinking down his forehead.

“Get out.” The bartender whispered.

The gingerbreadman looked out of the corner of his eye at the man. He was shaking and his face was changing colors. The gingerbreadman’s eyes traveled to the bartenders neck. There was a very small dart below his right ear. The bartender collapsed onto the bar sending the glasses crashing to the floor.

“Go, Claren--.” He chocked. With his last breath he swung his arm underneath the bar and hit the a button marked “DISTURBANCE: CHAIR.”

From the ceiling a chair fell from an opening and crashed onto the table below.

“Hey!” A drunken cowboy bellowed as he lurched to his feet. He looked around with glassy eyes and then settled on the the fellow sitting next to him.

“You... throwin’.... chairs at... at... ME?”

He staggered and threw back another drink.

Another cowboy from the other side of the bar kicked over the table where he was sitting. The bar had gone quiet and the music stopped. The stool clattered to the floor. He stood swaying and slugged down another shot of whiskey.

“Maybe I is, maybe I isn’t!” the one from across the room spat. The first one looked around, grabbed a stool and heaved it across the room. In an instant, a violent fight broke out inside the bar and the gingerbreadman slipped out through the back into the night.
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apologies to H.B. Kammer for this sentence.

Illustration Friday

"Lost"

Unless I come across anything else this will be it. Rough concepts for a publishing pitch at work. Not exactly having to do with lost, more just out and out destrution but well, he could be lost.

Details, details...

Unfinished detail of my Society of Illustrators entry piece.

Unfortunately I had to cut of this part to make the whole composition work better. It was tough, but on the whole makes a much more successful piece. So, in honor of it, I post it.

I'm nearly done with the finished piece so be sure to check back in the next day or so for an extensive post detailing the process.

To give a taste of where things stand now, here's a (for all practical purposes) finished detail of the background.

Tim Pike's View

Tim Pike is a good buddy of mine. He is talented in many crafts and he has an enviable view in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

He also relays to me very great things like these:

pistachio pudding makes me sick.
banana phone
lemon duckies

Here the website they're off of. Click on the video camera for more.
I haven't watched them all so possible saltiness and/or language.

Stretches in Black and White

IdeaFORGE is a new thing going on around the office instated by the illustrious Jamin Jantz, Portland Studios Project Manager. Creative morning stretches in black and white.

What is an IdeaFORGE you may ask? That is a very good question and worthy of an answer.
The following is taken directly from Jamin's email:

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FORMAT OF EACH DAY

I will email you several things each day. You are simply to follow the stream of consciousness that those words or ideas evoke. Start with writing out and following the idea, then move into sketching. I recommend starting a word document where you can write any good ideas or characters or storylines down. Review that file each day during your time and follow-up or add-to and ideas that show promise.

Today, I've given you a characteristic of a character, the first line of an actual children's book and a location. They are all picked randomly, so have fun.

CHARACTERISTIC: ANALYZE

1ST LINE: "Curses!" cried Freddy LeGrand

LOCATION: AIRPORT TERMINAL

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And here is what I wrote yesterday. I may or may not continue to post these. We'll see.

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"Curses!" cried Freddy LeGrand. He watched as the whole of the baggage claim erupted with green smoke. Freddy adjusted his thick glasses. The crowds of people shoving past him momentarily interupted his concentration.

“This day are my worst fears realized.” Freddy murmured, reaching instinctively for his pockets. “And in baggage claim no less.”

From the green vapors emerged a horrific sight; a prowling, hulking, grotesque beast of immense proportions. It stormed off the conveyer belt and stood upright, smoothed down its stalks of hair and continued. The creature allowed itself over the rubble and then stumbled onto a suticase. It regarded the luggage with question, it’s yellow eyes blinking intermittently. The creature then wretched the suitcase open, pulled out a neat hat and waistcoat and fit them on, snuggily.

Somehow the test tubes Freddy LeGrand, boy Mad Scientist, had stowed in his checked luggage must have mixed.

“Curses,” Freddy murmured again, swearing on Newton’s grave that he would never again travel with radioactive isotopes and cabbage again.

by Cory.
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Check out Chris Koelle's blog, Sequencing and scroll around to find his take on today's IdeaFORGE.

Lily von Silvie Lenore

Lily

Lily on the Water

by Cory