Monday, March 25, 2013

Toaster Guy Cover


Boom!

Hey everybody, I just finished a project I thought I'd share with you guys and gals (which I will combine to form the word Guyals from now on.)

I was contacted by cartoonist Aaron Hazouri (his blog here) and asked if I would be interested in doing some coloring work. He sent me the drawing I would be coloring and I said "YES!"

This is the cover for the 4th and final chapter of a self-published comic he is creating.

Color work by me
All line work done by Aaron Hazouri.

This one was really fun to work on. Aaron's drawing has tons of character and.... A HUGE ROBOT DESTROYING THE CITY!

I think it came together rather nicely.

Sos anyways... that's that.

now I will leave you with a ludicrous freestyle poem.

The Water Shoe Haiku
by Cam Kendell

Water shoe is blue
Does water shoe come back home
or forever roam?

lame.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Foot Ninja Ambush! - My Childhood Villains


Watch out!

You're getting ambushed by the foot!

I told you (i.e. warned you) that more Ninja Turtle stuff would be coming.

I just couldn't help myself.

Plus... I think I want to keep doing villains from my childhood. I started making a mental list of villains from old cartoons and tv shows. Yep, I geeked out.

feel free to suggest any villains you can think of.

I decided to go for an old school color scheme here.... yep, purple ninjas.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Sea Captain with Unruly Tentacle Hair


Behold!
I love pirates...
I love tentacles...
I love art...
.... and yeah. So I drewed this here sea captain.

... he has bed head... not the product... the condition.

I imagine that once you get tentacle bed head, it's pretty much a permanent state.

that's all. Oh, and I did it for the tentacle blog again. Maybe you should do something and submit it!

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Ninja Turtle vs Ninja Tentacles


Okay... sorry I lied. They aren't ninja tentacles... but that is a ninja turtle fo sho... Raphael for those of you not in the know.

T. U. R. T. L. E. power... after drawing Krang I just couldn't resist. And, there is probably more coming.

oh, and I would like to take this time to thank Vanilla Ice for the Ninja Rap.

When I was a kid Raphael was my "declared" favorite. Let me clarify. He wasn't actually my favorite. Michealangelo was my favorite. However, my best friend (you know who you are) declared Mikey was his favorite turtle before I did so I obviously had to choose a different one. So Raph was the closest, but in my heart it was always Mikey... though now it's Donatello.

and... since it has tentacles I threw it up on the More Tentacles Blog. Why? because it's Tentacle Tuesday!

In a little bit I think I'm going to take you through a magical journey of my artist heroes. I'll be picking some people from my links list over yonder and will be spotlighting their work. So... yeah...

Happy blog reading.

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Uniflop Process - Part 2


 Alright Everybody... here is part 2 of my illustration process for Startled By The Uniflop

Click here for Part 1

When we last left off we had an absolutely horrendous looking Layout Comp staring us down.
Well, now the suspense is over and the Uglification gives way to Beautification... hopefully... or that's the plan at least.

Step 5 - Draw Lines!
This is where I go through the lengthy process of refining the lines and creating a finished drawing. All the detail is there.. I look at reference and tweak anything that was off in my comp (admittedly that should have been done before..) It's a lengthy process but very soothing at the same time.


Step 6 - It's color time... delicious... delicious color time.
I use various overlay layers to lay down solid colors. At this point I'm not terribly concerned with value. You can see that in my thumbnail sketch the Troll was going to be a dark figure on a light background (yeah, that's right Will... I did listen). That is still the plan but I'm not worried about it at this point. I just want the general colors to be what I'm looking for. I went through a few varieties of troll skin color (blue, green, purple, red) before settling on his final complexion.


Step 7 - Shading...
ooooooo, I say to myself when this stage is finished. They seem to be coming alive! Here I add shadows and highlights to the... well, the everything. Things seem to start having depth which usually makes me giddy. I use multiply layers and screen or overlay or lighten... just whatever works for me.


Step 8 - Textures
I like texture. Subtle variations in value take a large flat surface and make it into something far more interesting. so here I added some texture to the troll's skin and hair, the Uniflop, and the trees. Some areas are more apparent than others. Oh, and I added some pinkish hues to the Trolls skin in areas like the nose, cheeks, feet, knuckles, and belly.


Step 9 - Mood my dear... mood.
In this step I used multiple layers of shadow and fog to create the value pattern I originally was shooting for. I also add atmosphere and try to push the depth of space. This is probably one of the more time consuming steps but the one that in many was is the funnest for me. It also makes me feel like Bob Ross when he plant a huge tree right in front of a mountain he just painstakingly painted. Some of the details get lost in shadow or faded out in a haze... but it's worth it. Oh... and I added a spider web in the far left tree. Sadly... it's looking a tad flat at this point... so onto the final step. 


 Step 10 - Finally the finale.
the last step involves me eating some candy like Pez or something and then tweaking the contrast, levels, and hues to get it just were I want it. Then I play Beep Bop Baby or some other made up game with the kids and come back to it. Make any more tweaks and put my John Hancock somewhere.


You made it!!!
I think that is the longest post I've ever done... hopefully it was enjoyable. And for a reward I'll tell you a joke (beware it is geeky):

Two droids walk into a bar
The bartender says "hey, we don'e serve your kind here"

Thanks for joining me... you can get back to pretending to work now.

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Krang! - My Childhood Villain


Krang... one of the absolute greatest villains from my childhood.
A tentacle brain alien is completely genius.
Every now and then I can hear his fantastic voice as it rises and plummets in pitch yelling "Shredder!"

Anyway... hope you enjoy. I did this piece for the More Tentacles Blog

Up Next: I'll be posting part 2 of the illustration process for Startled by the Uniflop

Friday, March 1, 2013

Uniflop Process - Part1


Happy March 1st!
I've been reading Alice in Wonderland to my kids at night. That book is awesome and completely insane. Waaaaaaay crazier than the disney version. So any who, in honor of the March Hare I thought I'd post this piece I've been working on and show a little of the process I went through to create it.

I call it "Startled by the Uniflop"

The Uniflop is a very rare magical creature. With the body of a deranged, white jack rabbit and a unicorn's horn protruding from just above it's creepy visage it is truly a sight to behold.
Often the Uniflop seems to appear out of nowhere. It then spends the next few minutes (or however long it decides to stay around) hopping around just inside your personal bubble while being careful to never actually make physical contact.
Those who have encountered this creature are often overwhelmed with an uneasy feeling, not because of it's dangerous powers, or ferocious disposition, but because of it's striking awkwardness.

Anyway, now that I've educated you on this rare creature... here's how I did this illustration.

Step 1- Thumbnail. It all started with this:


a tiny drawing to establish the general layout and value... though I switched the value where the Uniflop is.

Step 2 - Larger Layout comp. Then I scaled things up a bit and worked out where things would be placed and bit more detail of the posing of characters. At this point I knew it was a troll that would be startled but the startling agent was going to be a kitten. I scratched that idea because it seemed so... well... unimaginative.


Step 3 - Now the flood of sketches. Ranging from really ugly and sloppy chicken scratches to more refined sketches. This is just to explore the character designs and poses. During this process I looked at images of jack rabbits and pictures of me posing like a little startled girl. (here are a few of those... sketches, not the pictures of me. Those were deleted and sent to the void.)




Some of them are really hideous so... yeah. But, it is all in the name of science! or progress.

Step 4 - When I get the design I like (the last one above) I take an awesomely cruddy photo and put it in photoshop. Referring to the original thumbnail and layout comp I create a larger composition including value and more background details.


yeah... I know it's hideous... but so is the scaffolding of a building. Anyway, that's what I have to remind myself at this point.

So........... part 2 next time!

I feel so exposed right now.

And a big Thanks to Adam Munoa for doing a artist spotlight of me on his blog. Hopefully I will be able to share some of his work here soon.

Part 2 is here