New & Improved!

Lately the bulk of my time has been spent at The Third Floor company where I have been working as a storyboard artist on a film. It has been tough to set some time aside for other projects between the day gig and preparations for Christmas. However, I have been helping out an old friend from my Disney days in redesigning a character I first came up with for his online traffic school, ComedyTrafficSchool.com.

Yes folks, Captain Traffic is back, and better than before! My pal Brett Drogmund first asked me to develop this character as a mascot for his then brand new company at least 15 years ago. My drawings have graced his website (and the side of a car) ever since then. (You can read about it HERE!) But it was time to update this road warrior with a more contemporary look.

While staying true to the cheesy essence of the good captain, I made him more sleek and sophisticated in his coloring style. This is the first drawing in a series of them I am working on, and it just so happens to currently be on ComedyTrafficSchool.com’s homepage right this very moment!

 

Captain Traffic – the hero of every traffic violator’s sentencing.
Categories
Art: Painting Art: Photoshop Character Designs Illustrations

Wistfulness

Adulting is really hard sometimes. There can be those crucial moments in life when you wish you could have a do-over – to go back a day, a week, a month, even eleven months, and redo things with the knowledge you have now.

Sometimes you even long to go back to the simpler days of your childhood when you could just disappear for the day down by the ol’ lake with your faithful dog to sit in the shade and fish the day away without a care in the world. Aaah. Nice, isn’t it?

Then you remember, as I did, that you never lived near a lake, nor did you ever own a dog.

Oh well.

 

This wistful interlude is brought to you by genuine ink!
Categories
Animals Art: Drawings Art: Inking Random Doodles Sketchbook

40 Years

I came across this piece in my digital files this past weekend and thought I’d share it with you. It has a little bit of sweetness to it, and a lot of sentiment, because I created it for my parents nine years ago for their 40th wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe that next July will be their 50th, should God allow them to make it to that milestone. Time and health are not always kind to those we love.

I admire my folks for the love and faithfulness they’ve shown each other over the years, and only hope that one day I could be so blessed to have such a relationship.

 

 

 

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”  – I Corinthians 13:4-7

Categories
Animals Art: Colored Pencil Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Disney Illustrations

2017 Monster Month: Day 22 – Coming & Going

Beware the fire “breathing” dragon that is dangerous both as he comes and as he goes, so to speak.

 

If that was the bluebird of happiness, we’re in trouble.

 

And thus concludes Monster Month for 2017. Twenty-two beasties from my drafting table to your eyes. I hope you enjoyed them once again. These are always fun for me to draw, and almost all were drawn just for fun.

As always, I am available to be hired should you have a project requiring my abilities, whether it is a monster or something else. There is plenty of variety of subject matter on my blog, and also over on Instagram where I post regularly, too! I’m chadfrye_illustrationguy over there.

I can be reached at chad@chadfrye.com with serious inquiries. I have illustrated children’s books, magazine articles, and regularly work in animation as a character designer and storyboard artist.

Categories
Animals Art: Drawings Art: Inking Art: Painting Art: Photoshop Character Designs Illustrations Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 21 – Russian Rascal

You’ve seen several Monster Month posts this year of sketches and drawings I did while nestled in the cold cockles of the heart of a Russian winter last January. I got to thinking that none of those monsters seemed particularly Russian in their design. So, I grabbed my trusty brush pen and white paint (with some red accents), and created this Russian Rascal on some Canson paper for the eve of Halloween!

 

Truly, the only real monster here is the cruelty of a Russian winter.

 

Come back tomorrow to see the grand conclusion of this year’s MONSTER MONTH!!

Categories
Animals Art: Drawings Art: Inking Character Designs Illustrations Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 20 – The Job Interview

You know those job interviews where the interviewer can just tell by looking at the applicant that they wouldn’t be a good fit in their office environment? Yeah, this is THAT guy.

It just seemed funny to me that this monster thinks he is being turned down for his tattoo, when really it is likely due to the fact that he won’t be able to fit into a cubical, or control his oral excretions.

There’s also probably several folks whose dander allergies would be set off working side-by-side with Norman. (He just looks like a Norman, doesn’t he?) Anyway, he was accomplished traditionally in ink, watercolor, and gouache paint.

 

Human Resources – HUMAN. Not Monster Resources.
Categories
Art: Drawings Art: Inking Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Cartoons Character Designs Illustrations Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 19 – Coffee Monsters

Today you don’t get just one, not two, but THREE monsters for the price of admission!! How about that, huh?!

These are three monsters that I drew in just good ol’ ink for some folks who worked at LA Studios in Hollywood when I worked there on the movie Animal Crackers a couple of years ago (the TRAILER is out now). LA Studios is really a posh recording studio, but our Blue Dream Studios production was in some spare offices on the second floor where we were working on story. Two of the folks these cards went to worked the kitchen and would make drinks for us, as well as for the actors and folks who came in to record in the many studios they have there. Many a time I was made a frothy coffee or a special iced tea. The third was for the valet. While employees like me parked down the street in a lot, I enjoyed the daily conversations with Brandon, and made him a card, too.

Since giving them the cards, I decided to go back this month and do a bit of shading on them. No, I didn’t ask for the cards back. I kept scans of the art, painted the shading on new watercolor paper, then married the two in Photoshop.

And why do I call this post “Coffee Monsters?” The paint was COFFEE! Genuine liquid coffee. Creme Brûlée coffee to be precise (don’t lick your screen). You can actually see some of the grinds in the paint within the characters. A former drawing teacher of mine when I worked at Disney, Walt Stanchfield, sometimes would show us paintings he would do with coffee when he was in diners. He’d illustrate other customers and shade them with his coffee. I never did try it until now. Kind of a fun experiment!

 

Categories
Art: Inking Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Character Designs Monsters

2017 Monster Month: Day 18 – Snot Monster Redux

Again I am revisiting a monster from last year in this new version. Remember the Snot Monster from last year’s Monster Month? He just stood there with a schnoz ready to blow. After I did that drawing, I thought of an fun application to draw him again, though slightly more cartoony.

I was writing a letter to a good friend, and decided to have some fun on the back of the envelope. Yep, that little snot monster seemed like a perfect choice to help seal the envelope shut. Good times.

 

That’s not an envelope you’d want to lick.
Categories
Art: Inking Art: Watercolor Character Designs Monsters Random Doodles