Tale of the Whale

Each summer I spend some time in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. One of my favorite restaurants is Tale of the Whale in Nags Head where owners Dan, Kathy, & Carole Bibey always welcome us with open arms. Two weeks ago I dropped in and gave them this drawing that they are now using as a coloring sheet to occupy their youngest patrons.

 

How come we never see a scene like THIS while whale watching?

 

I hadn’t inked something on paper in a while, so I had to brush off the dust from my – um – brush, and supplement it with some of my pens. Always nerve racking drawing traditionally with a medium so permanent as ink after getting used to an undo button on the computer. Thankfully, white gouache still works to cover the few mistakes made.

So, if you happen to find yourself in good ol’ Nags Head, NC, be sure to drop in Tale of the Whale for an exquisite seafood dinner on the waterfront. I’m partial to the shrimp & grits or Pasta Nova – grilled salmon served over pasta covered in a sun dried tomato & lump crab sauce.

And even if you think you are too big to use crayons, feel free to ask for a coloring sheet.

Categories
Animals Art: Drawings Art: Inking Character Designs Coloring Book art Illustrations

Blackbeard’s Vacation

This summer the Frye family did something it had never done before. We had a family reunion. Yep, my parents, my siblings, their spouses and kids, and yes, even I, gathered on the beach in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Seventeen of us descended upon two beach houses.

Of course, any good family reunion requires a family T-shirt. For some strange reason, that job fell upon my shoulders. Imagine that! Well, when duty calls….

 

Now, I’m not saying my family looks like this. We look much sillier in bathing suits.

 

I got to thinking that good ol’ Blackbeard, the scourge of the sea that he was, happened to spend the last of his days in the Outer Banks. His end was untimely, of course. No self-respecting pirate dared to live into a life of old age, but was he felled by the sword? Or did Blackbeard and his mates meet their end foolishly surfing the untamed shark infested waves in a hurricane? History says one thing, my drawing says another.

 

A family self-portrait in red.

 

As you can see, everyone seemed to enjoy the shirts. However, a few nephews wondered out loud why Blackbeard’s beard was actually purple. Uncle Chad’s answer? Because.

Categories
Animals Art: Inking Art: Photography Art: Photoshop Caricature Cartoons Character Designs Illustrations Self Portrait

Rough, Tough, & Hard to Bluff

The old west fascinates me, perhaps because my pop loves watching westerns and always pulled me into that world as I was growing up. Whether good guys or bad guys, they always were wild characters ripe to be caricatured.

Whether or not they looked like they knew how to shoot, movie cowboys always carried a gun. This here feller looks like the gun will carry him instead! He’ll be okay, though. That’s the old west for you. They were rough, tough, and hard to bluff.

 

Pictures like this just make me want to speak with a drawl.

 

THIS ORIGINAL ART IS FOR SALE

15 x 19.5″ colored pencil & watercolor on Canson paper

$400.00

FREE SHIPPING WITHIN THE UNITED STATES

ADDITIONAL FEES MAY APPLY FOR INTERNATIONAL

CONTACT CHAD@CHADFRYE.COM

Categories
Animals Art: Colored Pencil Art: Drawings Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Character Designs For Sale Illustrations

Clubhouse Magazine – Noah Girl

Today is the final of three illustrations that appear in the July 2017 issue of Clubhouse Magazine for kids published by Focus on the Family. (If you missed the other two, just look at the previous two posts here on the ol’ blog.) All three images belong to a fun quiz that kids can take to help prevent summer boredom!

This image is of a little girl who, out of desperation of being stuck inside for a three-day rainstorm, has decided that her bed is the ark, her toys are the animals, and yes, that she is Noah in search of dry land with the rubber ducky she is about to release.

As in the previous posts, here is the rough drawing with a rough color job all worked out in Photoshop in preparation for the final traditionally created illustration.

 

This girl takes her playtime very seriously.

 

To help dry up “Noah’s” water problem, water was used with watercolor paint and colored pencil on textured paper to create a scene that is epic in this little girl’s own mind.

 

I’m sure to a child, three days of rain can seem like forty.

 

I sure enjoyed this assignment. Hope you enjoyed seeing all three illustrations created for it!

If you are interested in owning this original published art measuring roughly 14×12″, it is available for $700. Shipping is included within the USA. Additional charges will apply for international shipping. Feel free to contact me at Chad@ChadFrye.com if interested in purchasing this or any other art in my FOR SALE category here on the ol’ blog.

Categories
Animals Art: Colored Pencil Art: Painting Art: Photoshop Art: Preliminary Sketches Art: Watercolor Bible Art Character Designs For Sale Illustrations

Clubhouse Magazine – Lobster Lad

Last week I started sharing with you the first of three illustrations created for the July 2017 issue of Focus on the Family’s Clubhouse Magazine that is available NOW if you reach out to Clubhouse! Today you get to see the second piece.

This one is a tad bit unusual. Lobster Lad is a boy who is pretending to be a lobster in order to get out of a writing assignment. After all, how can a lobster ever hold a pencil with those sharp and powerful claws? Also, it is terribly difficult to write on wet paper. The boy’s plan is genius.

First, here is the final rough drawing that was colored in Photoshop to work out the color scheme.

 

You might say that this is the lobster art before it is cooked.

 

Here is the final watercolor and colored pencil illustration that appears in the magazine.

 

I wonder how much a 50 pound lobster would cost?

 

If you are interested in owning this original published art measuring roughly 11×12″, it is available for $500. Shipping is included within the USA. Additional charges will apply for international shipping. Feel free to contact me at Chad@ChadFrye.com if interested in purchasing this or any other art in my FOR SALE category here on the ol’ blog.

Categories
Animals Art: Colored Pencil Art: Painting Art: Photoshop Art: Preliminary Sketches Art: Watercolor Character Designs For Sale Illustrations

Clubhouse Magazine – Road Trip

Earlier this year I worked on some illustrations for the July issue of Focus on the Family’s Clubhouse Magazine. Clubhouse is a Christian magazine for kids that along with teaching life lessons and biblical principles, it is LOADED with fun!

My assignment was to create three illustrations to go along with a silly multiple choice quiz to help kids avoid summertime boredom. So I whipped up some concoctions with genuine watercolor paint and colored pencils for maximum entertainment! I’ll spread them out over the course of this month, but for now, here’s one to remind you to stay alert on road trips!

To start, I send an uncolored rough drawing to my art director for approval. If she wants changes, I make changes.

Then I do a color rough for myself in Photoshop. It helps to figure out what colors work in the composition in this way before going to the trouble of mixing paints. There was also the added issue of doing three illustrations for one story, so I wanted to be sure my colors would help all three pieces look cohesive.

 

Photoshop helps set the scene.

 

Next is the fully traditional illustration created in watercolor and colored pencil on genuine paper. Believe it or not, some artists still work this way.

 

While the destination is the goal of a road trip, there sure is a lot to enjoy on the way to the destination. Don’t miss it!

 

 

If you are interested in owning this original published art measuring roughly 13×12″, it is available for $600. Shipping is included within the USA. Additional charges will apply for international shipping. Feel free to contact me at Chad@ChadFrye.com if interested in purchasing this or any other art in my FOR SALE category here on the ol’ blog.

Categories
Animals Art: Colored Pencil Art: Painting Art: Photoshop Art: Preliminary Sketches Art: Watercolor Character Designs For Sale Illustrations

20 Years In Hollywood!

I realized a little late that today, July 7, 2017, is exactly my 20th anniversary of working in Hollywood!

My professional art career really began in 1991 when I started illustrating my first children’s book, and my career in animation actually started in 1994 back in South Carolina for a small cinder block studio behind a car wash working on computer games (anyone remember King’s Quest VII?). When that studio folded, I spent a couple of years illustrating children’s books before the lure of year-round sunshine and Mickey Mouse came calling.

 

Just look at that clean-shaven face all full of youthful enthusiasm.

 

In the summer of 1997, a fresh-faced young Chad made the move to CA with eyes bright and wide to work for Disney where his first project was behind-the-scenes on Mulan. (My shirt is correct – my first Disney boss was Walt Sturrock who had hired me.) I remember flying out on a Friday, and had the weekend to start looking for an apartment. When Monday morning rolled around, I started work.

That first month was tough. I lived out of the Burbank Hilton (now the Marriott), worked by day, apartment hunted at night, and somewhere in between I illustrated the cover for a book I was still under contract to produce. Yep, set up a make-shift studio in my hotel room complete with an airbrush compressor. (I also remember being robbed in that hotel room, and the Hilton did absolutely nothing to compensate me for the items stolen from my dresser – one item being my favorite Mickey Mouse watch. Haven’t stayed in a Hilton since.)

While my time at Disney was almost ten years collectively, other studios also found use for my abilities. Eleven feature films, three television series, several DVDs, many web cartoons, and even a float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade have encompassed the past twenty years! It has just flown by! With my slate currently open, I am looking forward to seeing what the future holds!

Categories
Art: Animation Caricature Disney Self Portrait Sketchbook

Friendly Neighborhood Giacchino-man

Spider-man Homecoming is the big new movie this coming weekend, and I am especially excited to hear the music written for the film. Past Spider-man movies have set a very high bar for exciting compositions from some of film music’s best composers such as Danny Elfman, Christopher Young, James Horner, and Hans Zimmer. No doubt this latest iteration of the web slinger will meet that bar and possibly exceed it with music slung by Michael Giacchino!

Giacchino is the perfect choice to bring something fresh and exciting to a character that Disney/Marvel hopes to make cinematically fresh and exciting again. This project comes after a year where the composer has set his own personal bar very high with amazing work for films that include Zootopia, Star Trek Beyond, Doctor Strange, Star Wars: Rogue One, and the upcoming War for the Planet of the Apes.

So, in anticipation of some thrilling musical delights, I present to you my latest inked and watercolored piece called “Giacchino-man!”

 

Spins a musical web – any size!

By the way, those musical notes are from the opening of the original Spider-man TV show theme song from the 1970s. 😉

 

Categories
Art: Inking Art: Painting Art: Watercolor Caricature Comic Books Disney Film Music Illustrations