The Chad Frye - Illustration GuyYou ever wonder where those random rain showers come from that even the weather people didn’t predict?
Colored pencil in a sketchbook.
Hey, going to the doctor’s office can be a scary thing, even for a big scary monster. They need a little love and reassurance, too! (And they also like lollipops when it’s all over.)
Traditional ink in a sketchbook with some slight blandishments from Photoshop.
…flock together!
Hey, if you find a group to hang out with that you get along with, hang out with them!
Traditional ink drawing in a sketchbook, colored in Photoshop.
Now and then, I like to take my sketchbook and just do some random freeform thinking with my pencil. This page came from a day of monster ruminations.
What that means is that I would sketch without a pre-conceived thought about where the sketch was going to go. I knew two things in advance. I would be drawing heads, and they would be monsters.
I would start drawing shapes, and then come up with the facial details as the sketch progressed. What came out was kind of fun, so I inked them with a brush pen, and dabbed on a little red watercolor paint. Five monster character design concepts were the result!
Whaaaa?! is right! Did you realize Monster Month is back, and it started yesterday? Well it is and it did!
Here is the exciting second piece, a completely traditional watercolor and colored pencil piece of a dumbfounded beast who is just as surprised to be here as you are in seeing him.
Welcome to day 1 of this year’s MONSTER MONTH!!!! After two years since the last one, did you miss it?
So, this being the first day, I thought I would gingerly let the first one out of the box without causing you too much fright. It is certainly nothing as horrendous as what Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt once found in a box, so you can breathe easily. Rest assured, you and the kiddies will likely enjoy (most of) what is to come this month.
Ink and black Prismacolor pencil from my sketchbook.
It’s hard to believe, but after a two year absence here on the ol’ blog, I am pleased to announce that I have decided to bring back Monster Month posts for the month of October!
Beginning in 2009 (A whopping TWELVE years ago!!! Where has the time gone?!), I began posting a monster drawing per day in the month of October. I like drawing silly monsters, and with Halloween being the last day in October, it seemed like the perfect month in which to do it!
Some years were too busy to post each day, so some days were skipped, until the past two years where I was just too busy with work and life to be able to do it at all. You see, most of the time, these drawings were not something I had done for any other purpose. They were just for my own amusement created in my spare time. Perhaps they amuse you, too. I hope so, because this year there is a full set of 31 monster posts coming your way!! (I’ve been busy.)
And to call them all “drawings” is not always the best description. They can be quick sketches, more studied pencil or ink drawings, some are traditional watercolor, some utilize gouache paint, some are painted digitally, and some are final illustration quality. They can be on flat paper, textured watercolor paper, colored paper – whatever seemed to be the right choice at the time. There might even be one this year that was colored with coffee!
So, please enjoy the things that go bump in the night this month – night since they all will be posted at midnight PST each day. The first beast will be unleashed tomorrow here on the ol’ blog, on my Instagram account, on my public Facebook page, and if I remember, on LinkedIn.
If you would like to see Monster Month posts from the past to get a sense of what you’ll be facing, feel free to CLICK HERE to access all of them here on the blog!
The birds, but no bees. Bees would just get in the way.
Ink and watercolor in a brown paper sketchbook.