Last year I gave my father a birthday gift of a hot air balloon ride since it was something he had been wanting to try for awhile. He’s flown in fighter jets, a glider, and sailed the seven seas, but has never sailed through the skies with hot air. Well, not in a balloon at least.
I, however, am not quite the daredevil Dad can be. The notion of a ride in a hot air balloon has a primal romanticism to it, so on that level it has a certain appeal, but bouncing along with the whim of the wind gives me the willies. You never know if you’ll wind up unexpectedly in Oz where you’ll live half your life. I’d rather sprawl out in the shade with a cold lemonade.
That being said, I felt inspired last night to do this sketch. When seated safely at my desk, I don’t mind reaching down to touch the treetops.
You can almost hear the 5th Dimension as this goes up, up and away. Almost.
Dad is supposed to take his balloon trip soon. He did try it once, but due to winds it was cancelled. I think his is supposed to go a little higher than mine purely for safety reasons. We shall see…
It seems like many western movies, whether from their heyday up until now, the hero cowboys are always chiseled sculptures of men. You know, like Michelangelo’s “David” with a wide brimmed hat and facial stubble. However, all the cowboys in the background and the side players are the ones that were probably most like real cowboys. Yes, folks, we are talking about the ugly ones.
Real cowboys could not possibly have taken care of their teeth very well, or shaved at all out on the trail, taken a bath in weeks, or had proper protection from the sun while out on a cattle drive. They would have been wrinkled, brow beaten, hairy, and very very dirty. Why do you think they kissed their horses? It’s because they were so ugly, the horses were the only ones who didn’t mind the attention.
So, in the spirit of true cowboys, I present to you this mighty ugly hero of the western stage…
I know what you are thinking after what was said above. “How come he doesn’t have a full beard?” It is because this cowboy is only 9 years old. Life on the trail is cruel.
Recently I created a traditional watercolor painting of Yogi Bear, his buddy Boo-Boo, his girl Cindy Bear, and the Ranger for inclusion in a Hanna-Barbera themed art show at Van Eaton Galleries in Sherman Oaks, CA. (Photos from the opening night reception are in yesterday’s post.) Van Eaton invited over 100 artists to participate in what is a spectacular display of creative interpretation of the Hanna-Barbera stable of characters. The show will be on display until April 20. (CLICK HERE for details if you would like to go see all the work!)
When I was first approached to contribute, I was slightly hesitant. You see, I grew up watching Looney Tunes cartoons, and even some Disney ones on the side, but the Hanna-Barbera shows rarely saw face time in our family room. So I didn’t have any childhood fondness from which to draw – literally.
I did, however, help my pal Dana Thompson paint a Yogi Bear children’s book back when I was a young illustrator. The book had been penciled by famed Hanna-Barbera designer Iwao Takamoto, and I remember how we enjoyed looking, with great admiration, over Iwao’s very precise and brilliant pencil lines. So, with fondness for that experience, Yogi Bear was destined to be my subject.
Penciled by veteran Hanna-Barbera designer Iwao Takamoto about eighteen years ago, Dana Thompson recruited me and fellow illustrator Julie Speer to help him paint this Yogi Bear children’s book on a tight deadline.
To make it interesting for me, my mind wandered into the realm of parody. Exactly one hundred fifty years ago in 1863, Èdouard Manet created his massive 105 by 85 inch oil painting titled The Bath which later became known as The Luncheon on the Grass. He had created his piece for a group artist show in Paris, but the jury rejected it. Its subject matter was deemed unfit for the tastes of the day, and they didn’t care much for his technique and seeming ignorace of perspective by having the figure in the background appear far too large to be natural. So, Manet entered it in the Salon des Refusès which was a show of rejected paintings put together to spite the big show. Many pieces from the rejected show went on to define the modern art of their age.
While I don’t anticipate any controversy with The Pic-a-nic on the Grass (my parody title of course), it seemed like a fun way to portray the Yogi Bear cast in that natural setting along with the picnic basket that was always the focus of Yogi’s energies.
So, as with any artistic process, it must begin with a drawing. These days I generally do my preliminary work on a Cintiq tablet (a fancy monitor that allows you to draw right on the screen with an electronic pen). I work in layers in Photoshop so that I can resize and redraw bits and pieces here and there to get my composition just right. In this case, the setting was already figured out for me since I was doing a parody of an existing piece of art. I don’t often do this, but I imported Manet’s painting into Photoshop, and literally traced his environment.
Then I drew, and redrew Yogi Bear, Boo-Boo, Yogi’s girl Cindy Bear, and the Ranger along with the picnic blanket containing elements from Yogi’s world and Manet’s painting.
You can see that my drawing closely follows the layout of Manet’s painting.
The next step was to get that digital drawing onto actual watercolor paper. After figuring out what I wanted the final size to be, I printed out the drawing in two pieces onto Strathmore Layout Bond paper, taped them together, then traced them down onto my watercolor paper using homemade graphite paper (same concept as the old time carbon copies one might have done in the days of typewriters).
On top is graphite paper made by rubbing a soft pencil lead on one side of tracing paper. The graphite side faces down onto the surface of the final watercolor paper, you place a drawing on top, then trace down with a pencil.
The watercolor paper I used was Strathmore’s rough textured Watercolor Block paper. The paper comes in a stiff stack that prevents the paper from curling up when you apply wet media to it. I actually prefer Arches brand because I feel I can have more control over the paint on Arches, but I still have some of this Strathmore in the studio and decided to use it for this piece.
Once the drawing is down on the paper, you can erase the graphite and redraw areas if you feel it is necessary. I then taped down the borders of the image area with white Artists’ Tape (low tack so it peels up easily later, but also helps give you a clean edge to your painting if so desired). It is now ready for paint!
Come back tomorrow to see the first steps in the painting process!
It has been awhile since my last post. Things have been swamped at the office with the imminent debut of an animated television show I have been working on for the past fourteen months, and the schedule has not lightened up one bit. Spending all day every day drawing in someone else’s style can wear on you a tad, so every now and then you need to let a little of yourself out on the page.
Last night I wanted to do something fun to break in a brand new sketchbook. As any follower of my blog knows, I enjoy drawing monsters, and if I have to draw a real life monster, reptiles are what come to mind first. This skeevy looking alligator fell out of my pen ready to prey on his next unsuspecting victim. Right now he has his eye on Ms. Animation Deadline.
Yeah, he thinks he looks suave, but he’s really all gut and no glory.
…is worth a bird in the belly! Of course I’m kidding. I’m sure this bear and bird are the best of pals.
I recently did a little drawing of a bear for a friend, and was pleased with the result. Thought I’d do one for myself this past weekend.
For those of you curious about the method of execution, I used a black brush pen on bumpy watercolor paper with some watercolor paint thrown on for good measure. Keeping it all loose makes it feel a bit energetic and whimsical, don’t you think?
It’s as if two buddies are catching up on old times. So long as the bigger of the buddies doesn’t end the conversation by eating his pal.
Yesterday I shared with you three concept sketches for an illustration about parasites for the 2013 Jan-Mar issue of Answers Magazine, the quarterly publication of Answers In Genesis. If you guessed that the sketch of the sports fanatic was chosen you would have been correct.
Murphy’s Law dictated that the red sketch had to be chosen because it was the one that had the most detail in it. I love detail because it is fun to look at, but at the same time, I loathe it because it is pretty time consuming to pull off. The art director also loved the detail, but wanted some of that detail changed. Below you can see the first version of the scene again (it is the same as in yesterday’s post), and then the altered version so you can see what changes were made. I drew these in Photoshop on the computer, so breaking parts off and changing them is a little easier to do than if it had been drawn on paper.
This was the first version of the sketch. Notice the food on the table are cookies and chips and soda. Some of the bagged junk food has now changed to more elaborate junk food like pizza, hot dogs, and fried chicken. Apparently parasites don’t care about cholesterol.
Now, the above is still just a concept drawing. While most of the detail is present, this is in no way ready for final art. The next step is to do a final “pencil” drawing to tie down everything as it will look in the final. The art director needs to see the final tight drawing before he can give the approval for the illustrator to move forward into final color. The drawing below is the final drawing, again created on the computer for ease in making any edits to the design. This time they liked it as is.
This is the final drawing created for the magazine’s approval before moving into the color stage.
You can see how the final drawing really hasn’t changed much, but all the details are made clearer – some are even new additions. Once approved, then the toughest part begins – creating the final painting. Many of my illustration colleagues create their final art completely on the computer these days. I have done that now and then, but for the most part I prefer to make a real watercolor painting with colored pencil accents. There is something about the real painting that computers cannot completely replicate – kind of a handmade feel to them. I almost always can tell when a “painting” was done on the computer as opposed to paper or canvas.
That being said, I will create my own personal color composite of the piece on the computer, especially for something as complicated as this. It helps to make those color choices where you can erase and redo. Watercolor on paper is not easily undone.
I don’t usually show the color comp to anyone because it is sloppy. It is just something to aid in my process, and won’t necessarily be precisely followed in the painting. So, here is the rare peek…
My personal color comp. This was where I decided to make the floor wooden. You can see crop lines in there to indicate the printed area of the illustration, but one must ALWAYS paint in a generous “bleed” area around the image in case the client needs to shift it or change the dimensions they originally planned for.
Tomorrow I’ll share with you the final painting along with a couple of “in progress” moments!
This Frankensketch came alive in one of my sketchbooks!
Well, I managed to squeeze out one more monster drawing here in what I usually dub “Monster Month”, and I leaned on my go-to guy Frankenstein. This one started as just a Prismacolor pencil sketch in my sketchbook, and I liked how he turned out so I added some watercolor right there in the book!
Yes, you purists out there will say that technically he is Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, and not actually Frankenstein. I differ with you on that, thou nay sayers! If one gives birth to a new life, they take your name. Dr. Frankenstein birthed, sort of, this creature, so by all rights he should also bear the name “Frankenstein”!
Regardless, Frankenstein has appeared a few times on the ol’ blog. In case you would like to explore my past with the big green guy, CLICK HERE to see all the Frankie posts.
Hopefully next October I’ll be back with monster art for each weekday. Until then continue to enjoy the various other art that I post here throughout the year!
Who is ready for tonight’s final presidential debate? I’ve listened to all the debates thus far and came away with one major observation – both sides have spent much of that airtime attempting to tear down each other without saying much of anything solid about what they can do in the next four years. It has been downright monstrous!
So, in the spirit of the Halloween season, I drew Barak Obama and Mitt Romney as they will likely appear tonight – as raging zombies.
Must….have….American……braaaaaaaains!!!
And for those of you Monster Month fans of the past keeping track at home, this counts as the second monster drawing of the month! Hopefully next year I can return to the “one a day” principle.
