Pastel Still Life

Here's a pastel drawing I created to submit to a local show. Pastel on paper.

Its been since.....January? Wow, time flies.

I've been rather busy since my last post. My bananas picture (from this post) was in part of group show at SCAD called DrawingWorks. I also submitted a portfolio to the Dragon*Con Art Show and was accepted into the show! This is my first time displaying at the show, and I am thrilled. Its been a goal of mine to make it into that show. In March, I had an art table at a small convention called GnomeCon in Savannah, GA. It was fun, and I made some new friends at the show. 

Here's a piece I finished for the Dragon*Con portfolio. This was painted in Manga Studio 5. 

Tailypo

This past fall, my wife, brother-in-law, and I were hanging out at a friend's house. We were telling creepy stories to each other, and our friend asked if we had heard about the Tailypo. I hadn't heard of it, so my friend proceeded to creep us all out with the story of a creature that seeks retribution after a hungry, hermetic old man chops off its tail and eats it. The story is an old Appalachian folk tale that has many variations and endings, but all have the same basic elements. When I heard the story, I knew that I had to illustrate it somehow. I wasn't sure if I wanted to make a mini-comic, or do a series of illustrations. I ultimately decided to go the illustration route. It allowed me to be more detailed in the images, while still trying to capture the moody atmosphere and mystery involved around the mythical creature.

I started out with a pencil drawing and then inked and toned it in Manga Studio EX. If you haven't used that program, I highly recommend it. It is an amazing program for creating digital artwork, but especially comics.

Here's my rough pencil drawing that served as a basis for the final inks and tones. A few revisions were made during the process. I also had to stitch this piece together in Photoshop because my scanner wasn't quite big enough to get all of it.

Here's the final version of the image. Some compositional elements were improved as well as adding more depth with the rendering. I had a lot of fun working on this and got a little absorbed in the details.

Family Gifts

I have some new vector work to show here. Both of these images were done for my family as gifts. A while back I gave my Mom a print of my self-portrait, and she wanted one of my sister to go along with it.

I also finished a poster  to commemorate my sister's wedding. A few of these elements I have posted here before. Here is the final design with all of the elements incorporated. 

Fruit!

I am taking an online Computer Art class this quarter at SCAD to round out my digital art skills a bit and the first program we are using is Adobe Illustrator. The first assignment was to draw some fruit using the gradient tool and the gradient mesh tool. Here are my results. The bananas were down with the gradient tool and various other tools, and the apple was done using the gradient mesh(my first time using it).

New Arts!

I just finished up these two images for submission to the Dragon Con Art Show. The first was done completely in Adobe Illustrator. The second was done in Paint Tool SAI and Photoshop.

Parka Blogs!

The awesome Parka Blogs has featured my art in a post! My self portrait was included in their "50 Amazing Vector Portraits" feature. Check it out here.

Parka Blogs reviews artbooks of all kinds, and usually showcases some really fantastic artwork. If you don't follow them, I highly recommend that you start. Its a great resource for inspiration and they frequently do giveaways of art books.