Inking and Painting

I got the inking for the newest Lily piece done a little earlier this week so I figured it was about time I showed it off. Unfortunately the piece of Krazz still sits there, uninked and looking none too happy about it. Ah well, Krazz, maybe next time!

Like the Brick piece I did last month I really wanted to try and paint the Lily piece all by hand. The Brick piece was easy since he is a crazy looking guy, especially in that piece. It made all the brush strokes in the paint look that much better. But, will painting a pretty girl who needs a smooth look work as well? We'll see.

Like last time I printed out the black inked line in a non reproducible blue line on a piece of bristol board. Unlike last time, I glued it to the heavier board first. Last time I taped the Brick piece down to a board and then glued it down to a heavier piece of board after it was already painted. We'll see if doing it this way keeps the piece from curling under all the water I am throwing on the paper.

I started by laying down some ink wash in the background. I wanted to try some different techniques and build an interesting background this time. On the Brick piece I just laid down an ink wash behind him and hoped for the best. This time I wanted to play a bit with the lighting and see how it goes. I even tried to do some "Kirby dots" by dipping the plunger tip of an old ink bottle top in my wash mix and making little dots all over the piece. I love the design aspect of it and I think it will look cool when I lay the color wash over it.

I don't know if I'll get this piece completed by tomorrow (I still have a few things I need to get to today before I tackle the painting) but it will definitely be done soon.

Okay, back to it. Have a great one and I'll talk to you all soon!

New Blog Header?

 I really thought I'd be inking the new Krazz penciled piece for my blog header this month but, while suffering from a little bout of insomnia this last week, I had an image of Lily in my head with her hair pushed over part of her face. The pencil sketch for her came together quickly and I am hoping I can get her inked and colored before the beginning of August. We'll see what happens in the next few days.

I do like the pencil sketch of Krazz but, honestly, it's hard to say no to Lily. She's just too darn cute!

Inks will definitely be coming soon! And, if I have enough time, maybe I'll get over to Krazz and get some inks on him as well!

Have a great one!

Sports Illustrated Kids July

 I just finished up September's "What's the Call" illustrations for Sports Illustrated Kids so I figured it was about time I showed you the pieces that are in July's issue, out this month and on the stands as we speak.

This month featured scenarios that had a triathlete getting a flat tire on his bicycling leg of the race, a skier who loses a ski but still finishes the course, and brings up the question if you, as a second baseman in baseball, can throw your glove with the ball in it to first base and still have it considered an out.

These are always a lot of fun to do and I hope I keep getting to do them for a long time.

Have a great weekend, everyone! I'll talk to you soon!

This...

...just made my day a whole lot better.

Tonya Kay's Pin-Up Pole Show

Here is a piece I worked on last month while I was stuck in the little bedroom studio while the hardwood floors were being installed. Since it has now been shown off on all sorts of social media networks I figured it was safe to show it off myself.

A friend of mine out in Los Angeles, Tonya Kay, approached me about doing some pin-up and logo work for her for a new company she was starting called "Tonya Kay's Pin-up Pole Show."

We started with the pin-up figure, based off a photo shoot she had done a few months prior. We changed the hair a bit and played around with a few different costume designs before we settled on the leopard print look with the arm stockings. I tried to push for cat ears, a la Josie and The Pussycats, but was shot down. Ah well, what can you do?

Once the figure was done we played around with the logo a bit, added Tonya's purple classic car, The Grape Space Coaster, and settled on the final design.

You can check out Tonya's website HERE and check out the Pin-Up Pole Show HERE.

It really sounds like a great experience, riding around in a classic car with beautiful burlesque dancers, dinner, drinks, and rock and roll to cap off the evening. Yeah, I may need to go visit LA one of these days!

But, for now, I am really happy with the way the art turned out. Here are a few production shots of the work in progress. Because we were messing around with costumes I made a paper-doll like pin-up that we could add different clothes to. That alone was a lot of fun and I can see at some point doing something like this with different costumes.

The question is, what costumes to draw Tonya in?

Have a great day everyone! Enjoy the art and I'll talk to you soon!

Happy July!

Like you didn't know I was going to use the new Brick illustration for this month's blog header...

Happy July everyone! I hope you have a great month!

Finished Brick

 So, here is the finished painting of Brick with the black inked line work placed over the watercolor painting I did the other night. If you want to see some of the process you can check out the other day's blog HERE.

I absolutely LOVE the way this piece came out. There is just something about a hand painted piece that will always beat digital painting for me. I had almost forgotten how much I love the look since I've been doing the majority of my coloring on the computer for the last ten years. Digital color may be more precise, more "perfect," but a hand painted piece, done by a human, just "feels" right.

I definitely need to do more of these in the near future. I see continuing to do my client work on the computer because it does make it a lot easier to make changes but, for myself, this may be the new (or old) way I do things. We'll have to see.

Here is the original scanned black and white artwork. I don't think I've shown it off before so I thought it might be cool to see.

And, while I could have simply painted the watercolor piece, scanned it in, and put the black line on top of it digitally, I really wanted to have a physical painting to hold in my hand. So, I headed on down to Kinko's, printed out the black and white line work on a clear transparency, and placed it over the original painting.

It's as close as I've done to a blue-line painting (the way I used to do ALL my painting back when I was working for Marvel Comics) in over fifteen years.

I didn't know I'd missed it so much until this weekend.

If you can't tell, I am fired up by this piece. It's pure art for art's sake and I love it.

This week, it's back to finishing the nine missing pages in the second OilCan Drive book. It's been too long since I've tackled that as well and it's time I got back to it.

Have a great week everyone! I'll talk to you soon!