Wednesday, February 24, 2010

2010 Student ADDY Awards


My Wizard of OZ series won a Silver ADDY last night at the Student ADDY Awards.
This was my last time entering anything in the Student competition rounding out an even number of 10 ADDYs total throughout my art college career.

Although I still feel my work is not up to a professional level as I would like to be, I will continue to learn and try my damnedest to get better. So, goodbye art for grades, hello Living the dream of "Please hire me to do art so I can pay my student loans... and rent."

Thank you to all the great instructors I've had at Nossi, especially Jeff Preston, if it wasn't for you, I'd probably still be working as a cook in a chain restaurant. As Arden always says... *"We're competition now"* and may the best artist pay the bills. :)


*note to self- I've got my work cut out for me...





Monday, February 22, 2010

The Road to MidSouth Con - JASPER

Last but not least, we have Jasper Dunlap to round out the Apparition Abolishers. This concludes the portraits that will appear on the upcoming poster that will be available (from us) at the MidSouthCon in Memphis. (more info about the con here)

Next week will be the first look at the poster, although I might post some progress or comp shots of it this week. Stay tuned to find out!!!

-b

Friday, February 19, 2010

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Torque's Lab - thumbnails part2


The whole point of the quick thumbnails is so that I will have a map as to how I want the story to unfold. They are very crude as you can see, but their only intent was to get the story down onto paper while I still had it fresh in my head. That way I can later go back and reference them when I am drawing more realized layouts without worrying about the story continuity as much.


Now I am able to go back and basically redraw the scenes with a bit more attention to overall design more conscious of the perspective and details of each scene. Some of these images will be different in the final cut and some might not actually make it at all. It's just better for me to just keep drawing fast loose renderings and then be able to take away rather than struggle for content.

These will then go through another phase where I will bring them into Photoshop and fix all perspective issues and create pretty tight color comps before I go to the final pencils.


The goal here is to fully realize the entire painting before I even begin the paint process. I want to work out all my kinks early on so I can just have fun when the paint starts flowing.


I'll try and post some of the color comps next week.
-b


Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Torque's Lab - thumbnails part1




After the abstract thumbnails I did about two weeks ago. I was able to revisit my original thumbnail sketches (below) and try to make what I thought was a bit crammed and bland into something a bit more exciting and interesting. The abstract thumbnails helped me find new perspectives and overall better layouts of what I thought should be an over the top underground laboratory of whom a few have considered "The Tony Stark of the Victorian Era." With a title like that, you can't just cheapen out on the grand introduction of his laboratory. I needed bigger and better. So what was a measly two pages, has now turned into EIGHT, most are full page illustrations too. Full of steam, gears, airships, nautical ship, gentlemen robots and the introduction to the first Abolisher. (finally!)


(initial thumbnail sketches = poo)

Needless to say, I have my work cut out for me. :)
Tomorrow I'll post some more refined sketches and maybe you can actually understand what the heck you're looking at up there.
-b

Monday, February 15, 2010

The Road to MidSouth Con - SIR QUINCY


Back again with another Abolisher portrait. This week we have Sir Quincy Peck. Next week will be our fourth and final portrait with yours truly aka Jasper Dunlap. and a sneak peek of the new poster which will be available at MidSouthCon the weekend of March 12th - 14th.

Thank you for viewing. and see you Wednesday when I will post the next stages of Dr. Torque's underground secret laboratory!

-b



Friday, February 12, 2010

Fun Time Fridays - My Little Pony ...Movie?

This week's fun little post goes to this epic adventure...




Tuesday, February 9, 2010

The Craftsman's Apron -logo design


I do not normally like to post work from my day job, but I thought this logo was Victorian / steampunkish enough to pass as awesome. Inspired (and requested by client) to pay homage to Col. Littleton.

Monday, February 8, 2010

The Road to MidSouth Con - BRASSY


Happy Monday! Here is the next installment of Abolishers portraits. This week we have the sexy yet scandalous Brassy Galore. Keep checking back as we are gearing up for MidSouthCon 28 on March 12th -14th as guest panelist. And a chance to receive an Apparition Abolishers poster exclusive to the Con.




Friday, February 5, 2010

Fun Time Fridays - Avatar Review

My buddy Tom over at Geeks of Doom posted the Avatar review by the guy who did the 70 min. Phantom Menace review (If you do not know what I'm talking about... stop what you're doing, and watch it! ... well, after you watch this one. )

This guy hits all right points and nails every feeling I had towards this film. You might disagree with this entire review, you might hate this guy... but man does he make some VALID points!




Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Abstract Thumbnailing

About two years ago a member of Gorilla Artfare and amazing artist Adam Paquette posted a really creative way of creating down and dirty super quick abstract-like thumbnails. I mentally filed his amazing process away and thought it would come in handy one day. Boy was I was right.

What you are looking at is a few results from my first attempt at this method. These crude little studies may not have perfect perspective or proper lighting. But they have proved to be invaluable to me for the conception of Torque's Laboratory.

Next week I'll post what I did with these gems to further push the imagery that is Dr. Mortimer J. Torque's private underground laboratory.

If you like to learn how I created these please visit the original post on Gorilla Artfare.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

The Road to MidSouth Con - TORQUE


Each week this month I will post a portrait of an Abolisher building up to the exclusive poster you can only receive at Mid-South Con (March 12th- 14th • Memphis,TN) Where we will be guest panelists.

More info coming soon!


Monday, February 1, 2010

Steampunk And Snow!

Well good things have happened this past weekend. Jeff Preston, my mentor and former instructor has posted a little teaser of the Illustration of the Abolishers on his Facebook page. It is truly an honor to see myself illustrated by such a master.

And here in Nashville we finally got our once-a-decade good snow. So me and Joy and My good friend Gerald and his kids took advantage of this by enjoying the weekend with a little sledding action, or should I say Snow-Tubing action!

Gerald made a pretty sweet video of our escapades.
Needless to say, good times all around. I have another treat I will be posting a little later as well. So stay tuned!