illustration + design
So that was 2017 excited to see whats in store for 2018. During my vacation caught up on shows notable mentions to Stranger Things 2 and The Punisher. I sent off the final In Design file for my 2017-2018 art book it’s still super exciting to get the hardbound edition in my hands.
I didn’t do much/any daily sketches but I did complete a couple of larger illustrations I wanted finished for the book.
With the year coming to and end I need to start scanning and clean up for my 2017 art book. I feel pretty comfortable with simple color illustration in Clip Paint Studio, the majority of the Frenden brushes imported perfectly. These illustrations were done on the iPad at 300 dpi still quite impressed how well it handles 20+ layers.
The last couple of weeks I haven’t had the time to do much. These are mostly Saturday morning breakfast sketches and the small notecard drawings are pieces I do at work during lunchtime. One of my favorite illustration programs Clip Studio Paint recently released an app for iOS is’s amazing. My process for sketching on paper and working on the desktop feels so antiquated. I am going through tutorials and trying to figure out a process that works using the iPad version more.
A couple of recent weekend illustrations. Lately reading up on a couple of design books for some ideas I have. Since last month it’s been strange to at least not get one quick doodle down on paper a day it’s a great feeling to have.
I managed to print a couple samples of my Inktober 2017 art book. Learned a couple of things in the process but happy with the end result. My last illustration for day 31 was also a starting point for October’s character design challenge topic – demon/devil. I added some base colors in the scan and had fun playing with vibrance layers for this illustration.
Inktober – Finale really happy with how this years Inktober turned out. Definitely going off topic at the end of the night with an brush pen in my hand was fun. I am almost done with final layouts to print these into a small art book to remember how it all turned out.
24. Sentai transformation
25. Elephants cutting loose
26. The Queen’s guard
27. All summer she practiced
28. One swift strike
29. Practicing summon magic
30. This squirrel fights back
31. In a Halloween mode for the last day
Inktober Week 3 – So far so good, I have a good handle on my illustrations the next few days. Going away from a particular theme esp. Halloween related like in the past was for the best. Some nights I look over at the clock and it’s past 1 AM, best part I still feel like I have so many fun ideas to try before the month is up.
17. Energy summon to destroy the orb
18. Never too old to skate
19. Crow mage
20. High altitude sky surfer
21. Lone priest ready to fight the undead
22. Good day for a ride
23. The forest archer prepares to strike
Inktober Week 2 – After hitting a few roadblocks late night I realized it’s best to just draw whatever comes to me at night. I thought about trying to hit a theme each day but in the past I got tired of sticking to a particular topic or era. Somedays I want to do sentai stuff the next day fun animal characters.
10. Crew hard at work before the next round
11. Chicken and Worm detectives 80’s cop team-up
12. Wasteland junker
13. Underwater always full of surprise
14. One swift strike
15. The best on the dance floor
16. Fleet commander charting the course
Inktober Week 1 – The first couple were a little hard. I have been doing digital lately so it takes a few tries before my hands feel steady to do long line work. So far so good I have a schedule when I get home to not burn out on my daily pieces for the month.
1. Jay-Z on SNL
2. Striker Jr. Pacific Rim 2
3. Iden Versio Battlefront 2
4. Wary traveller on his walk
5. Rooftop defender
6. Braking the 4th wall
7. Flamingo charging up his chi
8. Pizza delivery bot 30 mins or less
9. 80’s Sentai on her way to a fight
My last week before Inktober begins. I did a couple of iPad sketches while watching the fall premiere of my favorite shows. Bristol board paper with the Inktober paper has been printed and I have a full supply of ink cartridges for my brush pen.
It’s almost time for Inktober. I still haven’t decided if I am going to do some sequence stuff or just single page for the daily challenge. I do have a good grasp of the pencils and pens…so that’s the good part at least.
I have been trying to do reference studies of faces at least every other day. After doing a couple I pick a pose and build it up a bit more and force myself to color it. I don’t hate coloring but after finding my lines in a rough sketch I really want to move on.
