Garbage From Art School: Self Portrait on Skate Deck

Here's another embarrassing piece from art school. I was obviously still way into the horror thing that comprised most of my early freelance gigs. In art school, students are asked to create self portrait after self portrait. (Hey... worked for Rembrandt!). So as I go through my student work, please excuse the amount of pictures you will be seeing of me. I'm not a narcissist, I swear!

This is acrylic & collage on a very water damaged 1980s Sword & Skull Skateboard Deck by Powell Peralta. Painted in 2002. This piece is now in the private collection of my Mother.

Old Salt - Final Version!

First of all, I want to thank everyone who lent a critical eye to the first two versions of this illustration! I got a lot of great suggestions and you can see some of them employed in this version.

This is going to be my final pass at "Old Salt". I'm much happier with it than the previous versions which can be seen here and here. The water was originally a problem for me. I had to remind myself that the new style I'm working on is in a "Cartoon Modern" style. So, I took a design approach to the water. I think it fits the style I'm going for much better and gives the water much more life than it had previously.

At first I wasn't sold on the idea of putting anything additional into the background, but I thought I'd explore it anyway by putting land and a lighthouse in the distance (per the suggestion of a couple comments). I could always take it out if I didn't like it. As it turns out, this was a great suggestion and I think it really helped the piece come together.

I originally colored this illustration with a monochromatic, almost black & white, color scheme is because I wanted to it to feel older than a current illustration. After I had redone the water and added the background, I was fairly happy with the piece. But... it didn't feel "vintage" enough. So, I added a grungy paper texture to it. That sold this piece for me and now I feel confident calling it done.

Thanks again to everyone who helped out with critiques and suggestions! I totally appreciate it!!!

Sneak Peek: Monkey Mod Comic Panel

If you've been listening to Art & Story, you've no doubt heard Mark Rudolph and I talk about a story for a comic anthology (Tales of Hot Rod Horror Vol.2) that we are working on. The comic we are working on will feature one of Mark's characters and my character Monkey Mod. This is a story we've been kicking around for a little while now and, with this upcoming comic anthology, we've been presented with the opportunity to do it, use our own characters, get paid for it, and retain our rights as creators. Dream come true? You betcha!

Today I thought I'd share a sneak peek of one of the panels from this comic. Its a small sneak peek and doesn't give anything away. But, I wanted to show it to sneak peek the newer, more cartoony look of Monkey Mod. I had been wanting to redesign him for some time now and this anthology story gave me the opportunity to do that now too.

Introducing Artie Slammo!

Ladies and Gentlemen... I'd like to introduce you to Artie Slammo.

Artie Slammo is a pseudonym that I had planned to work under to do pretty girl pin-up illustration. What has happened is that Slammo is starting to take on a life of his own. Slammo is not only an artist, he is an Adventure-Illustrator, bon vivant, and world traveler.

Artie Slammo has his own website and updates will be starting soon. You can follow him through Google Connect, on his site, to see the updates as they happen or follow him on Twitter.

In closing, and in his own words, " I'm putting the needle on the Hi*Fi while laying down sweet inky lines to bring you the most way-out chicks ever committed to paper."

Garbage From Art School: Self Portrait

Today, I found a treasure trove of old work I did in art school on a disc. I'm going to be going through it and posting many of those images for better or worse. It should be interesting to see where I was then as compared to where I am now.

For starters, here is a self portrait I did in a heads & hands class on black paper with a white CarbOthello pencil. I believe this is from 1999.

Check out the robustness of my hair. It wasn't showing signs of falling out yet.

Ah, those were the days...

Old Salt - Revisited

Here is a repost of my illustration titled "Old Salt". I wasn't exactly happy with the way the water came out on the first version, so I decided to go back into it again. I'm hoping to make this piece portfolio worthy and the water seemed like it was holding it back. Constructive criticism is welcomed. Thanks!

Marvel's Super Hero Squad

Now that the NDA is over, I thought I'd share a couple pieces I illustrated last year, for a children's card game, for The Marvel Super Hero Squad property. I played the role of the inker and/or colorist on most of the cards I had a hand in completing, but these two are all mine. I particularly had fun working on The Thing.

These images are © and ™ Marvel Entertainment.

Old Salt

Here's another new illustration for my newly styled portfolio. For this one, I wanted to try to do two things I haven't done much of. The first thing was to do a subtle monochromatic color scheme, almost black & white. I'm fairly happy with how that turned out. The second thing I wanted to try was water. I think I did it well enough for the purpose of this illustration, but I probably have a lot more to learn about rendering water.