From the Moleskine #1

A friend gave me a tiny, pocket-sized Moleskine notebook a while back and from time to time I like to bring it with me on lectures to take notes and doodle if I get bored. I also take it on trips and sketch in it when there's not enough room to draw in my regular sketchbook, or if I'm in the mood for something different. I wanted to share some of those sketches, so here they are...

I approach things a little differently in my Moleskine, as you can probably tell from the spread in the top left, I like to do really warped drawings from time to time, they are just as fun as anything else. I try not to worry about rules or showing anyone when drawing in the Moleskine so sometimes things look a lot more crude than anything else I'll show people.

I hope you enjoyed this peek inside my Moleskine. I'll make another post in the future

From the Sketchbook #1

I've been doing so much digital work lately, I've been wondering if my traditional chops were going to crap or not. Well to be honest, for a while I had a really hard time drawing ANYTHING in very well in pencil and it began to depress me. It gave me mixed feelings about doing so much digital art recently. I love watching my digital skills get better and better but I always want to be able to maintain my traditional skills as well, they always come in handy. After a long sketching funk. I've finally done some stuff I'm happy to share!

Here's the first page of my brand new sketchbook. A lot of people always say the first page is the scariest but I've never understood that too much. I like to think of it more as a fresh start, there are tons of pages are ready to be filled and I just want to jump right in!

The top left piece was somewhat inspired by a creature found in the first Silent Hill game. It's not exact, and I wasn't looking at any reference at the time, but I was definitely thinking about Silent Hill when I starting drawing that guy.

For the bottom drawing I just started drawing the eye, with no real direction in my mind at the time. As I drew I decided I wanted the eye to be sitting inside of a really saggy eyelid. Then I thought about how this guy would blink, so I added a very scrunched upper-lid that folds back like a hood, I then tried adding interesting shapes connected to the bottom of it and it started looking like a worm or a caterpillar so I just went with that idea. I curved the body around to add some interest, then decided to hint at an environment behind him with the plants. I'm really happy with this one and I plan on taking it to finish as a creature design piece for my fantasy portfolio.

For the top right drawing, honestly it was just something I drew to fill more of the page. I don't really know what it is, just a cute little face I guess.

As you can probably tell by the "#1" in the title, I plan to make more posts showing my sketches in the future, I'm really gonna try and push myself to draw with a pencil more. Stay tuned for more posts From the Sketchbook.

Ape-Tribe Shaman

I recently saw "The Rise of the Planet of the Apes" in theaters and I loved it! It was a really fun movie with some great action and I like what was done with the story. I left the theater really pumped to paint something "Ape" based.

I've been trying some new approaches with my digital painting and I'm really liking the results. I'm going to try and continue experimenting with different brushes and techniques. I've been using more reference lately as well and I think that's really upping the ante on the quality of my work, I don't understand why I'm so reluctant to use it...I've got to get over that!

You can purchase a print of this piece on Society 6.

Maps for Savage Mojo's Gamescapes

About a year ago I painted a couple of maps for Savage Mojo's Gamescapes. The maps were released a little while back but I never got around to announcing it until now. They are both available for digital download, just click on the links under each preview I posted below (I can't post the whole maps because that would sort of defeat the purpose). You can see more bits of the maps previewed in the Savage Mojo shop...


Gatorglades Swamp


Ruins of the First Age

The process for these is a little different from a normal painting, but it was a lot of fun and something I've always wanted to try. I'd like to do some more in the future!

Concept Art for Independent Film

Just completed a few concept pieces for the guys over at REC Films. They're working on a short film that I can't reveal too much about. However I can show you the following images that I was asked to complete:

Main character

Card scanner prop

Interior setting.

The most I can say about the project at this time is that it follows the character shown above as he deals with some personal conflicts in his life and it takes place in a sci-fi-ish setting. I'll make sure to post again when the film has been released.

Cytlierr - A Kevin Holmes Monster

My friend Kevin Holmes, has a pretty crazy imagination when it comes to creating monsters. He comes up with some amazing ideas aesthetically as well as statistically and I've always wanted to take a stab at doing my own thing with one of his monsters. The one above is named Cytlierr and it as drawn by Kevin and painted by myself.

According to Kevin...

"Cytlierr are guardians of the Bittercold Fortress and exist in small numbers, often fighting solo and guarding key positions. Covered in ultra thick ice armor, the Cytlierr acts as a powerful phalanx in combat.

Abilities:
-Frost Fastings - Covered in ice so cold, fire can't even melt it, Cytlierr can't even be harmed unless their front armor is broken, exposing the eye. Additionally, attacks cut through most armor and all cold resistance.

-Shroud of Sadness- When its eye is attacked, its eye wells up and cries tears that quickly refreeze into Frost Fastings.
-Phalanx- Cytlierr is aware of combat and able to parry up to three attacks either against itself or nearby allies, generally negating the 3 strongest melee opponents. Additionally, Cytlierr never flinch and resist most status effects.
-Focused Strike- By temporarily forgoing parrying, Cytlierr can lash at a single target 9 times in rapid succession after a normal hit, each hit shredding a bit more armor and causing the target to flinch.
-Icy Grab- If a large amount of damage is dealt to its arms, each arm that can't parry (in a multiple of 3) grabs a lighter character and binds it, dealing a large amount of damage and preventing it from doing anything. While grabbing, it rarely changes targets."

Treefolk Fan Animation by Will Giamas

My friend Will Giamas is the creator of the acclaimed web animation series JojoVIll as well as several other animations and games. In the past, I've done a few fan art pieces of some of his characters at his request, in exchange he was supposed to do a fan art piece of some of my own characters as well. About a month ago, Will posted this animation to his deviant art and made me very happy in doing so.

*still image taken from Will Giamas's animation

Bunny and Beaver are Buddies

Here's a piece I just finished up for my Children's portfolio. Here we have a couple of young animal pals waiting for the bus together. Doesn't it make you wanna just go "awww"? I was messing around with brush settings and I found a way to get some really interesting strokes for the animal fur.

Louis C.K.

Louis C.K.

 Thought I'd do something different so I decided to do a quick portrait of comedian Louis C.K. His stand-up is hilarious and he has a show on FX called Louie, which is also pretty great.

Lightning Strike

New piece! VERY happy with this one. Feels like a big step for me. I was in bit of an art funk before I did this piece but now I feel recharged and pumped to do the next one. I'm thinking the next piece will be more cutesy...yeah, gotta paint something freaking adorable next.

In other news I've been sending out postcards and promotional emails like free candy (only much better for you). I've heard a few replies back from some publishers interested in working with me, so it's only a matter of time before I announce some cool projects. In the meantime I'm researching more clients to contact and building up my portfolios.

Dragon

I know I haven't been posting very regularly lately here on the blog but I plan on changing that very soon. I've decided I need to add new work to my portfolio so I'm officially kicking off operation: Portfolio Beef-Up. Not sure what my next piece will be just yet but I can promise you it's coming very soon!