Futuristic Violence & Fancy Suits Promotional Art

Nightmarish villains with superhuman enhancements

An all-seeing social network that tracks our every move
Mysterious Smooth-talking power players who lurk behind the scenes
A young girl from the trailer park
and
Her very smelly cat

I recently did some promotional art for David Wong's latest novel titled "Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits". It's a stand-alone story (not part of the John Dies at the End series) that I'd give you a synopsis for but why read that when you can read the FIRST SEVEN CHAPTERS FOR FREE instead!?

It's a really fun read that had me laughing out loud very often. If you like ridiculous humor and suspense-filled action, go ahead and do yourself the favor of ordering the book, I highly recommend it! Now with that, please enjoy the promotional material I made for the book, they'll give you an extra slice of what's in store.

CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE THE BOOK!

"The Rise of the Wigmonsters" a 'John Dies at the End' painting

Over the course of the past month I've been working on my 2nd John Dies at the End painting, this time featuring the ridiculous and horrifying wigmonsters as they attack the audience in a Vegas ballroom, interrupting a show put on by Dr. Marconi.

The Wigmonsters

I decided to do something a little different with painting this one. Instead of posting process shots on my facebook page like I normally do, I exclusively posted my process for this piece on my own thread on the John Dies at the End sub-forum on Cracked.com. So if you're interested on reading up on how this piece developed I encourage you to check out the thread HERE.

If you'd like to purchase a print of this piece you can get one on my InPrnt shop HERE

I go into detail on each step of the piece on the thread but I figured I would post the step-by-step shots here as well for anyone who doesn't want to scroll through a forum page. I hope you all like the piece!

Initial Scribble

Final Image

The next and final piece in my John Dies series will be featuring Korrok. Keep an eye on my thread if you'd like to follow along!

John Dies at the End, Part 1: Meat Monster with Process shots

“Prepare to meat your doom!”

Meat. Dozens of the wrapped and now partially-unwrapped hunks from the freezer, laying neatly on the floor next to the bed in an almost ceremonial fashion, the objects arranged in the rough shape of a man.

I moved the light toward the head area, where I found a frozen turkey still in the Butterball wrapper. Under it, wedged between turkey and torso, was the disembodied deer tongue, flapping around on its own accord.

Hmmmm. That was different.

Excerpt from John Dies at the End, by David Wong.

Initial greyscale sketch

John Dies at the End is a novel later made into a movie written by David Wong, the pen-name of Jason Pargin (shhh, don't tell anyone!) who is the executive editor of humor website Cracked.com. At it's core, JDatE is a chilling horror story coated with the perfect amount of hilarity resulting in a very deliciously entertaining meal.

Final color sketch

My first experience with JDatE was watching it on Netflix (it's still available for streaming) and I really loved what I saw. Being a big fan of Cracked.com, when I learned that the guy who wrote the book it was based on was an editor for the site, I became very interested in reading the book, so I hunted it down and devoured it with much pleasure. If you like horror and you like witty and immature humor you might really like this book/movie.

The book and movie are both very different from each other, yet both great, each showcasing the different strengths of each medium. One of my favorite parts of the movie was the scene depicting the monster made of  meat, the costume that they made was really beautiful and had an appropriate edge of silliness to it which was perfect for the film. However, the way the book describes that scene is a bit different, and the description of the monster is different as well. Feeling the urge to paint something JDatE related, I decided to tackle the book description of this scene.

If you want to know exactly what it says, pick up the book (you'll only regret not reading it, trust me). But for my painting I wanted it to be as close to the text as possible. I spent a lot of time skimming over the text to make sure I had all the details, from the bedroom setting to the Butterball-turkey head. It was a very tough challenge for me. I wanted the unsettling mood to be just right, the pose needed to convey what I wanted it to and despite the monster's lack of eyes, I wanted it to stare into the viewer, as if it was ready to step forward.

I really pushed this piece further than any other piece I've done so far. I called it "finished" about 4 or 5 times before finally posting it online. It got pretty tiresome at times, but in the end, I think it really paid off, and I'm very happy with how the piece turned out. Thanks to Stephen Najarian, and Alex Gustafson, for giving me advice on the piece, and extra special awesome thank-yous to JDatE connoisseurs Liz Goss and Heather Hudson, for their very helpful suggestions to help me nail the piece as close to the book as possible.

Heather in particular offered me some really great insight to the piece and pointed out something really important about the piece as a whole. In the end, the piece as it was was doomed to fail as a fully fleshed out illustration for a general audience. It lacks the storytelling elements necessary to convey a clear story to the viewer and winds up just being a meat monster in a bedroom without any context. I spent so much time trying to nail the details and rendering everything as best I could, but because I didn't plan it out better, there will always be something missing.

It was very frustrating to hear this advice, not because I felt put down, but because I knew I could have an even better piece if I hadn't missed the opportunity. It's the kind of comment that's going to rattle around in my brain come time to tackle the next piece, and it'll be all the better for it. So a sincere thank you to Heather for that push.

Still, that's not to downplay my excitement for the piece. Despite the fact that most people won't know what they're looking at, I think any JDatE fan would be able to instantly recognize this scene, as I feel like I've succeeded in depicting the description in the text. In the end I'm still left with a piece I'm very proud of.

Final

I hope you've enjoyed seeing the new piece as well as seeing the process shots throughout this post. This won't be the last JDatE piece I make, but I don't want to give too much away. I will say that it's monster related, and that's all. Lastly, speaking of Cracked.com, I'm hoping to announce some news regarding a project I worked on for them soon which I'm very excited about sharing. If you're interested in purchasing a print of the Meat Monster piece, click this link to my InPrnt shop. Alright, that's all you're getting out of me from now, go read and watch John Dies at the End!

Click the above image to go to my InPrnt shop!

My Demonic Calling

"I just want a hug"

I recently picked up a item called 'Hymns & Wretched Offerings to the Golden Ones'. It's a gorgeously made book that was put together by fantasy artist Jim Pavelec. The book is 135 pages long (counting from page 1 to the last page featuring artwork) and it's full some beautifully grotesque artwork showcasing tons of unearthly beings drawn by some of the coolest artists around.

The first tome

I bought the book from Jim at his table in the IlluXcon main show and I got to briefly share my enthusiasm for the book and how I'd been itching to get my hands on it. I had also overheard Jim explaining to someone else that there was a second book in the works called 'Parables & Prophecies of the Golden Ones'  and I told him I would really like to be a contributing artist if possible. He told me to send him an email...

'If the offerings are sufficient, I may then enter the mortal plane to conduct endless chaos and misery'

...so a couple weeks after I got home I made the above drawing and sent it to him. I hope you can see from the piece how excited I am about this upcoming book. It would be a HUGE honor if I was given the opportunity to be a part of the book. Some of my all time favorite artists made it into the first one and I would be extremely excited if I got to see my artwork sitting side-by-side with theirs in this upcoming book. But in order for this book to become real, it needs your help; so if you're interested in seeing a 2nd book happen (and maybe even MORE) then I strongly encourage you to swing by the kickstarter page and contribute a little something. Just $30 gets you the book itself, and even just sending the page around to others would be a huge help. With your help, you can make our nightmares come true!

Inspiration Spotlight #24: Dave DeVries and the Monster Engine...and a visit to NYC

I've got a special Spotlight post today! Yesterday I dragged my friend Anthony Briglia with me to New York City to see the opening for Dave DeVries's Monster Engine gallery show. But I'll get to that in a minute.

Before the opening we spent some time visiting different places like Forbidden Planet Comics, and The Evolution Store. In addition to those places we decided to hunt down the Comedy Cellar and Ben's Pizzeria, two locations (on the same block) featured in the FX show Louie, created by Louis CK. It was a lot of fun seeing the places in person, and we even got some slices at Ben's. We only got to see the outside of the Comedy Cellar, but I would really love to be able to go in and see a performance sometime in the future.

After we were done sight-seeing, we headed over to Sacred Gallery at 424 Broadway (2nd Floor) for Dave's opening. Here's an excerpt from the Engine's website where Dave describes what exactly the Monster Engine is:

The Monster Engine is a book, a demonstration, lecture and a gallery exhibition. The premise for all three came from one single question: What would a child’s drawing look like if it were painted realistically?


Below are some of the pieces that were at the exhibit, both the children's original drawings and Dave's paintings based on them.

Getting to see the pieces in person was a real treat; Dave has done some really great work. It'd been a while since I worked with Dave back on Blue Shift so it was nice seeing him again and saying hello. I got a signed copy of the printed Monster Engine book, full of interviews Dave conducts with the kids about the process.

If you're in the area you should stop by and check out the work yourself. The exhibit will be up until the 31st. Also check out his book and the news report on the Monster Engine on CBS (note:this doesn't cover the exhibit, only the Monster Engine itself).

Copies of my Children's Book

Last week I received a few copies of the children's book I did over the summer with Capstone, "Your Life as a Cabin Boy on a Pirate Ship".

 It's a pretty nice feeling to finally have the final hard copy in my hands. It's been so long since I worked on it that pretty much forgot about it, so it was a nice surprise. Here are a couple shots of the cover.

If you want to see what's on the inside you can pick up a copy from the Capstone website or from Amazon.

Inspiration Spotlight #15: Dr. Seuss

You know, for an illustration blog, the so called "inspiration" section could use a couple more illustrators huh? Might as well get this started off with someone good right? How about the most successful illustrator who ever lived!? Some of you may think I'm talking about Norman Rockwell, Charles Dana Gibson, or Frank Frazetta, but...um...not quite. While they are all FANTASTIC illustrators who have truly made their mark in the illustration world, truth is the average person doesn't even know their names. But there is one illustrator that everyone knows about no matter your age or interests...and that's good ole Dr. Seuss.

It's hard to deny that Dr. Seuss is the most successful illustrator when lots of illustrators I talk to these days complain about no one even understands what it is they do let alone can they appreciate it. Illustrators used to be celebrities, but now even the most talented illustrators these days aren't recognized or appreciated at the level their talents deserve, at least by the general population. I'm not including within the realm of illustrators, we know who the celebrities of the illustration world are today.

Dr. Seuss is known for (like you don't already know why he rocks) his crazy imaginative worlds and characters and his super delightful writing (yeah he illustrated AND wrote his own books). He wrote a lot of best sellers and his books pretty much make up their own genre now. Spell-check doesn't even yell at me when I type his name!

 

He's just awesome. I don't really need to explain, his work speaks for itself. I'm writing this mostly so people understand the magnitude at which his awesomeness reigns. I would suggest you do yourself a favor and pick up some of his books and love them forever, but it seems like most people are already doing that.

Inspiration Spotlight #14: All my friends are dead.

I heard about this book a while back, and it sounded hilarious. Then, one day I'm just waiting in line at a bookstore, and BAM... All my friends are dead., staring at me in the face. I picked it up and flipped a few pages and it was an instant buy!

 Here's an excerpt from the book...

 WASN'T THAT GREAT!? How about this one??...

Ok, it's hard to get the full effect of the book from just the first 2 pages, but it keeps going, it picks up momentum, getting better and better. The drawings are amusingly simplistic and the expressions on all the faces are pretty priceless, especially with the super awesome punchlines and perfect comedic timing. If you're interested in picking up the book (if you have a sense of humor then you should!) then you can check it out HERE.