Green Vesper

So this is pretty late, but I just finished cleaning it up. It's an illustration inspired by a drink called a "Green Vesper." The Vesper was "created" by Ian Fleming in one of his James Bond novels, and to my understanding it's mostly a very specific kind of martini. The green version just substitutes absinthe in for Kina Lillet. Big thanks to Kali Ciesemier for the help and encouragement with this one!

Mike Simpson: A Patient Soul

There you have it! Back to front, Mike Simpson's debut album is out now on Bandcamp! That's Mike Simpson, ladies and gents, and that's my work on the album art! LET EM KNOW

Wardruna: Charge Of The Pahhur Sag

Listening to Wardruna made me absolutely need to paint this last night. A race that I have been developing, the name is roughly Akkadian for "Fire Heads." I'm still working on it.

I'm afraid that i will need a reference for the character in the middle, the pose is too stiff for me to really enjoy painting it. Maybe I need to shift the torso back...

HELLO, 2011

Wow, that's a lot of non-updating for this blog....since December! Well, it's a new year now, so happy 2011 people. A lot of artwork has been made since the last update, and I will be faithfully trying to bring more of that to light. In the mean time, if you are too impatient, go ahead and check my website! YAODRAWS.COM It's totally up to date and has a whole mess of credibility now that it's on a paid server. Go on and drop by!

Here I am just trying out some simple, 2D portraits as a series of my friends at MICA. All done in Photoshop, averaging at a measly 1.5 - 2 hours each. Hoping to continue this series, and maybe one day in the distant distant future people will be paying me to do drawings like these. ONE DAY. In the meantime, note how each person's name is hand lettered, and relates to the person's interests or character! Yes, I know, I'm that awesome. Updates to continue!

TIME Cover

So my most recent assignment was to redo the cover of TIME's Aug. 30 issue for Concepts. I did Uncle Sam as a crusader, making the link with the medieval hunting of Muslims and connecting that to the question "Is America Islamophobic?" Hope it reads well enough. 11 hours, Photoshop.

Constitution Day Response

So for Constitution Day MICA held a panel about equal marriage rights featuring Dan Savage, Sharon Hayes, and Dr. Kendall Thomas, and moderated by NPR's Aaron Henkin. After attending, I made this piece in response to the issues discussed.

Spacemen

First short in my Sequential Arts class this fall! I like how it turned out. The assignment was to do a four-panel short where the phrase "this isn't going to work" was the only dialogue allowed, and only in one of the four panels. The concept was to portray a certain mood. I had a hell of a time figuring out how to get a decent screentone, and am still amazed that I cannot seem to find actual screentone brushes for photoshop. Inked with a brush, and then colored in CS4.

Tattoo?

Direct linking failed... Here's a small drawing. Originally for practicing painting tattoos, but only after I rendered the skin did I realize that the original resolution was too small to do any fine details, so after a few tries I gave up. I'll just have to learn how to paint tattoos the original way....or the Shawn Barber way? Time will tell.

Concept art: Monster

So here's what I've been working on. A pretty big file, full sized. Here's a smaller preview. I'm pretty happy with how it's going. Sorry for the washed out color, I've figured out what's making that happen, more or less, but haven't yet found a way around it.

Also, I'm totally getting a website made! View my progress HERE
My super awesome friend Robin has been helping me set this up, she's great at webdesign. Let me know if you want her contact info!

Mickey!

Hello, boys and girls. Here I have a personal piece that I started about two weeks ago. I was experimenting with a different coloring method in photoshop that will give a much cleaner, more graphic look to my work. Actually quite happy with how this turned out. I worked on and off, every once in a while as a break from doing commissions and stuff. I was inspired after watching Gaga's Alejandro video and finding some random picture of a Mickey Mouse halloween costume on tokyodandy.com.

My girlfriend Ashley did a parallel piece of Minnie, here!

comic: "See No Evil"

FINALLY my comic that I made for my Illustration 2 final is here! Loosely based on three chapters from the Chinese epic "Journey West" (also known as "Monkey" or "Monkey King"). I'll add more information to this post later.

Zodiac Part 1

3/5 Spot Illustrations done for Daniel Krall's Zodiac assignment. More coming later.

The God In The River REVISED

Okay, so I sent the final out to two professors for critique, and used both of their suggestions and came up with this, my final FINAL edit.

So to recap: 11x14", lineart was brush+ink+crow quill, colored digitally.

The God In The River

Awwwww hells YES.
So I've been working on this piece for like, an entire week, just to polish it up for scholarships and for Society of Illustrators. Here's the original ink and graphite, versus the final colored piece. This looks nothing like what I did in class.
This illustration was a non-literal interpretation of a remix of "My Sweet Shadow" by the band In Flames. I listened to the song, and wrote down what I heard instead of the actual lyrics, and then used the images I came up with as a spring board for that. The actual process was more complicated, but that's it in a nutshell.

Why Mister Poe, What A Black Cat You Have

Part 1 of a 3-part diptych illustrating Poe's "The Black Cat." Lots of planning involved in this project. Each is vertical 11"x18" and this first piece is completely digital. Resolution 300, so the psd is like...127 megabytes. Saving is a BITCH, but it's really close to done... I just need to figure out if i'm going to put some text or a pattern at the bottom of the frame. Any suggestions?

Work In Progress!

So, the aforementioned work in progress: The assignment is to do a 45 cover and back, the back which I will do in class. Apparently, a 45 is the old name for a single released on its own mini vinyl or something like that, but someone told me the cover size was 7x7". So yeah, mini I guess? Anyways, the song is Mark Farina's "Dream Machine." Go crazy.