Willie's rescue

"Willie was the only cheese maker in the land. In the shadows, a slow but unwavering rescue mission was underway."

Crystal Cave

More from LITOL series

Here are some of my favourite illustrations from Legends in their own Lunchbox. I did a total of more than 128 illustrations I think, so this is only a tiny fraction. I can gratefully say I took a lot of lessons from this project. One of the biggest was how to simplify. Simplify characters, props, backgrounds, compositions etc. That's a never ending journey, but I do feel I made some progress in this department, and I think this lesson is going to affect my future work.

The Dog Tags

 Friend Paul C. Newman wrote a short story called The Dog Tags. After reading it I thought it would make a good story to illustrate. At this stage I'm only doing one or two concept illustrations to see what it might look like. I put a lot of time into the colours for this one but I'm not sure how well I chose them. With digital painting I find it a real challenge to limit the number of colours and to keep them all singing together in harmony.

'Whisper'

 

“If you listen quietly enough life will whisper its secrets to you.” ~ Rasheed Ogunlaru

 
Well it's been a while, but here's my entry for this week's Illustration Friday. The week's word is 'Whisper'. Hope you like it!

Character design

Done some time ago, these character designs were 'spec' work for two different productions. The top one is an 'aussie santa' and the one below an immigrant janitor.

It's looking like both projects fell through, which means I can show them. Something to do with the GFC bogey man I suspect.. And perhaps setting Santa in the Australian summer time was too cruel a concept to contemplate anyway!

Picture book project - concept art

More concept art - these are earlier pieces that were painted digitally. Again most of this is likely to change as these were concepts done before the story had been formed. The character had regular human-like hands here for instance.

Illustration "Visitor"

Number 4 in the series.

In this illustration we follow the character towards a house on top of a hill. I thought this might be a good image to provoke a feeling of intense curiosity in the viewer. Who lives there? Why is this character going there today? Is he a regular visitor, or is this a special occasion? etc. I must admit, I'm not yet sure myself. I do have some ideas, and quite a lot of imagery floating around in my head. Hopefully I can make sense of it all at some point in the future, or else a writer can! In the end I may even reveal the identity of the hill top dweller prior to this scene, as these illustrations aren't necessarily in sequence.

"Day Trip"

Number 3 in the series.

I'm thinking that as I explore this character's world a loose narrative will unfold. Eventually, I envisage possibly collating the series into a picture book without words - a purely visual story. One example of this picture only format is Gon, the Japanese manga about a dinosaur.

"Basking"

This illustration entitled Basking, is the second installment in a series of digital paintings I'm doing around a common theme.

"Care Free"

As promised, here is the higher res version. Feel free to download and use it as your wallpaper... I am! This piece marks a milestone and a new direction for me creatively.  I hope to develop the style and motifs futher in subsequent pieces.

I decided to call this one "Care Free". So.. what do you see? Where's he going? What's he thinking? Your feedback and comments are most welcome!

Illustration - "Stowaway Adventurer"

"Blimping Together"

Caricature

A quick caricature from a photo reference. Will be posting a lot more of these since they are really quick to do, and fun, both to make and look at I think. This is also how I like to start character designs, using photo references, and then exaggerating etc.

digital painting "Curiosity"

Originally meant to only be a banner for my new website, I decided to turn it into a full-blown painting. I thought by making it black and white, I could focus on tone, at the same time making it less overbearing as a banner.

It's very much inspired by the 'Pixar look'. It depicts the idea of curiosity. A grandfather peers down a well with as much enthusiasm as his grandchildren. Or is he just feigning curiosity to spark theirs?

Speed painting

A quick digital painting - about one and a half hours. I used a photo reference of the Japanese actress Horikita Maki. The likeness is not perfect. My main objective was to practice painting light and shade for skin tones.

Character study

This digital painting is a quick character study for an in-progress illustration. More on that soon, hopefully!

Rowing By Moonlight

Big post this week, this illustration is intended for sale as a print. Going for lots of mood - I was listening to the French classical composer Erik Satie a lot while doing it, particularly Gymnopédies, and Gnossienne, and Ogive. If you know those pieces, you might be able to tell me if I have capture the right mood.

Character design

Some character concept art.

The Royal Conversion

Just an illustration for fun and folio. The idea here was a lord or king who has been convinced to discarding his riches for the sake of a 'higher' calling.