Make It So

Just a quick post as I haven't made an update in a while. Just a few things, new and old. Hope to have more stuff to post soon!

Fat Wizard!

Here's another Bloodsports entry in progress. Even though the deadline has passed I still plan to finish this one. The brief had us choose between three different ideas with key elements that must be included in the illustration. For fat wizard the key elements were "overweight, not elderly, and fantasy" with the optional character Diabehdeez, ancient demon lord. In this illustration you can see the fat wizard fighting the evil demon imps sent by Diabehdeez from his spire twisting up through the candy-coated landscape. I didn't have much time to work on this one so I focused more on getting a solid composition. It's still not perfect, but I learned so much and broke through a few walls doing it.

Miyazaki - DONE

Finally finished this piece. Still not happy with it, but at this point it isn't anything I can fix. Time to move on and do some new work! There are a few projects in the pipeline, so there should be updates soon enough.

BLOODSPORTS - THE CONTINUING

So long and no updates. I've completed a couple more Bloodsports challenges and am trying to finish one that has been haunting me for a while now. Illustration is so much harder than what I imagined it would be. The biggest hurdle is creating an engaging composition. I think the Miyazaki one is the closest I've come to being successful, but that's because I've stretched it way past the deadline. Good, bad, or incomplete, here are the latest Bloodsport entries from me:

Redesign a Miyazaki poster to appeal to a new audience. I tried playing up the small girl lost in a scary world and needing to grow up and face the hardships to come. Inspiration came from the movies of Guillermo del Toro and a movie poster for The Captured Bird.

Design a hunter, a beast, and the hunter after the kill incorporating the corpse into the design. A cunning fox is lose among the Queen's royal garden digging up her prized flower beds. The only way to be rid of this nuisance is by calling in the Master of the Hunt.

Re-imagine the world of Wind Waker and present it as the game box art. Here I tried to combine the old-school look of Zelda with the design aesthetic of the Art Nouveau movement. This was so much harder than I imagined it would be and didn't turn out exactly like I would have liked. After this I have even more respect for Mucha.

Admiral Chip Friskrocket and the Rex Council

Phew, made it! Stayed up all night and day to put the finishing touches on this piece. I learned so damn much about everything doing it. As much as the failure hurt, I loved it in the end. My muscles grow stronger. Still things in the illustration that bother me, but I'm happy enough with it to move on to the next competition. I should have thumbnails and comp sketches sooooon!

BLOODSPORTS!

So I'm doing these Bloodsport challenges put on by the beautiful, oily muscled Crimson Daggers. We're tasked with making the box art for an action figure package using one of three imaginary properties: Crystal Crusaders, Legend of Lizards, or Gorilla Guardians. I finally decided on Legend of Lizards turning it into a universe where a manly man fights dinosaurs with ray guns. Here's a little bit of the development behind it and a couple of (wasted) studies. The final illustration will look more like the darker composition below.