Blue Moon Blog

Well, this one sure was fun!

My client, Matt McCabe asked me to do up for his site my spin on a cross between Dr. Strange and the monkey from Family Guy and this is what I came up with. The image above shows the stages of work, from rough pencil, to ink, and color – all digital.

For context, here’s how Matt used the image at his SemiTechnical site. Look over rest of his stuff, too and perhaps avail yourself of his services – he’s a good guy!

Okay, so it’s not cheery. Just an image/idea that came to me, though I’m not particularly feeling Christmas stress this year – I can’t afford to.  C’mon even Santa has to take the edge off as the Dreaded Deadline looms….

With a lot of my drawings lately I’ve planned them for color, but sometimes like the black & white art better. Not so with this one. It works all right, but seems way too busy to me. The dramatic, muted flat color helps simplify the piece some.

And here’s how it began, with a very rough pencil, leaving much of the drawing again left for the inking stage. As I drew, I added detail and busy-ness – too much, as I said.

I’ll do a happier Christmas illo or two before The Day, promise.

My artist pal, Brent Schoonover recently found this Halloween CD in his garage, recognizing the art…

…as the cover art I did in ’92 for a Look & Find Scary Monsters book.

I’ve not seen the CD package yet, so am not sure if the same publisher put both out. But more likely the art was appropriated by a third party without permission. In a way it’s a tad flattering, but mostly this kinda thing drives artists crazy. In this case the original publisher owns the copyright to the image as I did the book as work for hire. Otherwise…this Hulk would be mad.

I’d been wanting to do this piece for a good long while.  Framed prints are available at the Blue Moon Boutique at Cafe Press.

This piece was done for a client who had it printed as a large poster, presenting it framed as a gift. Another version was done with a additional background color. We’re available to do a custom piece like it for you!

A very rough layout for a portfolio illustration I’m doing today…

Finishes by tonight.

Update: The final art…

One of my jazz faves: Blossom Dearie.

Executed compeletly in Photoshop. View a larger version at Google+ …and Circle me while you’re at it. Make sure to check out other artists’ entries as they roll in at the Daily Sketch Challenge blog.

I recently completed this pop art portrait for Jamie Baratta at Green Jar, an online environmental lifestyle magazine, bridging the gap between the environment and urban city youth.

I penciled digitally and inked with a Niji Waterbrush (medium) on a marker paper (Bienfang Graphics 360) overlay. Mary and colored this one in tandem.

Around the holidays I completed all illustrations and images for a Christian music EP CD, Bondage Breaker by Riot of Love. I wasn’t sure at first whether the concept of Jesus in the American West would fly, but I think it turned out well – we hit the right balance.

My initial digital layout for the front cover showed Cowboy Jesus full figure. And while the client and I both thought we should pull in tighter, the back cover was generally good to go.

So I did a second layout of the front cover, and after incorporating a few revisions moved to a final pencil, which I did at the drawing board, the old-fashioned way, inking with a brush on bristol board. Getting the details and expression of Jesus’s face just right were crucial at this stage.

I also prepared the inside front cover, which provided a background image for the credits, and a sepia close-up of Jesus for behind the CD in the case.

The client had the back cover image conceived right from the start, and after adding a few details, my wife, Mary and I finished it all off with digital colors, dropping in titles and such as necessary. All in all, fun to do CD art for another music project. If you’re a fan of Christian hard rock, LIKE Riot of Love on Facebook.

My pal, Mark Flora, for whom I’ve done album illustrations, and who played guitar and more for the most recent Bedbugs trailer, has assembled a new band, The Holy Rocka Rollaz! Over this past weekend, the band was out and about at a local car show, spreading the word and passing out CD samplers, which featured my art on the cover, in total Ratfink/Dragster mode.

The band provided me tons of good photo reference for the vibe and likenesses. There’s still some tweaking and finessing I’ll do on the art, as well as the type treatment, but this was good to go for their purposes early on as Mark and his gang lay the groundwork to set up gigs. The Holy Rocka Rollaz are a band that loves and pays tribute to early American rock ‘n’ roll, probably playing car shows, gigs events and even weddings by the Fall.

For your curiosity, I’m including here my initial and only sketch/pencil, done digitally, directly on the screen/computer. I printed it in blue and inked with a brush, scanning and coloring in Photoshop. I’ll post updates about the band here at the blog, as well as the updated art when it’s completed.