freelance
Last sketches of 2015
This October – December was the busiest on record, what with starting a new show at the studio, piles of freelance, and selling and buying a house…… so sadly my sketches took a backseat. I managed to squeak out a few, here they are!
For Inktober 2015:
A couple sketches in time for “Back to the Future” Day! [Brush pen on Moleskine sketchbook.]
A couple sketches of some of the regular dogs that frequent our studio ๐ [Brush pen on Moleskine sketchbook.]
And of course a sketch of our cat Mowgli in his favourite position.
I managed to fit in two commissions done as Christmas gifts for clients. The first one was for a couple who had just gotten married and loved trees, hence the background. The second was for someone who is a composer. Both digital.
Winery-inspired commission
A friend contacted me to do a commission for her and her hubby who were going to celebrate an anniversary. They share a love of visiting wineries, so she told me that she would love to have that incorporated somehow into it.
She also said that their phrase they always say to each other is “That’s amore!”, so I wanted to make sure I included that somewhere.
Here is what I came up with!
Rough sketch [digital]:
Character designs for unnamed project
I was asked to do a few exploratory character designs for a project, and here is what I came up with! I tried a few different styles, and it was fun just to draw a few different versions of the character I had in my head.
Brush pen and pencil crayon:
Illustration commission for wedding gift
I was asked to do a commission of a couple for someone to give to them as a wedding gift. After seeing a few photos of the couple together, I did some roughs. Below is the rough that worked best, and the final colour is at the bottom. Rough is in Colerase blue pencil; colour is digital [Photoshop].
Willow Tree Wedding Illustration
A few months ago, a friend from the studio asked if I would do a custom illustration for her wedding invitations. They were getting married by a willow tree, so she wanted that incorporated ๐ It was definitely fun to do, I sort of wanted a Golden Book feeling… and of course it was so great that she was so happy with it. ๐
Here is the finished illustration:
Here is a close-up of the bride and groom:
Here is what I did for the actual front of the invite:
A commission: Steve & Carolyn
One of my favourites things to do is to do sketches or illustrations for people for special occasions. It is always surprising when people contact me, and what they want drawn – it’s never a dull moment!
This one was fun – a childhood friend contacted me and said that a good friend of her was getting married, and they wanted to give her and her fiance a special gift at the wedding shower. But they also wanted a version of the drawing done like a colouring book, so the kids could colour it! That was a fantastic idea, I thought!
Here is the rough sketch I did of them – colerase blue pencil on animation paper. [I did a bunch of sketches from the pics my friend sent me, but this was the sketch I liked the most.]
Here is the “colouring book” version of the drawing. I cleaned it up digitally instead of inking it by hand because then it takes a while to get rid of the blue pencil.
Here is the final coloured illustration – my friend told me she always wears purple, so I made sure to make her dress purple ๐ I also added some details from an outfit she was wearing in one of the photos I was sent. [See below for engagement photo of Steve & Carolyn to compare to drawing.]
Congrats Steve & Carolyn! Hope you liked the illustration ๐
A Kids Book – Work in Progress
For quite a while now I have been working on illustrating a kids book with a friend of mine who has written one, and figured out all the publishing details. My life and work at the studio has kept me very busy and has made this project go very slowly…. but it is getting there one page at a time!
I have done roughs, a rough colour script, and so far two of the spreads. Here is a cropped sneak peek of two of the spreads.
Stay tuned for more!
Caricatures for comedian Lianna Carrera
Since the Christmas break, immediately followed by the GCN Conference in Chicago [stay tuned for postings on that!] things have just been a-movin’ and a-shakin’ – so I am a bit behind on posting about my latest projects!
I was commissioned by friend and funnylady Lianna Carrera to come up with some fun sketches of her for use on her shiny new website. Her site is up and a-runnin’ – check it out here!
She also indicated that she liked the style of [line master] Al Hirschfeld – ME TOO!! But, as an artist, that is a flipping TALL ORDER. I poured over a couple books I have of his illustrations, and tried my best to soak up his genius in hopes it would transfer over in even 2%!
Here are the final illustrations we came up with! ‘Twas a fun project, indeedy!
Petsecure dog & cat poses
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Some of the latest dog and cat poses for one of my clients: Petsecure Pet Insurance.
Started with rough pencil sketches – end product is digital.