Shoefiti

Score this design: "Shoefiti," to help it get printed on Threadless!

I couldn't resist creating this illustration for the latest Threadless.com "loves" design challenge. This challenges theme is "Pre-Love". My piece is an homage to my childhood fascination with other peoples pre-loved sneakers dangling from power cables. This challenge is sponsored by Volkswagon and they are giving away a car to the winner, plus the cash. I came up with the idea while taking a shower in the morning and I had till midnight that day to submit it.

If you want to rate it you have to sign up to the threadless community. Click the image below if you want to score it and read peoples comments.

I Made A Book!

Back in October/November 2008, I was singing/rapping in the shower and came up with a cheesy love line about my boo(girlfriend). So I wrote it down and then thought, hey, since my rap career is going nowhere why not try to create a full length illustrated poem. I came up with a bunch of lines and then narrowed them down when conceptualizing the images to go along with them. Then in my free time after work I spent most of the winter months drawing, painting, scanning, digital painting, etc. The style of the book is split in two, just like the story of the poem. This allowed me to work in the style I usually work in as well as try out a style I had been longing to imitate. The later of which would be from the works of illustrator Lou Peters, specifically his work from "The New England Cookbook". Enjoy!

Oh, I also had to work in secrecy from my girlfriend, because I wanted it to be a surprise. My goal was to give her the book, have her read it, and then after she read the last line I would get on one knee and ask her to marry me. Well my plan went perfect and she said yes. Woo hoo!

For anyone interested in printing professional quality books, of all shapes and sizes, I highly recommend printing through BLURB. The print quality of my book(11" x 13", image wrap hardcover) came out awesome. It looks like I bought it at a bookstore.

More Practice

More Construction Exercising

Construction: copy and learn

The Original Cover

Drawing the line of action and constructing the forms around the line of action. Keeping an eye out for proportion, positive and negative shapes, and perspective.

After scanning it I decided to draw in photoshop on different layers. I added the hat. Then...
I added the next level of detail and refined the shapes a little.

Lastly I added the final level of detail. Then i put the original on a layer to see how close I came.
My proportions are a bit off but I am satisfied. This is my first attempt at this.

For the past couple years or so I have been reading John K's Blog. His blog is mainly used to try and teach the drawing principles behind cartooning. He emphasizes a lot on construction. He has had a lot of posts lately on copying from master cartoonists to learn how to draw well constructed and appealing characters. The best way to get better as an artist is to copy, learn, and then apply (to your personal art). I should have been doing this back in art school. I now have to keep up with this exercise because I think it will really help my drawings. The only way to stay on top of your game is practice, practice and more practice.

MMM......Food!

This illustration is part of a "secret" personal project I am working on. I will post more images when the entire project is finished.

UPDATE: Below I changed the color of the hair and sweater. I must point out that something is happening to the image when uploading to Blogger. The colors shift a lot and are desaturated. The originals look much better . Anyone else having this problem?

T-Shirt Design Submitted

Click on image above to view and/or vote on my submission. It might not be up on the web for a few days though.

T-shirt: Final Version

T-Shirt, New Version

After some feedback I came up with a new version of my celtic tree design. What do ya think? I am going to try a couple more versions as well.

A New Year, Some New Art

Last weekend I revisited an idea that has been swimming in my head for many years. I have always been fascinated with trees and Celtic design, and one day I got this great idea to draw a tree and have its branches morph into Celtic patterns. I actually wanted to design a tattoo for my entire sleeve, but I soon realized I don't want ink permanently stained on my skin. I did attempt some sketches at the time but never really got it to look the way I envisioned it. I recently got inspired by the art in the church I went to on Christmas and once again the idea was eating up my brain and I had to spew it out on paper, umm make that many pieces of printing paper. I originally wanted to create a nice big watercolor from the sketch but I thought it would also be a good design for a t-shirt. So I scanned the drawing and then tweaked it and colored it in Flash. I plan on submitting it to Threadless.com and hopefully it will be accepted and turned into a t-shirt. I would love to get some feedback before I submit it. If anyone reads this I would love to know what you think. Thanks! Happy New Years!