Graphic Design and Illustration.

Posts from the ‘Illustration’ category

Almost Finished!

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Remember the dino render I posted a little while ago? Well, I’ve had some more time to work on it. Texturing is almost there. Just some (more) details around the mouth, and maybe a quick texture to dirty up the teeth a bit. I have also changed the camera angle and the lighting set up drastically from the last posting.

In case anyone is wondering, the 3D model was made in Blender 3D, using the still somewhat experimental Cycles rendering that will eventual replace the internal Blender renderer. The texturing is pretty much all Photoshop with some texture painting done right in Blender. I boosted the contrast slightly in Photoshop.

Dino Test Render

In celebration of my first trip to the Manitoba Museum in a while, I decided to see just how detailed a 3D model I could make of a dinosaur head. This one is more or less based on T-rex. I still have a wee bit more detail that I’d like to add to the model. Mostly around the mouth area. Then all I have to do is texture, light and render out a final image.

An earlier attempt at modeling a dinosaur can be found at this link.

Enjoy.

November Image of the Month

Remember this guy? I managed to get a more detailed render completed, and then coloured the guy in Photoshop. The background is some old watercolour texture I had lying around from who-knows-where. I wanted an old-timey feel to the illustration so a lot of muted tones.

Happy Halloween – Image of the month for October

I’m not normally quite this morbid, but ’tis the season and all. And besides, I had a much simplified skull lying around from another project,and my very old and slowly dying Wacom is getting awfully jittery these days, so drawing straight lines is a problem. Craggy, jittery line work is suddenly a whole lot easier. Enjoy.

Ambush Bug

My rendition of another favourite of mine from my childhood – Ambush Bug. A rather zany superhero from the DC Universe, who originally started out life as a Superman villan. More can be read out him here. As for the style, I’m trying to keep up with what I did in the post. And this one as well.

I like the character. He was so strange. I discovered him right around the same time I discovered Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, so zany humor mocking the comic-book industry was just what the doctor ordered. Any character who is forced to use a potted plant for Swamp Thing and finger puppets of villains, all because his super villain license had been revoked, was just perfect in my books. And by this time (my late teens) I was slowly beginning to loose interest in superhero comic stories, but not the artwork. Catching up on the rare stories featuring this guy was a good way for me to keep myself interested in Pop Art, but without the headache of over-the-top testosterone fueled storytelling. Not that I don’t still find a good adventure story exciting and interesting. I was just getting interested in greater storytelling experiences.

Image of the Month – September

I would have had this post in earlier, but it has been a busy few days for me! At least work has slowed down to manageable proportions. I put this image together while enjoying the absolutely crazy warm weather we had the past few days. And according to the weatherman, it should all come to an end right about now.

Anyways, a bit of mixed media here. Some watercolour along with a bit of acrylic to opaque some areas. And a bit of pen and ink to finish everything off. All on a really crappy stretch canvas that come with those cheap-o acrylic sets you can buy in stores like Michaels.

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Kitty! Image of the Month August

Attached is a pic I made of a sabre-tooth cat, Smilodon fatalis. Started out as a pencil sketch. Then heavily adultered in Photoshop with custom brushes. Sometimes I think this is how my cat, Jessie, sees herself. Enjoy.

A Stainless Steel Rat Finally Rusts Away…

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I found out the other day that one of my favourite childhood authors, Harry Harrison, passed away. You can read more about it on Neil Gaiman’s blog post about him.

As a young teenager I discovered him, like most of my early reading favourites, at the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the Coles Books in Unicity Shopping Mall, where I spent many an hour sweating out what book I was going to buy next with my meager childhood earnings.

Harrison was most famous for his Stainless Steel Rat series of books. Crime capers set in the far, far future and narrated by the main character, Slippery Jim diGriz. It basically followed the old idea of using a crook to catch a crook. Lots of zanny fun. Anyone familiar with the cable TV shows White Collar and Burn Notice would probably like the series. A must for any budding deviant young mind to take in. I remember the covers of the books featuring a small mechanical rat on them. While the books really had noting to do with mechanical rodents (the stainless steel rat referred to the type of criminal Slippery Jim fancied himself as) I remember being fascinated with the design of the robots. Attached is my very quick homage to the series of books and to the author who gave me so many enjoyable hours of entertainment. Enjoy.

Heidelberg Man – A Portait

Out of the mists of time a piercing gaze of an ancestor long dead.

This guy is my loose interpretation of Heidelberg Man. An early forerunner of Homo Sapiens that many believe is the direct link between us and the Neanderthals. Not much is known about them. They were on average quite tall. Maybe a bit taller than modern humans, though I understand there‘s been some specimens found in South Africa that are quite huge. And while they still have a sloping forehead, their brian size does fit into the smaller end of the normal human range.

What inspired this image and the Neanderthal I drew earlier is a fascinating book I picked up at the bookstore, Evolution The Human Story by Dr Alice Roberts. It has a great many really cool reconstructions by the artists of Adrie and Alfons Kennis. I strongly urge any interested to check out their stuff. Amazing work!

Anyways, my guy is based on the Heidelberg Man found in the book, but not quite as harsh looking. I wanted a more contemplative pose, possible from a shaman or tribal elder (assuming they had such things). Started off a a pencil sketch and colour finished in Photoshop. The colour scheme was quite difficult to work out and took several tries before I settled on anything. Added some tribal markings afterwards just for fun.

Enjoy.