Come back fighting.

Ok i've had a little break from art and stuff and come back fighting. I've finished my latest calender fairytale image here..

But also had the inspiration to get back and do some of my old school stuff, this image i'm very proud of which is saying something as i haven't been proud of my work in a long time.

Little bit of brain food.

Just to let all my followers out there know what I've been up to. I'm still working on the fairytale stuff as i'm determin to make enough to make a calender. I've been working on commissions for other people and family members, pondering on ideas for indecisive people who can't decide if they want my work or not.

Amongst this tornado of things happening i've been trying to get orginised and various projects finished so that I can get back on track with what Im supposed to be doing.

..and on the side i'm still sketching out page layouts for my next kids book.

To keep your eyes from visual starvation heres a little drawing. .. ..

.The return of Alice.

As well as working on an image for a booklet on 'What Hull Means To Me' I've drawn another Alice image to keep me going. All it needs is a bit of colouring, this is the line work of it, with stylized border also drawn by moi.

.Vs.

Having no inspiration can be a good thing because then when a competition comes along that has a deadline pretty soon, it will push you to create something unexpected in a short amount of time.

A situation like that came upon me recently, a competition related to the film Sucker Punch they wanted a mash up of things against things, the more random the combination the better.

The winner gets a signed book of artwork from the Sucker Punch movie created by Alex Pardee, not much to some people but a lot to me. So I gave it a go anyways, considering I did this in a week this is what I came up with.

The Atomic Poodle Vs Bruce Lee! how random is that!? ha ha

.Kidz'n'Pets.

..and just as I finish my last blog post I realise that since my last image post I have done more images!

So here's the idea, I series of images including characters and crazy creatures as pets, fun no?

Here is the first image, I have many ideas of more I can do but at the moment I have so much going on at the same time that I'm slowly getting on with everything, so watch this space for more images!

Timmy! blog link.

If people are interested, the Timmy book I've recently been working on now has it's own blog to keep tabs on it's progress and development. Here is the link in anyone want to follow the stages and making of Timmy and the Magic Bean:

http://www.timmybeanbook.blogspot.com/

Enjoy!

I'll be posting more new and images of my creative capers and drawing of 'Kidz'n'Pets' that I'm also working on.

.Mini.Project.

Setting myself project is one thing. Sticking to it is a whole new story!

So I've set myself a project which I will be forced to stick to as it will be in my face everyday and inexcusable. I've hand made another mini sketch book which I have labeled 'A Doodle A Day' you get the idea of the project from the title. Starting from February 1st 2011 I will be doodling one thing a day in this book until it's complete, not matter how good or bad the doodle may be I will do it.

This book is only small so it won't seem like a big task every time I doodle, also it will keep me drawing everyday and possible lead to ideas for other drawings.

.Drum.Guy.

Continuing on with my quest to create strange and ridiculous creatures based on musical instruments, my next instalment is Drum Guy. ( line work below, soon to be coloured )

.Free.Stuff.For.All!.

Ha ha! made you look...

Mr.Guitar in full colour, playing his music to the worlds eagerly awaiting ear drums. This image is digitally coloured in a new way of using tools that I've only just found out how to use (why 'only just' I have no idea because this could of helped me a lot in the past).

Rest assure I will most defiantly be using this colouring style more in the many creative days to come. Later on I will get round to doing the same image styles but with acrylics and good old fashion paintbrushes and sponges, to get a contrast and find out which way of colouring works best for me.

TA DA!

.slowly.back.on.track.

So lately I've been focusing more on the book I'm making, it's taking a lot of organising and sorting out as well as putting together and adding information but I'll keep you all updated as it progresses.

In the meantime I've been occasionally having a break from it and adding more and more to a painting I'm doing. It's quiet a big image and will have a lot of detail but I'm only going to give you a small peek of the progress.

.GNOME.Comp.

An idea that I started drawing a while back and I thought would work well as a design for the GNOME 3.0 t-shirt design competition. Being a bit psychedelic and crazy but also fun, I thought it was a good way of representing being able to be creative and fun whilst using the GNOME program to simplify and keep your files safe without any worry.
There are many variations of this design which can be used on different coloured t-shirts, obviously the original design would be the most expensive to make as it has lots of colours but I think it looks just as good in one or two colours. Below are a few examples of the different ways it could look and simplified sections of the design.

.Being.Festive.

Being creative can be difficult sometimes, especially when you try to be creative everyday so today I took a break and made some fragrant tree ornaments for Christmas. They smell gorgeous and are simple to make so try it yourself!

What you will need.

- 1 orange/tangerine/clementine (the smaller the better)

- whole cloves

- cinnamon sticks

What to do.

If the oranges have no stalks, use a needle to thread some cotton/string through parts of the skin to make the hanger, but before you tie the end off also thread it through a small bit of cinnamon stick, tie it off now.

Next stick the whole cloves in to the orange by pushing them through the skin they should stay there by themselves.

Then hang on the tree!

The should last about a week sometimes just over depending on how fresh the oranges are.

They smell gorgeous and add a festive touch to your x-mas tree.

.Illogical.

After going back to basics and taking up good old fashioned pencil drawing once again, it has inspired me to start working on another picture book. Usually I write the story, research elements, re-write and work parts THEN do the illustration. This technique seems the logical way of doing things and most people would take this route, but I'm not most people and love to be illogical :) so I'm doing it backwards..

The plan is, continue drawing pencil sketches relating each one to the previous drawing there for creating a story line by letting it fall in to it's own path. Once I think the images have reached an end i will organise them in to a story line and add text if necessary and see what the end product looks like!

Here are a few of the drawings and doodles I've done in the last few days...

.Hugo.Mixed.Tape.

The latest competitions I've been working on, the deadline is at the end of the week and I managed to get these designs done before then so yey! The aim was to pick a list of mixed songs from the hugocreate.com site and draw an album cover inspired by the music, also it had to include the Hugo bottle image somewhere. These are the three ideas i came up with, i tried to make them all very different to give voters a bit of variation to chose from.

Feel free to pick and vote by clicking on the links below...
http://www.hugocreate.com/gallery#art_4653
http://www.hugocreate.com/gallery#art_4644
http://www.hugocreate.com/gallery#art_4631

.people.picture.colour.

Finally! I've finished colouring the image! this has been one grueling piece of work and has taken just over a week to complete, that is me working on it about 3 1/2 to 4 hours a day. In the end I'm glad I've complete it but am now in a dilemma as to whether or not I like it best with a plain background of textured one, so comments appreciated!

.anything.goes.

Now that the 'This is not a sketchbook' has been send back to america, it felt a bit empty with out having it to doodle in..SO! I made another one of my own 'The Anything Goes Book' which will as is suggests on the cover be filled with random things. Watch this space to see how it turns out!

.people.gathering.

All that talk of people drawing was not exaggerated one bit, here are the line drawings of all the random people in the basics of my plan. I'm going to experiment with colour to see what works best then maybe add texture.

.people.people.people.

Yet another competition under way with the theme 'Embracing Our Differences' with the goal of creating a billboard sized image with lots of detail. My idea is many many many drawings of many people from many nationalities all merged in to one big drawing to reveal another drawing if you get my drift. Here are a few simple line drawings which I've started with, much more people drawing is on the agenda as I want to get as many as possible in to the big picture.

.In.A.Nutshell.

Lately I've been working on stuff for competitions and wish to continue creating more images, well at least one new image a day. I seemed to have come to the point where I feel I have lots of creativity and ideas that are just bursting to be drawn, painted and made in various other forms but i can't seem to see them clearly.

They are all stuck in the back of my mind just beyond the reach of my pencil and this is really annoying me. So expect a short term of silence followed by an explosion of blogs and creative ideas!

..zombies.continued..

These are the final two images of the zombies that I managed to get finished, so I've ended up sending all of them off to the competition.