Illustration contest & webpage UPDATE!

Update #1:

This is an old illustration from last semester that I touched up this week.

I was informed by my fellow illustrator Jeff Porter about a contest that was being held at the ArtOrder. I had three days to complete this illustration. I did it and it was exhausting. I have since learned that three days is a "Comfortable" time period to complete an illustration in the real freelance world. 0_O Well anyway I did not win anything in the contest, but it was a great opportunity. I also have made many adjustments since I finished it for the contest (so it no longer qualifies as being done in three days..haha) It is still not perfect in my opinion and I will continue to tinker till I get it right.

Update #2:

I have overhauled the gallery on my portfolio website and some of the images will even be different then last viewed here on the blog so go take a look:

http://www.jerbl.com/monisawa/

Illustration 2 - Veteran's club

I was asked by the Veteran's Club at MCC Longview to make a poster that would promote their existence and purpose. They wanted a poster that was similar to the old WW II posters. They also wanted the poster to have vibrant colors. Eventually I will include text around the figure (hence the huge open space around uncle sam).

Well that is that! I've finally found what I have been looking for. A style and technique that not only looks "finished", but leaves infinite possibilities and personal interest for future illustrations.

I think the first key is that I need to work on smaller/simpler illustrations first...before I tackle on the epic subjects (hence my first summer illustration...which has great modeling, but it is very clunky.)

The second key is working the illustration as if it was an acrylic painting. (see Greg newbolds post 1, post 2 for a visual...which btw I won a book from him this past week in honor of his blog being online a year!) I spent most of my time looking for the answer in digital artists. My big break came when I started looking more earnestly in traditional media and applying their approach in photoshop. I spent most of my time studying and doing masterstudies in acrylic illustrations, and oil paintings ranging from the mid 1800's to the early 1900's (might post some of em later if requested).

In regards to uncle sam I built a Maquette out of Super Sculpey. I based it off several of the posters I found online and my own exaggerations. The maquette was nice for visual and shading purposes, but it was not the end of all ends. I allowed the illustration and character to evolve as the illustration progressed.

Detail of illustration at 50% of actual size:

Illustration 1 - Cat-astrophe!

"The cat managed to fit his mind control unit on a human and quickly went to work doing important matters!"

My intention for this was to be a full spread as if from a children's book. The idea for the concept came to me while driving home one day and a bird flew right past my windshield. Ideas rarely come clear, forceful, and funny all at once, but this was one of them.

This illustration ended up taking a little under two weeks to complete. It was fairly complex and one of those, "is it done yet?...how about now?...is it ever going to get done!!!" illustrations. Make sure to click and look at the image closer since it has a lot of beautiful painterly texture.

I am behind in attempting 12 complete illustrations this summer mostly because I spent so much time exploring painting methods and brushes in photoshop....but thats ok with me. Progress is progress...and this is some of my best work. I am open for suggestions and critiques on this piece! Please give me input.

illustration Project- Michael Jordan tribute

Sorry for the lack of updates. I promise I will have several more this week.

Well I have to say that this is a little more realistic than I normally do with my illustrations, but it was part of the assignment. The theme was sports cover magazine. This was my final assignment for my illustration classes at UCM.

I chose basketball, mostly because Michael Jordan was my hero as a chid. I used to spend countless hours imagining I was Michael Jordan shooting hoops after school. Ironically I lived in Utah at the time and while most people were crying their eyes and hating Michael Jordan for defeating the Jazz at the championship title several times, I was glorifying him. Though my basketball skills ended (or never even started) back then, my respect and admiration for him did not.

I got a pretty bad grade on this assignment, mostly because I took too many creative liberties in interpreting Michael Jordan's face, but hopefully I fixed that and most of the concerns voiced in the critique.

This was another great step towards getting my illustrations to look more finished and less messy..I accomplished this by the brush in photoshop I have been attempting to develop all semester...though just in the past week I have already jumped ship to a new set of better and more amazing brushes (oh I can't wait to show you the results!)

Happy Birthday Cheri comic -part 1

It seems that meaningless birthdays just come and go every year. Since my wife is turning to the significant age of thir~ *WACK! (just got wacked in the back of my head) Looks over shoulder at her... How about...23? She nods her approval. I wanted to make this one special!

Not just that, it also is giving me the opportunity to do comics again (its been over a year). I'm a bit rusty, but have picked up at a pretty decent pace. My talented friend Amelia (see her webpage here) has also been giving me personal suggestions for the comic layout, and Missa, my sister, feedback on the story. Thanks!

The comic is by far not meant to be perfect (since I am working full time on my illustrations) and most undoubtably is FULL of mistakes, so please be understanding. :) I also plan to make one last run over the whole thing when I am done with all the parts...so if you catch something terrible please tell me.

Without further adieu I present:

Cheri's Birthday gift PART 1

page 1

page 2

page 3

page 4

page 5

page 6

IF- Lesson

With my spring semester all wrapped up today I am gearing myself for my self-imposed summer ILLUSTRATION PROJECT. (not very catchy title is it. I need to work on it.) Basically for the entire summer I will complete ONE illustration a week. I will push myself and spend at least 6 hours a day 5 days a week working on only illustration.

The illustration above was a pre-project test, trying to staple down my final style and methods for the roughly 12 or so illustrations I plan to complete over the summer. It came about after watching Omar Dogan paintings some of his backgrounds on BLOG TV and watching Will Terry paint these two illustrations on youtube (illustration 1 / Illustration 2.) I spent more time on the illustration than intended, mostly because it developed early on better than I thought it would...but ultimately had a great time. The methods were pretty similar to what I had already been doing except I enjoyed a lot of the broad to more specific brushstrokes both Omar and Will did. Seeing this in action really conditioned my mind in the right direction.

So be avid watchers this summer and make sure to keep on my case about getting them complete on time. ^_^ haha Oh and in the near future I will be posting some of my schoolwork from this semester as well! Look forward to it!

p.s. I'll bet you are wondering how this relates to Illustration Fridays topic, "LESSON" ...haha well watching Omar Dogan, and Will Terry's video was a lesson for me in the which this illustration resulted. ;)