Final Semester- Illustration: Foreign Lands

This poem is from "A Childs Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson. The book is out of copyright protection and can be viewed here: Gutenberg.org . I chose to illustrate this poem because it reminds me a lot of my childhood, and the fun children can have exploring and using JUST their IMAGINATION. Often TV, Video Games, comics, and sometimes even books limit the infinite bounds of a child's imagination by feeding them a bunch of stereotyped, processed, and commercialized garbage.

Oh my! Cross your fingers for me, I might get TWO illustrations done this week!!! As a side note, this illustration is the second installment of my new and improved greyscale-to-color method...and amazingly enough it looks like it will work in ANY situation. I shall try it on a more complex image. If I have time I will post something about the process I used for it later this week.

Honestly I can't believe I did that to myself with all the leaves on the trees, but I couldn't stop rendering until everything FELT right. I really feel like this illustration turned out successful.

Final Semester - Illustration: Creatures of the night

I started and completed this illustration last night. I made it for the ChildrensIllustrator monthly topic, "Night Creatures."

It was mostly that I wanted to retry 'greyscale to color' based on a tutorial from Rokoroko: Link here, but partly because who ISN'T enticed by the topic "Night creatures"?
The key differences from my old 'greyscale to color' methods was:
1.Using a brush to paint the unwanted color OUT/AWAY with a mask.
2. Utilizing the blend mode "soft light."
Everything else I did for this illustration was from my own methods.

I have also been looking for a way to simplify my illustration process and make it shorter/more profitable. My current method(s) continued to get complicated and I found myself becoming bored...since the complex route was NOT the direction I wanted to head. Not only that but my characters were becoming increasingly stiff and lifeless (I was overworking them).

So as a result, I discovered last night that this process guarantees absolute control, and a solid, animated illustration. I'm excited to explore further to see how exclusive this method is/isn't based upon other situations (daytime, complex colored backgrounds, etc.) I'll keep you posted.

Illustration gallery roundup...(as of yet)

As part of my final semester here at UCM I am going to participate in a gallery show. I thought everyone might be interested in seeing my line-up thus far (more illustrations still being made as we speak). These are also the core illustrations of my actual portfolio.

You might also notice some changes to the images you are familiar with...the biggest being that I had to blast the darks and saturated colors out in order to get a good print. Sigh... WHy can't images print the way they look on the screen?! (Rhetorical question btw).

Final Semester- Illustration: GERMS

For some of you this illustration may look vaguely familiar. A little under two years ago I created the original for illustration friday. The idea hit me hard and quick, as some great ideas do and since then it has been receiving a bit of recognition on my Deviantart account. In reply I wanted to bring it up to my current specs. Instead of trying to update the old version I recreated the whole thing starting from concepts and thumbnails, but this time I designed it for a children's magazine (such as Highlights, or Jack and Jill) where a poem could easily fit inside it. Don't think of it as replacing the old illustration, however think of it as a new and different one.

I've also noted that a lot of my pictures are STILL turning out dark...so today I experimented with a helpful method:

Take your "completed" picture >copymerge and paste. >desaturate it. >duplicate the desaturated layer and then either manually mess with levels, or try the Equalize option. >Adjust layer opacity until the right moderation of lights and darks. >Copy merge the greyscale layers. Paste as top. Turn layer blend mode to Overlay. >Take original color/final layer and place under that layer then adjust the greyscale layer until it looks almost right. >Can also manually adjust brightness of greyscale layer by HUE/Saturation -colorize. Turn off saturation and then move brightness up or down until right. Finally copy your original color layer place over to get rid of the BITE that levels/equalize gives to your colors. Adjust the opacity until satisfied.

As a side note my wife and I came up with a 5 year plan for our future...I graduate this semester and with that comes a lot of planning. You should hear more about it in the future as we hammer out the final details.

Contest

A good friend of mine, Amelia Parris, is hosting a short story contest. The winner will have their story made into a short manga! Amelia's work is highly professional, so expect good results for the winner. Go here to find out more: http://flossandchaos.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=90

Expect to see a story or two from me (depending on school and project restraints.)

Final semester- first illustration update!

Soooo....here is my first update. The hardest part was getting my illustration project schedule kicked into gear, but honestly it is going well and I am excited! I can't promise I will update every week as this IS my last semester at college and I have many comprehensive classes, but rest assured illustration work is being done!

Okay for the illustration above it is another installment of my "Mr. Grump" Easy Reader that I wrote last year. It is one of my favorite scenes from the book.
And here is a test I did for a spot illustration! I did it not only as a test for a typical 'spot illustration' for a magazine article but this illustration was done 100% in CMYK mode. I was talking with fellow illustrator Jeff Porter about digital illustrations and he mentioned that working in CMYK instead of RGB brought better results when printing for him. I didn't notice a huge difference with my colors when working in CMYK, but when I printed it off I was quite surprised at how nice the colors translated. So maybe I shall work in CMYK in the future?

For other news I am honored to announce that a question of mine, regarding Plein Aire to professional Illustrator Greg Newbold, has been answered in a two post reply:

part 1

http://gregnewbold.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-outdoor-painting-palette.html

part 2

http://gregnewbold.blogspot.com/2011/09/thoughts-mixing-more-vibrant-color.html

Have an enjoyable weekend!