For a change of pace on Wednesday and Thursday, I took a break from the ‘facebook portraits’ project, and spent the past few days working on another of my ‘comics’ that I’ve been doing with a collaborator. I haven’t done one of these in several months, so it took a little while to find my groove again, but I’m pretty pleased overall with how it turned out. (click on the image above to see a larger more detailed version) – This ended up being the last one of these ‘collaboration comics’.
Day Forty Nine
Here’s the finished illustration for that WSJ job. Personally I preferred the ‘magic trick’ sketch, but this one probably fits the story better, which the editors decided to go with.
Day Fifty
During the eighties, I had an extended period where I had pushed illustration to the side, and spent my time working in the field of graphic design and typesetting. This was in the days before computer graphics, and much of the type of work I was doing (paste ups, photostats, halftones, type specs) has since gone the way of the horse drawn carriage and manual typewriter. I haven’t done much in the way of graphic design in the past twenty plus years, but since I’ve been involved with this music group, I’ve started dabbling with poster design as a way of promoting our gigs. It’s been quite fun and personally rewarding, especially since the only client I have to please is myself (and my bandmates, who so far haven’t been all that opinionated on the subject).
So today, rather than posting an illustration, I’m going to post a series of poster/flyers that I’ve been creating in photoshop over the past several months for the ‘Jukejoint Handmedowns’, and more of my graphic work for this band can be seen on our ‘facebook page’ in one of the ‘photo galleries’. Photos used in these posters are courtesy of my wife Terri Foley.
Day Fifty One
Took the day off drawing on Sunday, as we had to drive down to South Haven for some babysitting duties. Didn’t really have much planned to do on Monday when I got back to work, but the morning emails contained a quick commission to draw a dog for the advertising for a musician’s stickers and tee shirts down in Georgia. I also had enough free time that I was able to finish up my ‘freaks of nurture’ comic adaptation (pictured below, click on the image to see a larger version).
Day Forty Six
Today I finished up the Roy Lichtenstein-esque illustration for the Chronicle (I posted the rough sketch yesterday). Not a lot of difference, other than tighter linework and slightly different color choices. This was a fun little project, it sort of reminded me of my days of graphic design back in the eighties, working with zipatone screens. I also saved a version of the black and white art, before I added the color swatches (pictured below).
Day Forty Seven
Today I’ve been working on sketches for the cover of an animal joke book for kids for one of my book publishing clients. The layout is still up in the air, so I’m giving them each animal separately so they can move them around in the design at this early stage.
Day Forty Eight
Today I spent a great deal of time working on another ‘Freaks of Nurture’ comic blog adaptation. I did a rough sketch for this several weeks back, but for some reason or another it was put on hold for some ‘writing tweaks’ that never quite materialized. I got about half done with it today, and will post the rest once I get it finished in the next few days. (click on the image above to see a larger version).
I also worked on some rough sketches for a Journal spot assignment. The finish is due tomorrow, so check in then to see which one got chosen.
Day Nineteen:
Today’s drawings are a couple rough sketches for an upcoming project for a west coast client. I had done a rather large project for them about two years ago, and hadn’t heard anything since, but then got a call out of the blue from them a couple weeks ago (turns out they are riding out the recession like a lot of folks, cutting back and scaling down, and have only just recently began assigning work again). There will be more to this project later, but for now, this is what I’ve been given the green light on.
Day Twenty:
Spent a lot of today working on rough sketches for upcoming projects, so along that vein, today’s illustration is more along the lines of a ‘quick sketch’.
Day Twenty One:
Today I started laying out the next comic feature for the ‘Freaks of Nurture’ project (and began the finished artwork, sample panel above). This one is a departure of sorts from the previous ones, where I’m adapting a ‘story’ that doesn’t really have much humor in it, but it is nicely written and I’m enthused to get going on it.
Day Twenty Two:
For today’s drawing, I did another experiment using the paint tools. Last winter, I did an illustration for a website called ‘Covered’, where artists submit illustrations based on old comic book covers. I decided to try this again (although this time I didn’t bother submitting it to the site, since it usually takes about a month or so to be posted, and they prefer you don’t post it to your own site until that time), and this time chose an old fifties ‘romance’ comic book for my inspiration.
Day Fourteen:
Yesterday’s ‘day fourteen’ illustration is coming in a little late for various good excuses. I was working on a rather large WSJ assignment (which will more than likely be ‘day fifteen’), plus my music group The Jukejoint Handmedowns began work on recording their first cd for several hours during the day.
So, anyways, today’s illustration is one for the Freaks of Nurture blog, an essay about ‘fear’.
Day Fifteen:
And here’s the Journal assignment I’ve been working on for the past few days. This is a cover assignment, which needed to leave room in the center and along the right edge for copy purposes.
Day Sixteen:
Another paying assignment today, this one to accompany a ‘father’s day’ article for Newsday. Quick turnaround, sketches in the morning, finish by the afternoon. I’ll also be working on some tee shirt concepts this afternoon, but the sun is shining, so I think I’m going to take a few hours off and enjoy the sunshine.
Day Seventeen:
Since it’s the weekend, and I didn’t have a lot of free time available, I decided to go back to some more paint experimentation with another ‘yearbook’ portrait. This time working a little bigger and in more detail.
Day Eighteen:
Skipped a day yesterday to enjoy a lazy Father’s Day, and today’s illustration is another paying assignment from the CRC. They wanted a series of small heads of parents, teens, kids, grandparents of mixed ethnicities in a fairly iconic colorful cartoon style.