The second half of December continued with the slowing trend that has characterized the latter half of the year. I had a few jobs here and there, and managed to keep work on the table most of the time, but I was never what I would call overly busy. The above piece was another fiction assignment for Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. I was really pleased with how this one turned out, making good use of dramatic lighting.
The two ‘biggest’ projects of December I won’t be posting for a while because they haven’t been published yet. I had a nice ‘painting’ assignment from a book publisher, an ‘archaology scene’ ala Indiana Jones that turned out to be one of my favorite assignments of the year (I’ll post it here in the spring sometime). Also a series of 20 or so cartoon images that I am working on for another upcoming book project, which I should be able to elaborate on in a few months time.
The illustration above was for the Chronicle of Higher Education, and concerned college applications. I also had another ‘health care’ spot for the Wall Street Journal, this one on the topic of ‘tongue scraping devices’.
A couple other black and white assignments for the same client are pictured below. The one to the left was about the dillema of whether to raise or lower interest rates, and the one to the right was about the US consumer’s impact on the global markets.
I had a few pieces for Barrons this month. The above illustration was a rather tricky one that dealt with a nobel prizewinner’s economic theory, and was tricky both to conceptualize, and to finish, but turned out rather nice in the end. The two illustrations below were for the same client. The first one (with the 100 dollar bill) was commissioned ahead of schedule, and then later when the story was written they realized that a 100 euro note would better fit the article, so I was asked to modify the art.
The above ‘dartboard’ illustration was another for the Wall Street Journal earlier in the month. A rather text heavy request, but it turned out nice. I’m glad I did a lot of research on how dart boards really looked, it was worth the time and effort.
And finally, the above piece was a same day assignment for Newsday. This one dealt with the changing troop strategies in Iraq, moving from ‘battle mode’ to ‘police mode’.
The Far Eastern Economic Review from Hong Kong emailed that same weekend and handed me a pair of illustrations, one of them an ‘overview’ of a telecommunications segment of the paper, and another one was a portrait of an up and coming politician. I also had due around this time, a series of small cartoon spots for Christian Home and School, having to do with various ways of showing kids that you care. (pictured below)
I was reminiscing with this client (who was retiring after the end of November), how when I first started working with him, how I would routinely use my son as reference for ‘kids’ in the illustrations, and how he’s now taller than me and looking at colleges for next year.
