This was another college piece. I don't remember the assignment but I do remember my thinking. I was striving to illustrate muscles and the human form convincingly.The X on the back of the head was a symbol that was having a resurgence in the late 80s. Also cutting designs in to hair was a big thing at the time. It was just supposed to feel powerful. Just for kicks I shopped the illustration to be a bit more topical to the current times and posted it beneath the original. The original was airbrush and colored pencil. The piece ended up being one of my promo piece mailers and was received pretty well during portfolio reviews.
Found gem. This found it's way to me by way of an old print my father kept. It was a printed promo piece for Pencil Pushers. Our first mailers/handouts were black and white since that was all we could do cheaply. We tried to showcase a variety of techniques with stipple being one. This was a concept for the Reach toothbrush and I used my self for the model. The stipple alone brought back so many memories of working with rapidograph pens and constantly cleaning the clogged tips. Fingers tips covered in india ink. We did get some stipple work from this and other pieces, so at least it worked. Not the strongest stipple piece but it was definitely an representation of my work at that time.
During our studio days, we were either slow or slammed. During one holiday season we were all slammed and were not able to send out a holiday card to our clients. Pep suggested doing a card for Elvis' birthday and our Elvismas theme promo was born. We each drew ourselves in an Elvis outfit with different concepts. Stuart wrote a whole story loosely based on the travels of the 3 wisemen. Overall it was a success and lots of people got a kick out it. It also helped us stand out from the deluge of Christmas promos that were sent out. The one I did was pretty much a Acrylic and Colored Pencil. I could not do the lip curl so I had to hold my lip up. We decided to keep it in the picture as a goof. I tried to add in little holiday elements into my outfit. A Christmas tree on the vest and Christmas ornaments on the belt buckle. If by some chance I can find the actual promo piece, I will post it. The story just makes it all that much better.
As you can tell I am and was really into Baseball imagery. While exploring a new technique I was thinking of a concept for a billboard. It was really never fleshed out fully, but I like the extreme horizontal nature of it. Being the a Braves fan, the only issue I had with it was that I used Wade Boggs for reference. I used Acrylic, Gouache, Colored Pencil and Matte Medium for this piece. If you note the bottom right corner, this was a variation of my signature, of which to this day I still have not found a signature for my work that I like. In some cases you will see no signature and in some cases I used to hide the signature within the painting.
This was back in College. Alex Bostic, one of my most influential instructors, had taught us a technique for painting a black and white acrylic illustration. This was my second attempt with it. Funny story about the picture. During one summer I worked for a office moving company. We were moving a big company office in D.C. Along with moving, we were in charge of throwing out tons and tons of trash. Part of the trash was old ad photos and negative. Being interested in photography at that time, I kept them from the trash, after clearing first of course. Years later, I was able to use one of those pictures as reference for this illustration.
This was a promo piece for the namesake of our Illustration Studio. Pencil Pushers Illustration. We were around for about 9 years. Very hard but fun times. Talk about trial by fire. It was a many nights and holidays at the studio. Took hour naps on the floor during all nighters. One of my longtime and dearest friends, Dave Evans posed for the picture. We used each other as models quite often. In fact Dave was our go to model for several project. He can be seen in medical illustrations, promo pieces, business magazines, and even in a time life book! I have a link to his blog also. He is and illustrator and is studying animation now.
Oh if only COMMAND Z worked in real life. Posting these old pictures has been kind of therapeutic. Along with some of the pictures that I like, I wanted to post some that I felt were not successful. Sort of a postmortem. This piece was done when I was experimenting with matte medium. I would do the under drawing in colored pencil, then seal it with matte medium. The rest would be additional colored pencil and acrylic paint over the matte medium. I like the luminosity this technique provided. Unfortunately it did not translate well to film or print. This was one of those pictures that you know something is off, but continue all the way to finish, because of the time invested already. I wasn't happy with the face, the shadows, the background or the detailing. I can visualize how it should have been now. Hind sight is 20/20. I resolved a lot of technical issues with this technique after this piece. All in all it served it purpose as a learning tool.
This was my first attempt at trying to really meld several different media types. I remember going into a panic when I sprayed it with matte varnish and it the guache started to speckle up. That is what gave me the idea to pick off the paint around the figure. I would just use a brush with water and brush around the figure or put droplets and pick them off with a paper towel. This picture took a very long time. It was submitted to the Richmond Arts Contest unfinished and won best of show. When I found out, I told the jurors that I was not finished with it and asked to have it back to finish it. They were reluctant, for worry that I would alter it too much. I had to clear how I was going to finish it before the would let me have it back. Years later it was repurposed for magazine cover as well as a local magazine.
This was a spec piece I did for a Black History Month calendar. Ultimately they chose other artists, but they were intrigued with the piece enough so to ask for more samples. This was pretty much just a typical pencil and acrylic piece. For awhile I was all about this extreme horizontal format. Just one of those phases I guess.
This is a piece we did to pitch the Richmond Renegades on doing some trading cards of their own. Unfortunately they could not justify it, as their fan support was not there. Some years later when showing this piece, a friend of mine recognized this player as a friend of his. He wanted to buy the piece, but I have a hard time parting with my sports pictures.
Figured I would put up and image that I am pulling into the computer to finish. Started out traditional with oils, colored pencil, paint markers and whatever I could get my hands on. Not too happy with background as of yet. Going to experiment in the computer. Will post again sometime later.
This was another college piece. I don't remember the assignment but I do remember my thinking. I was striving to illustrate muscles and the human form convincingly.The X on the back of the head was a symbol that was having a resurgence in the late 80s. Also cutting designs in to hair was a big thing at the time. It was just supposed to feel powerful. Just for kicks I shopped the illustration to be a bit more topical to the current times and posted it beneath the original. The original was airbrush and colored pencil. The piece ended up being one of my promo piece mailers and was received pretty well during portfolio reviews.
