Woodland Creatures

Finished artwork India ink, watercolor and Photoshop

 

I am starting to play around with some woodland creatures,   

I do not know what will come of it but they are fun to draw.

 

Fox sketch craft paper, color pencil, and Pigma BRUSH pen.  

Is Your Name Timmy?

 

 The sketch was done with a ballpoint pen.

 I got the pen from the Hyatt Hotel NYC back in February during the 2013 SCBWI Winter Conference.  

 

 

Using a brush pen I inked the character onto a clear sheet of vellum.  

 

 

 

I scanned the character into my computer;

Then added a splash of color using Photoshop. 

Illustration Friday "Shy"

 

Getting this one done just under the wire.

With hurricane Sandy and then the Northeastern blowing around it is amazing I got anything done in the last few weeks.

Anyway this is the image for

Illustration Friday's
word challenge for the week

 "Shy"   

 

 

Illustration Friday "Suspend"

I will never listen to a mouse again.

I will never listen to a mouse again.

 I will never listen to a mouse ag.......

Illustration Fridays

weekly word challenge

 "Suspend"

Illustration Friday "space"

This weeks topic

from

Illustration Friday

is

"Space"

Wedding

Oh Crap! I drew two Grooms!!!

maybe no one will notice

On Saturday I am off to a wedding it has been a long time since any of my friends got married.

The thought of putting on a suite in this weather is not my idea of fun. But what can you do.

The card is hand drawn and painted in Photoshop.

 I usually make all my cards, it is rare I don't have the time to put something together.      

Illustration Friday "Faded"

Good Night Sun!

Illustration Friday "sight"

The goal is in sight

Illustration Friday

"sight"

7 x 8 pen and ink digitally painted

Illustration Friday "Puzzled"

Illustration Friday

"Puzzled"

"When did that happen?"

Illustration Friday "Shades"

"Shades"

2012 Tomie dePaola Award Part 5

 I used to add color using water color over my pen and ink drawings.

But that all changed when I was taught how to work in Photoshop, 

It took me six months to understand how the program worked ; it took me another

 six months not to look like I was painting on a computer.

So the question I get asked is "why bother?";

in someways it saves me time. But what I truly like about it is that it gives

me more freedom to play with color with out messing up the original pen and ink.

Nothing less fun then re-drawing an image that took you days to ink, and it never comes out looking as fresh. I also love to layer the color tones overlap them then blend

 I feel it gives the artwork some depth.

Depending on the illustration I can use a few layers or many

This one had quite a few layers with all the characters on one page it was easier to

 keep them apart then blend them together later.

I think I spent about two weeks from start to finish.  

well worth the time!

Almost done

(BTW this is version CS5)



New books that came in the mail

In the last couple of weeks I received two out of the three books I was hoping to receive in the mail.

The first book is “Photoshop CS5 in easy steps” this book just made my life a little bit easier, I used the CS2 version to help me understand how that program worked; so it was a no brainer when I realized that this newer version changed enough that it took me an (1) hour to find how to cut paste and resize a head from one body to a new body then I couldn’t remember how I did it. Frustrating!

The other book that just came in the mail is “The Great Song Book” illustrated by Tomi Ungerer I was introduced to Mr. Ungerer artwork through Michael Sporn’s blog post the book is out of print but I was able to buy a copy from a used book dealer.

Sides note: I bought both books from Amazon web site; I have read and was told in the past how some people have had problems with their customer service to this date I have not. On the books I have illustrated sometimes thing are wrong like my name misspelled or no book cover artwork both I don’t understand how that happens but it does. I was told that “Amazon will fix it when they feel like it” well not really true you contact them tell them what is wrong and they fix it within three days. I have sent them the book cover artwork or the correct spelling of my name and it is taken care of simple! I have also had questions on orders I placed and have had nothing but good response from the people I have spoken to.

Illustration from Ferdinand Frog's Flight

The third book I am still waiting for is “Ferdinand Frog’s Flight” this is the last book I illustrated with 4RV Publishing and I am still waiting to see what the finished project looks like. If I can swing the cash there are a couple of contest I would like to summit it too but I’m not going to spend money on purchasing copies of the book if I don’t know what the end product looks like.  

The illustrations in this post are from the “The Great Song Book”  I have taken them from Michael Sporn’s Blog or “Splog” post (click me to link)

Easter Weekend



We were close, very close

closer then we have ever been before.

But age is agents us as we neared our pray, our arthritis kicked in and the

 Easter Bunny hopped into its SUV and sped off

Quick trick with Photoshop

I hope everyone had a very nice Easter