How absolutely mortifying! Showing up at the party with the same make-up.
I hadn't touched my sketchbook since the Dr. Sketchy's Baltimore session I attended last month, and I could sense the pathetic thing was feeling a little neglected. I let myself sketch for an hour or so before bed, but I only made it through three and a half pages. Yeah, I'm a little rusty.
Not much else I can share at the moment. Uh... I really like people with painted skull faces. And I also really like Suede's "The Drowners".
My blog header insists that this is an illustration and design blog, so I figure it's about time that I post some actual design stuff. Even though I'm an Illustration major in school, I like to take Graphic Design classes too, the most recent one being a Typography course. One of our assignments last semester was to make a little booklet using one type family and a single body of text. I chose the ever-lovely Futura and the beautifully painful lyrics to Pulp's "Sheffield: Sex City." It's an old, old song from the band's early days, more spoken than sung by Mr. Jarvis Cocker (by the by: NYC show on July 30!). We also had to cut some squares out of a magazine and then use a selection of the random pictures as our images in the booklet. I got a lot of ladies, so that worked out. Above are two of my favorite spreads.
In Illustrated Book, where my Snow Queen project initially started, we were only required to do the illustrations (cover, interiors, end papers, etc.) so I decided to combine it with my Typography final, which was to do the text for a book of our choice. It ended up being a lot more work than I expected, but it was nice to have a full product in the end. This is an example of a completed spread, complete with extra-fancy hand-drawn flourishes.
My Typography professor occasionally uploads classwork, and you can see a few examples of my projects, including the full "Sheffield" booklet and more pages from my Snow Queen book, in this Flickr stream.
Oh! And I went to the MoCCA Festival last weekend. It was interesting, even though I awkwardly avoided eye contact with everyone and ran away after only a few hours. Really, I'll get this whole "human interaction" thing down eventually.
As a little break, I spent a few hours putting this together for the current Remake/Remodel challenge on Whitechapel. For some reason, I decided a good way to take a breather from the art I was working on would be to do... more... art. I don't know. Anyway, it was pretty fun to work on a guy's costuming and get a little crazy -- but not too crazy -- with the DIY look. This fellow is Click Rush, the Gadget Man. First of all... Click Rush. Come on. Secondly, he's a crime-fighting inventor who loves the color brown and takes orders from a sass-mouth toad. A toad. Mind you, this is a comic originally from the 1930s. Lastly... Click Rush. Read more about this extra-weird character and see other illustrations by visiting the R/R thread.
Also, I added a few more artists to my links section. I have hundreds of artists' sites bookmarked but the ones on my blog are part of the handful I always revisit when I'm in an artistic rut (in other words, half of their page views are from me). I'm not going to point out which ones are new because I want you to see them all. Ha! Dick move!... of kindness.
Also, also, I hope you all have been following Edgar Wright's daily photo/video posts on EdgarWrightHere.com. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is going to be ridiculous. I honestly can't wait. I mean, for fuck's sake, look at this.
Ah! I forgot to post these other illustrations from my Snow Queen book. The first is the little robber maiden, looking all sneaky and extra-prone to stabbing you in the face. You may recognize her from this earlier character design. Maybe not. The second image in this post is the super-bored princess that has read every newspaper in the world.
You've now seen three of seven interior pieces posted on this blog. That will probably be it. I'm confident your imagination can come up with something much cooler than I did for the remaining four.
Also, if you're interested in occasional in-progress pictures and updates, there's been a bit of that going on my Twitter, @anniew. I'll still post sketches every once in a while on the blog, but if I feel like showing a half-colored piece, that will be a Twitter sort of deal. Following me is also a fun way to track my decline into madness and find out what I had for lunch.
Click the image for a larger version. Do it. For serious.
Alejandro Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain (1973) is an assault to the eyes with a story that barely holds everything together. Ancient perverts with glass eyes! A room full of cake-faced Jesuses! Half-bearded men showering you in milk from their screaming cat tits! So yeah, it's pretty much one of my favorite films. My Illustration Concepts II final was a series of magazine ads for the movie. I chose interesting but not super-aggressive images because I wanted something to intrigue, not necessarily shock. The end products are kind of okay; I would have liked to have more time to clean them up. I enjoy the images as a group more than standalones, so that's how I'm presenting them. Here's the trailer, in case you're super-curious:
These were my studio professors for the past year, if you guys are interested in taking a peek at their work: Deanna Staffo, Brian Ralph, Daniel Krall, Ted McGrath, Jeremy Botts (my one Graphic Design teacher this year), Allan Comport (actually, he's an artists' rep; his site is an interesting business resource, as is that of the company he works with, Shannon Associates). Thanks for not failing me.
I enjoyed doing the Virgin Suicides book cover last semester, so when I had to design something for my Snow Queen jacket, I decided to revisit ridiculous hair. I swear I'll back off the swishy hair eventually, but doing that kind of linework with a good DVD or podcast playing in the background is my pathetic version of stress relief. Please note that this piece is meant to be folded almost in half around a book; there's no spine treatment because the book I actually constructed is too thin for it (ideally, this would have been a super-heavy, epic hardcover made from endless layers of actual snow and sheets of ice, but I settled for one of those small, hand-made paperbacks with lovingly hand-torn pages). There's also a bit of hand-lettering in the title because I picked up some gothic calligraphy in Typography class. Thumbs up.
In other swishy hair news, I submitted the aforementioned Virgin Suicides piece to American Illustration, and it has been accepted to their online Tribute gallery. The collection of "Chosen" pieces will be up in November, I believe. Congratulations to everyone that made it into the gallery or book. Double thumbs up.
Classes are over, kids. Next up, Senior year. Crippling doubt and self-loathing at the ready!
Hey! Remember these fancy-looking guys? They're the mirror trolls from the Snow Queen series I'm doing. This is my first completed chapter illustration, so I thought I'd let you folks see the overall "look." I may go back in and add more tone later; I'm not sure. Suggestions welcome. And please, please click through to view the bigger version. That's the only way to see all the excruciatingly detailed parts I lovingly addressed, especially in the trolls' outfits (created with items from my own closet, apparently).
I'm in the middle of multiple massive projects, so while the posting may be light right now, expect to get smacked in the face with non-stop updates soon. This is assuming that all goes according to plan and I don't hate the end products, forever protecting them from the judging eyes of the Internet.
In unrelated news, I had an excellent birthday weekend in New York. I must plug the band I saw, Weep, which is fronted by one of my personal heroes, Doc Hammer (I mean that in the most genuine, un-fangirly way, though despite my very best efforts when seeing him in person, my nervous laughter sometimes kicks in anyway). The music was even better live and, let me just say, the audience saw some tattoos most fans are probably not even aware of. All in all, not a bad way to enter Year 21.
For you! A quick sketch from a few weeks ago and some reading material.
Mr. Chris Arrant recently interviewed me for Newsarama's Up & Coming series. Check it out. And sorry to those of you that have seen me link to this wherever I have a presence on the Internet. It's really your own fault for being my friend.
In the interview, I mention this year's Baltimore Comic-Con, which I don't think I've brought up anywhere else. Well, a few friends and I will be in the Artists' Alley for the first time, under the group name "Society of the Okay." No, it's not much of a society, but our last names (Rochon, Suvarnasuddhi, Wu) don't really lend themselves to any sort of fun formation. Anyway, keep October 10 and 11 open if you want to see me look confused behind a table, in a place other than a classroom.
My Snow Queen project is also mentioned, but there aren't any images. I was ready to scan some more for this entry, only to remember that everything's currently in non-photo blue. Those will have to wait.
There's a variety of other interesting things coming up. All shall be revealed in time.
More fashion illustration stuff. Our assignment was to depict a vice and its complementary virtue in fashionable theatrical posters (meant to be displayed side-by-side). I got Wrath and Patience and, after trashing a lot of other ideas, I came up with this. It's a little disagreement between psychotic Ira and super-chill Patientia (Latin, get on it). These were both printed out at 18"x24", which looks pretty nice, despite the fact that such a size magnifies each and every mistake of my 9"x12" originals. Some of you may remember I also did a vice and virtue assignment back in Sophomore year, with Lust and Chastity. It's very strange for me to see how much my work has changed in less than two years.
I was listening to this Radiohead cover of Carly Simon's James Bond song, "Nobody Does It Better", almost non-stop through the final stages of this project. It was kind of ridiculous and a little embarrassing. Anyway, here it is, in case you've never experienced this amazingness.
Also, the last half of March seems to have blinked into non-existence, because it's somehow April now. Did you know? This is the part where my brain explodes and I start bleeding from the eyes. More news later. Possibly. Maybe. Perhaps.
Lame title, I know, but it had to be done. At least I didn't use PON FARR-OCIOUS. It's a long walk, though it would have explained why LadySpock is looking a little sassier than usual.
This is for my Fashion & Lifestyle Illustration class. Each of us were assigned a different upcoming movie and had to create a related fashion spread using current runway fashion and female models. Luckily, I got Star Trek, which I secretly super-wanted in the first place. I immediately decided to draw a LadyKirk and LadySpock, so that was pretty easy. The flailing redshirts came later in the process, but they were still a lot of fun. Kirk and Spock are too busy looking hot to pay attention! And their crew is dying! Hilarious.
Obviously, I took some liberties with the ship's design and pulled some inspiration from the Star Trek: TOS too. For example, Chris Pine's Kirk seems to be wearing mostly grey and black in the movie, so I referred to William Shatner's mustard top instead. Oh, and I added bangles around their wrists instead of those rank braids that always reminded me of bad bricabrac.
Kirk and Spock are wearing Meadham Kirchoff and Alexander McQueen; Kirk has an additional Shipley & Halmos jacket and that black piece over Spock's dress is from Gucci. I think the redshirts are all wearing Fendi and Miss Sixty. If you're having some difficulty working with modern costuming, a good resource is Style.com. Just click through their runway photos; they're really fantastic. There's the option of sorting by model, so you can spend an entire afternoon staring at Jessica Stam and only Jessica Stam. I mean, if that's what you're into.
Also, hello to new visitors from the blogs of Rafael Soldi and Warren Ellis, both fine, beautifully creative gentlemen that deserve your fan-love and attention. Hello, hello.
I have so much work to post right now, I can't upload it all for fear of it CRUSHING THE INTERNET. I hope you don't mind if I share only select things from the past few weeks.
I'm in a class called Illustrated Book right now, and it basically breaks down as a semester-long project in which we pick a book and then, well, (re-)illustrate it. I chose Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen (designs shown are the Robber Maiden and the floaty mirror trolls). I remember it being my favorite fairy tale when I was little, though I don't know why, because it's extra-dreary, not particularly action-packed, and there wasn't a Disney version. Anyway, I was initially anxious about having to work on one thing for an entire semester, but now I'm pretty excited about how this is going to turn out. I'm planning on using pencil for the entire thing, which I haven't done before. Hopefully this will help me make the characters a more eerie and stylish than I have seen them in other books and allow my drawings to retain some of that energy that often gets lost during the inking process.
Also, I mentioned in my previous post that the Charm City Roller Girls used my "Let Them Eat Skate" illustration for their March poster (Art Director: Katy Clark; Design: Craig Lammes). Well, here it is all fancied up and ready for brawling. I swear, going to see live roller derby for the first time was even better than I expected. I'm not sure if this is because roller derby is awesome in general or because the CCRG did so incredibly that night. Regardless, I'm definitely going again.
Also, also, completely unrelated to illustration... Saturday night, I went to see Patton Oswalt record his new special in DC. That guy doesn't get nearly enough recognition, especially for his stand-up. He's my favorite comedian and I think if you check out his performances or read his blog, you'll enjoy him too. Here's a fanvid someone made for a routine that never gets old.
... Yeah, I just wanted an excuse to use that line from his act as my Title.
I'm mildly embarrassed about that title, but I couldn't think of anything better.
For my Illustration Concepts II class, we had to put a spin on an old myth or folk tale. This is Theseus as a matador, after conquering a massive minotaur. Obviously, Theseus is cool enough to get away with just a bloody nose, a mussed collar and a model-scowl. In my previous post, you can see a sketch for the other myth I was considering (human/cyborg Hermaphroditus).
In other news, the awesome Charm City Roller Girls and their art director, Katy Clark, are using my "Let Them Eat Skate" illustration for an upcoming poster. I'll upload the final poster after I see it at this weekend's bout, which I will be attending as a first-time viewer. Check out the Charm City Roller Girls website for more details and Flickr for some completely insane photos of the girls in action.
Lastly, two of my pieces were accepted by the Society of Illustrators Student Competition. The Interrobang group shot and the Virgin Suicides cover (second image) will be in the exhibition and catalog this year. This was my first time entering and I don't really know what to say about this, so I'll leave it alone for now, for fear of sounding like an idiot. Congratulations to everyone that got in (see: MICA peers; all institutions).
Surprise! Sketches. Lots of pencil and no real explanations as to why both ladies have their heads tilted at similar angles. I guess the left one stemmed from having Rocky Horror Picture Show on the brain because I'm playing Magenta in an upcoming shadow cast production. It's going to be interesting, since I'm the type that wears knee-high socks under pants for maximum protection against ankle exposure. And the lady on the right has an eyepatch because I gave up on fixing her eyeshadow on that side. I grant you full permission to create an infinitely cooler background story; it won't be difficult.
And this was for a myth re-telling assignment. I originally wanted to do a cyborg version of the Hermaphroditus myth (cyborg in lieu of a nymph, obviously), but the professor told me to go with my other sketch, which depicted a massive minotaur and Theseus as a super-surly matador. So this Hermaphroditus sketch probably won't become any more realized, unfortunately. Fingers crossed the Theseus illustration won't be too horrible to share online. I should note that I'm currently coloring it and Theseus has magenta tights. Gather your own conclusions.
By the way, did you know I'm on Twitter? 'Cause I am (@anniew).
I'm taking a fashion/lifestyle illustration class this semester, and our first assignment was to illustrate a location and appropriate designer clothes on some sexy people. Fair enough. I chose the NYC sewers because I'm a complete idiot. It was between that or mod England in the 60s and I went for the most unsexy of all unsexy places, but whatever. It was a challenge.
I did four illustrations in all but I only liked these two. The first features a 2007 Alexander McQueen and a bunch of dead goldfish, the second has two surly looking people wearing an odd mix of designers, plummeting through the pipes with a not-so-baby alligator. I was super-excited about this assignment and wish I had more time to work on it, but I got sick over the weekend and wasn't up to drawing anything pretty in my snotty state.
And now for a bunch of news regarding comics: I finally started Runaways and finished the first three volumes with record speed. It was a lot of fun, just like everything else Brian K. Vaughan does (I'm convinced the man saved Lost; bow to him). I then read the first four volumes of Scott Pilgrim, which were fantastic. I'm incredibly excited to see what Edgar Wright can do with the movie version of this.
I'm also feeling kind of down about not going to New York Comic-Con this weekend because I've gone for the past two years. If you see any people you know I extra-like around the convention center, please make them feel uncomfortable for me. Give some of those [adult swim] guys a completely uninvited, jaunty lapdance, bellow a dirty joke in Huttese to every slave Leia cosplayer you see, do what you gotta do. Just make the folks around the Javits Center feel like I'm still there, weirding people out. I'd really appreciate it.
