Merry Holidays, and tonight is all good

This will be FFWD tommorrow as part of the 'contents series'- a twelve week run of illustrations from various artists that I was asked to participate in in November. It was great, because I had total freedom to do whatever I wanted. This is what I ended up doing.

I will be going on my first holiday in over a year: to Tofino, to surf in the icy waters of the North Pacific with all my friends and drink beers. So don't expect to see or hear anything coherent out of me until the 4th or 5th day of 2010. Happy Christmasdays evvabody!

The Grapes of Seduction

These were some last minute Spots, appearing in FFWD, to accompany an article about which wines are most suitable for the purposes of seduction. Champagne and Chardonnay, apparently.

Shopping for a Fantasy

Here's the Mock up, and final, for a full page comic to be appearing in christmas issue of FFWD, on stands tommorrow. I was given a reader submitted story and told to turn it into a comic. The finished results are a bit risque, to say the least. Enjoy.

Bring Your Rubber Pants

A Halloween themed piece for Drew Anderson and FFWD, in Calgary, out this week.

I Accidentally the whole Cover!

The Media gatekeepers over at FFWD were brazen enough to hire a yahoo such as myself to do the illustration for the cover, and the cover story. Titled "Mass Exodus", it was written by Julia Bevin and Anthea Black, the article discusses what is needed to build the Calgary Arts community, and the revolving door of artists who leave and return to Calgary once or more throughout their careers. Straight off the bat, I only had a rough description of the subject. I was asked to emphasize the themes of building, community, and people leaving. So I got to work Sketching, and sent them this:

You know, making it, I was thinking: Fuck yeah, they're building a giant red cow, but that guy is stealing bricks as he exodizes off to some other city. This is going to be the most awesome illustration ever! But no, the idea was rejected. The cow was too cheesy, the image was too busy, and it didn't quite fit with the story. In hindsight, they were right, and I was wrong. So I sent them a bunch more sketches, and they ultimatelysettled on this one:

So I cleaned it up a bit, and gave them the Rough draft:

They seemed happy with it, so I got busy with the Ball point pen, on a sheet of 11x17 bond paper, and whipped out this:

All coloured up, it came out like this. Fiddling with the colours ends up taking alot longer than you think it should.

I erased some of the bushes, lassooed the cloud and slid it over, and got this:

This is what it looks like, all said nd done, on newstands throughout Calgary:

And as an added bonus I threw in a drawing for the inside (beats me as to whether they ran it or not, I can't find it at the FFWD website):

Revamp

I wasn't completely happy with the illustration I gave FFWD. My thinking got all uptight. Here I made a few simple changes and it looks so much better. I'll have to be more on the ball next time.

This is a quick sketchy version of the Eyeball I saw last night while falling asleep. When I get a chance I'll have to do a nice version. I've been meaning to get to the outerspace stuff for a while- I had a bunch of 'Alice In Wonderland In Space' type ideas last fall, and I'd like to get to them. They'd make a good series of paintings if done bright and big and cartoony. But while I type I'm procrastinating on paintings I should be doing now.

Loire Valley Wines

Hey, Sorry for the long deadzone between posts. First I was lethargic about the whole thing, and then, when Artwalk came along, I was super busy. But get a load of my first Bonafide Illustration. I drew her to accompany Kevin Maclean's article on the wines of the Loire Valley in France, Published in this weeks Issue of Fast Forward, in Calgary. Check out all the dead space to the left of her. I wish I had put something in there. Oh, Well. I'll do better next time. I had initially drawn her wearing coveralls and a plaid shirt, and with braids- workwear common in the region, but she came out looking like a hillbilly, so, no. Heres the original ballpoint pen drawing. As you can see, the face was replaced one I modelled after Audrey Tatou: