Roman

Been re-watching Rome lately, did these sketches of a soldier in and out of uniform. I love Rome so much drama, violence and debauchery I think they did a great job capturing the look and feel of the time. Many people I know feel that the series should have continued. I am of the belief that you should quit when your on top. The series was good it had two great seasons and two great endings to those seasons. Let it go do something else. There are tons of great stories out there. I think we need to look to the British model which is three seasons max. Instead of the American let's drag this story out for 9 seasons until nobody cares whether is ends or not model.

ladies sketches

Just some figure studies I was sketching the other day. Making the effort to do some colour studies as well. using thin paper with crow quill makes for some bleeding issues from page to page. I may just use the crow quill on some thicker stock and stick to brushwork in the sketchbooks for the sake of image transfer and clean-up.

I'm trying to draw women more they are difficult for me to draw but I have to keep at it else I will never succeed.

Spawn: Wings of Redemption in Colour

Here is the colour version of the Spawn Wings of redemption figure I promised. I have a long way to go but I am making some progress with digital colouring. More stuff to come in no particular order.

Cheers,

Colour Work

Yes I understand, I should do more colour. I'm at a bit of an impass though. I am usually just trying to get all the ideas and images out of my head and that leaves little time for colouring in what I'm drawing. I will do my very best as I actually enjoy colouring my work it ads a sense of depth and texture to what I draw. Here is a sketch of a hand with a screwed up pinky and a characature of Beth I did at Cafe 22 last night. Oh and another reason I don't do a lot of colour, you guys won't know this about the folfest images I posted. But there was some serious clean up going on. If you get those $3.00 Steadtler brush pens from Artist's Emporium, they are water soluble. So they may be convenient but if the ink gets wet good-by image. My sketchbook got damp with the heavy rains at folkfest and there was some serious bleeding going on between pages. So my newest method is to do pencil sketching go home do some colouring then go over my work in permanent ink. In this case I used a antelope brown acrylic ink. I like it on people bcause it is not as stark as black, it gives the image some warmth.

Beware water soluble ink.

Spawn: Wings of Redemption

For completing my illustration project. My good friend Adrian Shum bought me a Spawn collectible figure. I'm not actually a huge Spawn fan but I saw this figure about 7 years ago in New Zealand and I thought it was awesome. I always said I would buy it for myself but never really did. So in celebration of some published artwork Adrian bought the figure for me. Good man. He did ask that I do a sketch of Spawn so here is a sketch of him inked with a brush. I am in the process of colouring the sketch at the request of my wife. Who feels I never do enough colour work. I think I will do another sketch though as this one feels a bit static and literal. I feel like I got too caught up in how the figure actually looked instead of how "I" saw the figure. So I'm going to have another go.

Thanks Adrian you rule man!

Winnipeg Stadium Illustration

I am extremely excite.

I just did an illustration for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation of the Winnipeg Canad Inns Stadium. It was to show an option of what might be done with the current stadium for 20 million dollars. This is in response to the private sectore trying to get taxpayer money from the city to help fund the new stadium which is estimated at 400 million. I have no opinion other than I think debate is a great thing and if my illustration will help get people talking and god forbid participating in the democratic process, I'll be a happy man.

Useless Dogs

I made about 17 5.5"x8.5" sketchbook notepads the other day using recycled paper from work. I think it is a great way to make some use out of paper that has been printed on one side. I had quite a stack as I had been collecting for some time. I managed to score a thicker stock of paper for the covers. It is an uggly ass gray but it does the job. The best part about notebooks are the doodles. Especially the cover ones. Here is my newest doodle, I started out drawing this Chihuahua then I began adding more useless dog breeds floating in zero gravity. I'm going to colour this sketch but I wanted to post something as I have not done so in some time. Keep an eye out for the coloured piece.