I could probably go on tweaking this for another week, but I think I'm just going to go with it's finished now. Mostly worked on it at a crap monitor and then when I saw it on the laptop it was like "woah, gotta fix that" and then several hours later I'm still trying to fix the brightness and values and siiiiiiiiigh.
Anyway it looks good now on my screen currently, which means it's way too dark on my work monitor. But I think this is closer to what would look good on the average person's monitor screen. Hopefully.
This was very fun for me because it combines my love of jellyfish and red hair. :] It's not supposed to be Ariel (though I know that's the response it's going to get but I'm okay with that) just a redhead with green eyes (not blue) who happens to be cool with existing with jellies in her hair. Cropped it because I thought it looked more interesting that way...hm.
Some process shots:
When I was drawing this I would lose track of what was tentacle and what was hair, ha. Thus the red pencil lead.
Anytime I post what I think I'm going work on next I end up lying. Not on purpose, but I'm easily distracted, art-wise. But I think I'm either going to work on a fan art of one of Garth Nix's characters, or a new goofy self portrait, or a mock up bookcover for a story I came up with off the cuff when I friend texted me asking for a bed time story with the only condition being it had to be "a fantasmical story of whimsical proportions". Yes. Fantasmical.
Oh where to begin? With all the social networks out there it's easy to forget about blogging. At least for me. Honestly the best way to keep up with what I'm working on is to follow me on facebook, deviantART, or Behance or just periodically looking at my web site. I should probably look more into this tumblr thing the kids are into these days.
Anyway besides illustration work I've been doing a lot of craft projects around the apartment, ranging from humongous to small wall doohickeys. I might make some "how to" blog posts if anyone is particularly interested.
Here's some shots of the bottle lamps I've been working on:
Kraken rum bottle makes a nice accent in my dining room. I need to look into some LED bulbs, as this guy heats up. Regular string lights strung up into it, after drilling the hole and an extension cord.The Fish Eye one isn’t finished yet, as I need to get a shade for it, and I have plans on stenciling some jellyfish on it. Lamp bits kit, drilled bottle with the lamp cord threaded up into it and filled with different marble things to make the base heavy enough to support the lamp part but also ‘cause it looks cool. Thinking about trying to sell some wine bottles filled with lights, but as Etsy never really picked up for me I’m not too keen on posting variants of these guys up there.
Annnnd here is the monster that took up the dining room (the biggest area I had room to work on it in) for months, as it took me awhile to gather supplies and work on it in shifts. I tend to do craft projects on impulse, and I bought this dresser at the salvation army completely spur of the moment (stare at it, I want it, grab the ticket so no one else can) and then called my sister for assistance with moving it as she has a mom van. I wanted it to be blue, and after looking on the internets for ideas on painting and tips I decided it was to be crackle paint. So a large jug of Elmer’s, giant can of Behr paint, a small can of Minwax polyurethane,one replacement knob I had to modify to fit the massive screws, and lots of blow drying and now I have a very eye-catching dresser to help contain my massive amount of t-shirts.
Since I have a good amount of that paint left over I’ve been using it on random ideas, like wall hooks for jewelry and picture frames. I still have so much.
And how about some illustrations? Here’s a card I did for Hanukkah, a Venice jester based on a photo by Robert Anthony. (Here’s the link for the ref photo and a close up of her face and also a somewhat macabre scene my brain visualized while listening to some Florence + the Machine, the "Seven Devils" song in a particular. The girl with the jellyfish is what I'm currently working on.
And oh yeah! My book was published. Yay. So I was able to post some of the work I did. You can see more of them here. And you can see the book’s site here, with my work all over it.
There’s been more stuff I’ve worked on but I’m not going to make this post any longer. And if anyone wants to hire me to doodle all day and make crafty things that would be great, as my graphic design job just laid off 40 people and I’m not exactly thrilled about my job security.
Thanks to Barry and recently Connie, I have been working on things...I swear...sadly I get bored midway and move on to something else, and repeat. Those watercolors in the previous couple posts, they are mostly vectors now, look more polished. I've been reevaluating how I work, and have gone almost completely digital. Here's some completed vectors, for you to get an idea of where I'm heading (I think).
Lately I've been burnt out on working on ye olde mac, and trying to get my hands dirty again, at least for a bit. May have some watercolor sketches up, or at least over at Sketchraiders, a blog Ms. Medusa Lemieux started that has a few graduates of PCA&D posting their work. It's helped motivate me, I sometimes miss being in a class of people working on similar projects.
If you're interested in seeing all the completed vectors so far, you can check them here (my main site is getting a total revamp, so view this carbonmade one for now). Will try and stay on the ball, and update more frequently. Ha.
Working on lots of watercolor stuff for school, but made a vector on my own, since Charlie was so fond of my other ones. Some day I will have two portfolios, one for the vectors, one for the traditional watercolor. For now I have to concentrate on one area. Curses. So I'm doing vectors in my spare time (Read as "at 2 AM").
And now I have this:
Which came from this doodled in a notebook while working on my Red Riding Hood watercolor school piece:
This is about the same size as the original doodle.
The wolf idea came from various sources, some personal, but one inspired by the 10th Kingdom miniseries where the wolf is mostly human.
I always feel disappointed seeing my vectors not in an ai file. No matter what I do they are distorted in some way. Sigh. Here the colors are a bit off. The colors are more vibrant here: http://roguehobbit.deviantart.com/art/Red-99563189 though more likely to be ripped off so thus the giant watermark on the full size version. You can also see the full thing there.
But I'm pretty happy with the final ai file. I had a lot of fun with shapes and colors and flatness of perspective which I just can't capture with watercolor. Hopefully I'll have more vector ideas and time to do them. Must work on Halloween costume as well though...
Like all my "journals" throughout my life, my updating has been random, with bouts of renewed interest. Lately whenever I've felt like maybe posting something (like more art, imagine that) or ranting about This, That and the Other I've been dissuaded by the fact that I doubted anyone actually read this, besides one person who I would rather didn't know any more about my daily life. Also, I'm lazy.
But apparently I'm interesting enough to have VerveEarth e-mail me. Of course they want me to advertise for them, which I have (look at the widget. Look at it!). But if this gets my blog any more attention so much the better, because maybe some day someone will see some actual art and want to hire me. So on the off chance of that happening, I'm willing to add a widget for the chance of more (positive, not creepy thank you very much) attention.
It's summer, whoo. All jr.s have to have a "mentorship" over the course of the summer, and I pestered Jack Unruh to be my mentor (http://www.jackunruh.com/home.html) and he agreed. The poor man. So I'm working on that currently, we have to complete at least one project under our mentor's tutorledge. If I don't frick up it should turn out pretty awesomely. As soon as I scan in and send in the sketch to Jack I'll....I was about to lie. I may or may not put in extra effort and post it here. Ooooh, suspense. Will she or won't she?
Alright, some arting. Besides the mentorship and some emo-ness, I've been making happy vectors.
The pandas are from my Maya class, we had to design a room, and make some art using an Adobe product to put on the wall. Bleh. I like my octopus. If you want to see these bigger, and some other stuff, go here: http://roguehobbit.deviantart.com/ Maybe I'll get around to posting some of the watercolors I did at the end of the year. Mm. I should. I want to do a giant acrylic painting of the octopus vector, I think it would just be cool to have that on a wall and have it attack some poor smuck's eyeballs upon entering the apartment. Perhaps after the mentorship is over.
Currently I'm watching a group of young 19-20 year old males play Pixel Junk Monster. It's rather amusing. Watching them gathered around the tv on the floor playing a cute game while cursing at towers and insulting each other, I mean. Though the game is fun too (dancing on towers I can do). My amusement may be due to the fact that it's 6:30 in the morning, but hey.
Oh, I caved and am whoring some vectors on cafepress merchandise. Care to buy a button or t-shirt and help me buy more supplies? :D? http://www.cafepress.com/roguehobbit
Alright, I'm finished blabbing for now. Laters (but how much later no one knows...do doo doooo).
