a little editorial

I wanted to see if I could do a little editorial illustration in a couple hours before I go to bed. Didn't quite finish. I'll probably wrap it up tomorrow. Overall though, not too happy with it. I think it would be nice to make quick little opinion drawings, and have them look nice. Needs work. The idea behind this one was a commentary on the rampant spread on vampire love in pop culture.

Sheep

Just wanted to see if I could blog an instagram pic (@jeremyforson)

Zatanna

Alllllright. So, I had an idea to do comic book covers just for fun. This would be my idea for the cover of Zatanna #1, July 2010. I have a whole list of books I thought would be fun to make covers for, and this is where I started. I like the character, the magic/witchcraft aspect, there's lots of demons which is a big plus for me, and she lives in San Francisco, big plus! I'm happy with this, I think switching to digital has really opened things up for me. I'm much more inclined to experiment and paint with reckless abandon because I'm not afraid to mess up some part of the painting I like. The way I think about it, it's like a game of 21. When I'm painting with acrylics, if I've got an area of the painting that's a 19, I usually play it safe and stay there.

The guy with the knife is Brother Night. I know he looks like the Joker, but that's because he looks like the Joker. Take it up with DC. I took liberties with the characters. Ember is a half dragon lady, I wanted her to look a little more dragon-like than she is in the book. I gave Romalthi an octopus mask, even though he (she?) only turns into a frog/pig/and snail in the book. I also wanted Zatanna to be more dark looking. I feel like she usually looks kinda.... ordinary, for lack of a better word. Like a school teacher with implausible mams. I thought she should look a little more dark and mystical, like a Selma Blair, or Catherine Zeta Jones maybe. I'm sure if this was a commissioned job, I wouldn't be able to take such artistic liberties, but hey, this is just for fun. I've been "painting" this for a few days, kinda losing track of time because I just zone and noodle for hours when I'm working this way. At some point it's good to just stop, call it done. I want to make a lot of these, so I can't get too hung up on small details. It's easy to do that when you can zoom in %2400.

I have a list of covers I want to make. I plan to keep chipping away at it until I finish, or get pulled away on some other work. I chose them either because they are my favorites, or the play to what I consider my strength, which is creepy monster stuff. Here's the list in no particular order. If you have a suggestion, speak now or forever hold your peace!

Batman
Akira
Hellboy
Judge Dredd
Conan
Zombies(as if for a zombie comic, not a specific one)
Zatanna
Wildcats
Lobo
Tank Girl

Prop. 8

I've been wanting to do an illustration about Prop. 8, California's constitutional ban on same sex marriage, for some time now, but I was too busy working on other projects. I've left my company, amicably, and I'm now working on a new portfolio, and looking for work. It feels great to be doing personal pieces again :)

Over the summer I was working on NDA projects that have yet to be released, and it helped me to take a break from gallery work and illustration, and get some perspective on what I've been doing. Sometimes (in whatever you're doing) you can hit a wall, and it helps to take a break and come back to it. I don't know the exact science of why it helps, but it seems like your mind needs time off to make new neural connections. Now that I'm back at it, I feel as if I "leveled up" and it's amazing! When I'm drawing, it seems like I'm not moving the pencil, it's just doing what I'm thinking. Spooky. One direction I did not expect to be heading in was digital. I guess that the computer has been playing an increasingly larger role in my picture making over the last year or so, but after doing the Zombie self-portrait, and now this, I've become a digital convert. I can't imagine what this piece would be like if I tried to paint it, not to mention how long it would have taken. I'm in love with the speed and flexibility of working digitally, and for mostly practical reasons I expect to continue in this direction. I feel that I did a pretty good job of bringing my painting style into the digital realm, but I'd like some feedback on that. I'm showing some new influences as well. Since I got an iPhone, I've been digging vintage photography apps, and you can see that I applied a cross-process look to this illustration.


I really wanted to do an opinion illustration about this subject for a couple reasons. I haven't seen any illustrations about it, and it's an issue I feel strongly about. I think Barron Storey would say that's exactly the kinds of things you need to illustrate.

If you don't know, there's a big deal about gay marriage right now, duh. What you might not ave heard is that the Mormon church has put vast sums of money into banning gay marriage in California, which is why there's a little Mormon guy in the corner. This idea started off being humorous, a rampaging prop 8 monster destroying a city of gay wedding cakes, and in the beginning the monster was kinda silly looking, like a Japanese vinyl toy or something, but conceptually that bothered me. I didn't want prop. 8 to be cute or funny at all, because that's not how I feel about it, I wanted it to look as scary as possible. We're dealing with bigotry made into law after all. What I've ended up with is a mix of humor and horror that I had a lot of fun making.

Happy Halloween!

Zombie self-portrait for conceptart.org's CHOW. Came out pretty good I think. This is really my first digital "painting." I suppose I could have been doing painting this way all along, but I would always get impatient when working so long in photoshop. I have some misguided expectation that everything I do on the computer has to happen quickly, and when it comes to digital paintings, it's not really the case. It is still faster then doing to by hand, and much more forgiving.


Here's a little process. I just did what I normally do in paint with photoshop. Basic grisaille technique.

Civilized Creature

Another sketchoholic submission I did for a warm up. It's been nice to do these just for fun, and at least I have something to show people since everything else has been under wraps for months. This one is a little different because I want straight from pencils to color. Worked out ok, and saved me some time not having to ink it.

Hairy Creature

Did a little sketch for sketchoholic.com today. Topic: Hairy Creature. I don't do these contests a lot, but I thought it might be a good warm up exercise. Besides, it was fun!