Vesuvius

I took a Book Arts class this last semester of school which was rad. This was one of my "books"

This project was inspired by a Sufjan Stevens song, Vesuvius.  My goal was to mix in a little bit of (almost) everything I love: Design, Illustration, narratives and Sculpture. And then being a three-dimessional piece, incorporating photography to photograph it. (A note on that: On my last tour to Austin with The Diamond Center in April, I lost my main camera setup Canon 30D and IS lens... Luckily, still have my Rebel and was able to bring it back from the grave)

                                      
Underneath the Volcano, is a book slipcase and book telling the story of the couple in the landscape traveling to the volcano.

  It was an interesting challenge working with a triangular shaped book and triangular compositions with and actually very fun with the illustrations.

dip pen, digital color and wacom tablet for the typography.

 The trees and bushes etc. the the type is set on, are the shrubbery files that I used in the physical 3D landscape.

                                      

Here are the drawings.

I forgot the one below in the final book. It acted as a rest between the forest spirit page and second to last page before they hurl themselves in to the volcano (spoiler alert)

 warmup drawing with the dip pen. It's been quite a while. but I really dig this drawing.

 mock ups. I like the first one the most of the entire project. OH WELL.

In the Toolbox

Here are a couple tools I've been using extensively and appreciating recently.

Not the nib, but the holder. It's a Tachikawa T-36 holder and man has it made a difference in the amount of time I can draw with a nib.  The standard sort of "economy" nibs are thin left my hands cramped and only able to ink for about 30 minutes at a time.  I decided to invest in one after completing this piece. 
$5.40 on jetpens.com

This is a carpenters pencil, but I think this one came in a dinky graphite starters pack I had in 3rd grade. But nonetheless, it is an excellent mark maker. Plus you have to use a knife to sharpen it, which I have absolutely no complaint about. :) Heres some drawings below showing some of the variation you can get with this mighty beast.

I actually started sharpening all my pencils this way.  I noticed I can actually get a much longer life out of the graphite before having to sharpen it again!

The Devil Went Down to Georgia!

The Devil Went down to Georgia, 20"x16", dip pen and wash (sumi ink) on 300lb WC paper

I completed most of this piece at the Illustration Academy this summer. The assignment was given by Chris Payne, and the assignment was 'a conversation'. So, through much processing and ideation song, 'The Devil goes Down to Georgia' by Charlie Daniels came to mind. I was inspired by boss battles I wanted to give it a David and Goliath feel.

The piece is 20"x16" which felt a little daunting, tackling pretty much the entire thing with a dip pen. The washes were added in the end. I wasn't planning on adding ink washes; I wanted to get tone with line, but I felt it appropriate and I think that it helped add a sense of atmosphere in the image.

A goal I had was to pencil in as little as possible. Mostly just to keep the almost endless hatching and drawing fun for me. Because there was no way I was penciling in that beard and tracing it in ink. I got away with only marking in the face, most of the violin and part of the hand. The rest was exploration. It was a blast and Im pretty happy with the result.

Another goal was that I wasn't going to white out my mistakes, and there were ALOT of mistakes. Instead I planned on just scratched them out with a razor. You can see in the detail shot below, I scratched out little Johnny twice. That was scary. He needs to be redone, but he'll do for now.
beeeaaaarrrd. I have one too.
I just realized I forgot the strings on the Devil's violin... I'll be working on that! In the mean time let me know what you think! Thanks!

Sufjan Stevens: process drawing

I thought I should post some of the process drawing from the piece I posted yesterday (thanks dadu!) This was a small part of the process in coming to a solution, but by far the most enjoyable of any piece I have done.

Overall, I love this page in my sketchbook much more than the piece itself. You may too, maybe.  As always, it's just fresher and without any reserve. I guess they both serve there own purpose, but I remember how fun it was just to draw this with my trusty 'ol dip pen and ink. Hope you enjoy!

In the Sketchbook

 This is a small portion of recent stuff, It's become harder to share sketchook stuff... Maybe because it's become very personal to me... most of which I haven't shared :)