Thomas

I went to my friend Aaron's cabin to spend part of the long weekend this May long. I had a relaxing time and managed to get some drawing done out there as well.

Here are a couple quick sketches of my friend Tom. The first is of him playing barrel of monkeys, the second is Tom playing cards and has a better likeness to him, being the one done after a bit of warming up. Both of them could use a bit of cleaning up maybe looking at the lines now. This is one of the first life observation drawings I have done in my brown sketchbook, though I have been drawing people a whole bunch in my large white sketchbook, as well as my smaller more inconspicuous white sketchbook. I think since December I have been drawing people from life regularly, whether it be sketch club at lunch, or on the C-Train riding to and from work. I have been meaning to upload some of those sketches as well, but for now here is Thomas. Perhaps this will be the first in a series of friend sketches....

raccoon

Just a raccoon I drew the other night, gave him a bigger, more squashed face to make it a bit more stylized.

girls girls girls

3 new drawings of girls from my brown sketchbook. I've been drawing lots of girls over the past while. These are all done using a photo reference. The top one is my favorite here I think. I may try messing with these drawings in photoshop later.

R.I.P. Frank Frazetta

All of his stuff was super imaginative and always bad ass. I don't know nearly enough about all his work as I should but I know enough to realize what a huge impact he made in the sci-fi and fantasy art world, and what a loss it is to lose him.

RIP Frank Frazetta
1928-2010

new brown sketchbook

I hit up the annual sale at the Mona Lisa art supplies store on 17th ave last weekend. Between the Mona Lisa sale, Comic Expo, Free Comic Book Day, and The Mission Skate Warehouse sale I spent quite a bit of money in April. Hopefully I stockpiled enough stuff to last me a little while.

Among my purchases at Mona Lisa were a few brown paper sketchbooks and a black and white colour erase pencil. Here are my first couple drawings from them as well as me playing with color in photoshop with one of the sketches. I like the look of these drawings once they've been scanned so expect to see a bunch more brown paper sketches. They have a nice warm feeling and some nice natural texture as well.

in memory of guru

Last month on April 19th a hip hop legend passed away, Keith Elam better known as Guru of hip hop group Gang Starr. I won't write up a bio here of Guru or Gang Starr, but if you are hip hop fan chances are your favorite rapper has been influenced by them. Definitely check out their discography if you are not familiar.

Hip hop has been a huge part of my life for a long time so I felt compelled to make a tribute piece in Guru's memory, and here it is.





















And here's the song I took part of the text from, one of my favorite Gang Starr tracks.



GURU R.I.P.

calgary comic expo re cap

I can't let a week go by without writing something about the Calgary Comic Expo that took place last weekend, so I better do it now.

I was able to get some art signed by some amazing comic book artists while meeting them, Camilla d'erico, Pia Guerra (Y:The Last Man, my favorite comic), and Eric Powell (The Goon). Saw some celebrities, caught Brent Spiner taking some digs at Nimoy's retirement, and was pushed out of the way by Nimoy's body guards as they escorted him to his room.

The workshops were of course very constructive. I attended the independent comic panel, the character animation panel, the concept design panel, and the traditional painting panel, all of which I took something valuable away from.

The highlight for me was getting to talk to Marcelo Vignali and Iain McCaig, both really cool guys. Each of them asked to take a look at my sketchbook, which I appreciated as I don't know if I would have been able to muster up the courage to ask them on my own (it can be intimidating talking to these pros, though they couldn't have been more approachable). The advice they gave to me was invaluable, and just the opportunity to be able to talk to them one on one was not only pricelsess but highly motivational and inspirational. I am both blown away by their willingness to help and impressed by their positive outlook on life which comes through with every gesture they make when emphasizing a point, great stuff. I'm going to make sure if they are there next year that I will be prepared to show them my growth as an artist.

This could easily turn from a quick recap to a five page rambling summary so I will end it by saying the Comic Expo was a great success and made even better by taking it all in with some great friends. Can't wait for next year, when I hope to have more of a presence at the Comic Expo, just wish Calgary could have two a year.


































































Above: Marcelo Vignali looking at my sketchbook and allowing me the chance to tap into his wealth of knowledge. Iain McCaig showing me and buddy Sam his sketchbook along with some great advice. After talking to both it was easy to see why they made it to the top of the pack and remained there. I also chilled with R2D2 for a minute.

Big thanks to Ashley and Tobias for taking the photos used here.