This project was for an executive gift portrait. I’ve done a few of these now, they’re output to brushed aluminum, so the whites of the image allow the aluminum to show through and the texture of the brushed aluminum adds a nice translucency to the colors. The image was created using Sketchbook Pro and Photoshop, sixteen inches in diameter.
Here’s the cover design I was privileged to do for November’s City Palate magazine. It was a really fun project, the slideshow shows the finished design and the rejected ideas. I liked all three, but I’m glad they chose this image just because I liked the idea of the weird appetizers we’ve all seen. The Illustration is all digital, even my roughs are done digitally now–really speeds up the drawing process.
This illustration started out as a sketchbook drawing. I thought the idea would make an interesting finished piece. It was put together in Adobe Illustrator first, and finished in Photoshop. There’s things both apps do well and some things they don’t. My process is usually to use Illustrator to block in and Painter or Clip Studio Paint to add the bitmap effects and painting. Click on the image to enlarge it, and if you want to see some of the process, click the more link below.
This is one of the largest and most detailed pieces I’ve done. Measuring 52″ x 31″, it required a lot of detail work. It was done in Acrylic at 11″ x 17″, scanned high resolution and then repainted in Painter on a Cintiq tablet. All in all, around 50 hours to complete. I’ve attached a detail shot, the pencil sketch and the acrylic painting.
I read a book awhile back, The Practice and Science of Drawing by Harold Speed, published in 1972. In it he discusses how a drawing needs a bit of what he called “dither”–the thing that makes a drawing more interesting in it’s imperfections. You can see it in current trends in illustration, music, art–the less perfect work becomes the most interesting. The singer with a Tom Waits crackly voice, the woodcut instead of the perfect Adobe Illustrator drawing. This Illustration was meant to be a compromise between where my work has gone and where I see it going.
This collection of drawings and watercolours was recently hosted online by Gallica. They figure these drawings date back to the 1600’s or 1700’s. Some really interesting period pieces to be sure with great costumes and ornamentation.
