3 Ravens

3 pieces I've been working on for my Fairytale and Folklore project. I wanted to set the scenes in a modern environment. Through the first image I wanted to depict the subject of seduction, a strong theme in the story of Little Red Riding Hood. I've been looking at some awesome images by many other illustrators where they manipulate shadows to dramatizes a composition. Also film noir has been a big influence. The middle piece is an accumulation of symbols that relate back to many of the themes from the original story, such as: womanhood, purity, cleansing, and the role of the male.

LIVE DRAW butterflies

Recently I've been involved in a theatre performance which involves live painting of butterflies. A friend of mine and I volunteered ourselves to take on this task, not realising how big the job was - we don't get paid for the hours (mon-fri 17.30-21.30) and we had to personally collect enough card board boxes (our canvas) to fill up an entire length of 25m wall and 2 metres in height. We chose to limit the palette so it would look better. I love how the blue stands out against the brown of the card board and the black acrylic. Honestly, its exhausting. ONE MORE NIGHT TO GO!!!!

Beautiful Dreamers; the backdrop

This is the backdrop I drew out on black card with coloured pencils. Recently I've been playing around a lot with bright colours and coloured paper and the work is paying off. For instance I now have a better understanding of colour palettes! Because of the weird and small dimensions of the illustration I had to produce I could not put the whole piece in (sad face).

Beautiful Dreamers (first draft)

A while back I was listening to a Radio4 (BBC) show called Beautiful Dreamers. I think it was the title that immediately caught my attention and also in the blurb it said that it was about music. Had a listen and it was AMAZING! I produced a small 58x42mm illustration for it (uni course work). It was about Artur Mistek's Musica Zoologika - the world's first animal orchestra, set against a backdrop of the CCCP. Definitely worth a listen. There was a bit where they explain this butterfly gong - a massive flock of butterflies are flown into a gong and with every collision produces a soft sound. The unconscious/dead bodies then fall onto another gong. Cruel - possibly, but the sound this little scene omitted must have been awesome!

Goodbye to Berlin pt 2

A more clean and crisp version of the previous. The limited colours give it a slight vintage feel, I think.

Smoking bot

Was having a rummage through some of my old shizz the other day when I happened to stumble upon this - a drawing I really got into nearly a year ago. I used a mechanical pencil just so I could get all the detail down. Obviously I never properly came to finishing it but I kind of like that about it. I've always had a passion for mechanical things. At 13 I really got into HR Giger, the Swiss artist who's concepts were used for the very famous Alien movies. And also I'd like to point out that, shading with mechanical pencils kicks ass!

....response to the earlier post

As a response to the earlier post, a follower pointed out that it would look better if it was white on a red background and I'd like to say, Jenn Evans, you were quite right! Now I'll try and put it all in a sequence; I'm sure this will bring a host of new other problems to deal with ... guh!

Goodbye to Berlin

This is an mock editorial image for the Radio Times - for the radio interpretation of Christopher Isherwood's Goodbye to Berlin. The layout size is actually 58mmx42mm. Proper small! I tried to incorporate the bourgeoisie/luxury lifestyle with a hint of the Nazi threat. I usually try to avoid using black but in this case I think using a solid black really helps bring out the other colours. Looking at it now I recon I could make it better by working on some of the shapes ..... back to work then!

Tree pt2

Added block colours and shapes and made a simple composition. The 3 colours that make up the ring I really like right now.

Tree

A pen and ink drawing of a tree in a simple form. I put a sheet of tracing paper over it to give off a diffused feel. The scanner didn't quite capture it quite as well as I had hoped it would. I'm currently working on giving it a bit more of the 'something-factor' on photoshop.

Skull Safety Pin

Its a sketch I did a few months ago and I never really did anything with it. Turns out just dropping a simple colour onto it enhances the pencil lines. Why a skull suspended in a giant safety pin - I do not know.