Inktober 2016: Hunger (#04/31)

Today's Inktober word on the prompt list: Hunger.
Immediately zombies come to mind. Generally, that's is their entire life . . . eating, walking and looking for more to eat.

There are so many unanswered questions about zombies and eating:
1.) Do zombies ever get "full"?  2.) Do zombies only prefer "fresh" food?  3.) Why don't they eat each other?  4.) Do zombies poop?**

Image #4 "Hunger " for Inktober 2016, made with a mechanical pencil, Kuretake brush pen and Copic gray markers

This drawing touches on one of the things I always wondered as a kid; would a zombie ever eat itself?  If it did, that would be such a great efficient ecological system . . . am I right? I mean, if zombies can do that -- it'd make them have the smallest carbon footprint in the world!

Original pencil sketch of the self-sustaining zombie named Earl

(**Anyone have answers to these questions, let me know!)

Inktober 2016: Collect (#03/31)

Today's Inktober word on the prompt list: Collect.


SpongeBob SquarePants immediately came to mind with his impulsive hobby of jelly-fishing. I remember an episode where a giant jellyfish started to attach SpongeBob, to stop him from collecting little Jellyfish. I thought I'd take from that event and exaggerate the size of the bigger Jellyfish (and add more monstrous features like the teeth.)

Sketched, inked and highlighted this SpongeBob image on Toned Tan paper

I used to draw SpongeBob many times during my former job as a Creative Director in the Amusement business. It's been about 12 years since I drew this character. Back then I would design new outfits and concepts for new plush SpongeBob toys.

No sketch for this image since it was penciled and inked on the same sheet of paper.

Inktober 2016: Noisy (#02)

Today's Inktober word is "noisy", I started thinking of characters that were loud. The first character I thought of was Godzilla, but I already did Godzilla last year. So, thinking Sci-Fi, Chewbacca came to mind with his loud growl. I thought of this little joke where Chewbacca would amplify his voice.

Inktober 2016: Oct 2nd NOISY -- inked with Tombow brush pen and shaded with Copic markers

What actually took me some time was trying to make the megaphone look like something from the Deathstar. I thought, "What would Darth Vader use as a megaphone?". (I know, Vader wouldn't use a megaphone, he'd just used the force with some Jedi mind cast instead.)

Original pencil sketch of Chewbacca with a megaphone

Starting Inktober 2016: Fast (#01)

For the last few years, October has been the month for creating daily inked drawings thanks to Jake Parker's Inktober. Artists from all over the world partake in this creative event by simply drawing and posting their work online with the hashtag #Inktober (or more precisely #Inktober2016.) You can find out more at Jake's site here: http://www.inktober.com/

Last year, I did drawing based on childhood memories and concepts. This year, I'm going to follow Jake's Prompt List, which is a listing of random words for each day of the month. Oct. 1st's word of the day: FAST.

Inktober 2016: Oct 1st FAST -- inked with Tombow brush pen and shaded with Copic markers 

Just like last year, I'm doing dinosaur images right out the gate. I'll admit, dinosaurs are fun to draw and those images seem to get the most attention (along with dog and superhero sketches.) Since it's the Halloween season, I'll be doing many monsters, creatures, and science fiction related images.

The original digital pencil sketch of Oct 1st FAST 

Now technically, it's just supposed to be the inking with no wording . . . but I like adding humorous captions to the images. So this year I'll submit wordless images to my Twitter account and post the captioned images here on the blog and Facebook.

Original pencil rough of the concept.

Not happy with the character sketch, I scanned the image and started to change the character's features, details and positioning in Photoshop.

Illustration Friday: Weapon

Illustration Friday: Every Friday a word is given on the website, IllustrationFriday.com. Artists and illustrators then submit an image that represents that word all during the week.

This week's word: Weapon

For this week's submission, I simply took from an old image I did of my character Hairy. The page had Hairy getting ready to battle a monster in the closet, using the best toy weapons he could find.

Hairy loaded and ready for battle. Image taken from one of my oldest picture book stories.

Below is the original full image from which this image was taken from. This page is  #14 from the story, "Timmons and the Lumpy Bumpy Monster" back in the early 90's.

Original full colored dummy book page from "Timmons and the Lumpy Bumpy Monster"

Daily Quick Sketch: Roller Bot

Playing around with an old Wacom stylus that I connected to my backup computer, I quickly rough sketched this robotic character. I used the default pencil setting in Photoshop, which has a nice feel to it - makes it feel it a real pencil on the stylus.

Robot character created on an old Cintiq 1200W using Photoshop

Daily Quick Sketch: Octopus Character (for another children's book concept)

It's been awhile since I posted on the blog. I'm in a bit of a low creative mode lately due to work and general stress. Yet, another concept for a children's book idea came to me recently during the night. I woke up and created this character sketch to get that concept down on paper.
(Too many other ideas have floated away when I didn't do the same . . . )

ADDED: Just added a quick color version of the sketch above.

Digitally colored using PhotoShop

Inked Octopus character for a children's book idea set in an underwater setting

The first thing I thought was, "I need an octopus character." I've drawn many octopus characters over the years, often created with a typical look and style. So I thought I'd change my usual technique and think outside the box.

Original pencil sketch design of my Octopus character for my newest children's book story

I thought adding a long neck/torso would make the octopus look unique enough. I also envision him walking on four arms and using the remaining limbs as arms. Like all characters I create, this one will be redrawn, adjusted and hopefully improved to have a unique character look.

Watercolor + Pen variation

Daily Quick Sketch: My dog . . .

He's a quick sketch I based on my little dog, Brady. She's an Australian Cattle Dog, which is simply a ball of hyper energy wrapped in fur. She's an attention sponge that loves pampering. She also seems immune to pain, will oppose any size dog and is fearless on most grounds (except thunder and fireworks.) When she wants your attention, her ear-splitting yelps make one wonder, who's the master and who's the pet . . .

This little image was created shortly after Brady was in an angry and demanding mood 

Here's the little girl in a silent moment.

Daily Quick Sketch: Octopi Emojis

Here's an idea I played with about a year ago, simply a grouping of several cute octopus emojis doodles.

Sampling of several octopi emojis made with a brush pen

I'm not a fan of emojis. I rarely use them. But there seems to be a huge Internet following for emoji. If I find time, I'll update this image with a color version.

Daily Quick Sketch: Witch Nazel

UPDATE: B+W Image Colorized

Digitally colored in Photoshop

Quick note on the information below. I mention publishing an eBook version of the story, but after reading up on the market, eBooks aren't really catching fire . . . especially with children's books. Parents still want higher quality printed books and are willing to pay for that quality.

The major problem with eBooks is that everyone can make one - and it seems like they do. This creates a huge glut of poorly edited, poorly drawn and unprofessional picture books, which in turn makes any worthy eBook harder to find among all the clutter.

Bottomline: I'm no longer considering eBook publishing . . . going to try the old fashion way of submitting and waiting. We'll see if I can break into the business the proper way.

Originally Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013

I just purchased a new set of Copic Cool Gray markers and wanted to test them out.

I already had Warm and Neutral Grays . . . so I thought it would be best to try to create a wintry image with the cool grays. This was also a good opportunity for me to develop one of my supporting characters, Witch Nazel.

This version of Witch Nazel is more feminine, friendly and less freakish looking.
Marketing wise, this would be a better choice for her design since she would be accepted by more people. But the wacky side of me prefers a weirder looking Witch Nazel, (or at least not as clean cut as she appears in this image.) So, this may not be the version of Witch Nazel once the eBook is published. (. . . or . . . maybe it is . . . too early to tell.)

Gray toned image of Witch Nazel made with a cool gray set of Copic markers

This image of Witch Nazel is taken from one of the pages in my eBook, Worm Wire Glasses. I altered the background to make it more of a winter scene. Below is the original pencil sketch. You can slightly see a hint of the monster, Bladimir, flailing about in the lower right corner -- kicking a garbage can. This is from the scene where Witch Nazel floats over the ruckus that Bladimir is causing below on Halloween.   

Original pencil sketch of Witch Nazel flying on her broom during a Halloween night