Sketched Faces

Blah, blah, blah sketches.

Holidaze - Cupid

Here are sketches of Cupid for a character for a comic called Holidaze created by Dave Dellecese and Andy Cieslinski.

Holidaze - Easter Bunny

Here are sketches of Easter Bunny for a character for a comic called Holidaze created by Dave Dellecese and Andy Cieslinski.

Holidaze - Patty

Sketches of a character for a comic called Holidaze created by Dave Dellecese and Andy Cieslinski.

Sketches

I sketched in my office at work. I was sitting looking by the hall.

TheDorkyDaddy - Final Banner

Check out with The Dorky Daddy!

TheDorkyDaddy - Dad & Son

TheDorkyDaddy - Daddy's Logo

TheDorkyDaddy - The Author

This sketch is the author of his website, The Dorky Daddy.

TheDorkyDaddy - Banner - Shetches

Sketches for a banner for a website, The Dorky Daddy.

Madea Sketch

I'm trying to use my new photoshop.  I colored on my monitor with my fingers.  It's like finger paint!

LitGraphic at the Museum

I saw comic pages at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Art Institute. It's really great. You can even apply competition entries to another comic page too. Maybe you'll see my panel. Mine is the six panel. The artist who draws the page is Matt Madden.

Madea

Trojans: Mural Finished

Here is the final image. The mural was presented to the school during the graduation ceremony. I heard there was an unavailing. Alas, I was not there. I was on vacation a little early.

Trojans: Colors Applied

The book I've referred to for this project is The Mural Book: A Practical Guide for Educators by Janet Braun-Reinitz and Rochelle Shicoff. The authors recommend using Golden Paints. When I found out that Golden acrylics cost about $25 for an 8 oz. tube I nearly passed a stone. Thank God there was a more affordable option for me at Michael's. I ended up getting Liquitex's students-grade Basics acrylics. They were very creamy and covered a large area. I ended up buying double of what I actually needed. I'd recommend them to anyone. Especially, since they were only $8.99 for an 8 oz. tube. Here's one of the seniors up on the ladder.

So far so good. Next, the kids outline the entire image with black.

Trojans: Traced

I printed a grayscale version of the final image on a transparency sheet and put it on a transparency projector and blew it up on the gymnasium wall. In an earlier experiment I found that using pencils to draw on this type of masonry is not efficient. I needed to sharpen the pencil every 10 seconds. So I thought charcoal sticks or oil pastels might be too messy. It was then I happened to have discovered Korn's Lithographic Crayons hidden in one of my cabinets. They look like they could be 100 years old. Who knows how long they were in there.I had the students trace the projected image with the crayons and it went pretty well.

Trojans: Wall Primed

The area of the gymnasium wall on which the mural will be has been successfully primed thanks to the work of my students. Students and faculty who aren't in the know have been making fun guesses and questions due to the irregular shape of the image. Some have guessed correctly about the spear and arm.

Trojans In Color

As you can see I hacked out some colors in Photoshop to nail down what the final colors will look like.

Trojans In Black & White

Here is the final black and white design. I've never done a mural before and I had no idea where to start so I did an online search for school murals and came across some really great artwork. I cannot take too much credit, though. I did steal some design elements that I thought were amazing from another muralist. I took his sunburst circle background and the ribbon/banner in the front.

Trojans!

I fixed a couple of things and inked these Trojans.

Trojan Warrior Woman

The mural project must include a lady Trojan. So I had to research what a Trojan warrior woman looked like. I found some very interesting cos-players, strange video game designs and some interesting revealing anime characters. I then started researching the goddess of war, Athena, Pallas Athena, and Minerva. That's when I hit reference gold. I sketched three poses and was finally satisfied with the fourth.

Trojan Warrior

My school's senior class wanted to gift the school a mural in the gymnasium. They approached me to help them. There are a couple of problems. First of all it's the end of May and they've just asked me to help. Secondly, I would have to design it because their design isn't fully realized and there's no time to help them flesh it out. Lastly, it's their gift to the school. I'm not doing it for them. I finally decided today that it's too late in the year for them to complete this mural. However, as I started to sketch out my ideas I started getting into it. I may save this as a project for a future class. This first sketch was easy for me. It's a manly Trojan. It's a pretty classic pose. No biggie.

Birthday Girl

Today is my wife's birthday so I thought I'd draw a little portrait of her. The image is taken from one of my favorite photographs of her. Happy Birthday, sweetie!

2011 Grads

This year our school's yearbook adviser made advertising space available to staff. So I bought a space. Above is my ad. featuring caricatures of our school's graduates.

Rick Geary On An Envelope

I love the work of Rick Geary and I also love Recorded Books. I doodled this little homage/plagiarism of Rick Geary's logo for Recorded Books on the back of an envelope I sent to Recorded Books.

Chicken La Maison

"What's for dinner tonight?"
I'll tell you what's for dinner. I made Chicken La Maison for me and the wife. I got the inspiration from the great Stuart Immonen and the recipe from here. Try it. You'll like it. It's as good as it looks.

My Favorite Children's Books 3

This next book is the last one but most importantly it's the one that made the biggest impression on me. I finally found it through one of the local libraries. The first thing I did when I opened it up I took a big breath to smell that old familiar smell. Of course, you know what I mean. It's that musty, comfortable scent that takes you back.

Below I've included the pages that really hit that old childhood nerve. These pages delighted me and haunted me. It's hard to describe but it is truly wonderful. This book is wonderful. And if I could find it without paying an arm-and-a-leg, I'd buy it.

Suppose You Met A Witch
By Ian Serraillier Illustrated by Ed Emberley


As a child I definitely had a fear of
drowning after seeing the image below.

I was definitely glad that nasty, old witch got
her comeuppance but it was quite a ghastly way
to go. Later on, a farmer sets a match to the thistle
hedge that the witch is tangled in.
"And that was that."

My Favorite Children's Books 2

Here is another children's book that made a big impression on me as a kid. Once again, I had no idea of the title, author, or illustrator. I could only remember that there were some very odd creatures and monsters in the book. I remember copying the illustrations of some of the weirder creatures as a kid. I recently read these books to my nieces who are 3 and 4 years old. As I read to them I realized that these books were pretty horrific and that many of the latest kids books I've seen recently are pretty tame.

Grandpa's Ghost Stories by James Flora


I imitated the image below in my own drawings as a kid. I found the cross section of the cave fascinating. To be able to see inside and out of the cave was genius.


The image of below is something that disturbed me a kid and still does.

My Favorite Children's Books 1

Recently, I've thought about children's books that I had vague memories of. I couldn't remember the titles, authors, or illustrators. The only thing I could remember were certain illustrations that stuck with me these 30 plus years (give or take). These illustrations had made an impression on me as a kid and probably were a gateway into my interests in artwork and other things.

I challenged myself to try to hunt these books down and identify them. Remember, I was only going on vague memories of illustrations. That's it. No names or titles. My first step was to go to the public library I frequented as a kid. I went through their entire Easy-Reader and Juvenile sections. I didn't find any of the books but I did come across one book that featured illustrations of a similar style to one of the books I was searching for. I took down the illustrators name and did a search online and came up with the following book.

One Monster After Another by Mercer Mayer

As a kid I was interested in anything that involved monsters. That's still true today. Below are some of the images that have stayed in my mind all of these years.

Check out these pages that feature a Lovecraftian horror.This image is from the stuff of nightmares. I love it!

Grad Caricature 4

This is the final graduate caricature. It was also my most difficult to complete. I really struggled pinning down the likeness while trying to achieve some sort of exaggeration. In order to create a successful caricature I really need to experience a person's attitude and personality. This girl was always subdued in my presence but I knew well enough that she was quite fun-loving and mischievous around her friends outside of the classroom. That left me drawing solely from photo reference, which bore no fruit. After days and many sketches later I came up with the above drawing to my joy. I think that I balanced the likeness with exaggeration pretty well. When I finished the image it felt like I just gave birth.

Grad Caricature 3

Here's the third caricature I did of our school's 2010 graduates. After I finished this one I realized that it kind of looks like Tracy Morgan.

Grad Caricature 2

Here's the second graduate I drew using pencil and Photoshop.

Grad Caricature 1

The senior class asked me to create caricatures of them for the graduation day program that was handed out for the ceremony. Here's the first one I did using pencil and Photoshop.

Crayon X-Men Caricatures

I know the end of the school year is upon me when I start doing caricatures of students. I don't start projects during the last week of classes because we probably won't finish them. So, as a form of classroom management I will pick a student in class and draw a fast caricature. The three knuckleheads in the image are from a class I refer to as the "Sweat Hogs." I've drawn these three many times before because they have faces and personalities that lend themselves to exaggerated caricature. The boy represented as Wolverine has recently become obsessed with the X-Men so I decided to represent these three as such. All three caricatures are on an 11"x17" copy paper. They were penciled and colored with some crappy crayons. All finished in a 45 minute period. From left to right: Nightcrawler, Beast, Wolverine.