Indiana Jones Illustration

I created this banner for the 2008 year-end party for Hewlett-Packard held in Los Angeles. My job was to create a 21 foot long piece of artwork depicting various employees of the company as if they were in an Indiana Jones movie. For the party, they had also created a movie in which they employees were super-imposed over the actual footage from the films. I didn't see the entire film, but the clips I did see were really amazing. My banner was sort of the movie poster for the event.

For something this big, it made the most sense to me to create a clean line drawing, scan and convert it all to vectors, and then work in Adobe Illustrator for the coloring and rendering. It was a really fun job and I was happy to see that the employees enjoyed it!

More Marker Sketches

Value Sketching

More sketching-- concentrating on recognizing values.

Sketchbook

More sketches here with grayscale markers...

Hockey Illustration

Taking another of my little sketches to a finish. I just had to do this one because I really liked the overall pattern-- I have been a little obsessed lately with these sports compositions. Every free moment I've had in between my real jobs, this is what I have been playing with. There is something really fun about working with the obvious bold colors of a uniform-- it easy to see it as abstract shape I guess.

Anyway, this is another vector piece. I'm just not ready to give up on vector artwork, even though I fear there is a bias against it being real "art". There is something I am after with it that feels like it is starting to happen. I believe something will show up if I keep trying--and belief can be a dangerous thing.

I am also taking an oil painting class right now which couldn't be any more of a polar opposite approach (at least how I see it) than working with vectors. I alluded to this before, but I have this idea that if I make my mind work in two radically different ways (one very analytical/mathematical and one more intuitive/emotional) that I will overwhelm it and force it to expand into something better-- maybe something that can think both ways simultaneously.

...oh, and the pencil from this piece. My justification of vector art being something more than just tracing photographs...

And some more sketches...

This time moving on to gouache for a few. Just trying to work really quickly and really small(about 3x3) as a way of learning more about value, and pattern and how to mix color. I'm always surprised at how little line is necessary for the image to "read" if the values are arranged with some planning. I'm also having fun trying to draw these without caring about the end result. It is very hard for me to let go of the need for good results (and even harder for me to post these for others to see) but really enjoyable when things go well.

More Experiments...

Some more sketches that I've been doing lately while looking at magazines. Still concentrating on value and shape, and hoping to create an interesting abstract pattern...




And one I decided to finish as vector art...



I have a strange need to justify any digital artwork I do by showing the hand-drawn aspect of the creation. I'm not sure why I hold this bias, but I'm usually not a fan of vector art that is merely a traced photograph. I'm clearly looking at reference here, but trying to let the drawing process redesign it into something more interesting. Hopefully I've maintained some of the energy of a drawing in the above digital piece, but somehow I always like my sloppy thumbnails the best (probably because I don't care how they turn out). I'm always trying to bridge that gap. I wish my vector work could somehow have some of the randomness of the above thumbnails. Someday I hope to crack that code...

Below are some of the steps I take before starting on the computer to create vector artwork.