Just for Fun

I thought it would be a fun idea to develop a character card, I started doing some extra doodles of my bear in my sketchbook then started to elaborate the illustration, so thought I'd paint one up to see what it looks like! I think I would probably neaten it up given more time, but really happy with this little idea, I think it has some legs in it, but needs neatening up before adding it to my portfolio.

Line drawing:

Initial Outcome:

Changing the Fish Colour

Projects in Context

Looking at other ways to use existing projects or where I can apply it in other contexts.

Summer Show Poster:
The summer show poster follows mad hatter and vintage themes with the teapot and revisited colours. It would be great to develop it further as there are lots of opportunities especially in the summer for creating summer inspired posters - for tea parties and vintage events.

Examples of tea posters...



Norma Junk
I'm really starting to love my pinup girl I created after re-colouring them. The more colourful character works better in the vintage clothing scenario but I can really see the black and red character being used for burlesque events and other rockabilly entertainment. promotional posters, leaflets etc. I can really envision the red and black characters in a cocktail glass for a bburlesque event!

Examples of Burlesque posters...





Hallowed Latex Clothing Menu:

It's a pretty simple outcome really, but reminds me of paper cut outs, that might be a fun project to take on, might produce some interesting outcomes, if I combine the burlesque with the clothing menu would be like a little paper strip tease for adults!



Or possibly even combining my digital outcomes with simple paper cut outs of pinup girls, as the female form can have some great curves and shapes!



Finally my bears!

At the moment to put it in context my bears are being used in a Zine, on business cards, Postcards and stickers. For a while my octo xbox digital outcome has been my promotional tool but I think this Bear project has been some of my most successful work. I feel as though I've finally achieved a style I can work to, I feel as though I can apply my work from this zine to various areas. I can develop it into prints, greetings cards etc... I think it's a project good for developing into further make and sell projects. Aim to have a full product range like paperchase when they have a design featuring on books, ags, pencils, rubbers etc.

Also the original photo I found in national geographic magazine, my story has sort of developed around the photographers picture, not directly and not copying but I have contacted Paul Nicklen to show him my illustrated story so hope to hear back from him soon!

My Bear Zine

 Got my printed zines through the post so thought I'd share a few of the pages with you!

Very happy with the finish of the zine, pattern pages etc. I feel as though I've achieved what I wanted too through the research, planning and development. Really happy with my colour palette too.

Revised Logo Work Noma Junk

Did some revised illustrations for the norma junk logo.

From feedback it was clear my pinup girl and the shape of it worked really well just needed some different colours, so I reworked into it and came up with these two illustrations, compared to my first girl their colours work a lot more!


Initial Colour palette, the yellow top didn't quite work I don't think there was enough continuity and didn't match with the rest of the colouration.


revised images... using colours picking them out and putting them in various parts of the image, e.g. colours of jeans and colour of writing. This one is a bit more playful, chipper and works well as a clothing logo but I quite like the red one, would work well in a more evening/burlesque style image, might be something to play about in the near future! Maybe her in a cocktail glass! [=

Bears Revisted

From my presentation it was clear there was a lot of work needed for my bears. So I reworked digitally painting over what I had already done to get a really nice finish alike that on my postcard and front cover etc.

Comparison of two outcomes before and after reworking...

It looks a lot more polished and I definitely understand what they asked in the tutorial. Hope they can see how I've developed and changed what I needed to in order to get a better result.

Teapot Revisited

after a presentation and feedback from some of my work, it was DEFINITELY wise to revisit this project, I don't know why but at the time those colours seemed to work in my head but it really didn't support the research I'd done for it, here are some rough drafts playing about with the colour and text after said tutorial!

Zines

Full Bleed? borders? Great examples of Zines and Digital Illustrations in Zines...

Ben Newman - Ouroboros:
I love the vibrant colours in this zine, the zine mainly focuses on themes of ancient symbols, it's not what you'd initially think of when illustrating an ancient sybol , but it's really beautiful fun and vibrant.

ouroboros is actually the name for the ancient symbol, shown below of the snake eating it's own tail, theres a lot of superstition surrounding this particular symbol.





Robert Hunter - The New Ghost

I spoke about this illustrator in a previous project, but I still adore the zine he's created, using full page spreads as well as smaller panels to reflect his story. About a new ghost learning how to be a spirit, it follows his journey, and I love the colour palette too, makes the whole story feel soft, welcoming and calm.





A collection of other Zines

Page Development

This is so far what I've done for my first double page,

I've used this image as inspiration, my trees however are not as green! I wanted to create a really dulled down colour pallete so there's that stark difference between the white of the bear and it's surroundings, I did hoever add dashes of colour/greens to the leaves in the image.


Paul Nicklen Photography

Here's the development of the double page...
I started off by digitally going over my pencil drawing with colour line, this way whe I traced the digital drawing in illustrator it would keep the coloured line I desired for the main areas.

Initially it was almost too colourful the grass wasn't right and the bear didn't stand out enough.

So I changed it round some more thinking maybe a more grayscale colour palette will work if I change the background? But that wasn't quite right either, I wanted to create continuity throughout the comic, so the same background colour unless you want to change concept of time would be ideal. It was just too dark and I also had to consider I've got 2 other bears in the comic who or a dark grey so it just wouldn't have worked.

This is near to completion, I got the colours just about right but needed something else to not make it look as flat, just needed something. Which is where I started playing around with mist.

This is the final (not completely cleaned up version) I'm currently playing about with adding some mist/cloud to the night sky, you sometimes get that mist in forests, especially if it's high up!

My Bear

I love the contrast of my bear with that of Pauls photographed kermode bear!

I hope I've captured some of that essence and charm of this little guy!

Spirit of the Forest

Some images I've found useful for working from and doing some development sketches

All these images were taken by Paul Nicklen, than photographer who famously took a picture of the bears for national geographic.

I've in a way developed a story from his photographs, the contrast between the bears with the other black furred bears, catching the fish, and although being solitary and different finds friendship with the other bears, a simple little story line but something possible to illustrate.