IlluXcon 6

Last September I had the greatest opportunity to attend IlluXCon 6 in Allentown, Pennsylvania as one of the scholarship winners . It was one of the most amazing things to happen to me as an artist. Obviously, a big reason for this was the chance to see all the amazing art, and meet the amazing people connected to it. But my favourite moments were actually the small things along the way:

Like sharing a cab with Mark Behm.
Or Donato Giancola taking a seat next to me while ordering a sandwich.
Pulling out nails from the wall with Amanda, Jacob and Omar Rayyan.
Chatting with Joe Shoopack about his BYU hat.
Walking around the airport with Mike Sass.
Laughing about funny hotel neighbor stories with Juan. 
Getting a bit lost with Chris Rahn.
Eating blueberry pancakes at the diner with Brianna, Darrenn, Stephen, and Alexander.
Standing anywhere near Greg Hildebrandt. 
Grabbing a coffee for Christos Achilleos and asking Anthony Kosar's dad how to go about doing that exactly.
Being offered a chocolate treat by Cynthia Sheppard.
Tagging along with Freyja Dean and watching Lana sing and dance.
Riding in a van with John Palencar.
Seeing Zoë Robinson out and about with Lauren Panepinto in monster makeup.
Singing とんでったバナナ for Jon Schindehette and Robh Ruppel in front of everyone.
Running around with Pat and Jeannie before the grand opening, and loving every minute.

There is sooo much more, but I don't want to overload you with the details. Needless to say, it was so much fun. I felt so honored just to be around these amazing people. I am so thankful to Pat and Jeannie for giving me the chance to experience these things, to meet these fantastic artists and for giving me new goals to focus on. 

IlluXCon 6 was awesome!
 

You can see more photos here

Tha Doggfather

Quick caricature for CS3000, still need to work on pushing things more. I used to play Tha Doggfather a lot when it came out, something about the difference between this and Doggystyle really appealed to me. It had a more sophisticated swagger, and was less about the cheap thrills of making it big. It's also one of his least recognised albums, so who knows. Maybe it just hit at the right time for me

                          

Kobe Bryant sketch

Frantically trying to finish up my sketch book by Tuesday for finals (including the final painting), noticed that the Caricaturama 3000 page was doing Kobe Bryant this week so I jumped on board. Then I added a digital glaze.

Here's the source photo

Messing around with acrylics

These are just on illustration board with gesso, and one on masonite. I'm thinking about trying out casein again, after learning that artists like Harry Anderson and John Berkey worked primarily in that medium. It's fun to experiment!

Michelangelo is an 'arty' dude

 

Here's a piece for the Leonardo gallery in Salt Lake City. Viva la Renaissance!

Salt Lake Comic Con photos

There were so many photos that I just put them in this flickr account!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/43858538@N00/sets/72157635749594195/

Or you could just see it on my Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151965410243755.1073741832.620028754&type=1&l=acd0721d08

Salt Lake City Comic Con!

So today was the last night of the first comic convention in Salt Lake City, and it was awesome! A group of my peers and myself all purchased tables in the Artist Alley and it was a trip! 4 weeks before the convention started, I decided to do some illustrations specifically for this convention (which was a burn haha) and here they are!

It was so fun to see people come by my booth, stop, contemplate, and then laugh really loud. I loved being around like minded people, it was a blast!

I'm super tired right now, so I'll post one picture and then I'll do a real update later

Lincoln Osiris RDJ

I'm apart of a fantastic group on Facebook called 'Caricaturama Showdown 3000'. Each week they pick a different person to depict, and everyone tosses in their best versions of that subject. Last week it was Robert Downey Jr., so I did Lincoln Osiris!

This was a weekend warrior project, so I usually jump in and start off with something that looks nothing like the subject. That's probably not a good thing lol

Seeing all the amazing artists on that page made me think of this line from Tropic Thunder, which is why I chose Lincoln Osiris



Gotta stay strong!

Old Final Fantasy VII comic

I was doing some cleaning up in some of the older 'storage' rooms when I stumbled onto this comic I started when I was a teenager. The story behind it is I just wanted to send some fan art to a magazine I really liked, Diehard Gamefan. And the coloured piece was actually printed in this issue!

 Unfortunately, this is before I knew what a scanner was, so I only have a low quality copy of the last frame.

I totally wrote in my letter to them an explanation of what was going on. But they didn't read it :(

ANYWAYS, here it is (it's pretty bad)

*also when I first played this game, the Midgar Zolom in that little marshes place kept casting sleep on me. It was so annoying

I know what you might be thinking, "Hey that looks kind of like anime" Well we all have our phase :p

I also found this one in that room, which was done by me at age 11

Don't be a Zombie

Don had his digital painting class do a submission for the Deviantart contest with the Truth campaign.

I was able to see the class come up with some wonderful ideas, and they began to show their expertise with their execution.

Brandon
Sarah
 Ben
Kris 
Biyong
Heather
Sol
Adam
Vivi
Riley

to name a few (can't find the others!!!!!)

I had originally intended to enter as well, but circumstances prevented me from working on anything, due to lack of time. (other commissions, LIFE)

Class ended last Thursday, June 20th, just in time to make any last minute changes for the June 23rd 11:59pm deadline.

Thursday night, I went with the Illustration club to a farm and I thought to myself, "Maybe I should try something. ANYTHING"

Friday night, I doodled this ugly thing on the computer:

Come to think of it, the middle girl kind of reminds me of the M-113 creature from Star Trek the original series...

I took some quick photo reference and did these rough on separate layers

 Then used a grainy water blender to soften up the edges, and kind of just put them together. It is now Saturday night. Due date is the next night!!!!

Added colours using the digital glaze technique; (new multiply layers + digital airbrush)

Began to render more with an opaque brush after flattening everything. It is now Sunday night. I asked Adam Munoa on Facebook at 19:02 hours how to paint smoke, to which he kindly responded

Tossed in some glow brush for the lights and submitted!!!!!111!!!111!!

Here it is on Deviantart 

Memorial Day Mess up

Thought I would attempt something patriotic like for Memorial Day with these Crayola chalks. Circles were all a mess when I stood up, and then some babies needed some serious diaper changing. So I quit working on it forever!!!

My Xbox avatar is awesome

:)

Drawing on the Driveway

The texture is very rough, my blending finger feels a bit raw >_ >

Working on stuff

 

This one keeps getting pushed back to the back burner, so I thought I'd just share this screenshot for anyone not on Facebook. 

Working on an Alien

From midnight to 6 am-ish with baby breaks. Trying to go along with Don Seegmiller's summer class

Sketching on the Bus

830 bus from UVU all the way to the Front Runner station in South Provo.

 

Day 2 on Bus 

830 from UVU to Transit Center at the Mall, paused for rain (doh) then 832 to home

 

Prisma pencil on toned paper

Google Hangout UVU edition

My time as a student at Utah Valley University is such a blast, and so fulfilling. I always wondered what it would be like to be in a network of great artists, and now I know. There are many who are graduating and moving on, hopefully we will still be able to keep our friendships strong.

Here's to many more experiences!

Lucas the Hutt - Diamond Edition

Last assignment for Advanced Figure Drawing with Perry Stewart. It was fun to do, except for the two all nighters in a row :p

The idea popped in my head during the many Lucas sketches in preparation for this assignment. I decided to google search 'Lucas the Hutt' and saw that some earlier renditions had already existed. I went with it anyways; and gave it the Disney treatment, with the Diamond Edition super rerelease.

 

  Thanks to Perry, Justin and Adam for the excellent suggestions. Also thanks to Gabriel for the drool reference.

George Lucas sketch

Our next assignment is a caricature of George Lucas with some extra stuff. To prepare myself, I have been sketching GL constantly. Yesterday, I forgot to bring my sketchbook and photo reference, so I decided to try it out from memory.

Pretty neat!

 

I'll be doing more, and will show the final piece later

Zangief

So here's my painting during Saturday conference pic. I stopped painting it and did...this....huh...