Well, this is it, the very last illustration for IAD 2007:
My stab at Halloween. I wanted to go for a different, sadder kind of scary. As with a few others this month, I really wish I had more time to smooth out the wrinkles, but the message I want to convey is there.
Medium: AI CS3
“TIM-BERRRRR!”
Tim looked up from his dinner. His roommate Paul was standing in the doorway, holding an axe. He was also dressed as a lumberjack and it was Halloween, so Tim thought nothing of this.
“Nice costume, Paul. Where’d you get the fake axe?”
Paul swung the axe and embedded it in the center of the kitchen table, sending wood fragments flying.
“FAKE?” he shrieked.
Tim calmly picked the splinters out of his mashed potatoes, which had received the brunt of the blast, while Paul worked at extracting the axe from the tabletop.
“Was that really necessary?” Tim asked. “You could have just told me it was real.”
Paul grunted. “Wouldn’t have…” Grunt. “…had the…” He paused to catch his breath. “Woo, this is wedged in there real good.”
“Wouldn’t have had the what?”
“The same impact.” Paul resumed his struggle with the axe handle.
This was a quick one, but I packed it with a little extra absurdity:
One more to go.
Medium: AI CS3
This is an idea I've had stored in my brain for a long time. I was originally going to paint it, but it seemed to lend itself to IAD:
Medium: AI CS3
Now that Unloosen Awareness Month, also known as "October," is well underway, I thought I would put this one up. It isn't much, but what it IS is a little something I was able to make with magnetic letters I found amidst the debris in the back yard that the chair picture was taken in.
Some might think that it was just a lucky find, the right letters to make an Unloosen out of, but it was more than that: I went into the backyard fully and intentionally "Unloosen Aware."
Now, some folks think being Unloosen Aware is a trick, but I assure you that it is not. It's a way of being that anyone can achieve via a simple set of deep breathing exercises and a conscious desire to find the inner Unloosenness of several, if not many, common situations. I entered that yard thinking: "There will most surely be a goodly nugget for one who goes into this Unloosen Aware." And there was!
This technique doesn't only work in back yards, it can also be tried in other common places and venues: Men's rooms, Chanel boutiques, racetracks, grease pits, and amphitheatres. The places this can work are only limited by their number and, in some cases, operating hours and guard dogs.
So, I urge you to embrace the challenge of this Month for Unloosen Awareness, or whatever it's called, and to use it to the fullest. I know I might.
Medium: AI CS3
IAD nearly ended tonight as I was drawing this one:
Popping this one out was a psychological and creative struggle. The project is beginning to push me to the limit, mostly because of sleep deprivation.
Medium: AI CS3
I created this piece five long years ago while in college. This is one of the few things I still like after all of those years. It has a suggestive and greedy feel, which may be more relevant to the present, than it was when it was created.
Create in Photoshop 7
My head feels like scrambled eggs. The 26th installment of Illustration a Day follows the colon:
Medium: AI CS3
I guess technically, it's stealing tree, because a bit of duplication was employed. More than likely, I'll revisit this one after the month breaks -- I'd love to give it a little more time and attention.
143 points to the first person who notices the very thinly-veiled homage to an eminent surrealist.
Medium: AI CS3
A quick one, a bit darker and simpler than usual:
Medium: AI CS3
Near, far. Near, far. I guess I like the whole "wide-angle" dynamic.
Medium: AI CS3
This is actually an artists rendering of what I did on my summer vaccation.
Created in Adobe Illustrator 10
Titles are a bit of an afterthought, if it wasn't obvious already.
This one took a lot longer than I intended.
Medium: AI CS3
IAD 11, Open, was a quick sketch finished within a few minutes. I liked the idea and wanted to give it the full Adobe Illustrator treatment:
Although I'm pleased with the results from an artistic standpoint, I can't say it's one of my favorites. But I'm sure, just like the one with the pipes, a bunch of people will like it.
Here's another Illustration a Day entry. Only eleven to go.
I guess it's no secret that I'm a big fan of modernist illustration, specifically cartoon-type illustration. I try not to be too derivative, but I realize that I probably come pretty close to betraying my influences sometimes.
Medium: AI CS3
This one's dedicated to Dungeon Master Wargo:
Icosahedron, give me resolve.
Complimentary colors make-um file huge, even after chief's compression ceremony:
Medium: AI CS3 (again)
It's the 17th, a very special day for Unloosen "dot" com, and to mark the occasion I have dug deep into my digital image files ("pictures" in the local parlance) to find a suitable photo.
What this photo is actually suitable for is anyone's guess.
I suppose it serves as a good example of how busy the sidewalks in Los Angeles are. It's why we seldom look up, there's so much to read and learn. I know I originally took the picture thinking that one of the coming months was bound to have a 17th day in it and that it might be fun to make a big deal and all about it.
Not only has it happened but, by George, it's a big one! And by "by George" I mean literally BY George. Whatever the 17th is about (and only Chris can tell you, because it's his website, after all) it is because of George being somewhere ("here," according to the sidewalk) that we can even have the courage to address these meaty issues.
If this sounds vague, it's because I never really new this George. This apparently entitles me to try and "ki" his "fss." Now "fss" is obviously just that, I won't insult the regulars here with an unnecessary explanation of that.
The real mystery here is "ki." Is he suggesting we "key" his "fss?" I hope not, because that would be rude. This means the only other thing it could be is a regional spelling of "chi." This doesn't make a whole lot of sense until one remembers that much from the distant East is not only cool, but very mysterious.
And then there's all those other symbols! I have no idea what those are supposed to be about, man, not even a feather-dusting of a clue. But then, that's what our big city sidewalks are like -- one big pedestrian Da Vinci Code.
"The box! I choose the box!"
"OK, let's see what's in the box."
(A few of you know what comes next.)
Medium: AI CS3
Given a little extra time, I think this one could be even better. Click on it to see the bigger version; for this one, it's quite necessary:
But this is illustration a day. I'll have to make the changes and post it during illustration as you please.
Medium: AI CS3 (Adobe Illustrator CS3, for those of you who may have forgotten.)
A bit of a Mr. Chompins redux:
Mr. Chompins, you see, takes to the nighttime skies in pursuit of misbehaving, disrespectful children, whom he eats.
Medium: AI CS3
Illustration a day continues with BANINJA.
Textures: PS CS3
Illustration: AI CS3
Request filled:
I didn't comply 100% with Alex's original request ("I request a picture of an astronaut with space-rockets lined up for launch behind him, and behind them, a blue sky. The astronaut should also be holding a fresh, hot pie of some sort. Maybe there should be bikini-clad graduate students reflected in his visor, washing an official NASA pie truck."), but I dare say I improved on it. You be the judge.
Medium: AI CS3 (but of course!)
More (click it to see the biggun'):
Medium: AI CS3
When I was in Thailand a few years ago, I ran across a mural detailing the Ramakien, a mythology imported from India. Part of the mural depicts a scene in which one of the heroic characters (Hanuman, I think) expands his own head until it is the size of a building. He does this to disguise himself. People walk into his mouth and they don't realize it's alive. This idea has become a minor obsession of mine over the years. I started drawing a stream-of-consciousness piece and it crept in (or out, or whatever) again:
Medium: Pencil (Dixon Ticonderoga!) and Paper
Another in the style of Feeshes:
Textures: PS CS3
Medium: AI CS3
In the back yard of a house I was cleaning, there was this chair. It was an empty chair.
There, amidst the rubble and cat food, my hands sweated inside my rubber gloves as I wondered who had sat in that chair. It was a pretty good chair, which got me to thinking that another thing to ponder would be: who would later sit in that chair?
Sitting is oft enjoyed by all or most and the idea that any number of folk both grand and base might have sat there, or might sit there, lent a kind of solemnity to the place.
Might this be the place of rest for a king? Or perhaps a fashion designer? It might even provide rest for the other, less relevant, members of our society.
I apologise for the misleading title... The chair wasn't so empty after all.
I don't know why I keep going back to themes of oral hygiene; I've got good teeth and I've never feared the dentist. Maybe Dental Mania has indeed taken hold.
Medium: AI CS3
Media: Photoshop CS3 & AI CS3
Medium: AI CS3
Ironic utensils should be the required desktop background images on every computer.
"No way!?" says ye.
"WAY!" I exclaim, "So way!"
Medium: AI CS3
Available in other sizes and desktop-background-friendly dimensions upon request.
I had this idea... a forest made of all metal scraps. So I started drawing this tree and it ended up being a torturous mess. The effect I created to give the pipes dimension, in cooperation with a light drop shadow (for depth) crashed my computer about a dozen times. So I wrapped this one up and called it quits.
To be entirely honest, it doesn't fit into what I normally like to do, but here it is anyway, my very own Maxwell's Silver Hammer.
Medium: AI CS3
Text added for feeling.
Medium: Pencil & Paper
Illustration a Day continues with...
Medium: AI CS3
Any requests?
Media: Pencil & Paper/AI CS3
October is here, which means the second annual Unloosen Awareness Month is also here. This year, to celebrate the awareness, I've decided to post a new illustration every day for the next 31 days. I figured I might as well start things off right, so here goes:
Medium: Adobe Illustrator CS3
