The Rocky Horror Show!

The Pioneer Theater Company in SLC, Utah contacted me earlier this month to produce a playbill for their upcoming concert version of The Rocky Horror Show! I've been teasing this one on my Instagram for a while so I'm excited to present the final:

This was a really fun project but presented some interesting challenges. Because the actors hadn't been selected yet, we needed a composition that didn't focus too much on their faces, and because the image was going to be used not only as a playbill, but in ads and promotional material, we needed something that could be cropped in several different ways. After going through some sketches, we settled on this one with Frank's leg as the main character. I also painted the type separately, so each word could be resized and moved depending on the theater's needs. In the end I was really excited to delve back into my love of retro camp and produce a playbill that looks pretty rad! 

Lady in Purple

After a month long fight with a nasty case of bronchitis (I'm better now-thanks for asking) I finally got a chance to sit down and finish this personal piece I had started a while ago. A big thanks go to my friend Michelle McCurdy for letting me steal one of her instagram selfies for the woman. It doesn't look too much like her anymore but it was a big inspiration for the piece. The limited color palette was a bit of an experiment, but I think it turned out pretty well. The odd thing with purples and magentas in oils is that they will shift dramatically in different lights (sometimes even going brown), so I wasn't really sure which direction to push the digital version. I decided on a bit more saturated version and I like it. This will most likely turn into a wrap around book cover, but that will come later. Hope you like!

Happy Mothra's Day!

Another little gouache sketch for all the moms out there!

Happy Easterdillo!

Something I whipped up yesterday in honor of the holiday. Still experimenting with gouache and liking it quite a bit. One of these days I gotta use it to make a full image with a background and everything, but I love it for sketching and character work. 

War and Drugs (updated!)

(Updated 5/8) I found some cool brushes online and did a little editing on this one. Mainly some texture stuff. I'll probably still play around with it some more. but I figured I'd upload the newest version.

Pope on a Rope

Just finished a new editorial piece about Pope Francis so I figured I'd pop it up on the ol' bloggy blog. Here ya go:

So the thing with Francis is that everyone loves the guy, except for maybe the people who elected him. He was a pretty conservative cardinal, but all of a sudden he's all like "Peace and love, follow what Jesus actually said instead of years of political corruption and Papal opulence, blah blah blah". It's funny to see the higher-ups try to tone down his statements after he's made them, but I don't think they can keep him in check much longer. That was pretty much my inspiration, so I decided to have him glowing like a saint, but with these cardinal (get it?) ropes trying to hold him back. 

The original is in oil so I had to photograph it which turned out to be a pain because of the dark colors. Usually I use the "hope for an overcast day" method of lighting, but it was just nice enough that I was getting tons of glare. Then I remembered Dave Palumbo's post over at Muddy Colors about lighting your stuff on the cheap with some Target tree lamps. I ran around town and finally found a store with two in stock, and I gotta say, they worked PERFECTLY. They cost more than when he originally made the post ($40 each) but completely worth it. I highly recommend.

Finally, the original oil has this little "asterisk" where the one string is breaking, but I decided it was unnecessary so I cloned it out. BUT I felt bad for it, getting left out while the rest of the painting got to see the world, so I made a gif for fun:

The End

Adventures in Freelance

Whew, it's been a long time since my last post. Sorry 'bout that. Big news though! After years of illustrating on a part-time basis, I finally took the plunge, quit my day job, and am officially a full-time freelancer! The first couple of weeks have been crazy but I figured I'd take a second to post some updates about what I've been working on.

The first bit of news is that I actually have a piece in this week's Willamette Week, one of Portland's two alt-weekly papers. You can find it above the Music Calendar, but if you are out of state (or lazy) here you go:

While I generally work in oils, the deadline was pretty short so the art director let me work it up digitally. Here's a look at it in the paper:

I'm also working on an oils piece of the Pope, and you can see a preview of that over at my instagram account (which you should totally follow yo). I'll do a full post about it once it's finished.

Anyway, its only been a week-and-a-half since taking the full-time plunge, but I've never been this excited, motivated, or happy about a choice in my entire life. I highly suggest following your dreams, it's a hell of a feeling!