I have been doing flannelgraphs for one of my clients and I really enjoy it!  It really takes me back to the days I had to sit in a circle with other kids and listen to a Bible lesson illustrated with fuzzy backed characters.  Below you’ll find some characters from the Prodigal son story and also a tree .

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A short time ago I sat down to figure out what to do for a Christmas card. After numerous drawings of Santa dancing I finally decided to nix the whole thing and go with A Christmas Carol! Merry Christmas!

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I had the pleasure of working on the design and illustration for a self-published childrens book a few months ago. Stephanie Wuthnow approached me with her idea for a story that would teach kids about music. The book is called A Musical Mouse in a Rhythmical House

and is about a mouse who discovers rhythm with the help of her uncle, a cat, Mrs. Beckman and two children! I thought it sounded like a great idea so we set about creating the book together. You can buy the book from the her website but here are a few of my favorite illustrations from the book.

Awesome!

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I had the opportunity to make this little cartoon regarding the proposed health care bill. Sounds like it’s a doosy .

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Lucy's Beard

A recent post on my brother-in-law’s Facebook page said…

Tonight before bed, Lucy said, “Daddy, can you take off your beard so I can try it on?”

It made me laugh out loud!  I could almost see the scene taking place so here is how I imagined it.  I wonder how long it would be before she’d decide it wasn’t any fun anymore .

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The morning after doing my version of large and graceful showed me just how much it lacked ‘grace’.  I think the previous post says large and distinguished more than anything else!  Oh well… and what is the deal with all the bulls?  ha!  Anyway, here is another shot at the bull in a china shop idea… this time a little more graceful.  Below are some more pages of sketches where I play with the theme.

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Large and Graceful

Hey! I’m back! I haven’t had a lot to post in the past few days but tonight I decided to check out the Chiu-Stream

at Schoolism.com.  One of my favorite artists, Peter DeSeve was being interviewed by Bobby Chiu and, although it ran from 11-12pm, I couldn’t miss it.  The hour long interview was pretty great and while you listen they have a drawing challenge going on.  Tonight was pretty intense!  Peter DeSeve chose the topic and we were all playing for an original sketch by Peter!  The pressure is pretty high when you are working against the clock and you know there are so many other people competing against you as well.  The topic was to create a character that was both large and graceful… visions of ballet dancing elephants ran through my head but I finally settled on a Bull in a China shop… 0 Comments on Large and Graceful with Peter DeSeve’ as of 10/8/2009 3:36:00 AM

Another illustration based on Where the Wild Things Are.  I hope you like it!

I also updated the image from the previous post. Just added stripes to the monster and altered Max a little because he bugged me .

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I was working on this Twitter graphic for my site but then I found this great Wordpress Widget that handles everything I ever wanted in one shot!  Now I have no use for my little bluebird so I’ll post him!

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“Where are the Wild Things?”

I was so thrilled and honored to be invited by Cory Godbey to contribute an illustration to his blog Terrible Yellow Eyes. Terrible Yellow Eyes is a blog that features artwork from many wonderful artists who all have a love for Maurice Sendak’s, Where the Wild Things Are.  If you haven’t checked it out you should!  Not only because I’ve made it there (ha!) but because it has a ton of amazing artwork!

My brain went in all directions when trying to come up with my interpretation for TYE.  There are so many possibilities, but having come into the project several weeks after it had started, a lot of great images have already been made.  I didn’t want to do something that had already been done!  I just love the little boy, Max, who is so mischievous and bold!  And the monsters, while obviously scary, wither under his unyielding gaze!  Well, I’m sure that part of the Wild Rumpus would have been a rousing game of hide and seek and that’s what I was trying to show in ‘Where are the Wild Things?’

Thanks, Mr. Sendak, for such a wonderful book!

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I noticed recently that several of the artists that I follow have been creating images based on drawings by the kids at Chicken Nugget Lemon Tooty.  CNLT is a blog by 3 kids who draw CONSTANTLY (according to their bio .  Isaac, Grace, and Lily are celebrating their 3rd year of sharing their amazing pictures online!  They posted an invitation asking for anyone interested in re-imagining one of the drawings on the blog.  I found out about this a little late but am going to send in my illustration today.

There were so many fun and creative drawings to choose from but this dancing monster caught my eye.  I guess she entertains the kids at night!  I wonder if she would visit me?!

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I just completed a few illustrations for some Sunday School papers.  I really liked these two pieces and thought I’d post them.  Hope you like!  You never know what you’re going to get around here .

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I’m back with another ArtOrder challenge.  Two in a row!  I think I’m about 4 weeks ahead so you won’t see any for a while .

Back in the day when D&D was just getting started apparently they were hurting for monster ideas (not the case any more!).  Occasionally they would brew up a monster by taking random parts from different animals and sticking them together.  In this case the Owlbear.  Head of an owl and body of a bear.  Well, the ArtOrder challenge this time around was to re-imagine the owlbear.  What if the creature as so alien that the adventurer could only use the words he knew in order to describe it? Here is my submission!

I thought that it would be interesting if the teeth of the monster were vaguely shaped like the big round eyes of an owl that would glow yellow in the dark.  The silhouette of the monster would almost look owl-like but up close it would be terrifying!  The O-bears favorite treat are the glowing bugs that hang-out in the canopy of trees at night so their teeth are stained yellow from their phosphorescent goo.  And here are some of my sketches.

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This time around on ArtOrder we were to create a new create based on the provided description.  Here are my results with a few sketches.

Thanks for stopping by!  I’m sick today so I’ll keep this short .

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I came up with this for another round of promo cards and thought it would make a great desktop screen.  So, if you click on the picture above you can download a 1600×1200 image for use on your desktop if you are so inclined.

The second image is on the back of the promo card and shines a little more light on the story of a boy and his belt buckle.

Yeehaww!

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Well, these days it seems like I’m only posting on the challenges over at ArtOrder .  Well, they are such amazing challenges!  If I have any artists reading this who aren’t already involved please take a look.  They are fantasy related so if you aren’t into that then you may be out of luck.  But the prize for playing along are things like having your work looked at by well known artists and art directors in the business!  This has been my motivation to submit entries and really work on my technique.  It’s just fun.

At any rate.  This week we are trying our hand at creating a book cover with two characters locked in battle.  I think my take may have come out a bit James Bond-ish due to the massive explosion coming from the castle but it served to add some contrast and visual interest to the cover so that the potential buyer would be drawn to it.  Let’s see if the judges agree .

Below is just a peek at my process.  I’m still ironing out the kinks but it is getting there.  Thanks for stopping by.

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Hey gang!  I’ve got a fun update for you today!  The ArtOrder Concept Tuesday challenge this week was on catastrophic dragons.  These dragons embody the catastrophe they are named after… so a fire dragon would be filled with fire.  This is an Earthquake Dragon!  I feel bad for our intrepid knight and his faithful squire .  He may have bit off more than he could chew.

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Another ArtOrder Concept Tuesday Challenge!  This week we were challenged to create a biker gang from one of the imaginary races in D&D.  I chose the Halflings… not to be confused with hobbits these guys are nomadic race and live along the shores of lakes and streams in stilted huts.  Since they spend a lot of time near the water I designed some amphibious cycles for them!  Also, I read that they like to trade so they ride laden down with goods and are always ready to haggle .

Below is a little of the doodling I did to come up with the amphibious bikes.

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Well, the Indy 500 was several weeks ago but it’s taken me a while to get around to my tribute to that weekend. I was invited to go along with my Dad, my brother, and my brother’s father-in-law to a weekend at the races!  I’d never been so this was a new experience for me.  The race would have been fun on it’s own but our host, Aaron, cooked up a storm!  Marinated steaks,  strawberry shortcake, coffee icecream pie, french toast fondu!!  I think we all ate enough calories to last the rest of the week .  It was a great weekend so I worked up a little thank-you illustration for Aaron.  Here are the boys…

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I haven’t been keeping up with my updates!  Spring is here and it’s been perfect!  Cool and rainy some days, warm and dry on other days… Carrie has planted a great looking window box and I’ve got a few tomato plants to keep track of so I’ve been busy .  At any rate, here is a little picture I did recently.  I’ve got some promotional ideas brewing so there’s sure to be more updates soon.  Thanks for hanging in there .

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