this is going to be bats@!% cool!

Two Star Symphony, Houston's awesome local string quartet extraordinaire, needed a poster for their awesome upcoming live performance at the awesome Discovery Green venue of their awesome original score for the awesome public-domain-footage film "Silent Shadow of the Batman" by awesome writer/director/editor Andre Perkowski.

So, I came up with this poster for them. People seem to think it's cool. If you think the poster is cool, or even if you don't, you should go to the screening. I got off of work just so I could attend (it's going to be bats*&% awesome!)

Character Illustration

I recently completed a concept illustration commission of the main character in author Brant Forseng's upcoming fantasy novel. Mr. Forseng provided me with world and plot description, as well as detailed notes on Lady Merreth's character and appearance. Mr. Forseng gave me exact guidelines about how he wanted Merreth to look (so helpful!), but I otherwise had total creative control over the image elements, and it was a blast to work on the image.

This was my first commission as an artist and I wanted to do a really good job! I'd like to thank my previous digital concept instructor, Stephen Pearce, for all his input, advice, and encouragement.

Both the story and figure of Lady Merreth are extremely intriguing to me, and I'm looking forward to being able to read the book when it's published.  I hope I've done the character justice! Mr. Forseng doesn't have a site up yet for the book, but I will link it as soon as there is for my fellow fantasy bookworms.

Happy Easter

Easter was traditionally the biggest holiday in Greece, until the advent of trans-global consumerism and Santa.  The halo - the perfect circle - represented life eternal, and 'Oon' and the letters *omega*omicron*ni* are often inscribed in the halos on the icons of Christ in Greek Orthodox churches. 'Oon' was the ancient word for egg (hence Ova, OOcyte, etc, in modern biological terms), and it's traditional to eat eggs dyed dark red to symbolize the blood of Christ.

On the other hand, the original Germanic story of little Red Riding Hood was all about death, or at least the perils of reproduction. Upon meeting Riding Hood in the forest, the wolf inquires whether she will go to Grandmother's house via the 'path of pins or needles'. Some say that the 'path of needles' is a medieval metaphor for prostitution, the path of pins a metaphor for a girl's coming of age, and the Wolf a metaphor for the deadliness of STDs and childbirth.

So two very asymmetric influences on the image below, which works, since it was originally a Visual Narrative class assignment on the use of balance or asymmetry to convey mood.

Either way, it reminds me of what's really important this time of year - Cadbury cream-filled eggs.  Yum.

Happy BP-day!

So, apparently BP wrote off the clean-up costs of the Gulf Coast devastation as a $32 billion tax liability, and are now receiving a $13 Billion tax break from the U.S. government. I remember when the oil tankers spilled off of Galveston and we used to come back from the beach covered in tar for years. We rubbed on sunscreen before we got in the water, and turpentine after we got out. Of course, Galveston has been so overbuilt that it's literally sinking into the ocean and they actively pump sand up from the sea bed to keep any beach at all. Now, BP isn't actively responsible for Galveston's crud, but they did have two fatal refinery accidents within the space of two or three years in the Houston suburbs, and the second was so loud we heard it in the center of town.

This is from a term I Visual narrative assignment to design a monster or zombie, a cute character, and a hero character for a video game.  It's a whole year old, but somehow it still feels fresh to me. Is it summer yet? I'm hitting the beach. Please pass the turpentine.

Baby Steps

i'm taking a part-time digital concept art class through my school while i still have a chance. i've used photoshop extensively to fix photos and create various graphics, but i have never digitally painted, and never before used a wacom or any other type of tablet. i love it, and the instructor is awesome, but several people in the class are so phenomenal that a voice in my head starts telling me i should just become an accountant. luckily, i'm so stubborn i don't even listen to the voices in my head. 

this is my first completed project from that class. my buildings are not as sleekly sci-fi as some of my classmates, but i really like how the foreground structure turned out, and think Harry & David should show me the money to design their home offices in the same fashion. mmmmm, pears.

this is another color variation. i dig how.... gaudy it is.