Ok, so I'm one day early for the Countdown

I don't think I'll be able to get the place fixed up tomorrow, Oct 1, for the Countdown to Halloween so I thought I better get things decorated today.  I have new halloween pinup to post, you can see some of her in the header here, but I'm saving her for a bit.

I have some new art saved up to share for Halloween and I hope to keep creating new things as the month goes on so.  So Happy (early) Haunting!

A Classical Experiment

This weekend Andrew mentioned how Walter from the show Fringe would put on classical music to help him think.  That sounded interesting so to see how it worked I listened to a classical music radio station all day.  And, daggnabbit, I think it worked!  I've had such a short attention span lately for working in front of the computer that I needed something to keep my bum in the chair.  I managed to work 6.5 hours today without fidgeting or checking Twitter, my email or my usual time-wasting websites.  I'm really impressed with myself!  I now have another trick in my bag to use when I need the bump up my concentration.  I think it has something to do with the fact there are no lyrics to listen to, no words your brain wants to understand whether you care about them or not.  And the music goes on for longer than 3-4 minutes which about the average length of a song.  Pretty neat.

In other news, I'm signed up for the Countdown to Halloween!  So starting October 1st I'm going to try and post as many Halloween related things as I can.  I can't promise I'll post every day but I'm hoping to at least draw everyday and then post a few things at a time.

1950s Men really like their drinks

Not quite as fun as grey toning the ladies but I felt I could go goofier with the guys.

Drawing from those old photos has already changed the way I draw noses.  I had forgotten that practicing drawing makes you better!  I know, right?  Did you know?  Yeah, crazy huh!?

1950s Guys

Holy crap!  I really have to practice drawing men!  First I went through the photos from Tackorama and super roughly sketched some of my favourites.  Then I picked the ones I liked from those and drew them larger and with more detail.  Then I drew them again.  And again.  AND AGAIN!  Ooof.  Boy, they took a long time to get right.  And even then I wasn't totally satisfied so this morning I pulled out another sketchbook and redrew them from my drawings, not from looking at the photo.   So it's these drawings:

From these photos:

I flipped the one drinking milk because everyone I drew was facing to the left.  I get strangely paranoid when everything I draw faces one direction over and over so I vary it the best I can.

Hopefully will be vectored soon.

Illustration Friday: Boundaries

As much as I love the results I can get with Illustrator, it can sometimes feel like I'm doing everything with vectors.  I get a little trapped in the thinking I could/should finish everything in colour.  Sometimes a pencil drawing is good enough!  I've been missing the way you can just imply something with pencil or ink, like the roll of a shirt sleeve or the shape of a hairstyle.  In vector, pretty much everything has to be planned out and defined.  At least that's the way I have to produce things for work.  I'm slowly figuring out how to imply, convincingly, the same thing with vectors.

These were my thoughts for the topic of "boundaries".  Get it?  Because he's swinging on the bounding box in Illustrator?

1950s Phone Call

As I was colouring this all I could think of was the speech from the MST3k version of Manos: The Hands of Fate. where Tom goes on and on and on about his 20 year plan.  That cracked me up so hard the first time we watched it years ago and I still think of when someone's on the phone for a long, long time and I'm like "Just shuuuuuuut uuuuuuuuup already".  I didn't really want to transcribe the whole thing myself but unbelievably, searching for "manos, mst, year, plan" resulted in the very first link being a page where someone else already did it!

Here's the photo reference I used:

I made her a lot more psycho looking but that's just how my drawing evolved.  Once again, the photo is from Tackorama.  I think the women are out of my system now and I'd like to sit and try my hand at some of the men's photos.  They're just as wacky as the women's.

Viking

I was thinking of doing a viking pinup but drew this guy instead:

I'm still working out how to use my grey markers best.  I'm so used to using vectors to colour things where it doesn't matter if you put light over dark or dark over light.  I have to switch my brain around and remember that dark is dark, I can't make it lighter!

1950s Secrets....

Yes, another one.  Here's the reference photo I use from Tackorama:

There were quite a few of ladies sharing secrets but this one seemed the most typical.  "I got my hair done at...!"  "My husband always..."  "Mary down the street doesn't...."

I need to find a book of these kinds of photos.  Drawing off the computer can kind of suck at times.

Andrew Barr's Monstars

Andrew Barr has created a blog specifically for his Monstars! Right now he's reposting a lot of the earlier ones with a new one mixed in. You can also follow the blog on Twitter and see when he's posted something:

Andrew Barr's Monstars: Bad Ash: First appearance: Army of Darkness (1992)

Illustration Friday: Mysterious

I had this one sketched already and then saw the Illustration Friday word of the week was "mysterious" and I thought she would be appropriate.

Not really going for a 100% caricature, but using the photo as a jumping off point.

This is the photo I found at Tackorama.com

1950s lady

So while I was looking for new fonts I came across this great font site and also has stock photography:  Tackorama.  I downloaded about 500 photos from the 50's that are pretty hilarious.  Women smiling holding glasses, talking, crying, reading, you name it.  There's one of a happy woman holding a jar of what looks like pickled eggs.  I was totally inspired to draw them and thought I'd try greying them in. It was a nice change from concentrating on colours.   I wasn't going for a straight caricature but used the photo as a jumping off point.  I have a few more I want to finish so that'll be on my plate for a while.

I really liked her expression....

First I just did quick sketches of a bunch of my favourites to see what jumped out at me.  I saw potential in this one...

Then I spent some more time redrawing her pose.  Funny how sometimes you can draw something and then think "Did I do that?" (in a good way).  Feels like my style is on the verge of changing.  "On the edge of the bubble about to break through" is what we said in college.

It took about 2 hours to grey her in with Illustrator.  Again, did I do this?  I do love my vectors.  I'm hoping to get faster doing this and better at likenesses.  Plus a little practise just drawing like this never hurt.  I know I should probably draw more men and kids and objects but it's just so enjoyable doing a cute lady!

Disguise

I TOLD you I'd finish colouring it.

I changed her outfit again.  We were watching Cannonball Run after my sketch was done but all those 1970s clothes inspired me to put her in those shiny gym shorts and ringer t-shirt.