Handmade Family Drawing giveaway.

My Wife and I are long time Muppet fans. We enjoy them as much today as we did when we were kids, and we are all looking forward to the new movie coming out on November 23. In his speech to Doc Hopper at the end of the original Muppet movie, Kermit says:

“I’ve got a dream too. But it’s about singing and dancing and making people happy. That’s the kind of dream that gets better the more people you share it with. And…well…I’ve found a whole bunch of friends that share the same dream, and that makes us kind of like a family.”

We take a lot of joy in what we do, and with sharing it with you all. In that spirit, from now until when I manage to check our FB page on November 23, we will be having a giveaway drawing for this marker sketch of Kermit and his banjo. All you have to do is leave a comment on the photo thread on our fan page telling us who your favorite Muppet is.

And like kermit says, it gets better the more people you share it with, so let your friends know too!

All Stars: Vice Squad

Cover art for the All Stars vice squad game supplement coming soon from Hex Games.

This is actually the second cover in the All Stars series, the first one was by the super talented Lindsay Hornsby. I didn't try to match her art style, but did use her color palette. It was strange seeing the color choices that another artist used and thinking about how I would have done it differently. The two biggest differences are that her skin tone is very yellow while mine leans more toward reddish orange. And the over all tone is purple, where I usually go with a dark blue or red.

Like I said, the differences are interesting to me. Hope you like it!

Archon Con-Sketches

The upside of working for yourself, is that you can leave the office for a couple of days and meet new people and do new art. The downside is that you come back and there's work that needs to be done and your only employee wasn't there to do it. Ha-ha-ha!

Soooo... Archon was a lot of fun, but I'm still catching up on work so this is gonna be short. Mostly pictures. I still haven't processed most of the photos I took, so I'll get to that in the next couple of days. For now, I'm focusing on what I did while I was there. I had a table in Artists Alley this year, and spent my weekend talking to peoples and drawing pictures.

Here's my table set up on the first day of the con. We were told that we'd have 8ft tables, but only got 6 footers. Sometimes you just have to make do, but fortunately the person next to me never showed up so I ended up expanding onto his table.

The first commission on Friday. She had a printout to use as reference, and pretty much told me to do what I wanted...

This girl's ferret had just died, so she wanted a picture of him with angel wings and a halo. I always hope that what I make comes close to what's in peoples heads, because this stuff is kind of important to them.

There were a couple of drawings that I did just to kill time...
Peter Venkman from the Ghostbusters.

Chunk from the Goonies.

Mal from Firefly. I'm glad that this one ended up finding a home before the weekend was over.

I apparently have a slight obsession with superheros eating hamburgers. I think there's just something about people who are action oriented doing normal things.

Right before closing up on Sunday, three girls from the St Louis Science Center who were there promoting the new Star Trek Exhibit came and commissioned 3 drawings of themselves...

As Star Trek characters,

Goonies,

and riding dinosaurs. I had a lot of fun working on these.

That's it for now, so until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Happy Fall!

It's been a super busy work week, and until tonite I haven't had more than a minute to think. Still, I'll be lucky to get to bed before midnite.  Ha-ha-ha!

At any rate, I don't have much time for a "real" post, but thought I'd share some of the drawings I've been working on for my day (nite...late nite) job, celebrating the end of that aweful summer heat..

 

A jack-o-lantern...

 

and a turkey playing soccer.

That's it for now. Until next time, take care and be good!

Your friend,

Jeffrey

More Sprites

I'd meant to have these up here a couple of days ago, but have been experiencing some technical difficulties the past few days. Three more of the Sprite Illustrations I did last month. All six of these watercolor illustrations are available to purchase in my etsy shop Handmade Family. There are also a lot of other really cool items there made my my wife, like superhero capes and masks, key chains and baby blankets. Go check it out!
"The Mason Jar"
"Hat Shopping"
"Three Little Birds"

Until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

All Stars

Recently, I did some interior art for a new release from Hex, "All Stars", A game of low-budget superheroics. Basically, it's a game about the other guys. The super heroes that just didn't quite make it. Think "The Tick" or "Mystery Men". At any rate, this project was a lot of fun.

You can purchase your very own copy, written by Steve Johnson, with cover art by the talented Lindsay Hornsby, and interior art by Leighton Connor, Josh Burnett, and myself here.

Until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Some Of My Personal Work

Just a quick post to show you all a few things that I made for myself lately...well, they were actually so that I would have something to put in I Am What I Am on Main Street a local shop in downtown St. Charles where Amy and I have been Featured Artists this month. The link is to an interview we did with them for their blog.
"Walking in the rain"
"Bullfrog Ridin"
"Just One More Thing"

I did a longer write up about them, and the process over on the Handmade Family Blog and I actually documented them pretty well, so go check it out! I should have these available on my Etsy and Big Cartel shops as well by the end of this weekend. I'll keep you all posted!

Until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

A Little Bit of Process

As promised, here's a little bit of my working process. This isn't everything, because I'm not including my initial thumbnail sketches or any of the work on the logo, and I'm terrible about actually documenting what I do during the painting process...but it'll have to do for now. ha-ha-ha!

First I get the brief, and (usually) a copy of the current version of the text. Depending on who I'm working for, the brief can be more or less specific. Ian is usually pretty specific about his ideas, but is also pretty cool about letting me choose from his list of things. The cover brief for Edison force looked like this:

In the grand tradition of Fratboys, I like the idea of a host of evil rising up. Some things that might be good

In the midground

Luther Burbank with his vegetable minions

Marie Curie with her radium gun

J. Pierpont Morgan and his accountant henchmen

An X-ray image of a man

Nicholas Roerich seated crossed-legged in midair using the power of Shambala to levitate

An early tank

In the air maybe an evil black dirigible, pterodacyls—small, far off

In the background,

an ominous black figure, backlit by a sparking Tesla coil

In the foreground,

a ca. 1908 Thomas Edison backed by a team. Maybe a Roosevelt look-alike, an Annie Oakley, a guy in a leather flying helmet, a kid working a crystal set.

So as you can see, he gave me a lot of ideas to work with.

The first thing I do is start gathering reference. Mostly I'm looking for photos to cover the specific references, as well as poses, attitudes and inspiration. My reference files can get pretty big.
Like I said, I didn't scan the initial thumbnail sketches I did, exploring composition and content, and now I don't know where they are. This is my initial pencil drawing. Nothing too special, I use a 2h pencil for the initial lay in, and then go back over part of it with a 1 or 2b, to darken and finalize things.
After scanning in the pencils, I went ahead and did a composite using the graphic elements that I knew would be going into it. Basically, I wanted to make sure everything fit before putting too much work into the project.
Next I ink the pencil drawing. This defines all the major areas, as well as adding some textures and details to objects.
Finally, I color everything. Here's a detail of what the colors look like both with and without the inked lines.

One of these days I'll get more of a tutorial post together. The problem is that I'm still learning a lot with each new cover, so I don't always do it the same way. Hmmmm... Maybe that's the way it is with everybody though. I hope you all got at least some peak into the way I work through this.

Until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Edison Force!!!

Well, July is coming to an end, and with it will come the release of Edison Force from Hex Games!

This is probably my favorite cover to date...I guess that makes sense since it's the most recent, but I think there's more to it than that. I enjoyed the research and inspiration phase of it very much, and also the writer Ian gave me a lot of ideas to work with for what he wanted on it. So many ideas in fact, that I had to sift through them and unfortunately had to end up leaving a lot of them out.
I've been wanting to do a more in depth post talking a little bit about the way I work and develop my ideas lately. I'm not making any promises because I have a lot of other work to do to get ready for Archon, the holiday season at Fusion, and (hopefully) the Small Press Expo this fall, but I think I may put together something with this cover to kind of show it from start to finish.
The boy with the electric rifle was the first illustration that I did for this project. This is actually the second version of this drawing, as I felt that in my first go he was a little too old. The game is set in the turn of the 20th century, and revolves around a lot of electrical, steam/diesel punk technology. I felt (and I think this may have been Ian's intention) that there would be a lot of kids working for Mr. Edison's organization.
Diamond Jill and her Electric Handgun. I struggled with this one, wanting to do more of an "adventurer" design, until I realized that she really should be more subtle...like a member of the upper-class. Or at least a LADY, and not just some street urchin like the boy with the electric rifle. I imagine that she normally wouldn't use her electric handgun unless she was cornered, and that's why she's just a bit disheveled.
What game about turn of the century super-spies and mad scientists would be complete without a radio controlled monkey?

That's it for today. Until next time, take care and be good.
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Roller Girls Versus

I noticed today that it's managed to be two weeks since I posted last...wow. To be fair though, there are a couple of posts by me over on the handmade family blog, so you could go check that out, follow it, and suggest it to all your friends, acquaintances and family if you want. Or you could just go check it out. There's some pretty cool stuff, and my wife is putting up content about her work too, so that's pretty rad... and I'm better about putting pictures of the girls on there too, ha-ha-ha!

Okay, on to the real reasons (excuses) for not posting in two weeks. First, we've been accepted as vendors in a local hand-made cooperative, Fusion. More on that in the next couple of days, as we're working like crazy to get ready for set-up (I'm supposed to be designing our signing right now, actually). The second reason, is this new cover for the fine folks at Hex Games... Roller Girls Versus! I decided to take a different approach to it, and it kind of blew up in my face and took way longer than it should have. On the plus side though, I think I learned a couple of lessons and maybe earned a couple of experience points towards leveling up. I'm not going to jabber any more tonite, because I'm pretty beat, and still have work to do before bed.

Here's the pencils.
and here's the colored version. I pretty much just painted over the pencils this time, but there's a lot more going on than usual. Like I said..."trying something new". Ha-ha-ha! I hope you all like it.
Until next time, take care and be good.
Your friend,
Jeffrey

The Problem With Magna Doodles and a "Failed" Daily Life

I don't know if any of you have ever watched the show "Pokemon" or not. The show revolves around a boy who travels the world looking for cute little monsters to trap...or collect. Whatever. He then trains the little guys and takes them to tournaments to fight other pokemonsters. Like a cock-fight with superpowers. I imagine that trying to catch pokemon is only slightly easier than trying to catch a drawing that a two-and-a-half year old has done on a Magna Doodle. I'd been trying to get a good picture (heck, any picture) of this drawing since she was drawing jack-o-lanterns in November. Each new thing from that girl simultaneously thrills, amazes and saddens me. Really, it's one of the most difficult and at the same time rewarding things about watching them grow up. And we've just gotten started!

I started working on some new single illustration "Daily Life's" this week. I'd found this list of 100 themes by Robin Hall at Bubblegum Bullet. While I do have plenty of stories, it seems like it could be fun as well as a good exercise to fit them into the themes...sort of diversify my portfolio, or something. This first one is "Introduction", I'll get to the story in a minute... Ha-ha-ha! First I want to talk about the art. I know that's unusual with the Daily Life drawings, but I don't like this and want to do it over. So I'm going to talk about it.
When I started the Daily Life drawings, they were simple warm-ups that allowed me to work in a relaxed manner and experiment with new techniques. That hasn't changed, but I've been a little surprised with how well they have been received. I'm working on a new cover for Hex right now too, and wanted to try something new... a new way to draw and color the art. So I did this one first. There are a lot of things I like about it, but I don't really care for how the pencil went down on the paper. Originally, when I bought this pad of paper it was to do pencil drawings on. I liked the rough texture and thought it would be a good match. It isn't. So I am switching to a smoother paper next time (either smooth bristol board, or I might try Reeves BFK again), and will try again.
This past weekend I went up to Green Bay with some friends to watch the Super Bowl (Yes we knew the actual game was in Dallas, but you have to watch the Packers win all the marbles in GREEN BAY). For the party, AA (that's double A) made some great pizza using pretzel dough for the crust. There was a lot of work to do in the kitchen, and the game was going to start soon, so I offered to help. Chopping vegetables. I was thinking later how odd it is to greet people coming over with a hand-shake from one hand, while holding a knife in the other. Not the kind of introduction we normally want to have.

Justin told me the other day that I write a lot in my posts. Is it too much? Are you all thinking "More art, less words Jeffrey!"? Leave a comment! Let me know! Until next time, then. Take care and be good.

Your friend,
Jeffrey

Daily Life: The problem with persona projects...

I feel like I keep on promising this thing, but it never gets done... ugh. I'm so close to finishing it up, but I have to stop again to get some actual client work done. I was stressing out about this, because I really wanted to have this finished and ready to put up for sale in the middle of November so that maybe some peoples would buy it, Ha-ha-ha! That's the problem with being a professional with a blog that showcases a lot of personal work and projects... in progress. I think it sometimes makes me look more irresponsible than I actually am.
If you're waiting to pick one of these guys up, thank you for being so patient. Like I said, I'm nearly finished with the illustrations, and I'm really happy with how they are turning out. I'm really excited to see them printed. In the meantime, here's three of the colored images for you to check out. I hope you like them as much as I do.


Thanks for looking (and hopefully understanding) and being so patient. Until next time, take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

The Last of the Frat Boys Posts... Probably.

I've gotten into the (maybe terrible, but the jury is still out) habit of sitting and reading (and reading, and reading) blogs when I come down to the basement to work. I only say that it's (maybe) terrible, because it means that I end up staying up until three (or five) some mornings... My time management skills could use some managing, I think.

Okay, so here's one of the things that has kept me up this week... I'm sure you all are tired of hearing about the artwork for "Frat Boys: Versus" (Due out in November from Hex Games). Well, I finally got the cover all purdy and colored.

Here it is without all the title and copyright graphics. I'm overall happy with how it turned out. I think if I had it to do all over again, I'd probably color the background characters a little more graphically with flat colors and cell-style shading, but that's really neither here nor there.

Here it is with the title and copyright logos added. I wanted to keep it pretty simple and collegiate.

Until next time, take care and be good!

Oh yeah, and DON'T FORGET TO VOTE!

Your friend,
Jeffrey

Frat Boys Interior and cover inks

I know what you're probably saying... "More frat boys?! Geesh!" Almost done, I promise. This week, I got one last archetype, and finally the inks for the cover. Hope you like 'em!
The final archetype I have for you is the ring leader. This character archetype can vary wildly, but the constant is that he's charismatic, and perhaps a bit mischievous, but above all, he holds everything together. Examples include Anthony Edwards character in "Revenge of the Nerds", Val Kilmer in "Real Genius", and Ryan Reynolds in "Van Wilder". I based mine in part on Jeremy Piven in "PCU", and Bill Murray's unforgettable Peter Venkman in "Ghostbusters". Cast as Justin Bateman, I think he'd be charming, strong, and capable of being sardonic when the situation required it of him.
I have never liked "Scooby-Doo". There... I said it. I've always thought it was a cool idea, but ultimately, it was the same old show over and over again, and honestly it wasn't that entertaining the first time. I did like the intro, however... THAT was cool. Four kids and their dog on an adventure, being chased by monsters. Cool. So, that's what I had in mind when I was drawing the cover art for Frat Boys -Versus-. What would Scooby-Doo be like if it was cool. It's got everything from redneck truckers, to ostriches, to zombie girl-scouts, and even an astronaut with a sword!

Okay, so maybe my idea of cool and everybody elses is different. At any rate, I'm pretty excited about how it's coming along.

Until next time, take care and be good.
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Frat Boys Interiors

So, I was going to post about something else tonight, but I really have too much other work on my desk, and didn't manage to get all the artwork for that post done. There's always next week though, right?

I figured that instead I would share with you a couple more of the character archetypes for the "Frat Boys -Versus-" supplement for the QAGS game system that is due out before the end of October.

First up is the Party Animal. Most often, when I think of the party animal archetype, I think of John Belushi in "Animal House". I thought it would be kind of funny to cast him as Seth Rogan, and strap a keg on his back as his zombie-killing weapon-of-choice.

When I think of the Outsider, honestly I think of the black running-back in "Varsity Blues". At any rate, I thought it would be cool to have the person who was different from all the other pledge brothers be... A girl. Not just any girl would do though, so I cast Rosario Dawson. Steve said something to the effect of "I don't know what she's going to do with the beer-bong, but I have a feeling it'll be awesome."

Finally, on a semi-related note... RPGnow is offering $700.00 worth of gaming PDFs for $25 dollars. All the proceeds go to Doctors Without Borders. So if you like games, and you like saving a lot of dollars, and you like helping others save lives, go check it out! One of the pdfs in the offer is American Artifacts, by Hex Games.

Until next time, take care and be good.
Your friend,
Jeffrey

American Artifacts: The Car Hank Died In

I think the quote is "If you draw it, then you know it". I'm not 100% sure that I got the words right, but the spirit of the quote is there. Iain McCaig, a fantastic concept artist and illustrator said this in relation to forming new ideas, and drawings. Basically, it means that nothing grows in a vacuum (except dust-bunnies) and that even the most bizarre creation is based on SOMETHING that already exists. So. Part of our job as artists it to not only draw some fantastical stuff, but also to draw a lot (sorry, I meant A LOT) of regular stuff. This helps limber our arms and hands. It develops our eye. It stretches our minds, and builds a visual vocabulary of parts to pull from.

A few months ago, I did some art for the fine folks over at Hex Games for a supplement called "American Artifacts" (Have you bought your copy yet? It's really good, you should really look into it). I only did one interior illustration for it, but all of the artifacts were so cool that I wanted to do more. In the spirit of adding to my visual Vocabulary, as well as my portfolio, and hopefully to get some rad promo stuff together as well, I started drawing the other 19 artifacts. The first is the car that Hank died in... Referring to the great country singer Hank Williams sr.

From Wikipedia:

On January 1, 1953, Williams was due to play at a New Year's Day concert in Canton, Ohio, but he was unable to fly due to weather problems with snow and ice in Ohio. He hired a college student, Charles Carr, to drive him to the concerts he was to perform during the few final days of 1952 and early 1953. Upon leaving the Andrew Johnson Hotel in Knoxville, Tennessee, Williams apparently had injected himself with some pain-killers which included a morphine/Vitamin B-12 combination. Also found in the Cadillac convertible were some empty beer cans and the handwritten lyrics to a song yet to be recorded. According to some, Williams was carried semi-conscious to his automobile by Carr and a hotel employee, who wondered about Williams' condition, and later believed he might have been dead at that point.

In a slightly different version, Carr suspected Williams was moribund at some earlier point, but realized the great singer was dead several miles before entering the town of Oak Hill, West Virginia where he, almost in a panic, pulled up to the gas station to seek help.

My wife tells me it looks like the car's hit him. Admittedly, the whole "Spirit leaving the body" aspect of this illustration is a little shaky. I know what's going on, but that's because I drew it, Ha-ha-ha! At any rate the drawing was more about the car anyway, and I actually am really happy with how that turned out. I think the next one is the the car that won't die. I have an idea for it, and it should be good, but I need to see if they have "The Blues Brothers" at the library.

Until next time, Take care and be good!
Your friend,
Jeffrey

Some interiors for Frat Boys -VS- coming soon from Hex Games

The Guys at Hex are so good about letting me decide what I'm going to illustrate. Usually there are some guidelines or ideas for what they are looking for, but I feel very fortunate that they trust me enough to say basically "Here's the text, draw something cool."

My only direction was that they wanted a feeling of the setting, and maybe a party at the frat house. I decided to do the drawings based on frat boy archetypes (Jock, Nerd, Outsider, Party Animal, and Ringleader), showing bits of frat life (the partys, the house, the trash... the potential for adventure) as small back grounds.

Here's the Jock, and the Nerd interior illustrations.