The Guardian

 

 The Guardian, 30 x 24, oil on canvas.

About time this one was finished.  Believe it or not this guy has been lurking in the studio since about last April.  The water, Good Lord, the water.  How it taunted.  Quite a challenge getting all those waves in there, I think it turned out alright, but I'll definitely have to tackle another "maritime" piece for some much needed practice.  I'm sure that there's some dumb-easy trick to painting water that I just glossed over in the alla prima painter's handbook, but man - this was a challenge.  I also suppose this could be considered my first "dragon" painting.  Though I prefer to think of the beasty as an overgrown snapping turtle.  The finished drawing below for some comparison.

During the painting of all that water, I decided that the little silhouetted shaman/priest fellow on the cliff had to go.  I think it works a little better for the composition and storytelling (I like cliches as much as the next guy, but this was definitely a decision that I was more in love with 8 months ago than now), plus it was a complete pain to keep painting around him...

Oh, and I also managed to spell the file name incorrectly - yay, English.

A Delaware Christmas

A Delaware Christmas, 21x30, oil on canvas....And sketches.

This year's Christmas/Holiday Card for the high school.  I will forgo my usual hesitancies with my own artwork and come out and say that I'm really pleased with this painting.  It was some of the most fun and fulfilling work I've spent at the canvas in a while.

War Priest Finished Pencils

Piggy-backing off of the post below...at least I made use of the time between my "free time."  I think I mentioned this before, but I find it's a lot easier to drop in and out of a drawing while teaching than to drop in and out of a painting.  Fairly happy with the skulls in the background, but still need to tweak the values.  Hoping for paint around December.

More Joan Progress

Had some time between classes this week, so I started slapping down some of the background.  It's a lot of real estate, but hopefully it won't take too long once I get cooking.  The hair and the beginnings of the armor are from the last spurt of free time I had about a month ago.

Harvey, not exactly an NDA...

The high school that I teach at has a really great drama department, and since last year I've been doing the poster art for the fall and spring shows.  This fall's show is Harvey - set in the 1950s, it's a little yarn about a fellow named Elwood who sees a spirit, Harvey, who happens to be in the form of a six foot tall rabbit.  Needless to say, Elwood's a bit off his rocker, since no one else can see Harvey, but it's his sister, Veta, who has grown tired of Elwood's eccentric behavior, that gets committed to a sanitarium.  Don't worry, there's a happy ending.

These posters are a great opportunity for me to stretch my "inking" legs, since they are printed in black and white, and try to channel some of the great illustrators that I admire from the past.  The figures are the two leads from the show, we did a quick photo session (man does stage lighting come in handy...), a few sketches for an approval from the drama teacher, some ink and hand lettering later, and here we are. The printers will take care of the rest of the layout, I'll try and post the finished poster once it gets back.  Good fun.

Works in Progress

One drawing and one painting.

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