yote inks

I finished the inks for the coyote pieces last week but just got up to cleaning them a little bit for upload :) Final step is color! I'm also thinking of making myself a new banner....one that includes my new hook logo :3

Business Card and Logo Process

 So I have finished my logo and business card designs :) Shall I share the process? I THINK SO.

Step 1) Sketching: This is where I started off. I was trying to incorporate different things into my logo design. The tape holding the J and M together were for editing, the three ovals represented that I am the "third" (I like to sign my artwork as JLMIII). The hook on the J was supposed to represent the hook of a story. I decided to go with just the hook because this is obviously too ridiculous haha

Step 2) Trying to learn Illustrator: I grabbed a couple of ad/graph friends and got taught the basics of Adobe Illustrator. I started messing with the J and hook shapes and lineweight. However, these are awful.

Step 3) Actual Hooks: I started getting reference of actual fishing hooks and going from there, mixing and mashing different aspects that I liked and then warping the heck out of them to get the exact shapes that I wanted. This led to these scrappy sketches. I ended up going with the 2nd design - fishing line and all.

Step 4) Getting the Cards in Order: I opened up Illustrator and started going at it. Eventually I came up with this silly dummy that had random words like "Bangarang" where I wanted information to go and was editing as needed. I knew what colors I wanted so I played with them. I also played with the layout of information.

Step 5) Final Designing: After getting magnificent critique from my ad/graph friends, this is what the final design came out looking like, complete with catchphrase. WOO!

Step 6) Conforming: The printing company I'm going to be ordering from has a specific template for their business cards (as do most places). This was me taking my final design and just resizing it to their template. You can see how it slimmed out a little :)

Here you can see the template with the safety and bleed lines.

Possible Logo Idea (and Siblings update)

I'm really trying to work on some self-branding because the art sale and career fair are coming up at school within the next month or so. Logo's are NOT my specialty by any means, but here's what I've been playing with:

We'll see how it goes.

I've also been working on my Siblings piece (even though I've definitely slowed down on it since I've been playing with my bear character more)

That's all for now. I've got a lot to do for the art sale! Super excited! John and I have been thinking of opening an Etsy soon. We'll see :) More on that later.

Duilio Development

With my 2nd siblings piece, I'm really trying to figure out the characters of Cirino and Duilio. Duilio is based on a bear and suffers from deformaties in the story of Aviris. He's the type of character that looks like a bad guy (and who acts like one at first - bitter and calous and blunt), but is actually a great guy under the gruff. He's just misunderstood :)

I've been working on his design for a long time now and his head has always been something of a fun challenge for me. These are sketches I made today while playing around with different animal anatomies and trying to give him a certain look.

I'd appreciate any feedback on these. Which one do you like and why? Which do you think best shows the potential for a character who goes from mean to caring?  :)

All of the skull images were found on google via simple searches (EX "bear skull" and "mandrill skull") and btw, "study" is supposed to say "sturdy" lawl That one's my current fav :)

Yote Updates, Siblings2, and WHOAMGKENSHIN?!

The pencil work for the new coyote pieces are done!

 

From here, they will be inked with waterproof india ink and then colored :) I originally wanted to do the color in watercolor (like the other coyote pieces), but I may do them digitally depending :) Maybe both?

I hope to have prints of these available for sale at the Art Sale at my school in April.

I also started reworking "Siblings2" (I'm so original with titles).  I'm really trying to renoodle the designs for Duilio and Cirino - especially with Duilio's head. We'll see if I can get finished lines for this anytime soon heh




In completely random news, I came upon this trailer for a live action version of the well-known anime, Rurouni Kenshin (copy/paste it since I can't get the darn thing to embed):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lc_JmcRxdx8

This show was a super influence on my young, impressionable, pre-teen mind once upon a time :) I'm super excited to see more of it in the future. Hopefully, eventually, I can see it :D

Siblings2

Forgot to post this so I thought I'd go ahead...
Because I'm working on a siblings piece of Nikita, Kir, and Anya, I thought I'd go ahead and start one for Cirino and Duilio. I still need to work out their designs. I think I want Duilio/Jelani to be a little bigger and still have to figure out Cirino's anatomy (especially in those legs).

Coyote Pups & Fawns progress

Here's the latest progress on two of my coyote pieces. These both have to do with the Native American legend about Coyote and the Fawns. In the story, Coyote becomes entranced by the spots that a deer's fawns have. Wanting his own children to have spots, Coyote asks the Deer how she got the spots on her children.

The deer then explains that in order for Coyote to get spots on his children, he needs to trap them in a cave, set it on fire, and let the sparks hit them. The sparks of the fire will then give them spots.

Needless to say...that's not how it turned out D:>

In my version, Coyote's pups will survive, but have black spots rather than white (because they were burned). These pieces will be done in india ink and watercolor on 6ply bristol (not much different from my previous coyote work)

Coyote Sneak Peaks

I've been working on some sketches lately for various pieces :) A few of them are continuations of my coyote series (which I'm hoping to have done by mid-april). Take a lookie:

Coyote and Fawns

Coyote and Puppies

Coyote and Fox. I'm thinking of changing this one around a bit....

This one is NOT Coyote. It's actually for a calendar project that I've been working on for a while now :) The Calender will be about the western zodiac. This one is Taurus :) Long way to go on all of these!