Thunder Wolf

I did this little wolf illustration for a tutorial about tips for drawing cute creatures in the May 2013 issue of ImagineFX's Fantasy and Sci-Fi Digital Art magazine. You can also find him in IFX's 2013 Digital Artist's Survival Guide. :3

Daily Animal Sketch – Wolves and Caribou

Gesture sketches of wolves and caribou in motion.

Dream Big, Zaenok

Based on Zefanya N Putri's winning entry in my Arctic Animal Comic Competition, this illustration depicts her collared lemming character, Zaenok. I was really taken with the idea of a tiny lemming reaching for the stars and dreaming big. And traveling the ocean by seal. Zefanya will be receiving the original drawing and print of this in the mail as part of her prize pack. :)

Snow Leopard Trust

Illustration for the Snow Leopard Trust, published in the September/October 2012 issue of Bare Essentials magazine (see pg 84 for Snow Leopard illustration).

Daily Animal Sketch – Grizzlies and Polar Bears

Studies of grizzly bears in preparation for the Vital Ground illustration I did last month. Plus, polar bears warm-up gestures.

How to Draw a Polar Bear

Polar bears are large, muscular animals with short legs and powerful forelimbs. The polar bear’s body is streamlined for navigating ice, water, and land. Their elongated torso and tapered head and neck are perfect for long distance swimming, while large feet give them better traction on the ice. Thick fur protects them from the cold. Try to bring out these traits in your drawing.

The key to drawing anything is to break it down into basic shapes. If you can draw circles and ovals, you can draw a polar bear.  Don’t be discouraged if your first attempt doesn’t turn out exactly like the picture. Practice makes perfect, so let’s begin!

Click the image below to view the step-by-step polar bear drawing tutorial.

Don’t give up if your first drawings aren’t perfect. Art is not something that can be learned overnight. Drawing is a skill that must be practiced and supplemented through observation, so keep a sketchbook, and take it with you everywhere. Look around you, draw what you see.  Visit the zoo and sketch animals. Sketch people at the mall. The more you draw, the better you’ll get. Good luck!

Here's another article written by me with more animal sketching tips and resources.

Honey Bear

Honey is a bear-butterfly-lion (a Bearflyon?). My favorite part is her heart-shaped nose. :)
Pencil + coloring in Photoshop CS3.

Percy the Vogue Ferret

 Here's a new ferret character I designed, done in my Peach Fuzz-style. It took a minute to return to the cute bubbly style of my Peach Fuzz series, but after some warm up sketching, it came back to me, and so fun to do! Cel style coloring is also a joy.

He's based on The Vogue Ferret's real life ferret, Percy, seen here napping in a hammock.

 A sable like Peach, she would probably like this charming fellow (look out, Edwin, there's competition)!

Here's the conceptual sketches for Percy's look and pose:

Last of the Polar Bears - now a webcomic

Hi everyone,

I wanted to let all of you know that I've started posting pages of The Last of the Polar Bears online as a web comic. I plan to post a new double-page spread every week, on Mondays, as well as write about the process of making comics as time allows. You can read The Last of the Polar Bears comic here: www.lastpolarbears.com.

Why the webcomic format?

I started working on The Last of the Polar Bears a year ago, researching, plotting the story from beginning to end, designing the characters, and working on the sequential art. After storyboarding the first chapter, I determined the complete story would be around 500 pages--meaning it could take years before the book would be ready for publication.I strongly believe in The Last of the Polar Bears and its message, so rather than keeping the project hidden for the next several years while I continue to work on it, I've decided to make the pages available to readers as they are created. I'd love to hear your feedback. :)

P.S. If you know anyone who might also enjoy the comic, please pass along the link to them! Thanks and enjoy! :)

Last of the Polar Bears - pages 1-3

It's been a while since I last posted any tidbits about The Last of the Polar Bears graphic novel am working on, so here's a quick update. The proposal is currently making its rounds with agents. In the meantime, I'm continuing to work on more comic pages. I wanted to share the first few pages with all of you. A sweet little scene showing Nanook and Stella as itty-bitty baby polar bears!

Enjoy!

(Something fun to note is that all of the panel borders on these pages are "hand-drawn", that is, without the benefit of rulers. I wanted them to have a very organic, rough quality to them. That's why they have little squiggles and imperfections. Requiring a very steady hand, they take a lot longer to do, but I love the effect.)

Speedpaint 25 - Tiger 2

I downloaded some new texture brushes the other day. Thought I'd do a close-up of a tiger to figure out some fur painting techniques. Haven't figured out a technique that works yet, but it's a start. I'll keep working at it.

This time I painted the figure before the background. I wanted to put all my time and effort into the tiger since he was the primary focus of the composition. I used less saturated colors on the background to try to get the tiger to "pop" more.

Photoshop CS3, 59 minutes.

Speedpaint 24 - Tiger

For this speedpaint, I tried a different approach. As always, I work from back to front, blocking in the background before moving onto the figure. The difference is that this time, I started with the lightest colors and built up to the darkest shades (sort of like using watercolors), whereas in previous pieces, I started with my darkest colors first, and worked up to my lightest colors. As a result, the finished piece has a slightly more pastel color palette.

Photoshop CS3, 45 minutes.

Speedpaint 23 - Komodo Dragon

Finding a method for quickly painting reptilian scales proved difficult, so this is yesterday and today's speed paint. I did the background and basic body structure on the Komodo dragon yesterday, and then some retouching and scale texture today. I believe in total it took about an hour and a half. I'm not quite satisfied with the results, but that's not the point of these exercises. It's to expose myself to new challenges.

I think I'm in a rut with the greens and browns. I'll try to work some different colors into the next one.

Speedpaint 22 - Crow on Turquoise

New speedpainting. Going to try to get back into the habit of doing one a day again. :)

It was my birthday on the 9th. I turned 28. I went to Animal Kingdom to celebrate, where I encountered this crow. It looks like he's standing on water, but it's actually a solid object that's been painted to look like water.

Photoshop CS3, 1 hour, 9 minutes
Soundtrack: Joe Hisaishi - Studio Ghibli Concert 2008; Ghibli to Issho

Domo: The Manga - out in stores tomorrow!

The Domo: The Manga book I worked on is coming out tomorrow. It should be available in bookstores nationwide in the manga/graphic novel section! It's a full-color graphic novel published by Tokyopop involving that lovable brown monster guy with the big mouth! All the stories are lighthearted and fun, perfect for kids and great for fans of Domo and/or funny animal stories.

Two chapters in the book were done by me and Jared Hodges (pencils = me, Jared = colors).

Speedpaint 20 - Momoko

Tribute to Momoko. She loved to play in packing peanuts.

Photoshop CS3, 56 minutes.
Soundtrack: Who Framed Roger Rabbit

Speedpaint 16 and 17 - Monkey and 4th of July

This is a Snow monkey aka Japanese Macaque from the Central Park Zoo in NYC.

Photoshop CS3, 46 minutes.
Soundtrack: Donkey Kong Country 1 OST






This speed paint is incomplete. The scene I was working on was filled with wall-to-wall people (it was taken at Crane's Roost this year on the Fourth of July). My meticulous approach to the human figures, and all the color variation in clothing slowed me down immensely. After an hour, I still had a great deal of the scene left to do, and I had lots of work to do that day, so I called it quits.

Photoshop CS3, 53 minutes.
Soundtrack: Chrono Cross OST

Speedpaint 9 and 10 - Stairway and Dog

Speedpaint 10 - Dog
Photoshop CS3, 53 minutes.
Soundtrack: Square Enix Battle Tracks Vol.1

A friend's dog. I believe he's a Shiba inu, very handsome dog. Painting the short hair texture was a new challenge.





Speedpaint 9 - Stairway
Photoshop CS3, 34 minutes.
Soundtrack: drammatica -The Very Best of Yoko Shimomura-

A stairway at the UCF arena.

Speedpaint 6 - Ducks on the Water

Photoshop CS3, 44 minutes.
Soundtrack: Genso Suikoden Vocal Collection ~Faraway Star Echoes Of Love~

Nature Speed Paints + Boy and Gator 3 WIP

Here is where I currently am on the final Boy + Gator piece. I'm working my way down from top. The treetops and distant background details are done. Tomorrow, I plan on tackling the tree trunks and ground areas.


To brush up on my foliage painting abilities for the illustration, I did a couple of speed paintings, referenced from photos in my personal archive.



This was the view from my window at the last apartment I lived in. Photoshop CS3, 30 minutes.



Photoshop CS3, 50 minutes.

Watch me create the piece on livestream: