White Tiger 2

Played around with the backgrounds a little tonight. What do you think?

Later,

Joe

White Tiger

Alright so I was in LA for a training meeting last week and got busted by my Regional Director doodling. Let me put this into perspective....it's my boss's boss. The big guy! This used to happen to me all the time at my previous employer, but I had been there for 10yrs and everyone knew I was still paying attention. Not the best thing to do at a new company, where I haven't proven myself just yet.

Sooo to make a long story short, after a very pale atte

mpt to justify my doodling, I made a deal. I'd do an image of a White Tiger for our Regional Mascot, and we would forget about my notebook covered with random sketches....and a few not

es here and there.

Here is my crack at doing a White Tiger. Haven't done any "realistic" stuff in awhile so I'm rusty. I posted the step by step. I picked green because it is the color of the product we promote. I need to work on how to do eyes digitally, can't quite get them the way I picture the in my head. Still learning how to do this digital thing.

Hope you like it.

Fur and eyes

Base Colors

rough pencil sketch

Later,

Joe

Meet Mojo Mojo

Here is the image I submitted for my last digital painting class at Schoolism.com. The background is a little lack luster, but that's what you get for doing the assignment at 2am.

This is a character I came up with awhile ago. I was drawing

with my 4yr old son and he liked the little guy. He asked what his name was and the first thing that popped out of my head was Mojo-Mojo. I know it doesn't make sense but my son cracked up so the name stuck.

The step by step is below. Let me know what you think.

This is the original sketch I did on a scratch pad.

First I did the base colors

Next I added some Fur

This is the sketch I did with my son.

Hope you like them.

Later,

Joe

Sneak Peek

Just signed my first illustrating contract for a children's book. I'm really excited about this one. Here is the first sneak peek on a rough sketch I did for one of the pages. Let me know what you think.

I'll give some more details on the book as I go. I'll have everything completed by June. Keep you posted. Hope you like it.

Later,

Joe

Industry Logo Concept

So Here is my second crack at digitally painting my own images. I'm learning a ton from Bobby Chiu's class. He is amazing. Unfortunately I feel like I'm in high school again because my assignments I've submitted to the class stink. Just like high school I'm still trying to cram in way to much in too short a period of time, so my homework tends to be neglected.

If anyone has any interest in learning how to digitally paint check out www.schoolism.com and take Bobby's class. It's amazing what he can do. I'm pretty much embarrassed when I submit my assignments, but the feedback is incredible and I'm really learning from it.

Any way, this is a demo for a logo for the Industry project I have been working on. I included a partial step by step, from my sketch, to primary paint to finished product. Hope you like it. Let me know what you think.

Later,

Joe

More concept sketches

Here are a few test sketches for another project. I know I keep talking about all these projects and I haven't shown any finished stuff yet. I'll get some up here eventually.

Happy New Year Everybody,

Later

Joe

First Digital Painting

Alright, it has been waaaay to long since i had a post. I've been working on several projects and the normal chaos of life so I have neglected my little blog here.

I'm taking a digital painting class at www.schoolism.com with the very talented Bobby Chui. This guy is amazing. His paintings look like they are going to jump right off the screen. I'm loving the class. I haven't done too well on my homework assignments (just like high school all over again) but I'm learning a ton. If you have ever wanted to learn digital painting, check it out. I've only had two classes and I'm blown away by how good they are. I highly recomend it.

This is my first crack at my own digital painting. I am working with my buddy Rob Gervais to develop an album cover for a band called INDUSTRY (Check out www.myspace.com/industry1 ) very cool band.

So long story short, I figured I would test out my new skills while I worked on the album cover. This is my first crack at it. Here is the original sketch and first layer of colors that led to the final image.

I'm pretty happy with it since it is my first crack at this digital thing. Let me know what you think. You can see more of Bobby Chui's stuff at http://www.imaginismstudios.blogspot.com/

Later,

Joe

"Seeds" Update

I did some work on "Seeds of Change" while I was in LA. I was playing around with some new pencils and pens while I was working on some images for my page layouts. Let me know what you think. I'm getting closer to doing the final layouts and laying down the ink.

Hope ya like em!

Later,
Joe

Air plane Sketches

Just got back from training in LA for my new job. It has been pretty face paced over the last few weeks. So I welcomed some down time on the plane back to do some sketches.

Here are a few sketches from one of my projects I'm hoping to start ramping up in January. I need to finish Rocco and Joey and the "Seeds of Change" project I am working on. I love these characters I can't wait to tell the story. I came up with the story two years ago and have been writing and laying out the story line when I get a chance. I have a ton of the characters sketched out, but here are three of the main characters, Togg, Tugg and Turk. Hope you like them.

Later,

Joe

Summer Fun

Here is a video my wife put together from a family trip we took to Idlewild. Idlewild is a kids park in Legionare PA. We had a blast, the kids were hilarious. We just wished we didn't pick the hottest day of the summer.
Later,
Joe

Sneak Peek

Here is a little sneak peek from some of the pages I have been working on for my children's book. They are just little snap shots from a few of the pages. Not the full image. Let me know what you think.

Later,

Joe

I really need to go to start going to bed earlier.

Conan

Well I've been out of commission for awhile. At least as far as posting goes. Life got a little crazy. I just started a new job and it's been a bit of a whirl wind. I'm so excited about the opportunity and have been busting my but to get up and running. It was really hard to leave my former employer. I had been there for 9 years, met my wife there and made a lot of great friends. (To all of you good luck, I wish you all the best, and I'll truly miss you.)

Well back to the artwork. I've been plugging away on page layouts for "Seeds" and finishing some pages for my Children's book.

I did this one on the plane on the way out to LA for work.This is a sketch I did for a buddy of mine Jerry. His dog Conan passed recently and he wants to get a tattoo of him as a Gargoyle. This is my first run at the project. I have a few other images I'm working on for it. My scanner is too small to fit the wings in post. I need to get an outline of Jer's ribs to really get the wings the way I want them. I'll post some more of the images when I finish them up. Hopefully I can get pic of Jer's final tattoo to post as well. Hope you like it.

Later,

Joe

I Love Vacation!!!!!!

(my wife took these amazing pics of our kids. She's an incredibly talented photographer)

Every year we take a family vacation to the Outerbanks. We go with my wife's family. My in-laws are awesome and we have a blast. My father in-law makes the whole thing happen. My wife's two sisters and brother come down with their kids. Ten adults and eight kids in one house, it's crazy, but it's the perfect vacation.

We had so much fun! The kids where amazing and my wife and I can't believe how fast it went. I actually proposed to with on my first trip down to OBX about six years ago, so the place is really special to me. Hope you like the pics.

Later,

Joe

Terrible Yellow Eyes

I'm not sure how many people are familiar with Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. It was one of my favorite books as a kid. I was fascinated and terrified all at once. I recently came across a website to it call http://www.terribleyelloweyes.com/ The site was set up by an amazing artist Cory Godbey. Every week different artists contribute their work based around Maurice Sendaks masterpiece. I have no affiliation to the site, it just think it is an amazing collection of some truly talented artists. Definitely worth checking out. Especially if you love the book as much as I do.

These sketches I did where inspired by Cory's site and Mr. Sendaks amazing book. I love doing this kind of stuff and the monster I picked is my favorite one from the story. The first image is colored pencil and the second I is a rough ball point pen sketch I did while I was on the phone.

Check out the site you will be happy you did. Hope you like it.

Later

Joe

Here are some more rough sketches for the "Seeds of Change" project I am working on with Rob Gervais. I'm still working on page layouts and character concepts. Rob is starting to write more of the story. I can't wait to get some final pages and to read the rest of the story.

These images are rough sketches. I haven't put in too much detail and probably won't until I do the final images. I'm working with a short clock, I need to find a way to create more hours in the day. I'm still trying to figure out how to draw women. I'm still playing around with how I want her to look. I have a ways to go, but I'm getting there.

I'll keep ya posted. Hope you like the sketches, and let me know what you think.

Later,

Joe

More Seeds

Here are some character concept sketches I did for "Seeds of Change" my summer project with writer Rob Gervais.

They are not specific to the script, I just started to doodle and this is what popped out of my head. I have a hard time drawing women so I thought I'd practice a little. Hope you like them, let me know what you think. Later.
Joe

Change is Coming

If you checked out any of the post on Industry I eluded to working with a talented writer in San Diego. Well Rob Gervais has so kindly asked me to work on another project with him. Rob wrote an incredible story called "THE SEEDS OF CHANGE". He decided to do the project in a comic format and submit it online.

Not only am I flattered that he asked me to do the art work, but I am so fired up to get started on it. The story is such a cool concept. Rob truly has some serious talent and I can't wait to see where it takes him. I'm just happy to be along for the ride on this project. This is my summer project, so I hope to have everything completed by the end of the summer. I'll keep you posted with monthly updates.

In the mean time here are some of the early concepts. Let me know what you think. Later.

Joe