Happy Moanday

Just a dumb drawing I did in rough yesterday, I might redraw this in neat if I have the time. 

You're right, it's vitali kiltschko and Larry merchant.

November round up

It's been over a month since I last posted anything, from now on I think you will have to assume that if I don't post for a while it means that I'm just too busy doing fabulousness.

I think I put the nail in the coffin with the Deontay Wilder drawing, it's finally up on Form&Glory so go and buy it for your Nan for Christmas ;) I also tweeted it to Deontay on Twitter so we'll see if he gives it any extra clout.

- http://www.formandglory.com/collections/boxing/products/bronze-bomber

Also I was hired to work alongside a UK / US collaborative platform game. I drew some of the characters' action sequences and the credits. I'll get a working link for this when I can.

I've also made some moves with a personal project I'm working on called 'Slackman' the superhero wiho has amazing powers of flight, speed, telekinesis, and super strength, except he can't be bothered to use any of these powers. I've roped in a team of brilliant voice actors / actresses for this, so hopefully it will turn out well. I couldn't say how long it will take me to finish but optimistically I hope to get it done within a few weeks.

Here's a sneaky peek.

- http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/acbae98ae4ecee929a0f23c85a12638d

Finally, and I'm working on a very slick production with some 3rd year animation students in Santiago, Chile. I honestly feel like this is the most professional animation I've worked on, and the best quality animation I've worked on. It's also given me the opportunity to learn more about working with ToonBoom which I've never got round to playing with before. I'm in no doubt that when it's released it will be incredible, and I'll definitely put it up on here when that happens.

Here's something to wet your appetite

Annnnnyway. I'm still alive!

Next blog update will have more (moving) visuals. Until next time, remember to have a happy Christmas and a merry new year!

Deontay Wilder

I've spent the last few days sketching and designing a submission for the form&glory sport and design project - http://formandglory.com/

Deontay is one of my favourite boxers, and to be honest I was looking for an excuse to draw him anyway.

Orange is the new Black

I got into Orange is the new Black this week, and by that I mean I watched all 13 episodes in about 4 days.

It's helping me get over my Breaking Bad comedown, I enjoyed it so much I drew the main character Piper Chapman played by Taylor Schilling. If I find time I'd like to draw a collection of all the main characters.

September Round Up

I've been meaning to do this for a couple of days, but I've been busy, I'm very sorry.

September has definitely been a crazy month for me. There's been some personal setbacks, but nothing I'm going to bother moaning publicly about, more importantly I've made some major moves and been involved with some brilliant diverse stuff as well. Hopefully I can keep the momentum up.

I probably use blogspot too much to waffle, and I bet nobody except me is genuinely interested in my rambling so I'll get straight down to what I've got up to in September:

1. I painted some shutters.

before..

...AFTER!














This was inspired by an interview I watched of a guy called Steve Powers, the man with the best wig in Brooklyn. He mentioned how it important it is to do something with that your art that is positive and intrinsic to your community, I'm a big fan of The Village Store in Levenshulme, and I got to know Rahman who runs the shop by himself Mon-Sun so it was great to spend some time with him improving his shutters and promote his business a little more, he's a top banana.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKd6HmIzvyY
http://www.village-stores.com/

2. Scanned sketchbooks

Not much to say here, besides I've been meaning to scan all my sketchbooks for a while and I finally got round to it. Also my scanner sucks and doesn't pick up pencil very well / at all.

I'll probably put the decent ones on my website at some point.

3. Animated a rugby run cycle

Based on a quick doodled below. IN PENCIL

This was purely for practice, it's not going to be in a full length animation or anything, I need to do more of these run / walk cycles. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/e3a97ee53a0194541ab2994a3d13ba0c

4. 48 hour Independent Game Run 2013

A jam for independent game makers, I worked in a trio alongside a programmer from the US and a musician from Germany to create a game to be entered into the Indie Speed Run 2013, everything used in the project had to be created within a 48 hour window. There's a prize for the wining game, but I'd never made a game before this so don't hold your breath. Voting on the submissions began yesterday, so you can check out the progress of all the games on the website.

http://www.indiespeedrun.com/

Even though in my opinion the whole project could have been put together a little better by the programmer, this was still a good experience to be involved with, and I'm pretty impressed with what we managed to create within such a tight time-frame.

You can check out the game here.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/content/indie-speed-run/?game=393

5. London &/@ Not A Drop

Stalkers among you will remember me mentioning on this blog that I had applied to take part in a exhibition called 'Not a Drop' in London. I've never put my work on at a professional art show before so it was a genuine honour to be accepted and be involved in something like this alongside some amazing artists. The whole thing was great, they had some amazing 2d/3d/performance art across 3 stories, they also boiled some live crayfish in a bowl for some reason.





packin up packin up (left)



on display (below)

6. lil poddo

This is what's been keeping me from doing an update on this ere blog, I've been paid to create an animation to go with a podcast show by some guys in Australia. Considering this is the first bit of paid animation I've done, I'm extremely pleased to be involved. Below is an example of what they have been using. Not to brag, but I feel that mine is an improvement ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-kOVu61Zbk

My animation should be up on their youtube channel pretty soon, the title will be 'Computer Girls' by the time you read this it should be online.

http://www.youtube.com/user/LilPoddo

More like this next month!

I'm still alive

Private life's been pretty hectic recently, but I'm focused, inspired, and got a load of stuff in the pipeline for the last leg of September so watch this space :)

Quick snap of my hovel for the next few late night sessions.

Life drawing

Went to my first life drawing session I ages the other week, here's a couple of sketches which don't completely suck. 

Scribbles

More drawings.

I whipped up a little tshirt design idea for mancunian based clothing line Bait. 

Be sure to check out their stock at baitmcr.co.uk 

Also drew a cheeky Wimbledon inspired picture, based around my favourite child faced possible Serbian war criminal, man with the scrabble gamechanger surname, Novak Djocovic :)

Not A Drop

Here's a quick mock up for a project I'm hoping to be involved with later in the year, it's focusing on issues to do with water, and what I'm going to be looking at with this piece is the Texas sized collection of plastics in the middle of the pacific. 

Notadrop.org.uk 

"Not A Drop is a 48-hour arts event that will use creativity to draw attention to the ecological, social and political issues associated with water."

I took a little inspiration from a old poster called the Rhodes Colossus, and a little bit of stylistic flair from the Steadman exhibition I went to and who's still racing round my brain at the moment.

Holy whale

Drew a little friend in my friends studio during his exhibition to keep him company

AWOL Studios, London! Liverpool and Ralph Steadman

Apologies my little flock, I've been very quiet on this here blog lately, but that's only because I've been super busy in the big wide world. I've done a load of travelling around Manchester, Liverpool & London during the past few weeks and haven't had the time to get online and update anything.

I'm feeling motivated, inspired and positive having taken the time to explore some of the art & culture that's right under our noses yet often ignored in the UK. I don't think people realise how much stuff is going on outside their front door and how cheap and easy it is to go out and see it, it's good to get off the computer sometimes you know :)

MANCHESTER .

Awol Studios Exhibitions

A little open day at my mate's block of studios, it was a brilliant event where everyone who owned their own space opened up their doors to all the other artists, designers, photographers, tattooists, printmakers, etc and let them all wander around each other's studios having a nosy at their work and drink free beer. Some of the artwork on display here was incredible.

LONDON .

Every time I visit London I fall back in love with it. That sounds completely cheesy and lame but I stand by it :) There's so much cool shit to do, everyone's so diverse and interesting, and it only costs £7.50 to get around on the old toob, bargain! 

Originally I planned to just go down to see the Ralph Steadman exbo at the Cartoon Musuem, but I ended up sneaking an obligatory peak at the National Portrait Gallery and the British Museum as well.

A nasty lady at the exhibition kept telling me not to take pictures so these are were taken very sneakily ;) Ralph is now my new favourite illustrator / cartoonist / inspiration / guy on the planet.

Famous illustraion accompaniment work for Hunter S. Thomspon's Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas

"Authority is the mask of violence"

British Museum 

my best mate Napoleon 

Uncle Ben's Rice

LIVERPOOL .

I went down briefly to visit my girlfriend in scouseland (she's in one of the pictures making friends with ET) and see a bunch of arty things I've forgotten already. Liverpool's lovely, but it rained the whole time.

reading material

I've been reading a couple of new books recently to get the creative juices flowing.

- How To Draw Manga (Male Characters, Occult & Horror, Compiling Characters, Compiling Techniques)
- A few issues of Juxtapoz Magazine
- Manga
- The Illusion of Life, Disney Animation
- The Animation Bible
- The Art of Pixar Shorts

Plus a couple that I don't have the physical versions for, but I've been reading on my ipad dropbox

- BCA Flash Animation by Adam Phillips
- The Animator's Survival Kit by Richard Williams
- Elemental Magic
- Elemental Magic Volume II

notepad scribbles

I've spent a few hours drawing today, so I thought I'd upload a few, plus a couple of older drawings that I've never documented online before, enjoy ;)

Here's a quick mind map I made of major and minor influences on me, including artists like Dave Choe, The Yok, Vinnie Veritas etc, plus a bunch of crazy original people like Louis CK, Gavin McGuiness and David Choe

I found doing this very therapeutic, so I might do a version 2 sometime.. yehar

Second, here's something I drew with a spoonful of spagbol.

One of my favourite older doodles, even though it's pretty simple. 

Forgot about this,

'And it was then, and Carol put milk and sugar in before adding water, that Steve realised that in the 3 months he had known Carol, he didn't really know her'

Doodles from about 2010? Think these were inspired mainly by the Yok (www.theyok.com)

Same again, I like the way I've drawn the hands but everything else needs improvement.

Dre, Tang, Wood, Yok, Bears & Sausage rolls.

Might add a few more if they're decent, keep tabs on this page sports fans! ;)