Four entries in one day, I must be avoiding doing something hehe.

Ahead is... well a bunch of stuff. I have a line on a bunch of children's books that I can bid on to be an illustrator. Small pay for most of them but pay is pay and work is work. I just need to build my portfolio to show some kid friendly images. Granted as a child I would have loved a nice book of swimsuit pin-ups, probably not the look they are going for.

Also on the to do list, web banners. One for my own website, along with a redesign of the site. Want to make it a little more viewer friendly and have a better set up for the image gallery and video portfolio. I also need to make a banner for here. The above banner is a little, well lame. With all the amazing artists who are here they should have a contest to redesign that place holder banner of theirs. I still need my own though. I also want to do one for a friend's Warraft guild website. I have a few ideas for it, but the guild is very found of havig a dead night elf on the front page. It's a Horde guild so I guess that is understandable. Just have to figure out a way to incorporate that into the image lol.

Other projects on the horizon include some comic book submissions. may post some designs for that in the coming months. A lot of work to do on those. Hoping to have two done by the end of the year. Also want to build my coloring portfolio. I love drawing. Pencil on paper or in the computer. One of my favorite things to do. As of late I have found a passion for coloring and painting. Especially on my work it really brings the image alive.

I will also begin putting in bids on illustration jobs, probably in another month or two. I need that time to build the portfolio and show some more diversity in my work.

The lates image is again for an Antarctic Press Swimsuit Edition. This time for their Gold Digger title. And I checked the guidelines in advance. COLOR!! This one was another attempt also at refining and defining an overall style for my work. Embracing more manga aspects. I think my future work will probably lean more and more that way. I am happy with the overall look of the hair. It does need some work but I tink it is a good foundation for how I want the hair to look like. Not sure if using Lightwve for the compass and giant gold coin worked. I like the way they look just not sure if they fit with the overall piece. Will have to come back to the image in a few weeks to really know if it works for me. The water I think came out better, although most of the nice highlights are hidden behind the girls lol. I definitly could have done a better job of incorporating the boat into the scene. The boat was also built in Lightwave. The only question now is, will they choose to put the image in the book. It is due to be published in August. I must now wait and see. Would definitly be cool to be in print

At the beginning of the month I finished a web banner for a World of Warcraft guild's website. Both Gruul and Surrounded are parts of that web banner. I did the banner way bigger than it needed to be because I wanted to work on a more painterly style for this image. It still has a very comic book feel to it but I think it turned out pretty good. Learned a lot doing it so it is a success in that regard. I redid the metal several times trying to get the right look. Wanted to redo it about 100 more times but people were waiting. I did use Lightwave on this one to make the weapons in the Paladin's hands. She is the one with wings in the back. Used some screen grabs and altered them to build the texture maps then roughed out some quick models. Worked pretty well. The rogue sword and warrior sword were both done freehand. I definitly like the way the edge of the gnome's sword came out. The warrior's was modelled after a sword that had just dropped for me while playing Warcraft. It turned out okay, but doesn't have the hard crystal feel I was going for.

Figure I would start posting. Help me gather my own thoughts and keep track of what I am doing. First few images have been up for a while.

The Mai image was for a small contest on Pop Mhan's website. For those that don't know, Pop is a comic book artist who has worked on such titles as Spy Boy, Bat Girl, Spider-Man and currently he is creation Blank. The ontest was to draw a Mai image form the fighting game. Felt like a good oportunity to really finish an image and put it out there. The image won the contest. YAY! My trophy as an original image of Mai drawn and colored by Pop Mhan himself. Very cool!!!

Next is another comic inspired image of Sora. One of Ben Dunn's characters from his Antarctic Press comic Ninja High School. I had read that Antarctic Press regularly does fan art based Swimsuit editions so dove right in. Unfortunately once I finished it I decided to read all the guidelines and learned that the Ninja High School Swimsuit edition was in black and white. Helps to read the guidelines before doing the work. The work turned out pretty good, still not completely happy with the water. I tried looking thourgh a bunch of other artists work to find a style of water that would fit and a really liked. I didn't really find anything that jumped out as really good looking water, in the comic book style anyway. I am happy with the way the reflection turned out.