Friday, February 25, 2011

FMBC website work

I have been asked to design a new theme for www.fullmoonbusclub.com

After playing around a little, I came up with this idea for the banner across the top. It's a combination of many previous projects I have done and altered to fit together. Please give me some feedback as this is by no means a finished product and is in the working stages.

Here is the concept (click image to enlarge):




...and here are the various projects I have sampled from:

Background:


Bus and design:


and moon (I had planned on using more of it, lol!):

Thursday, February 24, 2011

A posting for Lesley

This week I have been working on a surprise painting for Lesley's mom (Eileen) in California. The painting's subject is a 10 year old rescue E. German shepherd named "Tara II" that has had some recent health issues. Luckily surgery went well and Tara II is doing much better, but the ordeal was rough on Lesley's mom. So to celebrate the strong bond between Eileen and Tara II, Lesley has commissioned me to create one of my colorful dog portraits! A 2'x 2' acrylic painting on stretched canvas.

After a long weekend painting Christian's wedding portrait, I took Tuesday off (sanity, right?). So on Wednesday I created a background suitable for this project. One of the only stipulations that Lesley had was that the background be neither orange nor green, as her mother is not a fan of either of those. So I went with a purple theme, layering reds, blues and purples to achieve this effect. I followed the layering w/ a lot of sanding to get a nice weathered look. I followed this w/ a subtle airbrushed vignette of magenta over purple, and finished it off by spattering some yellow and magenta (allowing time to dry between so to avoid orange cross contamination!)

Here is the product of that effort (click image for a larger view):



Today, I have been blocking out the lighter areas with white so that my colors wont need 35 coats to cover. The white areas here represent the placement of 6 colors on the finished painting. I am still debating the final color scheme, but I am probably going to try something new and go with tonal gradients instead of a spectrum of colors. What I mean by this is that instead of having white, yellow, orange, red...etc (like a rainbow) I will choose 2 or 3 colors and use varying amounts of white in each to create a slightly more subdued, grounded painting. We will see how it turns out! As always, If I don't like how it's going I reserve the right to change my mind! Please take note that the colors of both of these photos are slightly off due to the lighting in my studio.

Here is today's progress (click image for a larger view):

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Christian's portrait is finished!

Hey there Paintedbus fans,

I stayed up way too late last night finishing this up, but it's all done! I think it's worth the late hours :)

Hopefully so does Christian, his Brother Lonie and Lonie's soon-to-be wife! (Click image to zoom.)



For those of you that are familiar with my previous work, I modeled this painting strongly after the style used in my Jamer portrait. I think I am going to do more of these soon! Next up, a German Shepherd for an old Lady in California!

Friday, February 18, 2011

Progress for Christian

I forgot to post my progress on the wedding portrait I have been working on this week. The pics I have taken so far have all been pretty terrible, but they give a good idea of whats happening anyway! This is going to be a black and white double wedding portrait, using a three color tonal plane approach. In other words, the shadows will be black, the highlights white, and the mid-tones will be the back ground color. According to Christian, the wedding color is somewhere around an eggplant purple so thats what the background color is (my camera lies to me.) Their wedding is on the 26th, so I will be busting my butt to get this all finished up and out the door by Monday!


Here is the first pic from a couple of days ago:




...and today I all but finished up the black portion. I have to add the face attached to the extra arms tomorrow morning (too bleary-eyed right now.) Also, take note that the tape is actually straight, they appear curved as a result of me standing too close to the canvas while taking the picture!

Saturday, February 12, 2011

GGB7 and Christian's Canvas

Hey there!

I have been working the last week on a logo for Justin "Steelersbus" in PA. Every year for the past 6 years, he has hosted a campout in Beavertown, PA called Granny Grose's Buses. This year he asked me to come up with completely new design so this is it. Look carefully @ the water... :D Lets see what Justin thinks!

This version is for t-shirts etc.



And this version (not 100% on the colors yet) is for stickers/ web use etc.



...and a link for the larger file on this one:
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4102/5439155602_2ecb11e921_b.jpg


I have also started a canvas for Christian in California. This will be a portrait of his brother, his fiancée and his very trick lincoln continental. It is 24" x 36" and will be the focus of all my attention next week, so keep your eyes open on this one! It's going to be for his brothers wedding!


Thursday, February 10, 2011

open your eyes maria!

If it's hard to take pictures in the daylight, its impossible at night... but at least maria opened her eyes a little. lets see what she thinks!

Maria's finished painting!

I was able to log a whole bunch of hours last night and finished up Maria's painting! The photography process was ridiculous though, so you will have to imagine a bright yellow between the white and what looks like the second color in this photo. These iridescent colors don't like to have their pictures taken so the purple and blue were reading as blue and green respectively. Only with the magic of photoshop was I able to bring them back to their true colors... but then the yellow disappeared! AAAH!

So use your imagination maria, I have other work to get on! Sometime soon, I will edit this correctly.

This, along w/ snoopy's painting will be out in the mail tomorrow. Today I continue work on the GGB7 T-shirts and Christian's wedding painting for his brother the football player!


Sunday, February 6, 2011

Hey Snoopy, guess what?

Your painting is done! Now I have to finish Maria's!
I will be taking a better pic tomorrow when the sun is shining. Taking acceptable pictures under my studio lights is a lot harder than it should be.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Granny Grose's Buses 7

"Steelersbus" Justin asked me to come up with some t-shirt designs for the 7th annual Granny Grose's Buses Campout in PA.

Here are a couple quick ideas I came up with, ...Justin- feel free to say no to all of them! Obviously, these are thumbnail sketches, so fonts, details, accuracy etc, will all be refined on the final draft.



...and I was just thinking, on the "carabus" design, we could invert the curve and have the line-up of bus profiles splashing through the stream... just a thought as I post!
:D

(click to enlarge)

A snowy Wednesday progress report

Some work getting done on Snoopy's 21 window deluxe. I have a lot to do still, but its nice to see color finally coming in. I think I am going to have a pretty basic background, but we will see. I am probably going to make it @ dusk, so lots of silhouetted trees and plants and such. The colors are a little more saturated than this pic shows. Next time I will adjust the colors appropriately.



Sorry Maria, not enough progress to post right now. I will probably take tomorrow off of Snoopy's painting to work on yours (If I don't finish it today... which is the goal!)