Instant Inspiration

October has managed to fly by without a single blogpost so I'll try and make up for it before 2019 is finito. First up is a little bit of press promo. Was great to get invited to feature my work, along with a mini-interview, in the latest Computer Arts issue for the Instant Inspiration page. It's an Instagram thing! You can check mine out here.

MAN-AGE

Here's some personal work for a great online project called MAN-AGE that aims to publish creative stories and artwork that deal with male mental health struggles in an attempt to 'challenge unnecessary societal pressures, create a community of voices and combat isolation'. I found this a challenge at the outset as I’m quite a private person so decided to tackle the general themes of masculinity and mental health head on rather than get overly personal. Once I took that approach I couldn't be stopped and ended up creating four illustrations and a couple of animations using the man-age colour palette. The first 3D animation and accompanying artwork is called 'Fragmentation' and is an abstract take on a depressive episode. The third and fourth artwork, 'Bust' and 'Mars Attacks' deal with notions of broken masculinity and associated anxieties. The site is full of really interesting writing, photography and illustration and well worth a look at man-age.com. You can also see the work on the site with related work here.

Lürzer's Archive 200 Best Illustrators Cover

Roar-ly pleased to have one of my illustrations selected for the cover of this year's Lürzer's Archive 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide. It's my entry, Brex The Lionheart, for last year's Great British Postcard Competition judged by John Lydon, in which it was a finalist. Chuffed to also have a few other pieces chosen for the new edition, an article on which you can read on the Lürzer's site here.

Folio Society BIC2018

I finally got around to entering the  Folio Society Book Illustration Competition, something I've wanted to do for quite a while, and am really pleased to say I've made it on to this year's longlist. The chosen book to illustrate was The Selected Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes and the brief required illustrations for three short stories and a cover binding design rendered in a simpler graphic style.

It was great to soak up the atmosphere of the Arthur Conan Doyle stories (A Scandal In Bohemia, The Man With The Twisted Lip and The Musgrave Ritual) and select scenes I felt would lend themselves to interesting interpretations. Stylistically I tried to go for a modern and atmospheric painterly approach creating a digital collage of scanned-in-textures, photography and even a touch of 3D with subtle patterning effects. Really enjoyed the process of working on these and I might post some of the visuals that didn't make the cut at a later date.

In the meantime you can see all the excellent and varied entries on the longlist here and even vote your favourite ... ahem! The winner is announced at the Awards Night on February 20th. #BIC2018

AGIA Christmas Coaster Promo

The annual Anna Goodson Illustration Agency coaster promo is out just in time for Christmas and this year's theme is the power of love and art, no less. I went with a global warming theme for my illustration and animated gif. Mother Earth could do with a little more love in light of a certain large country withdrawing from international climate agreements. You can read about the promo here and check out illustrations on social media tagged with the #Loveisloveisart.

Trick Or Trump

Here's an illustrated response to my agent Anna Goodson's call for Halloween images recently. I was away from the studio last week so missed posting it on the 31st October myself but here it is anyway in all it's belated glory. Still very much a scary prospect.

The Great British Postcard

I've entered these two illustrations into a competition to design The Great British Postcard based on personal viewpoints of the country in 2017. The first entry, Brex the Lionheart, is a take on the current condition of the nation's pride and how an Elizabethan collar might help to curb any further self harm. The second, Keep Calm!, is a more playful interpretation of a nation acting out like a nostalgia crazed toy robot on the blink.

AI36

Pleased to discover I'm a selected winner in American Illustration 36 this year with my Pluripotency cover illustration for Nature Journal and will appear in the annual award book. After many years of entering the competition it's the first time I've made it in to the book, getting as far as the online Archive collection a few times, so proper chuffed. You can see the work on the site here.

Montreal 375

Get those liquid-containing vessels at the ready, it's time for the Anna Goodson Illustration Agency annual coaster promotion. Here's my illustration for this year's theme, a tribute to the great city of Montreal on the eve of the 375th anniversary of it's foundation. Always loved the inspired architecture and sci-fi weirdness of the '76 Olympic Stadium so it dominates my composition as it does the skyline. See previous coasters on the site here.

Coastering

My rep Anna Goodson Illustration Agency is celebrating 20 years in the business this year. An anniversary themed coaster campaign featuring all of the agency's illustrators was recently created to mark the occasion. Here's mine, featuring an art traffic control tower and a sky-load of illustrators, if you will. Now, time to place a cuppa on it.

Blog Tour

I was recently asked to hitch my digital wagon to the Blog Tour, a growing trail of creatives set loose on four career illuminating questions before inviting others to join the convoy. An old BA Hons buddy from Portsmouth Uni nominated me, Caroline Pedler, now a super-talented artist based in Cornwall, along with Tom Hubmann. Previous to Caroline were John Kilburn and Amber Hsu amongst others. Anyway, here goes...

What are you working on right now?
I've had a really busy period over the last three months working on an eclectic mix of different projects involving both illustration and animation. I'll run through a few recent jobs that represent an average cross-section of a working week as the stuff that I'm actually working on right now I can't post yet.

I'm currently creating an animated iPad version of my second cover illustration for BBC Focus Magazine, for which I've created a lot of science/tech editorial work recently. I also have a monthly column, called Into the Future, that I illustrate for the magazine where I get to play out a lot of my childhood sc-fi obsessions. Here's a recent example about deep space communications...

I'm usually juggling 2 or 3 different editorial commissions a week, some with 24 hour turnarounds such as this recent illustration for Wall Street Journal on the Ebola virus.

I've had ongoing rebrand work for the last few years illustrating book covers for the UK's largest music examining body, ABRSM. Here's a recent cover for the Guitar Scales & Arpeggios.

Earlier in the Summer I worked on my second brand illustration to promote Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park around London which included animation work for moving billboards. It's certainly a massive buzz seeing the work on a massive bus...no? Ok...

I like to have personal work on the go alongside the commercial as often as possible. A recent project, Post-Invasion Cards, involved transforming found vintage postcards into UFO crash-site scenes. I've since turned them back into postcards to be made available as a pack of four soon...

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

I like to straddle lots of different genres and styles while keeping a recognisable quality to the work that is identifiably mine. This can be my unapologetic use of vivid, and probably ridiculous, colour or my approach to photo collage or drawing style. I like to be versatile for the personal creative freedom it offers and the obvious commercial reasons of being able to tackle varied work. I've developed a brush pen drawing style over the last few years that is quite different to the Photoshop orientated work I create. I really love working with both of these digital and analogue methods and I'm constantly trying to bring the two together in more harmonious ways. More successful examples of this marriage of styles can be seen in my Claude Debussy: Life In Miniature animation...

...or a series of portraits for a book of rock and roll poetry A Circus Mind such as this Ken Kesey illustration.

Ultimately I like to be as stylistically simple (usually drawn) or hyper-detailed (Photoshop) as I feel the work requires, be it personal or commercial.

How does my illustration process work?

For commissioned work I'll read the brief or article before doing a little internet picture research around the subject for added, and often unexpected, inspiration. Some clients provide specific imagery to work around which can be really useful, in terms of clarity of brief, but can be creatively limiting. Either way, hopefully I'll have a good mental image of how the illustration should look and run with it. I often doodle a crude layout then build up an illustration-in-progress in Photoshop before sending a semi-developed image over to the client that's closer to a final rather than a bunch of sketches. It saves everybody time if it's green-lit as it's practically there. I'll happily return to the drawing board though if the client needs more ideas, every job finds it's own way. Below is an example of a smooth running job for ASAE in the States from client sketch, to approved semi-developed rough to fully detailed final.

For personal work the process is more organic than the commercial route and ideas can sit evolving in my brain for some time until I feel the need to get around to them. When I do, however, I approach them with a similar urgency and need to exorcise them quickly. Strike while the pen/mouse is hot as nobody says.

Why do I illustrate what I illustrate?

I'm driven by the joy I get from image-making mostly and exploring the varied ways I can communicate visual ideas. I feel fortunate that I can make a living doing something I've always loved to do so I'm going to keep doing it as long as I'm allowed, damn it! My personal work explores themes I'm interested in, obviously, but I don't feel there's overriding subject matter I need to explore obsessively besides the process itself. My childhood imagination was heavily influenced by imagery from films, art and books and the desire to translate the results to paper somehow and that's never really changed I'm glad to say.

That's me done for. Over to the fantastic drawer/painter Kenn Goodall and the wonderful world of Wellington Drawe!

Lapland Games

Here's a Christmas Knit pattern design for agency Cai and Kyn's HoHoHo Journal of Christmas Creativity and upcoming exhibition at Breese Little Gallery from 17th December. It was quite a fun challenge coming up with something simple enough to work well with the knit template, akin to pixel art really. I chose to stand on the shoulders of the Atari giants and reworked the graphics from the 80's Winter Games with speed skating Santa and conniving elf. See larger images on the site here.

Skullduggery

Here's a re-imagined film poster design for the 1965 Peter Cushing horror The Skull. It will be exhibited in the 'Art Of Horror' show, part of a of a Cushing centenary celebration at The Horsebridge Arts & Community Centre, Whitstable. Prints are available from the brand new online shop here.

Out To Launch

We have lift-off. The new site is now live in orbit around the planet interwebs. Prepare to engage. I'm commemorating the occasion with this space-age illustration for Imagination Magazine titled 'The Next Step In The Final Frontier'. Hope you enjoy.

NewWebPick

Here's an interview and showcase of work for the latest issue of online magazine NewWebPick. Click the images to enlarge.

Tingle On: Images 36 and 3 x 3 Proshow

The Tingler poster was selected to exhibit in this year's AOI Images 36 show at Somerset House and will continue on the exhibition tour around the UK. It also appears in the accompanying Images 36 Best Of British Illustration 2012 book in the Self Promotion category along with my Urban Utopia (New Scientist) and Creative Outsider (Design Week) illustrations both in the Editorial category. The Tingler pops up again in this year's 3x3 Proshow, selected for the Poster category.

New Prints Available

For all you lucky wall-owning folks out there! New high quality prints are available up at the online store. Ooohhh.

Illustrator Exhibition

Spent last Saturday hanging an exhibition of recent self-initiated illustration work in Gallery 3 at Whitstable's Horsebridge Centre. The show is simply called Illustrator and features myself, my old mucker and former studio bud Mark Taplin and Sam Blown. If you find yourself in sunny Whitstable between the 1st and 29th April then check it out.

The Tingler vs The Counter

A couple of last year's illustrations are doing well on the competition circuit this year. The Tingler film poster has been chosen as a winner in the Applied Arts 2012 Illustration Awards while East London Mornings' The Counter was accepted into the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles 50th Illustration West competition and a runner-up in Creative Quarterly 27 competition. 2-1 to The Counter!

Tears Of An Elephantine Clown

Here is this year's design for my agent Anna Goodson Management's annual coaster campaign. 'Circus' was the theme so I conjured up this clowny elephant creature to plonk the coffee on.