Sometimes the old gags are the best ones. This is week five of my 52-week drawing challenge. I was so happy with how the expressions came out for my April Fool’s bees. I also had a nice opportunity to play around with some different digital brushes for painting in the foliage.
Happy belated St. Patrick’s Day! This is week four of my 52-week illustration challenge. My little bee has found a leprechaun sleeping next to his pot of gold among the shamrocks. Lucky for the leprechaun, bees don’t need gold.
Week three of my 52-week drawing challenge finds a sleeping bee nestled in a flower as lightning bugs float lazily by. Fun fact: bees sometimes stay out too long to fly home safely, so they sleep on flowers overnight. I’m sure it looks exactly like this when they do!
Below you can check out some progress photos. The first is a shot of the image in Photoshop. The second is of the finished inked drawing, which I do traditionally by hand.
I was very happy to dedicate this week’s Drawing Challenge illustration to #kidlit4climate. Not only does it support a cause that is very important to me, but it also has given me an opportunity to continue my now-ongoing bee series with There Is No Planet Bee.
UK children’s book illustrator Emma Reynolds is asking the
The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators is using my Viking spot illustration for the SCBWI Highlighter Winter 2019 issue of their newsletter for the Mid-Atlantic. This was a fun little self-promotional piece I did awhile back, and I am very happy to see it in print. It was one of the first illustrations I did after purchasing the Megapack, my first set of digital brushes from the awesome Kyle T. Webster. You can see a larger version below:
Here is a bookmark I created for the Read Local Challenge, hosted by the SCBWI MD/DE/WV/VA. It’s one of several that were created by illustrators whose books are part of the reading challenge. The bookmarks are all black and white so that kids can color them in, but I figured “why should they have all the fun?” and colored one myself.
If you live in Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, or Virginia, and are interested in your kids or their school participating, you can learn all about it at the SCBWI MD/DE/WV/VA Read Local Challenge webpage. They have a great selection of fantastic children’s books that range from picture books (Like my very own Short Pump Bump!) to middle grade to young adult.
If you want to download a printable version of my bookmark or any of the other awesome bookmarks so you can color it yourself, go here.
Here’s a chubby, little, blissful bumblebee wallowing in a bed of fresh pollen. I wanted the bee to look like a fat cat getting its head scratched. My dad used to say that every living thing just wants its head scratched. One day a bumblebee landed in front of him while he was gardening and looked, to my dad at least, like it wanted its head scratched. So he reached out with a finger and scratched the bee’s head. Rather than sting my dad, it just sat there and happily got its head scratched. I like to imagine that this is what that bee looked like. Just a fat, cute, blissful bumblebee.
Below are a few images of my work in progress. I usually start with a digital sketch and once I’m happy with it, I’ll print it out. From there I’ll trace it, refining the drawing as I go. Next, I ink the drawing using a crow quill pen. Lastly, I scan the finished drawing into Photoshop and add the color digitally.
Here’s a pair of cute cacti enjoying their time to bloom in the desert. When I was growing up, my dad always had at least one cute little cactus as a houseplant. They were usually round and hairy and had funny names like ‘Herbert’ or ‘Cousin It.’ It wasn’t until we moved to Texas, where we had a little cactus garden, that I learned that they also can produce amazingly beautiful flowers.
Scroll down to see some of my drawing process.
While I was working on this, my wife fell in love with these two characters so much that I decided to surprise her with a framed print for her birthday. Here it is sitting in her office:
I had the wonderful opportunity to illustrate a set of twelve comic book style numbers for the upcoming issue of SCBWI’s mid-Atlantic magazine, The Highlighter. The numbers were for an article on twelve tips for writing graphic novels, by Eisner Award-winning author Paul Tobin (Bandette, Plants vs. Zombies). I have to say it was a real honor to be able to prove artwork for such an accomplished writer!
Many of the number designs are inspired by popular superheroes, such as Superman, Batman, Iron Man, The Human Torch, and X-Men’s Nightcrawler. Admittedly, the Fantastic Four one is a little on the nose but I’m still happy with how these all came out. You’ll have to be a SCBWI member to read the article, but you can check out larger versions of my artwork in the gallery below!
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