Living Dead Art Post - Zombies & Ghosts

Feeling that is was other due for another artwork post featuring my artwork. For this post I have grabbed a couple of pieces of work of my illustrated undead. Sketching, painting and rending all of the grisly details these wanders is always a pleasure for me as I can really go to town on the details and drive home a certain level of earthy realism, whether that be open muscle tissue, spots, bones, organs or bodily fluids. Read on!

The Undead, hungry and the lost for all eternity, they roam the earth until the end of days seeking retribution and flesh. 

Hollow Zombie

This is a slightly older image capturing a partially decomposed zombie ambling around in it’s tattered clothes, torn flesh and its stomach bloated with decay. The image captures 2 states of the zombie, with its stomach and without. This image was painted in drawn by hand and then rendered in Photoshop.

Ghoul – Swamp Zombie

And so, our undying friend has awoken from his long slumber by the dawn chorus of walking corpses... or a grave digger.

This illustration captures the moment the Ghoul clambers out from a peat bog to meet his brothers in death. Although undead or partially living, I wanted to capture a hulking mass of muscle that that could serve any necromancer, witch or warlord as long as it is paid in meat. The creature is also closer to life that death and so wanted to capture and expression of “Where am I!? - I was alive a moment ago”

Lady of the Lane

As with many folktales and local legends, I wanted to illustrate my rendition of the Lady of the Lane for exhibition I held in Looe in Cornwall. The Lady of the lane or the White lady is said to haunt a narrow lane leading to Talland Bay.

Holiday makers and revelers be wary when walking back to the camp site, should you see a white figure coming towards in the dead of night turn on your heel and run for the pub… ghost’s have little taste for beer.

Thank you for reading this post! If you would like to support me on Patreon please feel free to sign up. On a Ad hoc basis I submit artwork for you to enjoy. Or you can follow me on twitter!

I can also produce print on an Print on Demand basis which can take up to a Month to Print produce and ship.

Bring Out Your Beasts – MONSTER DRAW...

Bring Out Your Beasts – MONSTER DRAWINGS

Felt compelled to draw some vile things and a little less of the London Underground (although I will be coming back to this very soon) I have been getting my brain monsters and design down on paper. Most of these sketches, doodle's, drawing have been captured on a traditional cartridge paper using both my mechanical pencil and graphite.

I think it has to be said that I get a level of satisfaction from drawing the grisly details of creatures, be it afflictions, boils, wounds, teeth and any other visceral part of the anatomy. Drawing this gives me sense inner rhythm , a hum or chord in which my body and mind tunes into. It's gives me sense of focus and relaxation which I can only graze upon with these few words.

Take your time to have a browse, I have been feeling quite inspired to do some more creature design and studies since going to the zoological museum at UCL. Elephant skulls are quite fascinating to draw and also strange without flesh. That's for another day.

It's Blurred?

Thank you for looking and reading. To view more of these pieces of artwork you will need sign up to Patreon to see what that walking affliction might to look like, thank for you support. (You will need to pledge $5 or more see this post)

https://www.patreon.com/posts/

All artwork Copyright JD Odell 2016. Please do not use, distribute without my prior consent.

Thank you for reading

London Underground Drawing - Crowded Northern Line in Rush Hour. "Mind The Gap"

Tube drawing captures the folly of the London Underground

I have been traveling on the London Underground for years and despite the fact that it is a travel nightmare, most people avoid social interaction and a bit smelly! It is a fascinating place.

I felt inspired to draw a scene of the rat race capturing the annoyance, the displeasure and the all round chaos that unfolds in the morning and evening's getting from A to B - you should hear some of the expletives I mutter under my breath. With this drawing I felt compelled to share a sense of immense overcrowding, irritation and the general lack of personal space.


In this picture
None of these people are faceless numbers, each person is an individual with a story to tell. To pick a few faces out of the crowd: you have the builder getting to the site with his huge toolbox, both him and it covered in bits of muck and plaster. You have the woman in the middle trying sandwich herself on the already crammed train and the other woman to the right desperately trying to force herself and her luggage onto the carriage, in doing so obstructing the doors so nobody gets to where they are going but ironically she is frowning at someone else. You have the 'Turtles' (i'm guilty of this) sticking their backpack into other peoples personal space and also reducing the total capacity by a few – oh the joys. And lets not forget that stranger on the left holding a bin liner with a sword hilt inside... weirdo. This is all but a fragment of who and what travels the perilous London underground. These brave souls must venture to their place of work battling odours, the ignorant and tourists with selfie sticks, whats not to make you blow your lid!

This picture was illustrated on my travels from South Wimbledon to Honor Oak Park.

Happy new year all!

If you would like more information on this drawing be it a print or a commission feel free to get in touch.

London Artwork!

Business Card Sized Mini Prints. Artwork samples & illustrations. 1st Run

Mini Printed Pictures

I printed these mini business card sized pictures with idea to hand them out as sample prints to prospective businesses and to canvas for private commissions. Being pleased with the general quality of these miniature reproductions I am offering the last of the first run (1st Run) to the open market. Being satisfied with result of this batch I intend to print another batch although the characters and prints themselves may well be different in the next set.

Displaying the complete range of the first run

Top left to right : Bloated Zombie, The Poet, Golemn the cat, Madman's throne,
Gorian, Tulip, White hare, and the reverse of the card

About The Collection of Artwork

The collection of a printed cards consists of a range of illustration work taken from my portfolio, also available for viewing on JD illustration - my commercial illustration portfolio blog. Drawings and artwork vary from monsters, folklore to everyday characters. Some of the pieces have featured in exhibitions in the North and South East Cornwall.

The White Rabbit

The Poet

Gorian - The Miserable Imp

Can I buy These Cards?

Yes, although these cards are now in limited supply and once the first run from which there were 50 cards, there will be no more of these cards (1st Run) . Should you wish to purchase these cards I will sign the reverse before sending them to you via recorded post. The other 'Samples' do not have a signature which were sent out for canvasing purposes.

Please contact me for further information and which cards you would be interesting in buying from what is listed above.

http://jdillustration.jimmsdesign.co.uk/contact-freelance-illustrator.html

Artwork Update - Fantasy & Folklore Art : Manticore, The White Hare and a Faun

Artwork Update : Fantasy & Folklore

I felt it was time again to add some of my fantasy and folklore artwork to Blogger as it has been a while. I have been busy on the illustration and design side of things so that can only be a good thing, but this does take me away from working on my own personal updates. So, I have selected a couple of pieces of artwork for your interest. 

1 ) The Manticore : this is my rendition of the Manticore, a mythological beast with human features, the body of a lion and scorpion's tail. This depiction of the Manticore is based on a rewrite of a bestiary which was originally written by monks in the middle ages, which is a close as you could get to the original description of the mythological beast (how dare you! it's real I say!). Should you ever get the chance to read a classic historical bestiary I would recommend it - I don't know what those monks were taking but it seamed give them some fairly outrageous ideas! I also get the impression that most of these Monks didn't venture further than their chapel grounds, let alone visit the far east where they believed these creatures roamed free - so knights beware. I think one of my favourite inserts which I remember suggests : a virgin should cuddle a unicorn to cure a particular affliction... good luck finding a virgin!  

Red Manticore Illustration JD Odell

2 ) The White Rabbit (Hare) : I have written about this piece of artwork in previous posts and listings. This drawing was produced for a folklore exhibition I held in Looe in 2011 - with this animal being based on classic folklore "should you follow the rabbit your misfortunes will begin" the smugglers, sailors in Cornwall were superstitious in the day and this nasty legend was based on the misfortune of a young girl.

I wanted the Rabbit to look cuddly and enticing yet conceal an air of hidden malevolence to it, after all it is essentially a poltergeist. The artwork was produced using markers, pencils and PS.

The brief link below tells more of the 'White Hare' . Watch out when you next drink in the Jolly sailor in Looe - me and my partner are staying in a cottage on West Looe Hill

http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/england/cornwall/white-hare-of-looe.html

White Rabbit - Don't follow it!

3 ) The Faun Sleeps : This was another piece of fantasy artwork! This image depicts a faun sleeping in the dirt with its younger siblings nestled around him. I was fairly happy with the drawing aside from the environment looking bleak and lack of colour depth in the image. In hind sight I also wished I added more texture to the picture to really pull you into the scene, the browns all merge into one as it stands which is fine although I wander what it would have looked like with more to it.

At the very least... does the image make you want to lie down on the soft ground?

The Faun Sleeps - are you feeling sleepy?

I am more than happy to offer my services as a fantasy illustrator and artist be it for personal or commercial projects. For more information about my service please feel free to browse my website and contact me via my contact page. I can offer a range of skill with my main focus being in gritty details and commercial experience. My artwork has been used for print publications, marketing and graphic novels.

http://jdillustration.jimmsdesign.co.uk/

All artwork is Copyright James (Jimm, JD) Odell please do not reprint or distribute my artwork without prior consent. 2015

Folklore, monsters, creatures, fantasy, horror, drawing, artwork,

Quick Techniques For Reducing Banding / Posterization in Photoshop - BRUSH STROKES

Posterization – Rough Techniques For Reducing Banding!

Notice the subtle rings around the soft brush?

What is it?

If like me you work as illustrator/designer, I’m sure you will have run into the dreaded banding aka Posterization If so, I will go into detail shortly. Please note; this is told from an illustration and design bias.

Illustration in Photoshop has been a blessing for me. Edit, undo, save as, copy, paste, re-colour artwork the list goes on. This issue comes when working with radial and linear gradients and tones of black and grey. Working with a lot of black and orange as part of the colour palette, I have had to figure out ways for dealing with or working around banding. For example, when I’m rendering characters like Rufus the rat, he has grey body with even darker creases in the body, getting the shading and highlights to blend hasn't always been easy - banding has been a big issue. As it stands, I’m still uncertain as to how to get a completely smooth finish when rendering by work with a grey and black tones. I can offer some methods for reducing this so called ‘banding’ effect and the bane of drawing Rufus. 

For additional information this has been written based on the specs of the my iMac - OSX, but this issue has proven to effective on a TFT Screen using windows 7 and older versions of PS.

My Setup 1 : New Document ‘I like RGB’

From the off I have tested this on Photoshop CS5 and CC with similar results from version to version. 64 bit – 32 bit RGB to CMYK I’m not entirely sure if this has an influence aside from whether you are working with 8 bit, 16 bit and 32 bit; the later offering marginally tighter rings and hues. For this example I have worked with A 300 DPI document, in RGB using 8 bit (this can be changed later) also with the colour profile listed below on an iMac. This is by no means a significant contribution to the final out come but maybe worth noting. 

‘tangent alert’
 Using RGB in the early stages is my preferred method, not everybody’s. Isn’t this madness? You won’t see genuine colours of your artwork! Well unless, your screen is calibrated exactly and your using pantones, guaranteeing what you see on the screen to print can be tricky anyway. Besides, I work across both mediums of screen and print. 

Method 2 :  Ultimate Trick - Brush & Noise

I’m assuming that you are running into this issue whilst using a soft edged brush tool in Photoshop, based on that, I would advise turning the 'noise' on under the brush panel (as shown - press F5 bring this window up) this helps in the blending of steps with greys as shown below. As far as I can tell, based on my work, this improved the overall smoothness and graduation of the tones from light to dark regardless of bit mode or any other. You can also dabble with the filters if you are using large radials (That would be a different article). 
As you can see below, the black brush at the top has rings (banding) and the one below has far fewer the brush used on the lowest part of the blob has noise switched on. The speckled effect will be less obvious once you take your artwork to print.

See how the rings blend together of the lower part of the blob?

Method 3 : Big to small, playing with scale

Another trick for tightening this banding is by shrinking/scaling down your completed artwork. When you have applied the 'noise' and finished the process you can physically shrink the image to hide some of the messier details - an illusion essentially. 


This is a method that I have used not only to disguise banding when digitally painting but also to give the appearance of tighter line work and detail.



Step 1 piece of art = 100%
Step 2 scale art to = 75%

So when you print the document some so the details and blemishes are hidden away from the naked eye. This approach can also hide some of the rings in banding with added element of noise!

Conclusion
You will see the benefits for this when you come to printing your work, especially if you are working with shades of grey.

To summarise - Add noise to your brush mode.

Hope this helps!

This method was used when illustrating/digitally painting Rufus the Rat for Satzuma LTD

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BUTTROCK! - (Bumrock) photo from Talland Bay near Polperro in Cornwall

ButtRock

Bottoms Up

Well this a blast from the past. I figured that this bit of fun should grace the internet! lets call it a 10 year anniversary for good measure. 

This photo was taken around the time of the carefree days prior to uni and PCAD - simple times as you can tell. This piece of photography came about by chance, I remember looking at the rounded stones and thinking... (not a lot) well probably went something like this.

"Mate, go between those rocks stick your arses in the air!... left a bit, right! Good!' Click!

And now you have it a, a sea of apparent arses carved from natural landscape in one monochrome photo. I was most likely hoping for reactions such as:

'Oh my word!' China sets flung everywhere
'Oh my days! Doily all askew and monocles popping out left right and centre! 

Well it was fun. Photo taken near Polperro at Talland Bay. - Models Ritchie Crane and Darrell Butler. - Prints were available.

JD - Jolly Hockey Sticks!

copy right JD ODELL

Character faces and sketches from my A4 Sketch Pad

Sketch book - Character Faces

I felt my blog lacked this kind of thing, sketches, work in progress WIP's etc. So I wanted to start adding this kind of thing. People, faces, expressions and characters are just some of my areas of obsession, I get my kicks and from drawing gravely faces, ladies, scars and anything that comes to mind.

Back tracking slightly... somebody asked what was my favorite thing to draw - a tough question with more than one answer. I would say story telling, characters, hero's, villains, thieves, rogues, monsters, beasts, ladies, history, a scene the list goes on and on. I like to draw detail!!!

I'm quite liking the mean old man character and the lady eyes.

HB mechanical pencil

And yes... I do, do a spot of people watching... I get a lot of inspiration from crowded places.

Thank you for reading.

http://jdillustration.jimmsdesign.co.uk/

A New Blog from Jimm

Hello all I'm new to this blog spot. I'm a digital designer with a passion for drawing and being stupid!

Originally from Looe in Cornwall I have now moved to London to build my career in digital design and print.

for those who are interested in taking a look at some of my work then please feel free.

jimmsdesign this way >