Introduction

I'm a freelance illustrator/designer/art director and if you think I can help with your project, want to offer words of encouragement or simply say hi, feel free to get in touch.

I'm also on Twitter and Facebook. Follow me to find out every time I haul bits of imagination kicking and screaming into reality.

Friday 30 December 2011

Early Bird

Due to tight deadlines, Christmas festivities and a bit of quality family time, I haven't been doodling as much as I'd like so I've nothing much to share except this little project. This film making hobby is something I'd like to spend more time doing in the future hopefully resulting in a project that I'm 100% happy with.

Right, back to clearing my desk to get my pencils sharpened ready for the New year.

Happy new year folks!


Thursday 1 December 2011

Little house on an alien prarie

The news is hardly a barrel of laughs these days and with Stephen Hawkins effectively stating we have to leave the planet or die i was even more encouraged to create somewhere alien, peaceful and calm.

When we begin exploring the galaxy in earnest i imagine that there will be a lot of similarities between that and the drive to colonize the old new world in the 1500's. Once brave and noble explorers have finished encouraging the locals to move along, families and businesses will begin settling in droves. Especially if the Earth population keeps on increasing the way it is doing.

Thursday 10 November 2011

In space, Jane will hear you scream

I've always enjoyed the graphic qualities of old sci-fi movie posters, specifically the patterns and textures that came from the now defunct printing techniques of the first half of the 20th century. I wanted to take some of these techniques and mix them up with a slice of 70's - 80's sci-fi and see what came out of the other end.

Space Jane is an old project i dusted off recently and finally got round to finishing. She's a character I've been playing around with for 2-3 years now and have finally done something solid with her.

I believe there's mileage in that thar character though so she may make another appearance before too long. I'm pretty pleased with it but will no doubt tweak and toy with it a few more times, but for now, here it is.

Monday 17 October 2011

Bog Troll

Before I went away over summer i spent an afternoon backing up files, something i don't do nearly often enough. It always takes much longer than it should as i start reading through bits of random story ideas or looking at half finished images.

This time i read a few stories that I rather enjoyed. Usually I'm over critical of my own work and fall out of love with it within days of finishing... or before its even finished. So I was inspired by my own work to start illustrating stuff in my own rapidly diminishing free time.

This is the first draft of a character from one of these stories, and unusually I'm rather happy with him and I think this will be close to his final look. He's a rather unpleasant Troll. Who eats goats. And children.

Tuesday 11 October 2011

Baby on the move

Wow, a busy summer of both work and play has meant that I've been pretty lax on any kind of communication. Its been fun, but with the weather taking a turn for the worse I'm going to put some effort into my sketchbook and try and get some personal projects finished off. That is if i can pull myself away from my Xbox long enough.

Despite having fun playing through some great games, it does consume several hours of my free time every week. i need to find some balance. Maybe down the back of the sofa?

I've been drawing my son since (his) day one, but he changes so quickly its hard to pin down something that's clearly him. Through most of their first year, to most other people, babies all look the same. I think hes now reached an age where he's settled into something that i can focus on, but in the meantime here's a piece i did for a friends baby's first birthday. Its always tricky doing caricatures, especially of a baby as its very easy to offend the parents, but if that was the case, they were polite enough to tell me it was great.

Thursday 14 July 2011

There was art.

I've been a fan of Pratchett's work ever since my dad introduced me when I was 14. Recently I was playing through the Assassins creed games and during the last chapter all I could think of was how much fun it would be to use its parkour mechanics to navigate the great Discworld city of Ankh Morpork.

The closest I'm going to get any time soon was to recreate this as an image. So here it is, the view from the top of Dimwell St down to the banks of the river Ankh and Unseen University's tower of art.

Thursday 16 June 2011

In the beginning...

Ok. So i guess this is a blog. Lets just see how that works out shall we? I've no real experience of this form of self promotion other than a couple of friends and family who've embarked on something similar in the past.

Anyway, to kick off here's a picture.

I was inspired by the seemingly alien rock formations of Brimham rocks in North Yorkshire when i visited them a while ago, and wondered what they'd look like ten times the size.

A bit like that. Maybe?

Its not a fresh piece by any stretch, but its one of the first times i experimented with using photographic textures along side hand drawn and photoshopped elements. More recent images using this technique can be found on my site.

Anyway, I'll post some sketchbook work next time as i have piles of them that are gradually taking over my shelf space, and exercising some of their contents might put them to good use.