Cover Art - 'The 10th Album'

I know what you're thinking.

He's given up on the Balls of Steel challenge !

Nope - I'm still going on that. I have the next one drawn ( but not scanned or tidied ), the one after planned ( I want to try illustrator for that one perhaps ), and I'm working on the one after that ( essentially drawn now, just penning the lines properly ).

I have other things to get done though.

Like this cover art ! I know it needs to be done in November, and I've been kinda slack in getting it started. I'm making decent progress now though :

I have to add in five crosses on the bottom half, then try and get some more interesting texture on the silhouettes, and then add the text. I'm keeping this one pretty simple. 

Cover Art - The Thirteen Nights of Halloween

I was asked to do some alternate cover art for the Dunesteef's 'Thirteen Nights of Halloween'. I think I took a little too long to complete it - but I DID get it done !

Not the greatest - but there are some bits I like. It's pretty much just a collage of photo elements I stitched together.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #93 Give Up

The challenge has been off the boil for the last few weeks, thanks to all the other art stuff I've got on - but I have been slowly picking away at it.

I'll admit though - this one REALLY stumped me for a long time. I just couldn't think of anything to link into the phrase 'Give Up'.

But then I thought of this :

I'm not especially thrilled with it - but it's done at least 1

Seven to go !

Cover Art - 'A Lovely Singing Voice' - More fish

Got another couple of fish completed :

Learned how to do a three colour gradient shift fill with that top fish - which sounds far harder and more impressive than it actually is.

Cover Art - 'A Lovely Singing Voice' - Fish development

Been working on the tropical fish. The girl is supposed to be looking through a fish tank - not that you would have been able to know that up to this point ... though maybe the rocks gave a small clue :

The bottom one is mostly ( if not totally ) done. The orange / white one has just been started. I'm hoping that they don't make the image look too busy - but I guess the beauty of photoshop is that I can just turn the fish 'off', and rearrange their positions to mt heart's content !

Cover Art - 'A Lovely Singing Voice' - T-shirt, hair, face development

Had some time to work on the covert art a little this evening:

I'm still not overly thrilled at this stage. It's slowly coming together though.

Cover Art - 'A Lovely Singing Voice' - face development

Had some time to develop the face today :

I don't know that she looks particularly young at the moment - but she does look a good deal more sinister.

It's a start.

Cover Art - 'A Lovely Singing Voice'

I was listening to an episode of the Dunesteef's offshoot podcast today, and one of the hosts mentioned that he was needing cover art for his story 'A Lovely Singing Voice', and gave a brief description of what the image was that he was after - one of the principal characters looking through an aquarium.

'I could do that' I thought to myself.

When I got home ( I was at a park with the boys at the time ), I did a REALLY quick sketch, and sent it off to see what the general thought was on it. I didn't know if he wanted / needed me to do anything for him ( and I did feel a little weird about offering with no invitation ), but I thought that even if he didn't, it might be a good drawing exercise for me.

I was happily working on the look of the aquarium stones :

When I got an email back - he liked the general idea and seemed pretty happy for me to knock something out for him. So that's cool. He did want the girl looking more sinister and for it to be bigger - which shouldn't be too much of a problem.





Updates as I progress !

BoS Drawing Challenge - #92 All That I Have

Finally got this done. Yet again - I was GOING to only post the sketch, but I can't seem to help myself and had to get colour, shading and highlights in as well :

It's supposed to be one of the Junk Ladies from the movie Labyrinth. It turned out okay I think. The dress and apron could have used more work.

Eight to go !

BoS Drawing Challenge - #91 Drowned

Super busy with all sorts of stuff at work - so these last few are really dragging out.

I present this week's offering :

This is supposed to be Cthulu - the monstrous god-creature from the writing of H. P. Lovecraft. He lies in his death-sleep in the drowned city of R'lyeh, waiting till the stars align and his reign of terror can take over the planet. So, there's the drowned link.



It didn't really turn out as well as I thought it might be. The legs are pretty wonky, but the reaching hands arn't too bad I guess.

Nine to go.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #89 Through the Fire

Yet again - somewhat later than I would have liked, but here's the one I 'skipped' slightly :

This is Daenerys Targaryen, from the 'Game of Thrones' / Song of Ice and Fire stories, having gone 'through the fire' and having her newly hatched dragons with her. I tried to make the Daenerys layers look burned or sooty / grimy - but I couldn't really get it to work. This looks fine, and I'm reasonably pleased with the way it turned out.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #90 Triangle

Yes - I know that I've skipped number 89. I'm still working on that one, but this one is finished so I thought that I'd post it now :

The all-seeing eye of the Illuminati. Didn't turn out too bad at all.

Hard to believe that I'm almost down to the last 10 !

BoS Drawing Challenge - #88 Pain

So I wasn't going to colour this one, but I couldn't seem to stop myself. I'm glad I did now - it ended up looking pretty good :

This is a Pain Elemental - from the video game 'Doom 2'. They were pretty nasty enemies, from what I remember. They would spit out these flaming skull demons at you, and I'm pretty sure that when you finally killed one they would explode, releasing a number more of the flaming skull demons.

Pretty happy with the way this one turned out.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #87 Food

Quickly threw this one together :

The Cheese-Spider, from 'Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2'.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #86 Seeing Red

Just a quick one this time :

Sauron, seeing 'in red' over Middle-Earth, from the top of his fortress - Barad-Dur.

A little out of the box perhaps.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #85 Spiral

Yet again, this took far longer than I would have liked - but I think it was worth it this time :

This is one of the Black Spiral Dancers - the corrupted werewolf clan from the 'Werewolf : The Apocalypse' role-playing game. They're particularly dangerous enemies.

It hasn't been often I've said this in the Balls of Steel challenge, but I'm REALLY pleased with the way this one turned out. I like how the clashing colour looks on the green fur, and the green flames on the bane-glaives look pretty damn good, and I think I got the slight glow on the eyes working well.

So yes - I like this one a lot.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #84 Out Cold

Yet again - took longer than I would have liked to finish this one :

Perhaps a little more literal on the 'cold' word - but what the hell. Of course, this is Mr. Freeze - the Batman villain. I rather like Mr. Freeze. There's a tragic aspect to him. And that Mr. Freeze boss fight in the Arkham City video game ? Man - that was FANTASTIC. That Mr. Freeze was terrifying !

BoS Drawing Challenge - #83 Heal

Just finished this now :

This is supposed to be a Guardian of Kings from the 'Hearthstone' video game. When you summon it, it heals you. So there's the link.

I guess it turned out okay. I could have spent more time on the shading, but it's time to move on.

BoS Drawing Challenge - #82 Can You Hear Me ?

Finally finished #82 -

Not super happy with this. I had trouble thinking of something for the starter, and never really got into this one.

It's done now, at least !

BoS Drawing Challenge - #81 Pen and Paper

Only a quick clean-up and colour tonight :

Would have liked to change the wings a bit, otherwise - it's alright.