Recent Work Update

Things have been busy lately. Here is an update of some projects I've worked on recently or that have recently been published:

Frosh Student Guide 2011 Cover // Offbeat // Art Director: Elsa Hahne

This is one of my favorite pieces this year. I loved drawing the giant gumbo dish. It was great working with Elsa on this, she pushed the crab bits larger and larger and I was happy to go along with it. I played with some layer options to get a nice glow to certain areas of the color. I worked with Elsa on the text color and placement to ensure this would work as a good, eye-catching cover.

Beer on the Bayou // Offbeat // Art Director: Elsa Hahne

Another fun piece for Offbeat about one of my favorite subjects, beer! You can read the full article here. This has a lot of good information on the growing craft beer scene in Louisiana. My wife, Heather has begun coloring some of my work and she did an excellent job balancing the hues and adding just the right amount of pop to the right areas of this one.

Queasy Rider // Portland Mercury // Art Director: Suji Allen

Full article here. This one ran in black and white in the paper, but color online. Heather did the color for this one too.

Just Crazy Enough to Die // Portland Mercury // Art Director: Suji Allen

Another quick weekend illustration for the Mercury. Here is the full article online. Suji knew exactly what she was looking for, so this one came together pretty easily.

X-MEN Variant // Comix Gone Rogue // Publisher: Edwin Vazquez

This is a great project I was invited to submit to. Basically, some comic companies released blank covered comic books with just the masthead (presumably for industry signatures or sketches). Edwin distributed these to a variety of great artists (not necessarily mainstream comic artists) to fill in the cover as they see fit. Fun stuff! NSFW - Other variant submissions and more info can be seen here. 

Man Signs Dog - Offbeat New Orleans

Here is an editorial illustration I made for an article in Offbeat (New Orleans). You can read the article here. I've done a few pieces for them recently and they are great to work with. Every illo has been music related, which is one of the top subjects I enjoy illustrating.
I did a handfull of sketches for this one. One had an iconic Hendrix pose and another one used his fro to show it was him. I'm glad the A.D. went with this one.
I used a slightly different process with this one and worked from a tight, detailed, pencil drawing instead of my usual brush inks. I wanted to put a lot of detail and textures into the music equipment and I felt the brush line would muddy it up too much. I made some adjustments to the line in Photoshop and colored with a pretty simple, balanced palette. Then added in some doodly marks for extra flare. The end result has a lot of busy lines and direction, but the focal point on the dog and signature is clear.

Offbeat New Orleans - Wolfman!

Here's an illustration I did Offbeat, a music review publication in New Orleans. It illustrates a part of the article about a particularly lively musician known as Wolfman, testing out his new teeth on a bartenders neck. This was put together with using a layer of ink, watercolor, Photoshop color and texture. You can read the article here: http://offbeat.com/2011/07/01/across-the-bar-music-venue-bartenders/