Dragon Con Poster

My portfolio is lacking in dragons.

 

The solution? Make a mock-poster for the Dragon Con Independent Film Festival. I approached the project like I was receiving art direction from an art director for the event. Aside from the fact that I was receiving art direction from my teacher and peers (for which I am grateful), I took into account that all of the posters in the past had dragons and usually something related to film.

 These are the comps I made for class. The third one was a new idea that came to me after I finished the first two comps. I like the concept, but I think the execution is much less successful than the other two. 

 

Here is the poster as it stood before critiques.

Here is the final poster with some revisions I made after critiques. More information about the festival can be found at the official website.

Adopt a Griffin

You could be the proud parent of my baby griffin painting. It is now for sale at the ArtOrder Store along with many fantastical works of art. 

Guest Post: Funny Bones

 I would like to introduce my amazing sister, Kelsey Broersma. I will be enriching my blog with her insightful posts from time to time. You can see her full blog at kbroersma.blogspot.com. Enjoy her post on skulls: 


I love science, especially biology. As a kid, owning pets, watching Animal Planet, reading National Geographic, and discovering the ecosystem in my backyard fed my desire to learn more about the animal kingdom. As an adult, I still do all of those things and the natural world never ceases to amaze me. Drawing is learning. When I take the time to study a found object, I am amazed by its structure and complexity.

I received a partial skull and eagerly awaited to make a few skull studies. I believe it is a raccoon skull, but it could pass for an opossum too. The skull's small size made it ideal for life drawing--I kept the studies "sight-sized", a technique where you draw the object the exact size you perceive it whether it is next to your paper or several feet in front of you.

I took my skull theme to the internet, where I pulled dozens of animal skull images. I wanted to represent as many animals I could, so I ended up drawing twenty skulls including reptiles, mammals, amphibians, fish and birds. How many skulls can you identify?

Profile images display the most striking characteristics, so I let that rule guide my reference selection. Make sure you click on the image to enlarge it! I shaded the darkest areas to simplify the overall form.

If you want to see more scientific illustration, I recommend Cal State Monterey Bay's student gallery.
Have fun discovering!

Spot Illustration for Charleston Magazine

I made a spot Illustration for Charleston Magazine, which may or may not be published. However, I'm very happy with how it came out granted the short time I made it in. It's approximately a week's work from concept to finish, which is pretty darn fast for a slow poke like myself.

The final sketch:

 

The final:

Gershwin & Bernstein Poster Comps

Here are three comps for a mock-job doing a poster for the July 10th performance of the L.A. Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl. The program includes works by Bernstein & Gershwin, so I tried to add an Art Deco flare and lots of jazzy blue. The sailor is a reference to Bernstein's On The Town.