The illo was based on this concept by Evan:

Traffic Cone (see picture):  Traffic cones don’t get to have nearly as much fun as an ice cream cone, so one of them decided to switch roles when an ice cream cone wandered a little too close to the street he was set up on.  On the left side of the design in the street would be an ice cream cone turned over without any ice cream left on its top, and the ice cream cone itself would have a face and one black eye, looking beat up and tossed into the street to take the place of a traffic cone.  The traffic cone on the other hand who beat up the ice cream cone would be on the right side of the design, on the sidewalk away from the street, turned upside-down and having the ice cream cone’s scoops of ice cream in it, having stolen them from the ice cream cone and switched jobs and places with it!  The traffic cone would be in a state of total happiness, either using a spoon to take a bit of the ice cream scoops on top of its traffic cone head, or having an extra long tongue and slurping up some of the ice cream scoops.  The scoops could react as if they are being tickled, not unlike when a big dog slurps its tongue on a child’s face.  Role reversals are fun!

Evan's Concept Sketch

While reading his idea I sketched whatever came to mind...

Which fleshed itself out into....

We were pretty happy with the first sketch, so it was inked in Photoshop.

First color version included addition of a hole in the street.

Final version, with better hole and slight tweaking!

The End! :)

Here I finally got the Smiley Lion the way I wanted him!

Score this design: “Medusa’s Bath,” to help it get printed on Threadless!

Also, I’m excited that Sleeeeeep is doing really well and has the second highest score in the Loves Patterns competition. However,  it could really use some more votes, as the sheer number so far isn’t huge. Thanks again, all!

Score this design: Sleeeeep,” to help it get printed on Threadless!

Score this design: Cat Attack,” to help it get printed on Threadless!

This is a repeating pattern. It goes on foreeeeeeeever. You can click on it if you’d like to vote and see it, like, ON stuff… (It’s still pending as of July 13th– should be up tomorrow!) Thanks for looking :]

It's on stuff!

Night Song, SoHo Colored Pencils, June 29, 2011

I recreated this drawing of the Song Lion for the Jerry’s Artarama SoHo colored pencil contest, and thought it would fit in with the theme for Illustration Friday, too! (It’s, y’know, evening!! Um, and stuff.)

This contest required use of Jerry’s colored pencil brand, and I love trying out new brands and materials so thought it would be a good contest to enter. The color palette was limited (20 compared to 120 Prismacolors) and it was fun to experiment. These pencils won’t replace my Prismacolors, but one thing I really liked about them is that you can sharpen them to an extremely fine point, like a graphite pencil, whereas Prismacolors just fall apart. They make great colored lineart.

The SCAD Sidewalk Arts Festival has come to an end, and my dear Song Lion managed to place first in the Alumni Cyberwalk category. Not as much fun as actually making it to the real Festival, but close! I like this pose of him uku’in in the sunset, so he may soon become a colored pencil piece.

You can take a look at the list of winners here, or view the winning entries directly here.

Also, my friend Alexandra Clotfelter took part in creating this little beauty. Cat mermaids? Waaaaant!!

Alexandra and friends' Cat Mermaids

There are restrictions when trying to make a piece in the Cyberwalk program, such as the lack of blending ability, limited palette and fat uniformly-thick chalk strokes, but since I tend to go freaking nuts in these areas it’s fun to be forcibly limited.

I drew the Song Lion doing his thang. Check out all the submissions here, and enter!

I wasn’t expecting too much, as there were plenty of gorgeous entries, but I was lucky enough to win third place! Nobody notified me of this– I ended up discovering the fact on an obscure local newspaper web site. I have yet to discover what the prize is, but I’m hoping it’s something money-like ;).

Here’s my entry:

You can check out all the entries here. Make sure to check out Tran Ngyuyen’s piece–  she won first place and it’s pretty amazing!

Ella, ella, eh, eh, eh… OKOK.

For the pre-graduation thingy in Forsyth, soon-to-be grads were invited to decorate these paper umbrellas for a contest. The umbrellas were all varnished and glued and such, so watercoloring them was totally out of the question. I decided to give acrylic painting a shot, without high hopes because I am a dismal acrylic painter. I almost gave up in the middle cause it looked so bad, but once I finished it with black outlines I fell in love. She’s an adorable little trash mermaid!

I used acrylic airbrush paints rather than normal acrylics, and I think it helps a lot to make brushstrokes disappear.  They are very thin and smooth. I highly recommend that stuff!

The winner gets $500, so wish me luck! ( Unless you did one too ;) )

I have no idea what to do with a big ol’ umbrella I can’t fold up after the competition, though… :( I was thinking of hacking off the handle and hanging it up.