Urban Sketching in Carlisle book

I created an issuu book of my edited sketches made on the location/urban sketching brief.

Satanists again

I have revisited a previous brief (editorial illustration for an article on satanism in South Africa) before end of semester hand in and created a gif from one of my illustrations that I didn't go with.

This was the original drawing. I didn't go with it because I felt it was too simple, too flat and possibly boring

 However after feedback it was suggested that it was one of the stronger ones but didn't have a gif to go with it as per the brief instructions.

So here's the gif!

Revisiting it I went with this first, however I felt the eyes and grin were unnecessary and looked out of place. Also I realised that the man shouldn't relax his expression until the hand had disappeared. Both of which I have amended below.

As seen here.

Following some techniques I've used in my last brief on ghost stories I have used textures on this gif as well.

Ghost Story finals

Cover for The Folio Collection of Ghost Stories (front and spine of binding)

Full cover/binding

Illustration for 'The Treasure of Abbot Thomas'

Additional Gif

Illustration for 'The Upper Berth'

Gif of the character breathing in the cold.

Illustration for 'A Tale of an Empty House'

Gif of man watching the main character from the window.

Ghost Stories cover

The cover for The Folio Collection of Ghost Stories. I went with a visual of The Tale of an Empty House for the cover. As bindings/covers for folio society books use 3 colours (cover and 2 print colours) I designed it to that format.

The book material would be the dark blue as depicted below with an off white and dark grey as the printed colours.

I tried some different colours for the background thinking the current one would be too dark and to see if there was a colour that might suit it better.

I decided to go with the dark green/teal colour. When it came to placing the text on the spine, I realised the small house on the spine interfered with the text so I removed it.

With bleed

Without bleed

Ghost stories!

My current brief has been to illustrate 3 ghost stories and a cover that binds them. I've also decided to create some simple gifs of them to add to the illustration.

The Treasure of Abbot Thomas by M. R. James

' "So I looked up, and I see someone's 'ead lookin' over at us. I s'pose I must ha' said somethink, and I 'eld the light up and rune up the steps, and my light shone right on the face." '

The Upper Berth by F. Marion Crawford

In this story, the main character is plagued by the continuous opening of the porthole in his cabin. I can't find a line that best describes the situation but I felt that this illustrates the story as a whole.

A Tale of an Empty House by E. F. Benson

The main character decides to have his lunch by what seems to be an abandoned house, he awakes to hear sounds from inside the house and becomes concerned that he was being watched from the window he slept under.

Given feedback, I've made changes to these illustrations, which I'll post later.

Satanism in South Africa pt3

Even though I've created an illustration, I feel this one would be a stronger illustration but perhaps weaker in the animated aspect.

This is meant to illustrate the parts of the article that state that satanists eat the flesh of their victims and also to reference 'Belinda's' story of the satanist party she attended. "There was a lot of blood. I could feel strange powers. People screaming, running, eating and grabbing flesh. It was basically an orgy."

Satanism in South Africa pt2

EXPLICIT CONTENT WARNING - you've been warned.

Our current brief is to illustrate an article in print and digital versions. More explanation in my previous post.

Original thumbnails.

Print version

Digital version

Satanism in South Africa

EXPLICIT CONTENT WARNING - you've been warned.

Our latest brief was editorial illustration. We were each given existing articles and the size of the illustration with the existing illustration removed and that was all. We have to produce an illustration in two versions, one for print and one for digital. The digital one needs to be animated slightly whether it be a gif or in another way.

I got the happiest of all articles - Satanism and crime in South Africa, or 'Possession and the law', an article from FT magazine July 31 2004.

Above illustrations are meant to show the influence of the devil on people, his control over them. The article explores how people are possessed or commit crimes because of the devil. "These people aren't mentally ill ... They're just evil." - a quote from Colonel/Dr.Kobus Jonker from the article. 

Within the article there's the story of 'Belinda' (name given to her), a woman who claims that she was in a coven for '13 drug-fuelled years', which makes it sound all the more believable. However whether her story is real or not it is definitely disturbing. She claims to have gone to a Satanist party "There was a lot of blood. I could feel strange powers. People screaming, running, eating and grabbing flesh. It was basically an orgy." 

Further on she speaks of her experience in the coven; she says that she had seen four human sacrifices and that she was raped on an altar frequently as a spectacle. She believed that by accepting the latter 'punishment' she would be rewarded with supernatural powers.

So some of the ideas I've been working on have been from her section of the article. The above images are to illustrate both the satanist orgy and the scenes of rape, the clawed hands representing the hands of the devil as opposed to the supposed reality. 

Pixel characters

See previous post for more pixel characters.

Clangers and Soup Dragon
Daenerys Targaryen and a dragon (I don't know what her 3 dragons are called but there she is with a dragon)
Daenerys again
Some guy and his dad. Oh and their estranged friend.

Seals

Urban Sketching in Carlisle

Our latest brief involved going to locations around Carlisle and recording our surroundings. I drew at a couple of locations, Cecil Street and Botchergate. I tried to experiment with weight of line after looking at some of Lucinda Rogers illustrations.