Rough Character Design: The Acrobats

More roughs for my circus storybook..

 Think these need a bit more detail but can't put my finger on what's missing! 

Rough Character Design: The Ringmaster

Here is my first rough character design for a picture book I'm working on about the circus..

I think he's kinda cute! The final designs will of course have a lot more detail and generally better put together but you get the idea.

Not a lot of inspiration needed to create this character as I went for the stereotypical costume! I was slightly inspired by Harold Zidler from Moulin Rouge though...I love that movie!

Penguin Design Awards

This year's Puffin children's book brief is to design the front cover for Grimm's Fairy Tales.. Here's what I've been working on today; a cover based on The Frog Prince.

Not sure about it as of yet! I'm going to have a bash at doing some more designs based on different Grimm's Tales and see which one I like best at the end! 

Feedback is always welcome!

D&AD Competition Brief

Yesterday I began working on the D&AD illustration brief; to design the front cover for "Little White Lies," an independent film magazine. The brief was to illustrate one of their top rated films of 2011: Drive, Black Swan, The Tree of Life, Super 8, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

I chose Black Swan, and came up with this:

It's a lot different from my other work as the cover had to feature the main character..I'm not sure I'm happy about how fashion-y it's turned out but I think it works better this way rather than my usual style. I also kept with using textures by using real feathers in there..

Venetian

Venetian (2011)

I love venetian masks especially these ones with the long noses! I love the mystery that masks hold; and looking at these beautiful venetian masks I often imagine romantic characters and the stories behind them 

Day of the Dead

A new illustration inspired by the "Day of the Dead"

I have been meaning to do something inspired by this Mexican festival for a while now...so this is my first attempt! However, I'm hoping to read more into the subject and perhaps so some more work like this at some point!

Animation Test

Today I tried animating my paper puppet! Here is the result..

Just a very quick test to see if this media would be appropriate for the animation I have planned and just to improve my animating skills. I found the puppet really easy to animate - much easier than I think it would be to animate a puppet with wire limbs. I like the jerky movements and the method of replacing the head for different angles. I might try altering the puppet by making the limbs skinnier - a bit more like the illustrations I've recently been producing - to see if it would work as well. 

Overall I am quite please with this quick test. It has given me more confidence to actually get stuck in and produce an animation for my uni project..rather than just have the idea lingering in my head for a billion years! It's also given me a rough idea of how long it might take to produce a 2 and half minute animation (which is roughly how long I want my proper one to be)...

To produce this I took the frames on my Nikon D40 and imported them into iStopmotion. I added a filter to the video in iMovie :)