Know what I mean, Jelly Bean?

Yummy Gummy Gumdrops

Here's the next installment for my candy theme.

Mint Candy

It's been awhile since I've posted anything personal because I've been up to my ears in freelance projects.  This is a great problem to have.  I'm not complaining!

Anyway, here's the first piece of the new theme I've started - Candy!

Little Rabbit Riding Hood

Here's a sneak peak of my new character design!

Match 3 Game Board - Concept

I'm starting a new piece centered more around Game UI that's more painted and less vector than my previous set.  This is for a Match 3 game that I loosely devised a few months ago.  I have the Air and Earth boards concepted.  Earth is has a more completed set of concept drawings but I really wanted to start with the Air board for some reason.  

Below you'll find the concept sketch and how far along I am with the painted piece.  

Yes, I know that four across may not be the best option for a match 3 but I'm trying to stay focused more on the design and feel of the board than worry about if it 100% functionally!

User Interface for Dragon Game - Status Bar

Status Bar with Levels, Gold and Gem amounts.

User Interface for Dragon Game - Quests

User Interface for Dragon Game - Icons

Here are three possible versions of UI icons in my Dragon Game style.

On the icons without a border, the colour of the stroke really depends on the vibrancy of the game as often times white strokes simply work best.

Apple Study

An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Egg Study

Not exactly sure why I wanted to "paint" eggs today, but I did.  Discovered some different types of chicken eggs.  Maran chickens lay beautiful, deep brown eggs.  Araucanas lay light blue or green eggs.  

User Interface for Dragon Game - Final

And here we have the completed piece.

User Interface for Dragon Game - WIP 2

The UI is coming along!  The little dragon needs the bulk of the work still.  Other than that, need to work out some more details on the ropes and texture of the wood.  Happy to have found a font that works for me.

Baby Zedonk

Saw a picture of one of these and really felt the need to draw one.  They're so cute!  Anyway, a new scanner has been acquired.  Much easier to work with but still need to learn how best to tweak the drawings.

User Interface for a Dragon Game - WIP

A couple of months ago I made the dragons below heavily influenced by the iOS casual game trend of raising dragons.  The three games that I used as reference were my favourites - Dragon Story, Dragonvale and Dragon Skies.  There's two possible eggs, a baby and an adult version of one type of dragon.  

Taking the above style into account, I've decided to make an Options menu for a game to start off the UI portion of my portfolio as I've become pretty fascinated with the job of UI Artists.  If this were an actual game, this is how the UI might look.

First, these are my preliminary sketches (excuse my quick scrawl for the text) using both the wood and stone nests.  

I have started with the wooden, more tribal version which I am currently calling "Stick Tied".  Here's the progress so far.  Still a ways to go yet:

Undecided about whether or not I'll actually develop the stone or Greek version or not.

Materials Test - Wood

Found this a nice tutorial on Pinterest on how to draw a wooden plank.  The text is translated, so the English leaves a little to be desired.  However, it's broken up well enough that you can totally get the gist of what they want you to do and then add your own touches.

This is my result.  I feel like I learned a thing or two about stylized wood.

Society6 Shop Pick

Society6 is one of those websites where artists can sell their artwork.  With mostly minimal fuss you can upload your work and create different products on which is can be made.  As long as you follow their size requirements, it's fairly simple.  When someone chooses to purchase an item with your desk, you get a small commission.  The company is keeping the bulk of the money because they're actually the ones purchasing the template items and printing it.  

I'm pretty excited that I got an email today from Society6 saying that this print here, Happy as a Fox balancing an Umbrella in the Rain, got picked officially to be part of the Society6 Shop.  I'm not 100% certain what this means yet but I do imagine that it means my piece will get more visibility.  One would hope that means it would actually sell as well.  So far, I've only sold one set of stationary cards of this particular design.

I can also say that it makes me want to make more pieces like this!

Material Test - Metals

I could tweak this forever to keep trying to get it "better".  However, sometimes it's good enough.  You've learned what you set out to learn and you need to move on.  I feel like I have the basic principles of gold, silver and copper down now.

Badger Pirate Concept

A quick concept for a badger pirate.  Ever set out to draw something and it evolves into something else?  Well, that happened here.  He was supposed to be a blacksmith.

American Badger Sketches

More American Badger drawings.

Badger Heads

I truly enjoy sketching with my col-erase pencils and some loose leaf paper on my drawing board while curled up on the couch.  While I can see the multitude of benefits that come with sketching with a tablet on the computer, it's just not the same and certainly not as meditative for me.  However, as I've said several times before, I really need to get a proper scanner if I want to keep putting them on this sketchblog.

Anyway, here are some badger heads.

Materials - Gemstones

Worked on this for several days.  Tried out different gem colours, shapes and number of facets.

My little Deer with Background

I added a background.  Tried to keep it in the My Little Pony style.

My Little Deer

Goodness, I have really slacked off this month with sketches and whatnot.  Anyway, here's a little doe done in the new My Little Pony style.  Why pink stripes in her hair?  If you know me, you know why.

Materials Test - Stone

Next up - Stone.
Sandstone inspired.

Material Test - Water Droplets

Decided it's time to conquer some materials.
First one - water droplets.  Painted in Photoshop.

Painted Goldfish

This isn't exactly just a sketch but I wanted to try my hand at some more painting in Photoshop.  Specifically, I wanted to try out some new brushes I had found versus just the standard brushes I usually use.  I found I liked a few, which is a good thing.

Kitty Yawn

Yawning kitty sketch.  Tried out line shading in Sketchbook Pro 6.  Eh, I need a little more patience with it yet.

Sparrow Flight Again

Another rough sketch.  Working out small bird wings.

Another Sparrow Flight

More rough stuff.

Sparrow in Flight

Didn't feel like polishing up the linework on the sparrow.  Rough can be good too.

Stellar's Jay

I keep wanting to call these guys Stellar Jay.  It just rolls off the tongue better.  Plus, they are pretty stellar bird. ;)

Little Blue Dragon

Bear Cub

Quick sketch of a bear cub.

Little Red Panda

Sleeping Fennec Fox

Still playing with the copic marker set in Sketchbook Pro 6.  I rather like the colour options.

Icelandic Sheepdog

My sketch of our Icelandic Sheepdog, Tui.

Kitty Love

Quick sketch up in Sketchbook Pro 6.  Playing with the Copic marker set.

Little Monster

Working on linework in Sketchbook Pro 6

Camel Head

Quick Camel character sketch in Sketchbook Pro 6

Armadillo Tank

Little sketch based on an armadillo and glyptodon.

Running Dappled Gray

Playing with Sketchbook Pro 6.

Red Panda with Ball sketch

Working with col-erase pencil again but my scanner doesn't seem to like it.  Actually, it's just time to get a new scanner.

Itchy Red Panda

Working on drawing in Photoshop with a quick colour study.

No, I'm not obsessed with Red Pandas.  I'm just trying out the method of drawing something over and over again until you feel comfortable with it based on the idea of drawing it 100 times.

Leaping Hare

Working on pen tablet line work in Sketchbook Pro.

Red Panda Pencil Sketch

Red Pandas in Col-erase.  One of my all time favourite sketch tools.