Ape on the Moon: Contemporary Visual Arts » Character Illustration

Dan Matutina Creates Edgy Google Planets World for Google Plus Course

Alex Mathers — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 13:28:03 +0000

I’ve been putting together a comprehensive guide for creatives and other freelancing heroes on how to use Google+ for winning projects and clients. Feedback has been really good, and the course becomes available on February 7th 2012.

I asked Philippines-based illustrator Dan Matutina to create the artwork for the course and to add some further depth to it. The brief was in creating a futuristic space-world that encapsulated the features of Google’s new social network Google+ as a professional tool.

This meant representing ‘Google+ Circles’ with planets and ‘Google+ Profiles’ with spaceships and zany control panels. The results, as you can see, were nothing short of fantastic, and I’m pleased to show them to you in the run up to the launch of the online course, which is available here.

Cover Image:

‘Part 1: Getting Ready!’ Cover Image:

Part 2: ‘Setting Up Your Google+ Hub’ Cover Image:

Part 3: ‘Taking Action!’ Cover Image:

The instantly downloadable e-course is available to buy here.

Interview with Stephen Cheetham about his Cheeky, Colourful Illustration

Philip Dennis — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 10:08:59 +0000

It’s always great to come across work that makes you smile, and with the slightly morbid, yet cheeky humour in Stephen Cheetham’s work, it’s hard not to. He obviously has fun doing what he does, but with his eye for clean, simple design, he does it with a fresh and clear panache. We sat down with Stephen to find out more about how he started, and where that sense of humour came from.

Illustration for issue 397 of weekly news magazine, ‘Le Cool’.

Can you tell us a little about yourself and how you came about doing the work you do?

I live in London and work from my bedroom using a laptop and a Wacom. I got into illustration through friends who asked me to do flyers for their parties and gigs. I got a pretty good response and loved doing the work, so kept going. At the beginning I treated it as a hobby, just doing it for the love and freebie gig tickets.

Then gradually I got people asking me to do work in exchange for money so that was a bonus! I studied Product Design at university and tried to get a job as a designer, but that didn’t happen, which I’m now pretty glad about.

What’s your typical process when working on an illustration?

Starting normally involves making a list of ideas. I do keep a sketchbook, but it’s mostly words rather than pictures. Once I have the idea sorted, I may make a very rough sketch and then open a new file in Illustrator and get going. I do my sketching in Illustrator I guess, playing with shapes, moving arms and legs, trying to get the composition right, playing with colours, and hopefully end up with something either me or the client or both are happy with.

Have you always been interested in reduced forms and a graphic look or is it something that’s developed naturally?

I guess it was there from the beginning, although it’s been cleaned up and has become more refined over the years.

Some of your illustrations like your ‘Le Cool’ piece have a hint of dark humour to them. Is this something you like to add yourself or is it just something that crops up in commissions now and then?

Sometimes I get a client who wants to get humour into their commission, but most of the time it’s just me adding it. I can’t really do serious. The ‘Le Cool’ piece was my own doing. It was the first thing I thought of when asked to draw something about London.

We love the characters in your work, are you interested in comics or doing more character-based projects in the future?

Comics are something I want to get into this year, as well as animation. I’m also working on some pretty ‘character-heavy’ personal work at the moment… so I guess the answer’s yes!

Do you have any interesting projects planned for 2012?

I’m taking over the walls of a cafe in Dalston called ‘Tina, We Salute You’ in February. They’ve said I can do whatever I want, which is exciting but also pretty daunting.

Rainbow Bright and Charming yet Graphic Illustrations from Pintachan

Philip Dennis — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 16:02:08 +0000

Using rainbow-bright colours and soft-edged shapes, Pablo, aka Pintachan creates the most enchanting children’s illustrations. But, with his clever touches of texture, dancing brush strokes, and overall modern, graphic sensibilities, Pintachan works across a range of design areas.

In his own words, Pintachan says, ”Pablo runs Pintachan from the north of Spain. He loves liquorice, playing with Lego, watching old sci-fi movies and collecting children’s books.”

“My workspace it’s nothing special, just a Mac and a bunch of books. So, I’ve attached a photo of my childhood. It’s a bit weird but in a certain way it’s what I wish to transmit with illustration— childhood, naivety, happiness …”

Drawing Lines and Colourful Printing with Marie ERR

Philip Dennis — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 17:04:14 +0000

Here are some fun illustrations from Marie ERR, showing off her great passion for colour. She was kind enough to give us a backstage look at some of the printing processes she uses.

I usually sketch my ideas on random papers or in sketchbooks, the trouble starts when I try to look for them, usually without much luck. Depending on the type of work I’m doing, I usually draw lines with either indian ink or markers, and then I add colour with Photoshop.

If I’m going for handmade only, my favorite medium is acrylic on plywood, the colour always gets super bright, just the way I like it! And, if I like the design enough, I can always screen print it! It’s so much hard work but so much fun to do, I love it!

Bright Quirky Character Illustration from Kaley McKean

Philip Dennis — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 19:04:25 +0000

Fantastically bright as much as they are weird and wonderful, we’re enjoying these illustrations by Toronto-based Kaley McKean. Mixing an interest in cartoons and the paranormal, Kaley’s producing unique and charmingly fun work.

“I take a pretty light-hearted approach to making illustrations. I am not a very serious person— I think it’s important to have fun with whatever I’m working on. I love using colour, texture, and patterns to make pictures that appeal to the eyes. I work almost exclusively with traditional media, usually some combination of gouache, acrylic, inks, and collaged tissue paper.”

“Today I am inspired by funny animals, kids’ game shows, and the relationship between the bizarre/fantastical and everyday life.”

Nick Sheehy/Show Chicken’s Beautifully Surreal Universe

Philip Dennis — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 17:16:17 +0000

Haunting owl-like creatures brandishing strange instruments, in battle with creepy serpents, fill Nick Sheehy/Show Chicken’s depictions of his mythological world. Perhaps it’s his characters’ hollow eyes that create the unsettling atmosphere, but the lovely pastel colours and delicate pencil work create something altogether beautiful. We’d love to see him work on a children’s book!

“I like to draw weird pictures of things I’ve not seen before, combining clumsy with precision. I start all work with a mechanical pencil on either Bristol Board, Moleskine or heavyweight drawing paper.

I like to work into a drawing with crosshatching or standard shading, using a combination of leads and then colour at the end with thin glazes of acrylic paint, colour pencils or watercolours. If the work is for a commercial project then I usually colour in photoshop.”

‘Countdown’ an Animated Sequence by Céline Desrumaux

Alex Mathers — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 19:55:22 +0000

It’s animated work and visual imagery like this that gets me extremely excited about independent artists like Céline who can create pieces of such quality. I’m looking forward to seeing more from this talent.

A Peek into the Colourful and Wide-ranging World of Brosmind Studio

Philip Dennis — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 18:15:09 +0000

Brothers Juan and Alejandro Mingarro have been making good use of their combined skills and working hard to expand the reach of their studio, Brosmind. Since being established in 2006, Brosmind studio has, apart from creating work for large ad campaigns, translated their bright and comical illustrations into collectibles, furniture, and even a car.

We were eager to find out more about how they work as a collaborative pair and how they’re pushing Brosmind as an all-inclusive brand.

Having studied art separately, did you actively try and develop a cohesive style or has your work always been similar to one another?

We have been a creative couple since our childhood. When we were kids, we spent all day making comics, building vehicles for our action figures and creating our own movies with a domestic camcorder.

Juan is only three years older than me (Alejandro) so we have the same background and influences, we think in the same way and share the same kind of ideas. Having said that, it’s true that there were some slight differences between our drawing styles, but when we started our studio we naturally developed the actual Brosmind style.

How does your process as a duo differ from how you’ve worked previously?

Now is easier for us. We can quickly explain an idea to each other and be sure that he is going to understand it perfectly. The cool thing about being brothers is that we can be totally sincere in our criticism or have really big arguments and still be friends. That helps, for sure, to take our work to a higher level than before.

Is all the work produced as Brosmind totally collaborative or do you sometimes allocate individual parts of a project to one another?

We develop all the ideas in common and also develop the pencilled drawing together. When we decide that the pencil stage is finished, Juan does the ink and Alejandro adds the color on the computer.

As well as your work, you get a lot of positive attention as yourselves as artists. Is this something you’ve always thought would be part of the branding of Brosmind, or is it something that’s happened naturally because of people’s interest in you?

We would love being only artists, but for the moment it’s easier to live from commercial work. For the moment, we’ve just reached a balance between commercial and personal work that makes us feel really comfortable.

Would you recommend working as a team to other artists out there?

Each person is different. For us, it’s great to work together, but our relationship is so special that it would be really difficult to have anybody else in the studio. We also know really talented artists who work alone and also other studios, which create amazing things being a big team.

Continuing from your venture into other products, such as Brosmind Army and Brosmind City, can we expect to see any further expansion of the Brosmind universe in the near future?

Of course. We have two great projects!

We got invited to do the Main titles for the OFFF Festival in Barcelona 2012. And we’ll be working together with Upper First, and that’s going to be big! We are really excite about this project : )

We”ll be presenting them on May 2012, so stay tuned!

And, probably on the same dates, we’ll launch an amazing personal project, but unfortunately for the moment we can’t say WHAT’S INSIDE?, so stay tuned!

Philosophical Game Design by Luke Pearson

Philip Dennis — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 21:31:37 +0000

Luke Pearson created the designs for Channel 4′s online game, ‘The End’. It’s a free platformer, dealing with concepts of death, our existence and the afterlife, where players must navigate through physics-based puzzles and ponder philosophical questions. Head over to the website to have a go, but be careful— Luke’s stunning visuals and the unique gameplay created by Preloaded may keep you away from work for hours!

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

“I created nearly all the artwork you see in the game (with the exception of the graphic design and death cards elements). It was a lot of work, but it was the best kind of work and it’s so exciting to see it all brought together and to be able to play it now. Working with the Preloaded crew is one of the best experiences of my career so far, so much work went into making this and they’ve done an amazing job in my opinion.”

“My line-based work is all hand drawn and inked on paper. To ink, I currently use a Pentel brush pen. It’s an extremely convenient tool, as good as most decent brushes with all the convenience of a pen and you don’t really have to look after it too much. You can get a massive variety of line qualities with it and I find it fun to use.

Although sometimes, if you’re like me and hold your pens ridiculously close to the nib, you will end up with ink all over your fingers and there’ve been a few occasions where I’ve unwittingly smeared grubby finger prints on a picture after spending a long time meticulously inking it.”

“I scan my lines, refine and colour them digitally in Photoshop which is the only program I use. I use an A6 Wacom Bamboo for colouring and occasionally redrawing bits of the line work that I messed up in the original.”

“For my flatter, more shape-based stuff, I work solely in Photoshop. I’ll often sketch and compose the image in thumbnail form on paper as I find it a million times easier to see what’s wrong with something and work out the basics in a small drawing on a real piece of paper. I’ll then scan that, knock the opacity way down so I can just see it as a guideline and then work digitally on top of it. I used to use the polygon lasso a lot to create block shapes, but I prefer now to manually draw out shapes with a slightly wobbly-round-the-edges brush I made and carve away at them until they’re what I want.

Even if I’m making straightforward shapes, this lends a hand drawn slightly ‘off’ quality that distracts from its digital nature. I’ll often erase chunks from a block of colour and scribble on top of them with the same brush, until there are only tiny specks of the background showing through, which again distracts from the digital truth and suggests something that’s printed.”

Kingston University Graduate Sam Falconer Mixing Pencil and Collage

Philip Dennis — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 19:04:04 +0000

Here are some examples of work from recent Kingston University graduate, Sam Falconer. He uses an interesting mix of pencil and collage, injected with a little light-hearted humour and charming characters. Since finishing his studies this year, he has already worked on a number of editorial and advertising projects for clients including Reader’s Digest UK and Nokia.

“I am a freelance illustrator currently between the Midlands and London and I’ve recently finished the Illustration course at Kingston Uni. After working out ideas and roughs in my notebook, all of my final work is produced through digital collage of scanned photographic elements and pencil marks.

This way of working allows me to play around with compositions and ideas a lot more freely then when I worked exclusively by hand and I really enjoy it.”