Elephants & Tap shoes

**This was supposed to have been published a while ago, but somehow the scheduling part of blogger didn't go through. Oh well! ;) **


Hey guys!

I wanted to share a project with you that I finished up last month for a good friend of mine.  I illustrated a piece for her as a graduation present.

She and I have become pretty good friends over the last year or so; we met in the local community theater and have bonded over a few shows, tap dancing classes, and Disneyland trips.

She is a very creative person, loves to dance, and loves loves LOVES Pinterest! haha so I knew I needed to make her something inspiring that she can relate to in all her crafting a pinning endeavors. It started off pretty sneakily with me sending random texts asking what her favorite animals were... "I need some cute animals to draw, what's your favorite?" I asked.  Her reply was elephants, dinosaurs, baby orangutans, and baby tortoises.  Well, that would be an interesting illustration! LOL

So I got out my sketchbook and proceeded to study up on these.

sweet little elephants

fuzzy orangutans

I posted these to my facebook page to show that I actually was taking her up on the suggestions.  Meanwhile on facebook, I was completely going stalker- status on her pictures page.  It's an odd thing when one finds themselves zooming in on a friends facebook picture and studying the detail of their cheeks and how their eyes are positioned on their face...

.... anyway....


After getting the sketch of her face down I began to work on the composition of the piece.  I knew that I wouldn't be able to put in all the animals she wanted so I started out focusing on the elephant and a little monkey.  In the end, I had to edit out the monkey as the elephant stole the show. It just would have been too distracting as I illustrated the lettering as well.  When I got to the lettering, another text was sent "What are your favorite colors?"... so sneaky ...

Here are some process shots...

sketching out details of her face

I sketch ideas down and then use tracing paper to clean it up and get a full image

redrew the image on watercolor paper with my light box

illustrated Inspiration quote

why wouldn't an elephant wear leg warmers??

totally want to steal her outfit...

final framed piece 

I'm so happy with how it turned out.  That elephant made me giggle every time I looked at her.  Although, the best part was giving it to my friend.  It took all of my will power not to drive over to her house the second I finished, pound down her door, shove it in her face and yell "LOOK WHAT I MADE YOU!!!"  hahaha I'm a horrible gift giver, I can never wait!  I still had like 3 days before her party too.

Anyway, she did open it and she loved it! It lives in her house now above the fireplace tap tap tapping the night away :)

Some Inspiration

Hey guys!

It has been way way way too long!  I have failed miserably this month in not only posting but actually doing projects to post at all.  Our house has been filled with sickness and injuries for literally a month. It started with my mom and I being bowled over with reoccuring illnesses and inflictions for weeks AND THEN my dad, as a lot of you know, had a bad bicycle crash and shattered his clavical and broke 3 ribs. Just when Mom and I were starting to be able to function again, Dad had his traumatic few weeks with the accident, Dr's visits, a surgery, more Dr visits, and pretty much round the clock care to stay on top of the wounds and pain. It's been a really hard beginning of the year for the Hobbses. But now, we're all on the mend and it can only get better from here, right?  ....crossing my fingers...

Ok, because I don't have anything to show you, I thought I'd share with you a few of the things that have inspired me.

1. I love when illustrators are able to evoke emotion and story telling into the simplest of characters. I adore Mo Willems and his Pigeon books! Here's a link to his blog page: Pigeon page  Mo creates the simplest form characters and shows an incredible amount of expression and body language throughout each of his books. I highly recommend them to anyone wanting a good young childrens series. They are so fun to read!

2. The art and humor of Marc Davis.  Ok, ok, I know its super cliche' to say I love Disney animators and add them to "favorites lists" but this particular artist had a knack for adding in his personal touch of humor and wit. In each of his projects, be it imagineering a park attraction or sketching out a character for an animation sequence, he was able to put his own little marc (ha ha PUN!) on each. If you look into a lot of the classic Disneyland attractions many of them have jokes and puns hidden within.
Some examples are:
A: The Hatbox Ghost in the Haunted Mansion, where the ghost carries around his own head in the hatbox

B: Some recent, but original ideas from Marc Davis, that were added during the Rivers of America refurb. Poor raccoons... its either the skunk or the water!!

 

C: Last, look at this characterization! So sophisticated and yet it's a pig...and an eagle... and an owl. And its hilarious. This is some concept work for the now extinct attraction "America Sings" (Fun Fact: a lot of these animatronics were/ and currently are being reused in Splash Mountain!)

 

picture from  http://tomorrowlounge.blogspot.com/

3.Ok, the last little thing I want to show is a new (to me) blog one of my friends posted on facebook this week. I've sent it around to my friends already, but it's so stinking cute that I can't not show it on here for you all to see! It's called My Milk Toof  and it's the most teeth rotting sweetest thing you'll ever see.  Its a blog about 2 "Milk Teeth" and their adventures. The artist took some sculpy and made about 5 of each character with different expressions. Each frame is a picture illustration, so the story goes sort of like a stop motion comic. Please go check this out!! you will NOT regret it!

Hope you guys enjoy those little tidbits :) Im hoping to get back into the swing of things this weekend. It's been so tough, I'm more than ready for the weeks to get back to normal!

Have a Great Weekend!