Just a phone. . .

Nothing to exciting, but I felt like it had been a while since my last post! Definately some perspective issues (again)!

What 007 should be driving. . .

Aston's finished. . .

I noticed a serious difference between the saturation & contrast levels between home and work (higher at work). I adjusted for home by over saturating the image while I was working on it (after hours, of course). Let me know if this looks better than the in progress images below in term of saturation.

I also sharpened the horizon reflection; the softness of the in progress image below was really bugging me.

And added some bad@$$ red spoked wheels. I saw one in this color combo and fell in love. Maybe I'll play around and do a real James Bond version some time (silver/chrome).

Aston in Progress

So I was in Monterey this weekend for the Historics (vintage car races). I saw a few Aston martin DB4s and was reminded of just how beautiful they are. Here's my attempt to do a retro-modern version. I know it isn't as sporty as the current Astons, but man, wouldn't it be great to have a more stately Aston available?

I didn't finish, so instead decided to show a few 'in progress' images (not so much a tutorial as a mere progress report).
The first is my initial line drawing; it's rough I know, but for some reason I'm having real trouble with my Cintiq pressure sensitivity (I just can't get it where I want right now and I'm waiting for my new computer before going gangbusters on the paint portion of Alias StudioTools).
The second is with key body lines pathed and stroked (okay, so I made up pathed as a verb).
The third has some core shading done on the body side. . . a long way from done, but I was finished for the day (about 65 minutes so far, slow I know, but I wasn't rushing).

Automotive Nostalgia

Loose and Grey. . .

Old School Fencing!

This is terrible, but I'm showing it anyway! They can't all be perfect. Another Digital canson, but this one was meant to look old school. This is another one I spent some time and only then did I mirror it. Should have spent more time on the sketch (you'll hear that alot with me). Looking at the thumbnail I did, maybe I should have scanned that in because I like it better than this, Maybe I'll just stick to sketching for awhile!?
And one I did on real paper a few months ago. . .The cars are nothing special. They are about 3.5" long and just really quick and dirty. They have that toy quality to them (i.e. they look way to extreme to be real). And, yes, I know the top one has a SERIOUS rear wheel camber issue!

BMX is in the Olymics!

I'm hoping this is the first in a series of ideas for sporting equipment for the Olympics. Just a quick Carbon BMX bike to equip our athletes in the newest Olympic sport! It has a built-in seatpost/seat and a carbon fork with integrated fender. Silly, loose, and not all that unique. . .

A Shoe, or something vaguely shoe-like?

Okay, so I know nothing about shoes, but I did a sketch and threw some loose color on it. By the time I was done, I'd wished I never started. It looked, well, just wrong. I flattened a bunch of layers together and got to work with the perspective, distort, and scale tools to try to make it look like something resembling a shoe. This is as good as it got. . .

Lesson, make sure you have a decent sketch before spending alot of time trying to put lipstick on a pig. I guess the other lesson is to not just abandon something that isn't right if it can be fixed. I leave it up to you as to which this particular shoe like object is an example of! Let me know. . .

So I was thinking of modifying a perfectly good. . .

Suzuki DR650 dual-sport bike. I sold one motorcycle (1998 Honda VTR1000 Superhawk) and was thinking of getting a replacement as a project bike. I threw together some concepts before deciding that I couldn't really get the thing low enough without compromising the steering head geometry. Result - project cancelled. This is the sort of thing I waste my spare time on!

The top one is a minimalist city bike, the bottom one more of a flat-track style bike. I love the look of the huge 21" front wheel, even if it doesn't make sense for the kind of bike I was trying to make. On the other hand, the wheels are sort of a mess as I didn't have any circle templates big enough and I made a mess of it with a ridiculously flimsy compass.

These are just verithin and marker on A3 Letraset. It had been a while since I had done anything this involved on paper and I just wanted to dust off the old art bin full of tools. I was even too lazy to go and replace my dried out white guasche, so the highlights are white-out specials.

Okay, I'll admit it, I'm sort of a photoshop junky these days, but when they give you a big Wacom Cintiq at work it is hard to ignore the benefits of the digital age!

This was going to be a Christmas card but. . . .

I never got my act together. And it isn't very topical anyway, so no major loss. Yes, I know, it's old (late last year), but I'm trying to build a body of work to get this blog started, so lay off!

Is motion blur the new lens flare? I like it for backgrounds sometimes because it can make the focal object stand off the surroundings, I don't like it because it is a little gimmicky. Thoughts?

How about some more Products?

Okay, so I studied Transportation design but I'm employed as a product designer. You can expect to see a bunch of Trans. stuff here just because I think it is fun to do. Anyway, here are some sunglasses. The gold frames took about 4 hours, the blue ones took closer to 10-15 minutes. Wow right! Even a quick look up close reveals where the time went, but the first read of both is pretty similar. Just goes to show you, work smart!

Oh, and a toaster with low self-esteem issues. . .

Something LOOSE. . .

An example of something super loose. Part of why I'm starting this blog is because I think my quick sketch technique is getting pretty shabby (too much photo-real photoshop stuff at work these days)!

Monochrome Ferrari Dino

My take on a smaller Ferrari. I know, I know, there is probably too much Sant'Agata Bolognese and not enough Maranello in this, but it was quick and it is done so too late now! Just some digital Canson fun. . . I use this technique quite a bit these days. It's fast, easy, and looks decent.

A few watches

Just a few watches. Most are pretty derivative, but hey, we've got to start somewhere!