Sketchbook...

From my tiny, falling-apart sketchbook...




I went on a cave tour when I was visiting my parents in Texas. At one point, the guide turned off his flashlight so we could experience total darkness--besides a cave, the only other place you can experience total darkness is very, very deep in the ocean.

Op Ed Final: Family Comic

For our Op Ed final, we got to design an Op Art piece. I chose to create a comic based on the parallel trips that my grandparents and I made from Maine to Los Angeles--theirs in 1946, and mine in 1998.

The piece was far more time consuming than I'd planned, but I'm really happy with the end product. I'd love to do more comics in the future.

Op Ed Ill...in color

A few weeks ago, we got an assignment to do a cover piece--that meant color and a portrait. From four article options, I chose the one on Stephen King. It was a book review, but most of the article was on King and his literary merits.

He says at one point that he was afraid of being brought into the upper-echelon literary fold because people would wonder "who let the barbarian in the palace." I based by illustration on his feeling of being judged by the greats (pictured below are Shakespeare, Bronte, Balzac, and Dickens). I'm thinking about going back in and including their names (duh). Originally, I didn't want the text to become what people focused on.

My Art, Her Body

I got the opportunity to do some chickadee tattoo designs for a friend (of a friend of a friend) recently. She ended up dropping the text since it would be too small and wouldn't age well. She went with the third chickadee.

I have to say, it was amazing to see something I created actually tattooed on someone. It was quite humbling, and I think the true honor of it is still sinking in.

More Op Ed Ill

Two more projects from Op Ed Ill class.

The first article was about an Afr.-Amer. professor who noted that 9 times out of 10, the only empty seat on the high-speed Acela train in New England was next to him.

The second article was titled, "How Not to Fight a Cold":

I'm still thinking about putting some color on it...

Op Ed Ill

I'm taking a great class this term with Brian Rea and Paul Rogers. Brian was the art director of the Op Ed page of the New York Times for several years. In this class, we get one-week assignments to illustrate a current Op Ed article.

First assignment finals, "Follow the Dirty Money":

The second assignment final, "Weird Weather in a Warming World":

Final from "How to Spot a Terrorist," an article on homegrown terrorism:

Inventive Character finals

For Inventive Character class, we got to choose a story, create a special slant/setting for the story, then design five characters. I chose the story of Matilda, by Roald Dahl.

Matilda is a gifted girl who has horrible parents, and an even more horrible arch-rival, Agatha Trunchbull. Miss Honey is Matilda's only support. I chose to set the story in a traveling circus. By the end, Matilda has used her telepathic powers to become the star.

Miss Honey didn't make it to the portfolio pages. People didn't seem too fond of her "Yah-ta-da-da" pose.

Graphic Design for Entertainment

The second project of the term for Graphic Design for Entertainment was to design a series of pieces for the movie, Guys and Dolls. The first portion of the project involved designing a show poster for Miss Adelaide's show at the Hot Box, as well as a menu cover for Mindy's.

The menu cover:

And the show poster:

The last portion of the project was to design a street block in Times Square from the 1950s.

The pencil:

The final: