Keep Your Eyes Open

My Grandfather- 358th Special Duties Squadron. Burma 1944

2009-01-29T19:42:00.004+10:30

Here's a rough for a picture I've been meaning to do for a long time. I'm pretty happy with it. I hope my grandfather is too, where ever he's looking down from. He served in a bomber squadron that took the highest risks for those special forces on the ground behind enemy lines. He made it home. He truly is one of my heroes.

more bmx goodness

2008-12-06T17:31:00.005+10:30

Well here's a somewhat finished version. Still not entirely 100% on it as it still feels a little too simple, although there's plenty of complexity in the pose to offset the simple bg.. will leave it for now I think.

Little Black bike

2008-12-02T14:30:00.004+10:30

Here's another pic which I thought I'd put up as my enthusiasm for bikes and artwork begin to snowball. For a mate's bike shop, this was used in a full page ad in 2020 bmx magazine. Pretty stoked about it, and glad to have done well for a good mate. Made him look 10 years younger in the process.

The top image is one I completed today in it's rough(ish) stage. I had intended to do a final in illustrator but hell, I'm happy with it as it is and am moving onto the next illo!

Sam Hill -remember I mentioned it ages ago?

2008-12-02T14:26:00.002+10:30

Well here it is, finally. After a thousands shelvings due other work and some serious procrastination I finally finished it. I'm pretty darn happy with it. All in all it worked out as good as I had hoped. It seemed for a while it would never get finished..
Also got the man himself to sign it!

Doth my eyes deceive me? My Animation book is real!

2008-07-04T11:10:00.003+09:30

well who would've thought this day would come? After two and a bit long years of life challenging experiences and procrastination my book was finally finished and has now finally been printed. I'm pretty happy with it, although the matte paper they used inside has killed the colours a little. Aside from that I'm well chuffed.

Sam Hill Rough

2008-02-19T15:46:00.004+10:30

Here's a rough illo of double downhill world champ Sam Hill. In the last year I've really embraced mountian biking as a sport, not that i compete but it gives me something to go outside and do. Anyways in the interest of generating some new work I'm getting a couple personal projects underway, this being one of them. Sam's features are subtle and took a revision or two to get it right but I'm happy with the initial results. I've got to do a few more lead up illos to get the feel right and work out composition etc. more to come....

cover redesign

2008-02-04T13:02:00.000+10:30

Ah well it happens doesn't it... the schmos who think only of the $ wanted a cover that had more "pop" on the shelf.... Well here's what is the final cover for my book. I don't mind it but I had others that I preferred a lot more based purely on design.. never the less it still looks good and everyone is happy.

Contents page

2007-12-14T11:00:00.000+10:30

Well my book is lookng more and more finished everyday! I'm getting pretty pumped about it. Here's the contents page. Text will prob be played with a little but the image is final.

How about a bunch of fives?

2007-12-07T09:29:00.001+10:30

Here's a bit of rough animation I've put together as an example in the animation section of my book. I was explaining key frames and in-betweens with this and it turned out pretty good considering I certainly ain't a "professional" animator.

Illustration Friday- Zoo

2007-11-27T16:47:00.000+10:30

Well Here's my first sub for ill friday... I'm not a big fan of Zoos. I love animals, but rocking up to a Zoo to watch a lion tread the same worn looping path he's walked for years around a cage depresses the hell out of me. I didn't spend a great deal of time on it as I've got other stuff to do but it was a good loosener and broke up my book work nicely..

Poor old johnny

2007-11-27T11:25:00.000+10:30

Here's a illo I banged out just amusing myself whilst bored. The old man turned out looking somewhat like our outgoing priminister and I kinda like the pic. You might think that maube this will be him driving himself to the local woolies to get some milk and newspaper to check the cricket scores. Bout time he was out of government...

Front and Back cover

2007-10-22T18:56:00.000+09:30

Well I've managed to sneak in some time on my book, and it's slowly coming to fruition instead of being one massive bunch of random illustrations and designs.. so anyways here's the front and back cover in all their glory....

More storyboards

2007-08-23T21:58:00.000+09:30

Well here's the other scenario, a little different to what I had mapped out originally. It made me laugh, by the end of doing it the humour was well and trully gone from it so maybe it ain't that funny... if it communicates properly you might get a chuckle out of it. Things in my head have a habit of being very specific to my sense of humour... a lot of "you had to be there" type crap..... anyways onto the next chapter of the book woohooo! oh and it's pg1-3 top to bottom....

Ah illustrator, bout time I started using it.

2007-08-15T16:16:00.000+09:30

Just had some fun mucking around in illustrator. I'll keep using it from now on even though it's a little on the slow side at the mo. Of course 6 months from now I'll be wondering why I ever persisted with freehand.....

I reckon this'd make a sweet graphic novel.... bit o black comedy never goes astray

Storyboards for animation book....

2007-08-07T22:39:00.000+09:30

Well finally some more progress on my animation book that is quite literally taking me an eternity to get finished. Feels good to get some more out the way... get back into the flow of the characters etc..

What's this? A new post??

2007-07-11T22:25:00.000+09:30

well..... I've been in some kinda rut in the last couple of months. This little pic I did for my son Noahso he can stick it on the family wall at his childcare. Not to sing my own praises too much but it absolutely kicks the asses off any thing else on that wall..... pah... photos stuck on a white piece of A4 are no match for the awesomeness of this family setup. That aside.... it'll give Noah something to brag about at childcare, mainly because his robot has flames on it.... and is red...

blood, such a pretty colour.....

2007-05-29T17:04:00.000+09:30

A mate of mine needs some artwork for his metal project called Human Damage experiment. Here's some prelims..style wise I'll tighten it up in regards to continuity, but I've gotten off to a good start with it

The Barber

2007-03-29T11:35:00.000+09:30

Here's another character... yawn... gettin sick of typing that... I like this one tho, personal fav.

E-card Character Final colours

2007-03-22T17:17:00.000+10:30

uh...what is says in the title...

Duh.....

2007-03-21T04:54:00.000+10:30

Here's some expressions for Ralph. Not smart, and extremely black and white in his emotions (no freaking pun intended). This character was a bit of a chore though to get flowing with. He has potential, I'll be able to use him well in the storyboarding.

Character sheet for Animation book

2007-03-16T17:11:00.000+10:30

Well I'm still stuck in the character design section of this book. Time is starting to get tight with the June deadline, but I am enjoying it a lot. This is prob my best work to date and I feel like I'm improving all the time.

Here's a cute little girl named Meego (Funnily enough, heh Meeghan would be eating it up the attention) She may look cute but she can handle her shit that's for sure (much like Meeghan). I figured Meeghan was always asking me to draw her pictures so I thought I'd just immortalise her in this book. I think she'd be happy with that.

Character designs for animated e-cards

2007-03-16T17:07:00.000+10:30

Got some fun little projects coming in the form of 25 animated e-cards. I haven't done any flash animation since the Hilltop Hoods vid clip so I'm kinda looking forward to wetting the wistle again on these. There's two main characters to the e-cards and these are it. Simple but effective.

Seems like it was only yesterday

2007-03-04T19:55:00.000+10:30

Well here it is twelve months on from when Meeghan passed away. It's hard to believe it's just been me and my boys for a whole year. I don't need to explain to anyone that knew her how much she loved her sons, and that she'll be cursing herself for the foolish mistake she made that took her away from them.

I'll love her forever.

Character Model work

2007-03-04T17:21:00.000+10:30

Here's some character model sheet type work, I'm trying to push myself angles wise. There'll be more of the girl to come.

The gangs all here.....

2007-02-16T18:42:00.000+10:30

Well well, I finally finshed them.....

Gang Leader continued.....

2007-01-23T16:23:00.000+10:30

*yawn* Still trying a few options. Switched the riding crop with a nice Zatoichi-esque japanese sword, just perhaps thinner to compliment her fairly lean frame. Removed the dragon tattoo cos between her sword and suit that's enough dragon really..... I'lll design something else to go on her arm that is equally nasty lookin. so it continues.... I swear I've gotten to the point of over doing it and gone completely past it..... The Buckles are basic at this stage as I really only wanted to get the overall feel of them. If Idecide to go with it I'll clean 'em up and get all the sizes pretty similar...

Finshed Character

2007-01-18T14:38:00.000+10:30

Here's the 99% finshed version, just gotta put the riding crop in her right hand and fix up a few minor details. The colours are way off for some weird exporting reason but you get the idea....

Early stage of final design

2007-01-15T17:05:00.000+10:30

Here's where I'm at with the Gang leader (name yet to be decided). She's coming along ok, but there's still a ways to go to make her really complete...

Animation Book Characters.....

2007-01-11T16:12:00.000+10:30

Well this project is still going! The longer it takes the better it seems, as the time spent on it is bearing fruit. Here's some concepts for two of the characters in the gang. The chick is the gang leader, and judging by her appearance I'd say she's got it under control. I've got to develop her outfit further, prob do that when it comes time do her in full colour. The other is one of her henchman, which when it came time to knock up in a final just didn't feel right and needed reworking.

Design Festa Poster

2006-11-13T10:42:00.000+10:30

Here's a one off for the Design Festa booth me and the lads from Pixel Envy have over in Tokyo coming up in december. Pretty much used it as an opportunity to clean up some character design and polish my style and method a bit more. Pretty happy with it, as usual I feel like I coulda done more.....

Beware of Ladders......

2006-10-15T23:16:00.000+09:30

Don't ask me to explain why these ladders are doing what they're doing, or what the idea behind the advert is because I don't have any more of an idea than you do. This particular job I just did what was asked. "we want ladders invading a country with guns" "we want ladders peeing into a river" "we want ladders getting drunk and rowdy outside a closed pub". Interesting eh? The ad (I've not seen it yet) was going be like a 1940s/50s propaganda flick, with narrator and black and white footage to boot. I had to do three stills for it. I must say for all the obscurity of the theme, I actually enjoyed doing these pics!

Revised Version of Cat

2006-10-12T16:51:00.000+09:30

I've further developed the colours on Cat. The saturation just wasn't there in some of the colours. Especially when placed next to the other characters. I'm happy with the way he looks now. Even the yellow bag isn't bothering me too much although I'm not 100% on it. The balance is better overall I think.

Alva, my main man!

2006-10-12T16:47:00.000+09:30

Here's Cat's best mate Alva. Constant travelling companion and also, conveniently enough, a mechanic. He keeps their two seater mini jet humming along. I'm pretty stoked with this one. I've found a level of detail I'm happy with as my style is developing from character to character.

main plot character coloured up

2006-09-25T19:29:00.000+09:30

Well here's another. I'm not completely convinced by it. He's the main character in the story but his colours just aren't sitting right in my mind. I've tried numerous combos.... anyone out there let me know what you think!

There will be no cutting, I'm talking to yewww....Mr Cutter..

2006-09-19T23:19:00.000+09:30

Well here's a tricked up version of an old character I did back at the start of the year for my animation book. I'm trying to get started on it again. So I'm going to vector up all the characters (which needs to be done anyways) so as to ease myself back into the feel of it all....

Mural Finished! (for now)

2006-08-22T22:40:00.000+09:30

well here it is in all it's er..... Glory. Not as complex as I'd have liked but I'm certainly going to add to it down the track. It's a tricky bit of space to fill, but I'll slowly filll in the gaps underneath. At this stage I just don't wanna bite off more than I can chew. Being my first paste up project and all!

Mural Stuff Part III

2006-08-16T16:54:00.000+09:30

Still plugging away at this mural. I'm coming up with miscellaneous icons that I can maximise my use of space with. They don't have to mean anything, just want them to create some extra interest aside from the main images and compliment the rest of the design. The little dudes I'll prob slot in here and there expressing themselves in different ways.

Skateshop Mural: Work in Progress

2006-08-07T23:29:00.000+09:30

well here's the hypothetical start of my mural. It's gonna be all paste ups as the building is heritage listed so I can't paint on there. No doubt it'll take quite a few sessions to get it all up. But it's prob 50% complete at the mo in this pic (it'll prob change a few more times). I'm going to layout some kind of character based scene all the way to the door from where the little dead mickey dude is.
How friggin crap is their signage!? it had nothing to do with the shop owner, more to do with the guy that owns the building.....average stuff, man I'm still shaking my head about it... it'll be interesting to see the public reaction, as the town's population is on average pretty old.

misc skateshop ideas

2006-08-06T21:14:00.000+09:30

now that I'm doing the entire shop front I'm just sitting down and drawing with a theme in mind but no real specific ideas. Here's a couple....

social security

2006-07-09T19:53:00.000+09:30

If anyone has ever been on the dole or involved with the social security system in this country then you'll prob be able to relate to this pic.... I didn't intend to draw this pic it just kinda fell out on the page and then I thought what would make me cry and want to use a gun?

skateshop stickers?

2006-07-09T14:15:00.000+09:30

figured I was gettin a little tired of just doing a lot of pen drawings so I've been hittin' freehand pretty hard and it's refreshingly fun. Colour can sometimes make the difference! This is justa couple of colour muck arounds for potential shop stickers.....

Meeghan's Grandpa

2006-07-08T22:23:00.000+09:30

If life wasn't tough enough on my wife Meeghan's family after her death, four months to the very day her grandpa also passed away. He literally could not bear life without her it seems. I was asked to draw a small picture for the attendance book. This is it, it was emotional to do it but it just came to me and I was finished without really thinking about it. He always saw her as his little grandaughter and used to take her fishing, the family wanted a fishing oriented illo so it seemed kinda natural to do it like this...this blog is gettin rather depressing is it not?

to my wifey and her boys

2006-07-08T16:23:00.000+09:30

Well it's now been four months since Meeghan died. I must say I feel pretty upbeat these days. I miss her like hell but my memories are now happy ones. This pic popped in my head and wouldn't go away so I put it down on paper and then fiddled aroudn with it in Freehand. Here's a couple of colour versions of it.

yawn just passing the time

2006-07-04T23:09:00.000+09:30

Well my boys are keeping me rather tired these days. There's absolutely nothing on TV worth watching so I sat down and doodled some gear whilst listening to the Hilltop Hoods latest "The Hard Road". Quality hip hop that, class all the way. Good aussie stuff. anyways here's what I whittled out of my wooden brain tonight. I like the result considering the train of thought was a fairly blank one. Don't ask me what the dude in the bg is all about.... but he's up to no good me thinks.

Mural Stuff Part II

2006-06-06T18:44:00.000+09:30

Here's anothery. I'm reasonably happy with how it's turned out. The shop colours are black and red so I'm a bit limited in my palette options.

Further mural stuff

2006-06-06T13:30:00.000+09:30

Here's one of the ideas pushed further. I'm pretty stoked with this one at the mo.
Hopefully when I push the rest of them they'll all progress to something nice and solid.

Skate Shop Mural

2006-05-29T16:26:00.000+09:30

Here's a fun little project I'm doing at the mo. It's a pic to go on a wall of the local skate shop called "Off The Street". i'm gonna paste it up which oughta be some fun. More so that when some little punk comes along and tags it we can paste another right over the top rather than repainting it. These are just some roughies I've put down to find my direction.

No one should be alone

2006-05-10T14:21:00.000+09:30

Here's a rather sombre insight into my emotions yesterday. Not having Meeghan around is bloody tough, and the longer time goes on the more vivid my memories of our life together are becoming which makes it hard sometimes. I felt very alone yesterday, even with the boys. Nothing compares to the warmth and sense of safe you get from your closest companion.

Character concept for book

2006-05-02T12:02:00.000+09:30

Here's something I threw up last night in a bid to loosen up and get back in the swing of things, I ain't trully satisfied with it, but then again when is any illustrator really happy with what they've drawn?? I tightened up on it pretty quick so it didn't come out as well as it could have but I feel like I'm getting back there...... oh and she will actually have clothes on in the next concept! She's a mean lady who's bit of an alpha female in a mostly male environment. She knows how to kickass!

doodling to get the flow back

2006-05-01T09:51:00.000+09:30

Well it's literally been two months since I last did anything creative. My head is slowly coming back to the right place and things seem to be clicking back into place. In the interest of posting stuff here that I'm not 100% on here's some scribbling that I did the other day...... Don't ask me what it's about I just let it happen.

My Beautful Wife

2006-03-19T09:52:00.000+10:30

On the 5th of March my beautiful wife, mother to my two sons, passed away. I will forever be left with a gaping hole in my life, of which I doubt I can fill again. Our young boys will never get to know the mother that brought them into this world. Too soon, too young.

Meeghan Lee Turra 28-07-1978 - 05-03-06

She will be forever with me and my sons.

WOW! EXCITING! .......aircraft hangar background

2006-03-01T23:38:00.000+10:30

here's another bg for the book, about 90% of the action takes place in this hangar, and most of it won't be seen as the shots are quite tight. This bg is absent of objects etc, just getting the structure out the way. I''ll add stuff later....

Chapter title pages

2006-02-28T23:01:00.000+10:30

Another couple of title pages done and dusted. Keeping it simple, this book is dragging out badly.... not easy looking after two young boys and trying to squeeze enough hours to actually get work done!

yawn it's a market.....hurrah....

2006-02-23T02:09:00.000+10:30

well it's late again and I've got incredible tunnel vision.... Got this background finished off with a bit of tinkering but it ain't all that I hoped it'd be, the tonal range just isn't there... I might leave it for a bit and try again another day!

Fio - colour muck around

2006-02-22T01:56:00.000+10:30

Here's a splash opf colour for once, even though this'll wind up a greyscale pic I had to let loose some colour! I know the pose is as boring as hell but it's merely a concept for her appearance, I'll do something more dynamic later on when I've prefected her. I'm happy with where she is going style wise..... Not 100% convinced with my colour choices, but I'm yet to experiment fully.

Oooooooh props......

2006-02-22T01:10:00.000+10:30

Here's some exciting stuff to draw! never the less it has to be done. Just a brief example of prop design for my book.

Female Character concept

2006-02-16T01:19:00.000+10:30

Hey ya! Here's a concept sketch for a female character that saves the day toward the end of the script when it looks like our two heroes numbers are up. This is the first complete concept so it ain't perfect but it's gettin there, gotta think of a name for her too! Also have a female character for the Dom gang too but that'sa little way off.....

cargo bay sketch

2006-02-15T00:56:00.000+10:30

Here's a rough sketch of what the cargo bay looks like inside the cargo plane, the upper deck is accessed via the ramp that is in the up position underneath the opening. Cargo is loaded through the front and then rolled up to the upper deck, so the plane is essentially a dual level cargo plane....

Finals of Cat's Jet Tourer- Mechanical model sheets

2006-02-10T18:13:00.000+10:30

Well, this is dragging out nicely but at least i've got a little bit to show for it! These are final tech drawings for Cat's jet. Bit of a compact yet sporty flyer this one. Goes fast as well as far thanks to some new fang dangled fuel cells.....beats me how it works!

Devils can be both good and bad can't they?

2006-02-10T13:56:00.000+10:30

Got a little off track doing a small graphic for an aircraft in my book, altho I quite like what I came up with, could make some cool T-shirts or something if they get pushed further....

Final Mechanical Designs

2006-02-08T15:09:00.000+10:30

I enjoy detail, theses aren't overly detailed but they've come up well and not taken too long to do. only a couple more mechanical finals to do and I can move onto the storybaords! Finally I'll be able to loosen up again...

cover pages for each section

2006-02-04T23:15:00.000+10:30

There's twelve sections in my book. Each section has it's own cover page, just to split it up nicely. Here's 3 of them.

Cover for my book....

2006-02-04T22:59:00.000+10:30

Hey Hey! Here's the cover for my book in colour. It's ok I
guess. If I had more time I'd push it some more with the
character but all in all I'm 95% happy with it. The animation frames in the bg are pretty shite tho....The publisher preferred those colours over some others but they initially wanted something way more boring, so it was a decent compromise in the end.

2006-02-02T12:30:00.000+10:30

Here's some more of my book. Just the more boring gun and aircraft design. I've gotta start the front side and top views for the model sheets of these designs. The aircraft I've designed down the bottom is a fictional cargo plane, based on a couple of real life aircraft. The weapns above are just miscellaneous objects that would be seen in the animation so they've gotta be designed! again based on the real thing but sort of a mish mash of a few different ones.

FRRRNK!!

2006-02-01T00:34:00.000+10:30

Hmmm........These late nights are killin' me. Not sure from what murky depths this emerged from but after doodling it in a state of total distraction, ten minutes later I was still screwing with it....... maybe I oughta lay off the coffee.....needless to say my book progress has stalled a tad....

2006-01-27T18:21:00.000+10:30

Here's the bad guys. The Domino Gang. Don't ask me why they're called that but they. Maybe they like the game. Never played it myself. You poke fun they'll have ya, especially the barber bottom right. He's a very unhappy man.....

2006-01-27T17:59:00.000+10:30

Here's the two main characters for a book I'm working on titled "how to draw animation". Although it really it more about the entire creative process as well as actually knowing how to animate. more images will follow...

hey hey! brand spanking new blog

2006-01-27T17:48:00.000+10:30

Hey all, about time I set one of these do hickies up! You'll find here all the ideas I put down on paper whether they get used or not! It'll be my creative outlet that will be on going....something has to stop me from ending up in jail or the nut house....