Here be Gryphons!

Woah! It's been ages since I've made a post so here's something fun.

Friend and fellow White Cloud Worlds contributor, Tanya Marriott, had cast a bronze prototype from a Zbrush sculpt of her Baby Gryphon character and I though it would make a grand gift for my partner Mel. Rather than a monetary exchange we wrangled an art trade. A gryphon for a gryphon seemed appropriate. For my character, I wanted to convey a sense of this entity as a hyper-dimensional being, existing in various spacial states at any point in time, hence the multiple heads seeing in all directions.

For more of Tanya's work, check out her website for a myriad of exquisite, original dolls and sculptural  art pieces.

Tellus Consumed

I've been neglecting my blog for too long! A number of confidential projects on the go currently, but here's a recently finished work I can show."Tellus Consumed" is a T-shirt design for Vomitous as a companion piece to the album cover for their EP "Empires of Great Enslavement". White charcoal on black paper with digital colouring. 

Weta Workshop Design Blog

So there's a new blog from the design team at Weta Workshop where we're posting a bunch of random illustrations outside of our normal day to day film work. The idea is that we come up with a brief that is loose enough that we have significant freedom of interpretation. There's a whole heap of rad stuff from my some very talented colleagues so go check it out!

designblog.wetaworkshop.com

Here are a few of my contributions with the related brief noted:

Girl and Robot

Half Human Half Thing

Space Marine 

Knight and Mount

Saturday self portrait

Having not done any painting for a few weeks due to travel I thought I'd have a go at a self portrait to warm back into it on a Saturday afternoon. Took five hours total. I should have taken more work-in-progress shots at  regular intervals as I only ended up with four. Next time...

Anyway, was a bit of fun to see what I could do in one session. Definitely need to do more life painting. And life drawing for that matter.

Reverie

This is a recent oil painting I did in support of the documentary film "Better Things: The Life and Choices of Jeffrey Catherine Jones", directed by Maria P. Cabardo. The proceeds from the sale of the work will be donated to help with the film's expenses and it will also be part of a tribute book.

Check out the website and facebook page for this project about the legendary comic book artist/illustrator:

www.macabfilms.com

www.facebook.com/pages/Better-Things-The-Life-and-Choices-of-Jeffrey-Catherine-Jones

"Reverie", oil on canvas, 2013

Dredged up from the vault.....

Woah! Here's some crazy shit I painted probably two years ago now. Not sure I can verbally describe what it's all about. Subconscious, symbolic weirdness. My favourite stuff! Anyway I'd love to hear some subjective interpretations....I call it "Slave to the Stone", oil on canvas, 2011

Everblack

The release of the new album 'Everblack' from The Black Dahlia Murder has been announced and the artwork I contributed has been revealed. The job entailed the full layout for the package including a 3-panel gatefold illustration. It's actually a triptych of three separate oil on canvas paintings which I photographed then digitally stitched together into a sprawling landscape. The three paintings together measure 180cm wide.

Front cover

Full 3-panel gatefold

If you're a fan of the band you can listen to the new song "Into the Everblack" here as well as preorder the album (check out that sexy purple & white marbled vinyl!) -  http://www.metalblade.com/bdm

Beastwars Rip It Up!

An odd job that came up recently was a cover illustration for Rip It Up magazine April/May issue. The mag's  cover usually consists of photographs of featured musicians, so the opportunity to do a far-out digital painting of local Wellington band Beastwars was an opportunity not to pass up. Extra-terrestrial calamari anyone?

http://www.ripitup.co.nz/

Blood Becomes Fire

So, with the new album on the verge of release, I can unveil the recent paintings I've done for Beastwars' second sonic assault "Blood Becomes Fire". In keeping with the format of their debut album I've painted another two complementary gatefold images, my attempt to visually interpret the powerful narrative and conceptual themes of the album. 

As described by the band: 

"The new album serves witness to the end of days, told through the eyes of a dying traveler from another time. It is a work inspired by eternal themes. 'It's a reflection on mortality, death and disease. Sooner or later they come for all of us and we've all screamed to the gods for answers, not that they've ever come.'"

Check out the band's new website here:

http://www.bloodbecomesfire.com/

And a taster of the album:

https://soundcloud.com/destroy-records/beastwars-blood-becomes-fire

Front/back cover

Inner gatefold

Stay tuned for further posts detailing the creative process from pencil sketches through to the finished  oil paintings.....

Middle Earth Madness

So a bit of an update to the blog with a slightly different flavour than usual. As part of the gigantic Tourism NZ campaign associated with the release of the Hobbit, my colleagues at Weta Gus Hunter, Paul Tobin and I have done a series of illustrations transforming photography from around New Zealand into illustrations depicting locations and characters from Middle Earth. The idea being to convey that with a little bit of imagination New Zealand is Middle Earth. Here are a couple of my images that have been released so far.

Check out the website to see Gus and Paul's work too:

http://www.newzealand.com/int/

Elven maidens watch soldiers ford the River Bruinen on their approach to Rivendell

Radagast's rabbit drawn sleigh hurtles through the depths of Mirkwood

A view into the abyss....

A preview of the album art I recently did for Wellington metal band Bulletbelt for their upcoming debut "Down in the Cold of the Grave". The painting is oil on canvas and the logo was a relatively new foray for me into the territory of graphic design.

EMPIRES OF GREAT ENSLAVEMENT

This is a recent project of mine in collaboration with Sweden's Vomitous for their upcoming release "Empires of Great Enslavement". 75cm x 75cm oil on canvas \m/

If you're partial to a solid slab of brutal death metal check em out: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1m1oGW43rq0

Some recent scribblings

 Been a bit lazy updating the blog. Here are a few sketches riffing on a theme, a couple of which I'm currently developing into paintings. Further posts to come.....

Figure painting update

So, as a quick follow up to the previous post, here is a higher quality image of the final painting.

Figure Painting at the Florence Art Academy

Having recently attended the Florence Art Academy for their Summer school course in figure painting, I've put together a progression of my project using photographs at the end of each days 3 hour session. I learnt a hell of a lot through the process as this was the first time I've done this sort of extensive, multiple session life painting. Oils on canvas, 45cm x 70cm.

Razorwyre album on the way....

Ooohhh.....the release of the long awaited Razorwyre LP on vinyl featuring album art courtesy of yours truly. Available from the 15th September  I believe.  Looking forward to getting my grubby mitts on a copy. Check out info on the band here: https://www.facebook.com/razorwyre

Existence....

A film poster I did recently for the upcoming NZ film "Existence" -  a Salvagepunk Western set in a dystopian future. Trapped behind the Boundary Fence, Freya dreams of escape and pursues a mysterious outsider who can free her. Condemned by her desires she destroys her world to discover that the reality of her existence was not what she imagined. 

Check out the facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Existence/143037925767280

Oil on board

Warrior's Way Weaponry

Thought I'd inject something a little different than my usual posts on this blog. These are a couple of weapon designs for the film Warrior's Way I did way back in 2007. Somewhat historical, exluding the rather exaggerated nature of  the sniper rifle for Geoffrey Rush's character.

\m/ >_< \m/

Here's another album cover preview for Auckland metal band Exordium Mors' upcoming EP "Sacrifice, Perish & Demise"

Check them out here: http://exordiummors.com/

Razorwyre preview

Here is a little teaser from a band I recently did some cover art for....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMhkkvcBHYk