Hairy and Scary

Done for the Avalanche blog art challenge. The theme is Rock Stars.

Meet the Concept Art

The Meet the Robinsons video game hits retailers today so I thought it an appropriate time to post some concept art I did for the game. None of these designs made it in the game, but I like to think they had a little influence on the end product. My position here at Avalanche is in production and I think it's ultimately the right place for me, but I'm glad that I can occasionally do a little visual development because I really enjoy it.

Glass Tree

My parents recently built an addition onto their house which includes a new bathroom with a cool octagonal window. I like doing the occasional stained glass project and my mother thought the previously mentioned window would be good space to include one. It's not perfect, but I think it turned out better than my last stained glass piece, and it looks really nice in my parents bathroom (this photo was taken at my house before it was installed, in case there was any confusion). I can't take all the credit since my mom picked out all the glass and I think she chose some really nice colors and textures.

Trailer Ho!

Today, like every other day, is a good day to love pirates. Not just for all the regular awesome reasons, but because tonight is the world premiere of the Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End movie trailer on ABC! The only potential problem is that it's debuting sometime during the 2 hour Dancing with the Stars season premiere (at 8/7c). Of course the internet will have it everywhere the day after, if you can wait. Me, I'm watching Dancing with the Stars tonight.

Rock Tree

I like the way this tree turned out because it kind of reminds me of an album cover by Roger Dean or Rodney Matthews for some progressive rock band in the 70's.

Movie Posters Rant

The Maltese Falcon is a great film. Sharp dialogue, incredible characters, great performances, thick atmosphere, and a fantastic story all work together to create a spectacular film that is cooler than ten Tarantino movies. Great movies don't always have great posters and the Maltese Falcon is a good example of that. While none of the images created for the film have been particularly bad, I feel it's always lacked a definitive poster that adequately captures the spirit of the film. Hopefully mine does to some extent.

I'm always irritated by bad posters or DVD covers for good movies. The original poster for Mulan is a favorite of mine. It's a very cool image that captures the spirit of what the film is truly about. Yet when it came time to release the film on DVD the marketing guys thought process must have went something like this: "We need more characters on the cover, and what about Mushu, everyone loves him. The oriental color scheme might alienate western consumers," and so on. Thus, the DVD was released with this cover.

Return of the Jedi has made $309 million in domestic box office earnings alone, but apparently that was not enough to give it a decent DVD cover (all the Star Wars DVD covers are bad, but this one really bugs me in particular for the following reasons):

My favorite part is the position and size of Luke's hands. In my modified version to the right I roughly painted in what his arms would have to look like based on the positions of his wrists and shoulders to actually attach his body to those hands. I also like the stars shooting out of the lens flare of his light sabre and the various characters and objects that all look like they came from different sources with no effort put into unifying the values, colors, saturation, etc. But the thing that really irritates me about this cover is that a lot of artists, Drew Struzan in particular, have created excellent pieces of promotional art for all the Star Wars films. There's no excuse for this poorly photoshopped junk.

Anyway, you're probably asking why I care so much, I'm not really sure actually. The poster or cover doesn't affect the content on the film or the disc. I just hate having some of these hideous things on my shelf.

Guy with Tie

Crestfallen Caveman

Slugly

QT

This was done for the I Heart U/Too Cute For Comfort theme on the Avalanche Blog, the object of which was to do something "unbearably cute" in the interest of Valentine's Day. I'm a little concerned about how much fun I had doing it, I feel like I have to draw something extra NOT cute now to cleanse my creative palate.

I dedicate this image to my lovely wife, Heather (who happens to love unbearbly cute things). Happy Valentine's day!

Amaterasu

If Roger Ebert had played Okami or a number of other great games he perhaps wouldn’t have made this comment:

"Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control…I am prepared to believe that video games can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful. But I believe the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art."

His observation certainly applies to some games, but many are more like a film than he may realize. The player is driving the action, true, but aside from irrelevant details, everything that happens is still under authorial control. The path is set, the artist/storyteller is simply using the unique tools that gaming offers to more fully immerse the players in his story. The interactive nature of games only enhances their ability to move people. The audience is naturally more invested in the characters because they feel like participants in the events taking place. That said, I admit that games have been doing it a little clumsily thus far. There are still a number of limitations keeping the narratives of games from achieving the emotional impact they’re capable of. However, I think they are well on their way to breaking those barriers. I fully believe video games will eventually affect society just as profoundly as literature and film have.

Curses and Villains

A couple pieces I posted on the Avalanche blog. I've been drawing so little lately, but the game I was working on here at work is finishing up so I'm excited to take some time off and get re-acquainted with my sketch book.

Captain Zombeard

Happy new year! I wanted to take my two favorite things to draw (pirates and zombies) and put them together. This is the result.

Bogey

This is a portrait of Humphrey Bogart I've started for what will eventually be a poster for the Maltese Falcon (possibly my favorite film, it and Gladiator are always fighting in my brain for the top spot). I'll of course post the finished product here.

Fun Guy

Don't be fooled by the sad look on his face, that's how he gets invited to parties.

Depth Perception

I've been drawing so little lately-my new baby, lots of overtime at work, Final Fantasy XII, and a new freelance job have all been eating my spare time. Once the new Zelda comes out in four days (four days!) I'll have forgotten entirely what spare time is...I guess playing video games could be considered spare time.

This is another piece for the Avalanche Art Blog. It's not as finished as I would like it to be, but I don't really want to work on it anymore.

Welcome, Foolish Mortals...

...to Ghoulsmire Castle!

-Done for the Avalanche Art Blog challenge.

Melancholy Monarch

MAX!

I'm a dad! My son, Max Lonnie Keele was born on Oct. 17th-the day the population in the U.S. reached 300 million and exactly 2 weeks before Halloween. At birth he weighed in at 7 lbs. 10 oz. and was 19 and a half inches long. He's named after the main character in the book "Where the Wild Things Are" and his grandpa. Both he and my wife, Heather, are doing great and I couldn't be happier.
When we got him home, one of the first things I did was draw him. He's often got this funny, thoughtful scowl on his face (which I tried to capture). Heather thinks he turned out looking a little like the Brain from Pinky and the Brain (in my drawing, not in real life). I don't think he currently has any plans to take over the world, but who knows what the future may hold...

Mutant Housewife Swamp Creature

Three weeks until Halloween.

Sawyer and Sayid

A lot of us LOST fans here at work (and even a few who've never seen it) have been drawing characters from the show in anticipation for Wednesday's season 3 premiere.

'Tis the Season

A Halloween theme seems to be moving through the blog world. If this is the way the blog winds are blowing, let it not be said that I don't also blow.

de Muertos y Gringos

Things have been insane at work and my wife is on the verge of birthing a baby so I've had precious little time to draw lately. However I was able to produce this, my addition to the Spaghetti Western theme which Joe, Sam, Ryan, and I have been doing. Better late than never I guess.

Sketchbook Dump

I've been regularly keeping a sketchbook since I started high school (10 years ago). These drawings are all from my brand new one. The zombie was done with a brush pen after a night of playing Dead Rising with my brother. The others are ball-point pen and were probably drawn in church (one of the best places to draw).

Marion the Barbarian

I kind of stole this idea from my dad who once did a Francis the Barbarian. Big burly guys with girly names are funny to me. John Wayne's real name was Marion Morrison.

Jamaica Inn

Daphne DuMaurier is my favorite author. One of the things I love about her is the rich atmosphere she conjures when describing the locations in her books. Jamaica Inn is an old building perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean on one side and barren mashland on the other. It is the only building between two towns and was once a place of refuge when travelling the harsh landscape between. But not anymore. Mary Yellen's mother has died and she is going to stay with her aunt and uncle, the new owners of the inn. She is dropped off by the carraige at the foot of the road leading up to it, the driver won't go any nearer.
The new Art Challenge theme here at work is to draw an environment. When I heard the theme I had recently finished reading Jamaica Inn and the openning scene which I described above had really captured my imagination. I don't do environments often but I had a lot of fun doing this and want to do more.

Girl with Swirl

Paradise Lost

I feel guilty that I haven't posted in a while. I'm amazed at people who do it so often. Work has kept me really busy, which is a lame excuse because all the frequent posters that I mentioned earlier have jobs too. Many of them work at the same place I do. I've decided to post more of my sketches and get less hung up on only posting more finished pieces.

Anyway, this is Gollum, if you couldn't tell (one of my co-workers thought it was Ghandi, I added the thought bubble to make it more obvious). I wanted to draw him at the depression stage of his withdrawal.

Axe and Arbor

The Call of Booty

Okay, I think these will be my last pirates for a while. There are more in my sketchbook, but these two were my favorites. I've seen Dead Man's Chest twice now and I'm going again tonight. I absolutely love every single second of it. But I'll be the first to admit that I'm hopelessly biased. Old Pirate legends and ships and sea monsters and treasure maps and all that stuff is like crack to me. I can't get enough. Watching Pirates of the Caribbean is like someone feeding hot fudge brownies to my soul.

Anyway, I added a bunch of links to other great blogs recently. If you're featured in one of these links and wish not to be affiliated with me (something I can totally understand and maybe even endorse), let me know.

Welcome to the Jungle

I haven't posted anything in a while and this is the culprit. My wife is nearly 7 months pregnant with our first child and we thought it would be fun to give the future baby room a jungle theme, including a jungle mural on one wall. So all my free time for the past couple weeks has been swallowed up in painting it. It was fun.

Avast!

I keep drawing pirates (I'm excited for July 7th).

Seattle

My wife and I recently took a trip to Seattle to visit some friends. I drew these while we were out there. The tree was inspired by the twisty, viny, mossy, rooty awesomeness that is the Hoh Rainforest on the Olympic Peninsula. The guy is just some guy.

Dead Men Tell No Tales

It be too late to alter course. No fear, have ye of evil curses, says you? Ha. Properly warned ye be, says I. Who knows when that evil curse will strike...(Dialogue from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride in Disneyland).

Twilight Princess

I am probably more excited about the new Legend of Zelda than I have been for any video game in my life. For me, there is not a single experience that exists in the realm of entertainment media that tops a good Zelda game.

Tommy and Ray

I'm a big fan of both Film Noir and cheesy sci-fi movies of the 40's and 50's(though I can't stand Mystery Science Theater 3000-shut up and let me watch the movie, I know why it's funny). Anyway, I drew these as a tribute to all great pulp art.

Post of the Living Dead!