Something Udderly Fishy

Alien Species.

What do you say to an agency that asks you to illustrate a UFO flown by a fish? And if that wasn't cool enough they also requested a cow boxing a fish into submission. Who are these cornball cartoonish illos for? The Canadian Fish and Game Department.

The themes reflect alien species of fish encroaching on the native species, farm lands and how they can effect local fish habitats all communicated in a fun way via a simple Flash animation. I'm not doing the Flash work, that'll be handled by the agency who hired me to illustrate these goofy visual assets.


Bull Trout Character.

My animated gif shows some of the movement that will bring these characters to life on screen. I suppose if they are Canadian the fish might be saying

"I'll kick your ärse Cow. Come back and I'll give you a fin sandwich, eh?"

Brook Trout Character.

Yeah so I flipped the fish, re-colored him, modified the shape of his head ever so subtly and voila, new art. What? All's fair in love and vectors baby.

So what might this fish be saying?

"Hey hoser, take me to your leader, eh?"

The Brawling Bovine.

In this corner is my lame animated gif weighing in at exactly 152 KB. This image doesn't do this heifer justice. His head is modular and I provided a library of images so as they can make him jab and punch and get a MOOve on!


Underwater environment.

This is the background for the alien species animation. These will be displayed on large plasma screens in their final form.


Detail of Scene.

Close the door your letting all the water out.


Pleasant Meadow and Spring.

This is the background for the cow boxing the fish. I suppose if they are fighting a discouraging word was heard, eh?

Rough Cut Animations
View a rough cut of "Fish -vs- Cow" here.
View a rough cut of "Invasive Species" here.

Please Ask Permission

SirGrimm86 (Flickr User), another fan of my "Tribal Tattoo" artwork.

Seems like every three or four months someone takes my artwork and gets it permanently applied to their body. The last time this happened was in October of 2008.

This same modus operandi has been going on now for the last few years. It makes me wonder how many I don't find out about? Normally other people spot it and let me know, but last night while checking web traffic I came across this latest one.


My Original Artwork.

I certainly don't mind people wanting to make a life time commitment to my art like this, that much is very flattering of course and I'm glad they like my work. I'd just rather people ask permission first, and acknowledge that I own the artwork and need to grant them permission to use it before they use it.


Imperial Toy, LLC ripped off my "Tribal Tattoo Face" artwork.

I'm not a jerk, and have only denied someone permission once and that only was due to the fact that I had a copyright lawsuit in progress with a toy company at the time they had asked. (I won that case BTW)


The bat appears within the "Sims 2" universe.

I suppose one could argue that my bat tattoo has now "Jumped the Shark" seeing as it's being ripped off and used to skin people in the virtual world that is "Sims 2." This of course brings up all kinds of interesting copyright issues in and of itself.

Or, maybe I could take a cue and start selling tribal tattoo undies in my Zazzle.com store? Hmmm.


The Bat Signal.

I have to admit, I think tattoos look cool. But I also think they look better on young bodies. I can't argue with the image above at all, but will my art look so good on a 70 year old canvas with sublimated liver spots, and a wrinkled texture running through it?

In any regard, if you're a person looking for a cool tribal tattoo and have Googled your way to this post, then take the time to shoot me an email (See side bar at top right) and ask permission to use my art first.

Thanks.

Drugstore Cowboy

The crown jewel of Washington State.

Some of my fondest memories growing up in Washington State were the annual trips to San Juan Island our family would make. Part of the fun was the two hour ferry boat ride to get there. Our friends owned a resort for many years called "Lonesome Cove Resort" and we'd stay in a beach side cabin and I'd spend the days exploring the many tide pools, throwing rocks off the cliff, fishing for Ling and Rock Cod (Ugly fish BTW), catching small crabs or clamming.


The "Wild Goose" a former WWII mine sweeper.

In the summer of 1977 we once again headed for San Juan Island, I was 11 years old and as the ferry boat was coming into Friday Harbor my dad pointed towards the marina and said "See that big one? That's John Wayne's Yacht." Almost every summer we'd see the "Wild Goose" cruising around the island waters, it was a WWII mine sweeper that the "Duke" had converted.

The ferry docked and our car exited. Before making our way to our friends house we stopped at the local drug store to pick up a few things. Me and my mom went inside to buy a few items then we stood in line to check out.

I heard someone come up behind us so I turned to look and there he was John Wayne. He loomed above me, wearing a captains hat and smiled down at me saying "Hello there." I smiled back and said "Hi." then quickly turned around and tugged at my moms shirt saying "It's John Wayne!"

My mom turned around, and the normal adult movie star groveling pursued for the next several minutes. It was a very brief but very memorable moment for me.

Illustrating an American Icon


The iconic John "Duke" Wayne. (Click Image to View Larger)

So when I was approached to work on this iconic illustration on behalf of Wayne Enterprises I was so eager to do it I actually told the agency I'd do it for free. (Talk about groveling) Thankfully the agency didn't take me up on my offer.

That initial excitement was closely followed by fear. You know those doubting thoughts that creep in when you approach a project that intimidates you. My mind kept asking "What if my illustration sucks?" I then imagined John Wayne looking at what ever I came up with and saying in his classic drawl "Son, that drawing looks like a horses ass!"

But then I remembered a cool John Wayne quote I had read years before.

"Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway."

Good advice.

Since we were working with Wayne Enterprises, I suggested it would be best if they could provide me with archive photos I could use for reference. They agreed and I worked from the images provided to create my art. Wayne Enterprises not the agency had final approval of the artwork.

This style involves a lot of drawing and re-drawing, and with each revision I bake the image down, removing unnecessary detail and simplify the shapes to arrive at my final iconic image. The entire process took roughly three months to complete going back and forth with one revision after another.

It could have taken a mere week but such is the process when you deal with a committee. That said, I'm very happy with the final results.


Second branded image.

When it was all said and done I created two branded images for Wayne Enterprises. This art will be made available to those who purchase license agreements to use the John Wayne image.


Raw hide?

The agency that hired me to do this on behalf of Wayne Enterprises was doing so because they were hired to design the new Beef Jerky packaging the Wayne Estates was selling and didn't have any approved artwork they could use to brand it with. I found this usage a bit humorous myself but when it was all said and done (Mainly due to the economy I suspect) Wayne Enterprises pulled the plug on this venture.

In any regard the whole project was a blast, and it brought back a lot of fun memories for me personally. I am so thankful for all the cool projects I get to work on. Giddy up!

The Premise of My Livelihood

Not all my projects are large ones. I work on a bunch of smaller jobs for smaller agencies too. I enjoy working with other creatives regardless of how large or small their business is because it brings with it a wide range of diverse assignments and that tends to be a lot more fun creatively speaking.

I'd call this project a "Von Gets Paid to Draw" job. I say that because in all honesty my livelihood is fundamentally based on the fact that other designers can't draw well, so they pay me to do it instead.


Client provided photograph.

The client needed simple B&W artwork of this Jewish mans head. He had seen my "NBA Portraits" and wanted me to do the same based on the hostage quality photo he provided above.


Non-kosher vectors!

This was the clients own attempt at creating simple B&W artwork based on the photo. Do you understand how that whole livelihood thing I mentioned previously comes into play now?

This is nothing new mind you, it's been the fundamental premise of existence for illustrators going back to prehistoric times perhaps. You know, Grog can't throw spear and slay mammoth so he stays home in the cave and draws what happens on the wall. It's fine, everyone has their lot in life.


Refined drawing.

So now it's my turn to draw off the photo provided. As always I draw out my ideas completely so I know what to expect moving to digital. This prevents any guess work as I build my art in vector form.

This specific style is all about simplification. Looking at the facial forms and baking them down to simple shapes until you capture the correct feeling.


Scanned refined drawing.

I scan in my refined drawing, place it into Illustrator, grey it back and lock it on it's own layer. Here it stays as my precise road map to build upon.


Vector shape building.

I build my vector shapes according to my pre-established drawing.


No guess work building.

Precise vector building comes about by figuring out what you need to build before hand by drawing it all out. This is where I think a lot of designers get lazy and jump on the computer too quickly.


To those with an ear let them hear.

Even though this style plays off photography you have to take creative license and improve on reality to make an illustration better. This dudes right ear looks kind of strange being smaller on one side. So I need to fix that.


Base B&W artwork done.

I perform vector plastic surgery on my art and fix his ear.


Back to the drawing board.

I print out my artwork (note lame vertical streaking because my printer sucks) and using a regular pencil I draw out my shading. I refer back to the source photo to pick out visual cues on how they should be drawn.


Building shading vectors.

I follow the same modus operandi as I used to build my primary base art.


More precision building.

I use snap to point all the time. That said the functionality inside CS4 is kind of hinky and doesn't alway work which is a major pain in the butt at times and bloats my build time. Thank you very little Adobe.


Responding to comments.

OK, for those of you who posted early you were correct his ear still looked hinky so I fixed it. The reason I didn't put grey in his beard is because I thought the client didn't want that. I based the decision on their own attempt shown above which was a poor assumption on my part because they came back and requested it.

I guess that means "Commenters: 2" and "Von: 0" so you guys win.


Final floating head.

Grey added to beard, mouth adjusted so he's smiling more and hinky ear repaired.

I've illustrated well over 200 portraits in this style, using the same methodology for MLB, NBA, and NFL licenses over the past several years but I still enjoy it.

I thank God for my livelihood.

The Method to My Madness

Reference and image research.

I usually save the sharing of my creative process for my tutorial site www.IllustrationClass.com, but it's been a while since I posted any like that over here so I decided to take you all through a recent custom tattoo design I created.

The Client

Michael Gano had seen some of my previous tribal tattoo designs as well as some of my most recent artwork and requested his own custom tattoo design based on an Armadillo.

Last time I drew an Armadillo was around 1988 or so, and it was done in a very graphic Santa Fe style so I did some simple research to get reference. Like I tell my students:

"You may know what an Armadillo looks like in general but you'll be able to draw it better if you reference the real thing."

I forgot how cool looking these varmints are. They're like a cross between a Rhino and a Rat on steroids.


Thumb nailing out a rough.

All good things digital start in analog form. At least for me they do.

At this point I'm not too worried about specific detail, I'm just trying to get the idea out of my head and on to the paper. I'm balancing out the composition and figuring out how things relate to one another in a general.

The Challenge

An Armadillos form is simple and not very complex and that made the design of this tattoo difficult. The client also requested a circular tattoo which added to the design challenge as well.


Refined drawing.

I prefer to draw out my ideas completely so I know what to expect moving to digital. This prevents any guess work as I build my art in vector form. This of course isn't an iron clad rule but tends to be true more times then not for me.

All the creative heavy lifting IMO, is done prior to digitally building it.

Working digitally has many fringe benefits. One of best ones is symmetrical designs. You only have to do half the work and still get all the fun. Just copy, paste and flip!


Scanned refined drawing.

At this point I need to run my design by the client for approval. So I scan it in and use Photoshop to copy and clone the missing content. I also clean up any other detail I may spot at this stage too. This takes all of about ten minutes or so.

The Presentation


Client comp image.

After mocking up the comp image from my scan I decide to push the tail more literal in it's appearance and I add indentations on the Armadillos back to represent the various plates.

I didn't really care for the look of the tail at this point but it was good enough for the comp and I'll finesse it so it looks better once it gets approved by my client.

The Build


Vector building starts.

As I say in my "Illustrative Design Presentation" you have to be a "Bezier Curve Jedi Master." It does help if you have ADD tendencies though.


Vector shapes completed.

Why do I use "Pink" lines to build my shapes? Because I've been doing it this way for like 18 years now and it makes perfect sense to me. So no wise cracks. No, really I'm sensitive on this issue and you don't want to make me cry.

Note how I simplified the tail detail.

The Reveal


Final artwork completed.

I tried several different approaches when integrating the indentations on the Armadillos back until I arrived at this solution. Over all I'm happy with the results and so was my client.


Tattoo in context.

The reason my client wanted the circular motif was due to the final tattoo's placement on his shoulder. I like the fact it's not an immediate read, it's a slow reveal which is kind of cool.

If you'd like to see the artwork a little larger I played around with it using a texture here.

I hope Michael enjoys this tattoo design and I thank him for letting me use his body as my canvas.

Tattoo Design is Copyright © 2009 Glitschka Studios.

First and Goal

Play Flag Football Logo.

I was asked recently in a design interview to explain my approach to logo design. I used the analogy of an investigation. I never know where it will take me or how the design problem will be solved until my creative investigation is finished.

The same was true with this client. At first glance I read the name "Play Flag Football" and thought to myself "That's not a business name that's a sentence." Obviously the biggest challenge for me would be to somehow simplify the complexity that a long name was causing.

My favorite moment in any logo project is when I stumble upon that one clever metaphor or visual element that reinforces a concept and brings my design to life. With this project I wanted it to say football without showing a literal football.


Play Flag Football Logo (Patch Version)

Play Flag Football sponsors flag football events nationwide and wanted their logo in a format that would work well for embroidery purposes too. This version of the logo is for patches.


Embroidery Patch Designs.

Other programs ran by Play Flag Football needed their own embroidery patch designs as well. They will reward these patches to the kids who earn them so they can sew them onto their uniform.


Horizontal Logo Format.

This shows the logo in horizontal format and how it can be integrated into a photograph.

Play Flag Football was a very successful company before I worked with them. And the new identity I created for them will equipped them to keep moving forward on the field of success.

If only I could convince Google to do the same. ;-)