Quick One for Heritage Farm

Here's a quick Entertainment cover done this week for the Heritage Farm. I had short notice so I didn't get to do much verbiage. Aside from the Mike and Henriella Perry reference, I looked for and found a nice buckboard wagon for reference, and because of cramping of the composition, abandoned a brief idea to include a goat off to the side.

Finish on obesity illustration

I had fun with the cool light of the television cast on one side and the warm light of the sun on the other.

Establish form first, then work toward specific

For front page layout, a horizontal main image works best as the art can be seen above the fold ~ to be seen better in newspapers sold in street corner boxes. So I needed to reconfigured the ruff.

Here is the illustration in process. Using a dark colored paper and working the light colors back into it. I’m keeping the shapes rough and geometric and I will gradually tighten the image, add more color and punch the highlights. In college, my drawing professor had the class work in black and white pencil on mid-range grey paper. The idea was for us to draw from life, only the darkest shadows and the lightest highlights. In doing this, it was really surprising how much one can leave out of the illustration and still come away with real solid image. The middle areas are suggested without being specific. This helped us concentrate on overall form and solid structure, rather than zeroing in on detail that ends up on a shaky, ill-conceived structure.

Childhood obesity ruffs

I am currently working on a front page illustration for a childhood obesity package that runs this weekend. The subject of obesity can be a touchy subject, and our problem is – how to get a good solid main photo.
I’ve found a fairly stylized illustrated image works well. They are non-specific, non-comical and can represent the issue objectively.
I had done a comical illustration for a feature story on kids lazing around all summer. It was a backside view of a extremely large boy sitting on the floor in front of the television with a remote in one hand and surrounded by an abundance of snacks. Meanwhile, outside his window is a perfectly good sunny day being enjoyed by and unidentified dog-walker.
Now, the humor of that illustration coupled with the lightness of the feature story was appropriate. However, this upcoming story is not to be viewed the same way.
My idea will be basically the same, as the elements of the obesity problem are consistent: inactivity, lousy food choices in abundance are key elements.
So here’s my rough where I’m changing the angle of composition, while still getting the view out the window. From here I can stylize with big bold shapes and less detail to distract. The box around the ruff is where I was adjusting my crop – deciding how tight a composition I want and where I want to place the key elements.

Finish on Hannah and Bob

These two were pretty easy to do. The smoke coming out of the cars was added in Photoshop. The only hitch was getting enough space under the cars to fit a headline and copyblock. Check out the print edition to see how it all came together.

First impressions

This weeks Entertainment cover story is on the eclectic mix of things to see and do this Easter weekend. Comedian Bob Zany and the Hannah Montana movie release, along with some demolition derby make for a fun drawing opportunity.
Here’s my first impression of Bob Zany ~ an important step in the caricature process. I try to get one done quickly and at a small scale. This helps me avoid over-analyzing the features and allows me to concentrate on how the features relate to each other.