Antikewl Daily » Art

Halloween Papercraft Big Head costume

Trevor May — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:01:58 +0000

I’m going to make this a tradition. Each year I’ll pick out the best Halloween costume and post it up here. A couple of years ago I featured these fantastic Bioshock costumes — and they’re still one of the post popular things on this site.

This time it’s another videogame inspired creation. 3D game artist Eric Testroete has recreated his own head using Pepakura, 3D Studio Max and copy of Photoshop in the style of those Playstation-era video game characters in “big head mode”.

The emotionless expression is also very slightly unnerving.

Backgrounds: The art behind the animation

Trevor May — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 14:54:06 +0000

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of all aspects of animation, from concept artwork to storyboards to roughs to the finished scene. One often overlooked piece of the animation puzzle is the humble background. Whilst the eye is drawn to the life of the moving characters on screen little attention is often given to the illustrated scene behind.

The Animation Backgrounds blog digitally removes characters from scenes and stitches together panned shots to reveal the uncluttered artwork underneath. There’s a wealth of background artwork here from the watercolours of Lilo and Stitch (above) to the Mary Blair-inspired Alice in Wonderland. (via Aegir)

COMBO by Blu and David Ellis

Trevor May — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:57:32 +0000

You may remember MUTO, an animated short by Blu made using chalk and paint on real-world environments, which we featured here a year or so ago. Here’s his latest collaboration with artist David Ellis.

Blu also has a new website (or certainly one that I haven’t seen before!) featuring some of his more static artwork. (thanks Ward!)

Lou Romano and the Art of “Up”

Trevor May — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:23:26 +0000

I’ve just been browsing Lou Romano’s production artwork that he did for Pixar’s “Up” again — specifically the colour script work that he did — and wondered why I hadn’t mentioned it here before!

Lou was a production designer on the movie and he’s posted dozens and dozens of pieces of artwork as well as some After Effects tests and dioramas.

Up Color Script
Art of Up: “Here is some of the development & production work I did on UP (2005-2008).”

Be sure to check out the rest of his blog too for more superb artwork, including stuff for The Incredibles and The Powerpuff Girls.

Lou’s work also features in Pixar’s Art of Up (US) book.

On The Way: Photography by Samuel Hicks

Trevor May — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 14:00:00 +0000

This weekend we dropped into the Crane Kalman Gallery in Brighton’s North Laine to check out British photographer Samuel Hicks’ first solo exhibition, “On the Way”.

Here’s an introduction by the artist himself:

“The … images are from 3 trips to the States over 18 months, driving through Texas, New Mexico, California and Nevada.

These trips were essentially quite loose; sometimes we knew we had to be at a specific place in a week’s time, but how we got there and where we stopped was decided along the way, sometimes by looking at the map, or often asking someone what it was like there.

I wanted to have a look around, see for myself…”

Typically, the photo I loved (Mustang, above, shot in El Mirage, California) was the most expensive. If anyone has a spare £1100 lying around… donations gratefully received.

If you can’t make it to Brighton for the show, much of it is available to view online at FOTO8.

More images by Samuel Hicks are on his website, samuelhicks.com.

On The Way runs from 4th June to 19th July 2009 at Crane Kalman Brighton, 38 Kensington Gardens, North Laine, Brighton BN1 4AL.

Lost Charley Harper paintings found

Trevor May — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 20:51:41 +0000

The Charley Harper Museum have revealed on their blog that a number of lost paintings by Charley Harper produced for the Ford Times and Lincoln Mercury Times magazines in the 1960s have been discovered deep within their archives.

The discovery of these paintings came as a surprise even to Charley’s son Brett. “I felt like I was opening a buried treasure chest that had been locked up for more than 35 years.”

The Estate and Studio have already respectfully declined several immediate offers for portions of the priceless collection. Brett believes that as the market begins to understand what the collage originals of birds, fish, and travel series represent—the rarest of the rare—collectors will be stunned.

Some of the pieces will be exhibited at the Fabulous Frames & Art Gallery in Chicago from July 11th until August 8th 2009. I can only hope they make an appearance somewhere closer to me in the future! (via Grain Edit)

Update: You can see a whole load more of them here: Long Lost Charley Harper (thanks Ward!)

More Alice in Wonderland concept art

Trevor May — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 21:01:47 +0000

Back in March I posted some links to scans from Disney’s 23 magazine about Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland movie. USA Today has just published some more beautiful pieces of concept art from the film’s production.

Also making a first appearance today are images of the Johnny Depp as The Mad Hatter, Helena Bonham Carter as The Queen of Hearts, Anne Hathaway as The White Queen and Matt Lucas as both Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dee.

Alice in Wonderland will be released on the 5th March, 2010 in the US and on the 12th in the UK.

Otaku magazine issue 5: Play

Trevor May — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 16:23:31 +0000

Just a quickie! Otaku magazine’s “Play” issue is now out.

“Serious play represents a feature of any otaku’s activity. Basically you play, but you do it with the greatest dedication, seriousness and interest. We don’t want to be the prisoners of the industries that bet on our ability as playful mammals, but we desire to know them and explore their limits. Otaku PLAY explores the universe of players and play of all kinds. How and when you play. What you learn while playing and where do you risk arriving when you remain blocked within the same play.”

Otaku is an independent magazine from Romania which promotes Japanese-inspired visual arts. This issue comes with an interactive DVD and a superb 60cm x 40cm New York EbOY poster.

Also check out their blog for much much more of the same! (via Sam)

Busted Up Pokémon by Justin White

Trevor May — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 09:23:18 +0000

Californian illustrator and designer Justin White has been creating a series of Pokémon portrait illustrations.

The idea was to capture each character after a long battle
recuperating inside their pokeball. Or maybe I just wanted to imagine pokemon in a lot of pain. This was really just a fun way to keep active and creative.

You can find all of them on his Flickr stream or in his portfolio. While you’re there, also check out his other great projects including the Mario Brothers portraits and the Alphabet vector illustrations.

Wondering if I can fit the word “illustration” into this article one more time. Done. Enjoy!

Terrible Yellow Eyes, illustration inspired by Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are

Trevor May — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 22:11:11 +0000

With the Spike Jonze-directed movie forthcoming, illustrator Cory Godbey has started an awesome project, Terrible Yellow Eyes, to celebrate Maurice Sendak’s illustrated children’s classic, Where the Wild Things Are. He’s invited numerous talented artists to contribute their own works, inspired by the book itself.

Over the coming weeks and months I’ll display a growing collection of works created by invited contributing artists and myself. We share a love and admiration for Sendak’s work and the pieces we present here are done as a tribute to his life and legacy.

Simply put, like a visual love letter to the book, with Terrible Yellow Eyes I am seeking to celebrate and promote the original masterwork by Maurice Sendak in the best way I know how — with pictures.

I was going to write a list of my personal favourites from the collection but there are simply too many to mention!

Maurice Sendak celebrated his 81st birthday on Wednesday. Happy birthday Maurice!

(discovered via Ward, who’s contributed this lovely illustration to the project)

Update: Lindsey just drew my attention to the We Love You So blog. It’s a diary of multitude of stuff that has inspired the making of the film adaptation by the film crew themselves.

Update Sept 3rd 2009: Terrible Yellow Eyes will now be running as an exhibition at the Gallery Nucleus in Alhambra, California between September 19th and October 6th, 2009.

Antikewl gets SWFTed

Trevor May — Sun, 17 May 2009 10:03:07 +0000

I mentioned Sam Bradley, the guy who’s been doing the illustrated social experiment on Twitter, a week or so ago. Since then he’s put all the illustrations he’s produced up on their own website, SWFT.ca, and added me to the ranks alongside such glitterati as Douglas Coupland and Drawn’s Robot Johnny.

Might need to lighten up the tone of my tweets though — I appear to have been depicted as a miserable tiny balding man!

Samantha Cotterill Felt Art

Trevor May — Sat, 09 May 2009 20:19:08 +0000

mummysam from upstate New York produces some wonderful dolls and wall hangings using felt. Visit her etsy shop, mummysam and her blog. (via CassiaB)

Sam Bradley Illustrates Twitter

Trevor May — Wed, 06 May 2009 20:15:17 +0000

Artist Sam Bradley has started a new social art project: He’s pledged to illustrate, four times a week, an individual tweet from the social networking site Twitter.

He hasn’t set up a site for it yet (I’ll update this post when he does) but you can see his drawings as he posts them on his Twitter stream @abysmalred.

Update: You can now find all of his Twitter illustrations at SWFT.ca

Stunning Blade Runner Scene Recreated Using CryENGINE 2

Trevor May — Tue, 05 May 2009 19:55:06 +0000

It’s no secret that Blade Runner is one of my favourite movies so I’ve just been ~~salivating~~ looking through some superb images created using Sandbox 2 and CryENGINE 2, the video game engine used for the first-person shooter Crysis.

The images were created as entries to a movie-themed contest at game-artist.net and winning entries included sets from The X-Men, Aliens and I Am Legend. This Blade Runner set deservedly took winning place and you can view the process behind the construction on this message thread. (via N4G)

75 Ways to Draw More

Trevor May — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 19:53:30 +0000

This is something I should do. I love drawing, but can’t remember the last time I did it (except for on my son’s erasable drawing pad… Ok, I do that most days…).

Illustrator Michael Nobbs has put together a little booklet with 75 light-hearted ideas on how to get yourself to draw more. You can print it out for free or order a signed copy from his website. (via Drawn)

Henry Hatsworth Concept Artwork

Trevor May — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 20:14:02 +0000

Offworld have just begun a new series of posts around the production art of video games entitled Concept Album and I’ve just been thumbing through the first of them — an extensive three-page collection of concept artwork for the Nintendo DS platform-puzzler Henry Hatsworth.

I always love to see the creative that eventually evolves to become a video game, animated feature, theme park attraction or motion picture. This one I find particularly interesting as, ultimately, it’s all going to be crammed into a screen no wider than two and half inches!

Be sure to check out Henry Hatsworth Art Director Jay Epperson’s own blog for more sketches and art. And here’s the official game site.

Little Robot: Paper, pictures automata and other fanciful things

Trevor May — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 21:36:48 +0000

This is something I’d been meaning to share for some time and has, in fact, been sitting in the Friends’ links to the left for about a year!

I used to work with Lindsey many years ago when she was all pixels and vectors. Since then she’s moved to Scotland, branched into some rather splendid Victorian-inspired artwork and goes by the name of Little Robot.

She also has an Etsy shop.

Quentin Blake’s House of Illustration

Trevor May — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 22:01:17 +0000

I was, apparently, born in the same town and went to the same school as Illustrator Quentin Blake, most famous for his wonderfully apparently effortless illustrations for the books of Roald Dahl; although obviously not at the same time… what with him being 43 years my senior. Anyway, I managed to spot an interview him on BBC Breakfast News before I left for work this morning where he was talking about a proposed museum for illustration in London.

They’re currently trying to raise the £6 million required to build a “House of Illustration” in Kings Cross, London by 2011 — the world’s first museum dedicated to the art of illustration in all its forms.

The House of Illustration is a registered charity that was established in 2002. It is the brainchild of Quentin Blake. As an experienced illustrator and teacher, he saw a gap in the UK’s museum sector. At the moment, illustration is only seen in occasional temporary exhibitions in other museums and galleries. The House of Illustration will change that.

The House of Illustration will be the place to see past and present illustration, both British and international. It will be the world’s first centre dedicated to the art of illustration in all its forms.

They are a registered charity and currently accepting donations via their website.

Ward Jenkins’ B-Boy Show

Trevor May — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 21:16:31 +0000

Ward Jenkins, animator, contributor to Drawn! and curator of the wonderful Ward-O-Matic blog current has a wonderful looking solo show at the Grassy Knoll Gallery in Portland, Oregon inspired by graffiti and 80′s hip hop. This is a little too far for me to travel so I’m grateful that so many photos are available online.

Original artwork can also be purchased directly from the gallery website.

My Little Pony: Horror movie dress-up

Trevor May — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 20:55:55 +0000

Mari Kasurinen didn’t think My Little Pony was anywhere near interesting enough… so she’s modded them into movie characters like the Alien, Predator, Darth Vader and Batman. They’re also available to purchase, should your My Little Pony collection be feeling a little too cutesy. (via Boing Boing)

Game Boy-inspired screenshots of recent video games

Trevor May — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 20:36:44 +0000

Hah! Blogging! Remember that? Er, where was I…?

Recently (and by “recently” I mean “over a year ago“) Pixelation ran a little contest on their forum to see who could create Game Boy-inspired screenshots of more recent video games. The entries are fantastic — some of my favourites, World of Warcraft, Bioshock, Sam & Max and American McGee’s Alice, are above.

Go take a look if you haven’t seen them already… and if you have it was probably so long ago now that you’ve forgotten about it and should go have another look anyway!

Illustrator Oliver Jeffers

Trevor May — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 22:08:12 +0000

With a little boy on the way I find myself checking out more and more children’s books, especially ones with interesting and quirky illustration. In Waterstones today I spotted a great book by Oliver Jeffers called “The Way Back Home” about a little boy who finds an aeroplane in his bedroom cupboard and flies to the moon, where he finds he’s not the only one that’s lost. It was a little while later, after getting back and Googling, that I realised I’d seen his work before.

Anyway, here’s his site, and an interview. Enjoy.

Halloween Bioshock Big Daddy / Little Sister costumes

Trevor May — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 13:55:45 +0000

I had a Halloween post all ready but never got around to posting it. I guess it’s a bit late now so I’ll have to save it for next year. C’est la vie.

This, however, I do have to share. Friends of a friend of a friend (yeah, we’re that close) created (and dressed up as) a Big Daddy and Little Sister from the Bioshock. Amusingly, the costumes are better than the ones at the games own launch event! (Thanks to See-ming for the tip!)

More Bioshock Halloween costumes on Cult of Rapture.

Update: Forgot to link the “making-of” set.

Update 2: Another video of a dad and his kids playing Big Daddy and Little Sisters. “no little sisters were harvested in the making of this video or when walking rapture looking for treats” (via Wonderland).

Sony ripping off Kozyndan?

Trevor May — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 09:18:36 +0000

Possibly an enormous co-incidence, but the new animated Play-Doh bunnies commercial for Sony Bravia by ad agency Fallon bears a rather remarkable resemblance to one of artist duo Kozyndan‘s earlier pieces of artwork, “What’s next, USA-chan?”

It really is a beautiful commercial, but a huge shame they haven’t credited the very obvious inspiration. Bad Sony. Again.

Chris Sanders has a website

Trevor May — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 22:01:38 +0000

Chris Sanders, former Disney artist and the creator/director of Lilo and Stitch, finally has a website. He also released a new sketchbook at this year’s San Diego Comi-con which I’ll have to order a copy of to sit alongside the one he printed last year on my bookshelf.