Here is my submission to the 2008 Portland Funbook. This will be the third Funbook and seems to be gearing up to be the biggest and best yet. You can click here or on the image above for a full-size PDF, so you can print it out and play in the comfort of your own home or place of employment. Enjoy!

This is my final illustration class assignment of the semester, also created as a self-promotional card image for a big freelance work push I’ve got planned for this summer. It combines two of my favorite things: bikes and hairy things.

I feel like I’m on a roll here, with two consecutive Illustration class projects in which I am incredibly happy with the results. This week’s project was to create an image that could be used within an advertisement for a product of our choice, but without designing the ad itself. I decided to do something fun for my favorite beer in the whole world, Grain Belt. It’s only available in the northern midwest, so I cannot enjoy it whenever I please, as I once could, so this is my tribute. I wanted something that spoke of the history of the beer (the old neon sign, snapped while I was on a trip back to Minnesota) but also the very specific region in which it is available.

I’ve been working on this image for almost three weeks now from the thumbnail sketch stage and it still cracks me up every time. I think I might be using this as a promo post card image soon.

My latest assignment for my Intermediate Illustration class was to create a “seasonal magazine cover” illustration, representing both a city and season of our choice. I chose to represent an early morning Spring cleaning in Minneapolis, MN, where I am originally from. For those of you who don’t know, that is the Spoonbridge and Cherry, a huge Claes Oldenburg sculpture, and one of the most iconic images of Minneapolis. Even though the internet is chock full of the exact same photo, I was in Minneapolis a few weeks ago and snapped my own reference.

Here’s some more BeardBot stuff for the final week of my “New Markets” assignment for Illustration class. For my final, each of the four bots will be featured in a different venue in which they could, in theory, be used in real life. Hopefully you’ve already seen the plush #2 last week, so here’s a coffee mug design featuring #1.

And here’s how it might look on an actual mug.

Finally, here’s a simple t-shirt design featuring #4, being modeled by the also-bearded Charlie of the Threadless submission pack. I’m probably going to have to actually print up one of these for myself on of these days.

#3’s piece will be posted tomorrow along with some buttons and keychains I’ve already made.

Late last week, I was asked to create four illustrations for the special “Drunken Issue” of The Portland Mercury, alongside a feature entitled “The Winter Drunk-A-Lympics.” This is the main illustration for the article, which introduces us to the hero of the four illustrations.

For a small article describing different international drinking games.

Taking the drunken fun outside the bar. This is my favorite of the four and I think a lot of that is due to how much I love that little dog.

And finally, hangover cures.

Baby Otto Contest

I never posted my final Illustration class assignment from last semester because I left the original at school over winter break and didn’t get it scanned until yesterday. Our assignment was to illustrate a “tradition.” The tradition I chose was that of the language of Russian prison tattoos, specifically of the Soviet era. I had some other tattoo-related things in mind at first, but Russian prison tattoos have such a compelling history that, in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to do anything but this specific tradition. Gouache, ink and charcoal.

Sorry for the bad pic, it’s not actually so shiny.

For the last assignment in my Intermediate Illustration class, we were set with the task of creating an illustration that may, in the end, be published with an essay entitled The Green Zone by Barry Sanders. The essay deals with the environmental havoc wreaked by the current war in Iraq. Professor Sanders came into our class to speak and answer questions, and then all of us were given preliminary copies of his essay. My illustration is in reference to a section of his essay dealing with the issue of increased land erosion in areas of heavy tank traffic.

This is a little something different than what I usually do obviously, and was certainly a challenge, but I am proud of the end result. It’s actually put together in three layers: The bottom is corrugated cardboard, slathered with black ink, charcoal, and Root Beer Concentrate (really!), and then set afire in various stages. The middle layer is watercolor paper (ripped and burned), with ink, watercolor, gouache, charcoal, and the ash from burning the cardboard, and finally the tank is the top layer of ink, watercolor and charcoal on heavy chipboard, which I ripped to shape and then burned around the edges.

Also, big thanks go to Art Sherwyn for inspiring me to use a little (ok, a lot) of fire on this piece.

The end of 2007 has been dominated by me taking a leadership or organizational role on a lot of big projects. The 2008 comics anthology from my school, PNCA, will probably be the last big thing I put together, or help put together, for a while; it’s all sort of wearing me out. Anyways, this is the initial, get your submissions ready, poster for the anthology.

I think I might strip the smaller speech balloon out and make this an art print, so I did a little marker comp of that.

This is Elvis. He’s not my cat, but his owners leave him outside a lot, so he’s learned he can come next door and sit in front of our door, and either my roommate or I will let him inside and play with him for a while, or sometimes even feed him. He purrs like a motorboat and I have been late for class many a time due to playing with this little guy.

(No relation to the other Tiny Showcase)

Long-time listeners may recall me mentioning a future group show that I was setting up, a show in which I hoped to include artists from all over the world. Well, I realized what a massive undertaking that would be, so I scrapped the idea and decided to only include people from my school, PNCA. Here’s the poster I made to get the word out. This probably took far longer than it’s actually worth, but I do so love to lettering (and drawing myself on items that will be seen in public).

I also made this little plush robot over the weekend; mostly for fun, but also as a prototype for some other plush bots I’ve got in the works.

I think I’ll sign all my future plush robots this way.