25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Christmas Day

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Christmas Eve

The Man himself from A Charlie Brown Christmas. I always loved all the kid's dancing animations.

A little bit of trivia I know, it's very rare to come across a copy of this special that still has the Coca-Cola billboards in the background of the opening shots. (When it originally aired, Coke was ironically the main sponsor of this special about anti-commercialism.) Also, the song that everybody designates as Charlie Brown's theme song, titled "Linus and Lucy," was originally written for and only meant to be used in this special, but it ended up catching on and being associated with the characters.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 23

Snoopy from A Charlie Brown Christmas and a guest from a movie that many people often forget is Christmas related.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 22

PigPen and Linus from probably the most famous special of all, A Charlie Brown Christmas. Everybody knows this special inside and out but I'm still surprised every year at just how good it is. I love how all the other kids are so hard on Charlie Brown, it crosses into an area of genuine dislike that I'm not sure would be used in a special made today.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 21

The Grinch from How the Grinch Stole Christmas. If I were pressed to choose a favorite Christmas special, I think the Grinch would have to be it. I used to draw out scenes from it when I was a kid.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 20

The Heat Miser from The Year Without a Santa Claus.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 19

The Snow Miser from The Year Without a Santa Claus

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 18

Kermit from A Muppet Family Christmas, holding a reference to one of my favorite live-action Christmas movies. Can you guess it?

Also check out the new Muppet movie if you haven't already, it's outstanding. It far exceeded my expectations.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 17

Max and Olive, two dogs wearing antlers from How the Grinch Stole Christmas and the somewhat more recent special Olive the Other Reindeer.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 16

One of my favorite gags from A Muppet Family Christmas where the Swedish Chef wants to cook Big Bird and serve him for Christmas dinner. Also included is a reference to a very famous Christmas movie.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 15

Bert and Ernie from another one of my all-time Favorites, A Muppet Family Christmas. I understand that the unedited version is hard to come by these days due to rights issues, but the original includes a giant cast of characters from The Muppets, Sesame Street, and Fraggle Rock all together in one house. There's even actual puppet versions of the Muppet Babies and a cameo by Jim Henson.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 14

Scrooge and Tiny Tim from Mickey's Christmas Carol.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 13

Santa's Little Helper from the very first Simpsons episode ever, where the Simpsons rescue him from a greyhound racetrack just in time for Christmas. He's seen here thinking about his favorite subject.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 12

Frosty is both his name and favorite food (I'm guessing.) From the Rankin Bass special Frosty the Snowman.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 11

This may not be from an actual special, but everybody my age remembers the holiday Fruity Pebbles commercial where Barney finally shares some of his cereal with Fred. I know quite a few people who can still recite all of the dialog, even all these years later.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 10

Garfield and Grandma from A Garfield Christmas. This is one of my favorite specials of all time. It's surprising how genuinely funny and moving it is. I think it deserves to be added into the mix of currently aired Xmas specials.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 9

Santa from Futurama. Also included is a nod to a famous Christmas movie that isn't always immediately associated with the holidays.

In a really strange move by executives, this depiction of Santa was deemed too scary and the Futurama Christmas episodes were not allowed to be aired until late at night for a little while.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 8

Stinky from the Ren & Stimpy Show episode "Son of Stimpy," originally titled "Stimpy's First Fart." My grandmother bought me the VHS of this special one year for Christmas. I remember thinking about how unlikely it was that a cartoon character as gross as Stimpy had never farted before.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 7

A bell from the bells segment of Will Vinton's Claymation Christmas

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 6

Emmet Otter from Jim Henson's adaption of the children's storybook, Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 5

From South Park, Kyle and his pal Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 4

Chewbacca, his son Lumpy, and his father Itchy from the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special. For those who haven't seen it, yes, those are the actual names of Chewy's family.

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 3

 

A California Raisin from Will Vinton's Claymation Christmas. There's also a reference to a live-action Christmas movie that I'm wondering if anyone will get...

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 2

Hermey and Rudolph from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. I love stop motion animation, but does anyone else think that parodies of this special are starting to be a bit overused?

25 Days of Xmas Drawings: Day 1

Each day in December from now until the 25th I'm going to post a new drawing inspired by the classic Christmas specials I grew up with, so check back every day this month!

First up is the Bumble from the very famous Rankin Bass stop motion classic Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

Keyboard Girl

Here's a commission I finished not too long ago for a music production studio. They wanted an original pin-up that involved a vintage keyboard synthesizer; beyond that I was given free reign. Luckily I enjoy drawing pin-ups and love the design of vintage electronics (a weird interest, I know, but us designers can find visual interest just about anywhere.)

I'm really happy with the finished result. I did some research on keyboard synthesizers and tried to stay authentic while still playing around with it here and there to give it a fun design.

Robotnik

Here's my piece for the Sonic Generations art show! Which, as I'm sure you can guess, is an exhibition that pays tribute to the beloved Sonic the Hedgehog video game series. It'll be opening at Brave New Worlds in Philadelphia next month.

Dr. Robotnik was the first character that came to my mind because it bugs me how in later years his name has been changed to Dr. Eggman. I'm not sure if it's one of those deals like in Mario games where Princess Toadstool's name was changed to Peach because that's what it was always intended to be (It was changed by Nintendo of America when the first Mario game was brought over from Japan) but I still like Robotnik better. Not that this piece does anything to make that distinction, hah. I did put the final piece in an oval frame to emphasize his egg-like body, however.

A little Dr. Robotnik trivia, his design was based on Theodore Roosevelt.

Here is the website for the show where you can check out all the other art, and here's the invite:

My buddy Chris Beaumont, founder of Cubeecraft.com, is in charge of the show, so thanks to him for the invite and for putting on what I'm sure will be an awesome show!

Fill Up Your Hearts

Check out this new Zelda tribute blog called Fill Up Your Hearts. It was started by my friend Chogrin and features art by fellow Autumn Society members. I've got a couple pieces posted there, and all the featured art is seriously outstanding.

The launch of the blog coincides with the release of the latest Zelda Game, Skyward Sword. I was able to pick up a special edition copy today but just by the skin of my teeth. Apparently it is a very limited release; even Amazon is sold out!

Comissioned Piece

I was commissioned to do this piece by a guy who wanted a present for his girlfriend, and he contacted me since they are both fans of my work. He asked me at just the right time schedule wise, and what can I say, the fact that they are a couple who both like my art was really cool to me. The props are requested references to the video games Street Fighter and Bayonetta respectively, and he wanted me to show off her cool spine tattoo. I'm really glad I could help out with a cool gift!

The Video Dead Apocalypse

Now that Halloween has come and gone, here's the full three page comic that I contributed to the Halloween edition of the Strange Kids Club magazine, written by Rondal Scott and illustrated by me.

I was almost finished with the whole thing when I had the idea to give myself a live-action cameo. Since I own a power glove, I took a photo of myself putting it on to replace the illustration in the first panel of the the third page.

I forgot that I had done such a clean job on the pencils, so here are those as well in case anyone is interested!

Please Post Bills

This is my piece for Gallery 1988's Please Post Bills art show, a tribute to Bill Murray.  I was initially at a bit of a loss for what to draw because there is an unusually large amount of great Bill Murray artwork out there already, and I knew more awesome work would be created for this show. It was finally my girlfriend who suggested the idea of Bill's characters from Caddy Shack and Fantastic Mr. Fox interacting with each other. I'm not really a huge Caddy Shack fan, and there are so many other Bill Murray movies that I absolutely love, but I thought this was a really clever idea so I went with it.

I also decided to add a bunch of little references to his other movies. In total there are twelve "hidden" references to twelve separate films (including the two already mentioned.) Can you identify them all?


 The show opens tonight, here's the official info:

Artmares

Check out this cool drawing by artist Chase Henderson. For this year's Artmares show he did a series 
of self portraits where he's dressed up as local artists for Halloween, and each piece is in the style of that particular artist. In this one he's dressed like...me! I really like the smock with the picture of my face on it (one of my favorite things about old Halloween costumes) as well as the touches that emulate my work, like the background and the signature.

And speaking of Artmares, here's some nice press from my friend Rondal Scott over on FuelYourIllustration.com.

Hallows Eve

This is my main piece for this year's Artmares show; it's the one I did first and it also took the most time. (Though I'm very happy I was able to play around with all the ideas I had and produce three new works total.)

There's no deeper meaning to this piece other than drawing whatever seemed fun at the time, and adding little elements and design choices as they came to me.

One thing I did while working on this piece was to research the history of Halloween. I found out that originally people carved turnips rather than pumpkins, and they used them as lanterns to go door-to-door on All Saint's Eve asking for gifts in exchange for prayers on All Saint's Day. Pumpkins weren't used until the tradition was brought to America, where they are a native crop and easier to carve since they're larger.

I thought it would be cool to include a turnip lantern, as well as something I remember from my Trick or Treat days, the McDonalds' Halloween pail.

Interesting how some people have deemed Halloween a Satanic holiday when it was originally such a religious affair, huh?

Strange Kids Comix Magazine #2 Update

Here I am enjoying my Halloween edition of Strange Kids Magazine, which you can order here! Also note issue #1 and the Strange Kid T-shirt, both of which I had a hand in. And that creepy mask is included in the book!

If you're on the fence about ordering a copy here are a handful of reviews:

Freddy In Space - Cool Shit: Strange Kid Comix Magazine #2
The Liberal Dead - Strange Kid Comix Magazine #2
The Bloodsrpayer - Retro Radioactivity: A review of Strange Kid Comix #2
ComicBooked.com - Review, Strange Kid Coimx Magazine #2

When the time is right I'll post the full comic that I contributed to this issue.

Wendigo

I've been working on my pieces for this years Artmares show and I really wanted to draw some sort of mythological creature that hasn't been done to death. I already drew the mothman once before, so that was pretty much out. I settled on the wendigo, a creature you'll supposedly turn into if you engage in acts of cannibalism. I drew a lot of inspiration from Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. comics' version of the creature, as well as some images I found online. Apparently there was a low budget horror movie made about a wendigo, and in that it had the giant head of a deer. I have no idea if that has any roots whatsoever in the actual wendigo myth, but I really liked the antlers so I used them.

The Artmares reception will be from 6 to 10 pm on Friday, Octrober 28 at the Kanawha Players Theater, 309 Beauregard St, Charleston, WV.

Donald Duck

For whatever reason I've had the to idea to do a weird drawing of Donald Duck floating in my head for probably a year or two now. Something about the design of early animation characters is just so perfect; it makes you want to do your own take on them even though you know it will never be as good as the original. Also, I recently got to spend a day at Walt Disney World and one of the gift shop items I found were these plush Mickey Mouse dolls that had really weird arbitrary coloring, and I loved them. I eventually found a Minnie, Goofy, and several color variations for Mickey, but no Donald. So I decided to carry the idea over to  my drawing and give Donald his own funky palette.

Adventure Time Update

The Dr. Sketchy Adventure Time session got a nice mention on TheDailyWhat.

And Chase Henderson has put up a ton of pictures from the event which you can check out here on his site. All the photos are great, so give them a look. Plus they have more nudity than the ones I posted earlier in the week! Which may or may not be a good thing depending on if you're reading this from your couch at home or from an office surrounded by coworkers.

Ghost Glen

A Halloween themed self portrait, just for fun.

Dr. Sketchy's Adventure Time Tribute

I've mentioned Dr. Sketchy on here before, but I'll explain again for the newbies: Dr. Sketchy's Anti Art School is a hybrid figure drawing class and burlesque show, with emphasis on a fun, sexy, and social atmosphere. There are Dr Sketchy branches all over the US and in several countries, and the new branch in my hometown of Charleston, WV has been going strong.

Several months ago Chase Henderson, local artist and the guy in charge of our branch, brought up the idea of doing a session themed after the Cartoon Network show Adventure Time. I think it was mostly thrown out there as a silly "wouldn't this be funny?" sort of idea, but I thought it sounded great, so I encouraged him and offered to help.

Chase quickly set to work recruiting models, and it was officially decided that Charleston's September Dr. Sketchy would be an homage to Adventure Time.

I had a blast at the session and I'm sure everyone else did as well. The poses were clever and tied into the show/characters, costumes were accurate (well, I suppose they had to be creative with what the character's skivvies looked like,) props were cool (including a Beemo,) and everyone was excited to participate in the various contests.

Chase took all the photos you see here, showing off the hard work of  the models: Molly Tilly as Finn and/or Fiona, Lavender Menace as Princess Bubblegum, and Lita Lane as Marceline.

Here are a couple of my drawings from the evening:

Apparently the main Dr Sketchy branch in NY loved this idea and we wouldn't be surprised to see a few more Adventure Time sessions start popping up across the country.