Survival Tactics and First Snows

Two posts in one day, both with new work!? What's happening to the world? This is the fourth and final illustration in a series I did for a client. The story was about a couple who got stranded in the frozen north. Due to the quick turn around on work, I ended up doing this all on the wacom...and uhh, a bit sloppily I might add. This is the best one by far, but thats probably due to how much I love drawing starved wolves. Photoshop CS3 is the best thing that ever happened to me...it handles gradients so so smoothly. And this whole thing also reminded me how much I love drawing snow scenes, or maybe just using white...I'm not quite sure. I am also super happy with the colors on this particular image...though, I didn't do anything I don't normally do....so I am going to blame that on the awesomeness of CS3.

And speaking of snow scenes, today is the first decent snow we have had in Chicago. 2 inches in a few hours, and no sign of it stopping. I don't think there is anything I really like more than working while watching the snow fall outside. Took Ichabod for a quick walk in the snow...which surprisingly he loved every second of. This may be the first time he has seen snow in his 5 years. They raced him in Florida, so who knows kind of weather the big guy has seen. He totally freaked out, and ran full speed (okay, not full speed...considering full speed is FULL SPEED for a greyhound) dragging my clumsy ass behind him. I didn't get my boots resoled this fall, and I am now paying the consequences.

And now speaking of boots. I was making a list the other day of things I love in art (illustration, comics, literature, traditional art, etc). There is a part in Pope's "Heavy Liquid" where S is making his way to his ex's to ask her about doing the statue. Somewhere in there, his ex talks about how he looks the same, and is still wearing the same boots that he just keeps getting resoled over and over again. I have always loved that part.

So, the work continues. It is only Tuesday and already I am looking forward to a few days off. I have a slew of deadlines from all over the place, all due before or on Friday morning. But it's not all bad; one is another piece for Penthouse, and another is an album cover for Type Records (unless John has forgotten all about me, due to my constant tardiness with Type deadlines).