Elevator Pitch

I wrote an article recently for the Creative Relay blog about the importance of having an elevator pitch that helps to sell you, as well as realizing that every situation where you meet someone new can be viewed as an interview.

To go with the article I created the above image of the elevator counting down for you.

You can read the article here: Rock the Interview

Domesticated Dog

Tintin Poster Commission Hot Air Balloon over Africa

In November, I was hired to create a custom Tintin poster as a surprise Christmas gift by a man for his fiancée. He came to me with what he wanted represented in the image (which is meant to look like the cover of a Tintin book) along with some photos and I put together a few sketches.

It's important to give your client what they ask for but to find the right spin on it. Originally, he requested that the balloon (and fiancée) be on the ground but I found that the composition wasn't going to be dynamic enough and it would be hard for a viewer to know what to focus on. So I brought the balloon to the foreground.

He wanted zebras, an elephant, a giraffe, a leopard, a Great Dane, a bird and a Vervet monkey.

I poured through Tintin books at the library (and at my parents' house) to really understand how Hergé would have done these characters and the background. His style is so simple and each line is perfect and intentional; it can be a little daunting but I was able to work it out.

Below are some screenshots I took while I worked:

The progression for the balloon and basket. Although very little of the balloon shows in the final piece, I drew it in its entirety.

The various characters start coming together.

Mostly done. The photo at the bottom right is a portion of a shot I took in Africa in 2007 and I was using it to try to get the tall grass right. In the final piece you'll note that the zebras have been switched around (which meant thickening or thinning the line weights accordingly) and a few elements were moved to improve the flow.

My client's fiancée loved the gift and the poster/book cover is framed and hanging in their home.

Grammar Illustrated: Two, Too and To

Grammar, Illustrated: Heroine vs. Heroin

This was just posted on the Creative Relay blog.

There's a lot of bad grammar and misuse of words out there- we'd like to fix one recurring mistake:

Groundhog Day 2012

Happy Groundhog's Day! 

What did you get me?

Another installment of my yearly Groundhog Day celebration. I've been creating illustrations and cards for Groundhog Day since 1992 (I skipped a couple of years somewhere in there) and this time I show what it would be like for either outcome.

You can check out a bunch more Groundhog Day illustrations on this blog by clicking HERE.

Excuse me- I have to go rent Groundhog Day, the movie, and watch it over and over and over...


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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

A Kiss for the New Year

This is an illustration I recently created for a client's blog and newsletter. One of their articles talked about the Hershey's Kisses that the company's clients couldn't keep their hands off during the New Year's party so it was a no-brainer what the illustration should be!

This style is a little more realistic than my usual so it falls under the "FRED" section of my website.

My Slides for a Social Event

Because creative people don't get out of the house much (at least not us freelance types and especially not those with a newborn like I have), AIGA Boston has put together a large social event - Cross-Org AFTA - for creative professionals in the Boston area. It's an opportunity to network, schmooze and compare drawing pen nibs.

I'll be there as a working illustrator/graphic designer and also as the co-founder of Creative Relay as we are one of the 12 co-host design organizations. Very exciting considering we've only been around since September 2011.

Here are all the hosts:

During the course of the evening there will be a slideshow of submitted work so I thought that I would post my slides on my blog. They run the gamut of kid's stuff to editorial illustrations to superheroes to design-y pieces with a little bit of illustration.

Looking forward to getting out of the house!

Tickle Monsters

Here's a Sneak-Peek at Vanessa Trien's new stickers which will debut at her big Coolidge Corner Theatre show in Brookline, MA on December 11.

I designed Vanessa's logo, and her most recent CD, Carnival Day, a few years back and she's now recording a new CD. One of the most popular of her new songs is without a doubt Tickle Monster. In fact, after going to one of her shows, a friend asked me if I had a way of getting an advanced recording of that song since I have an 'in' with Vanessa!

Vanessa asked me to design some stickers (and tattoos later!) for her show and this is what I came up with in a very, very short amount of time. The text is all hand lettered to have a fun, organic feel to it.

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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

Recent Book Illustrations

I recently completed illustrations for a new book by a local (to Boston) author, Nancy Finn. The name of the book is e-Patients Live Longer and it is a book that describes how to be an e-Patient who uses the tools available in today's wired world to become empowered and knowledgeable about your health issues and take the proper actions and precautions that protect you from making critical mistakes. Yes, that's a long sentence but it describes the book so well!

I really enjoyed working directly with the author to work out what images would best describe the chapter and we went through a few rounds of sketches so I could refine the details before I created the final art.

Leo Monster

My son started Kindergarten last week and a few nights ago we had curriculum night. The teacher left out paper and crayons for parents to leave their child a note and this is what I left Leo in his cubby.

Tan Lines

I feel a little awkward telling you I went on vacation after I've already returned, but I guess it's better than announcing to the world that our home is unoccupied and available for plundering. We had a wonderful time and I was actually able to do some work between visits to the pool, the beach and, most importantly, the bed.

I did a number of sketches while away but I really wanted to show off the tan lines from my thongs first:

That's hot. I know.

And below is a drawing I did in my sketchbook (in a sketchier style than my usual) and then colored in Adobe Illustrator and finished in Photoshop.

It's good to be back!

Plaid Boy

Plaid Boy! Able to match his shirt to the background!

Actually, this is me playing with some of the new tools in Adobe Illustrator CS5.

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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

Float Around

From the sketchbook.

Changing the World- Tikkun Olam

This is a t-shirt design I created for a summer camp in New York. The concept is based on Tikkun Olam which means 'repairing the world' in Hebrew. The idea behind Tikkun Olam is that we are all responsible for the world and society and must work to improve the lives of everyone around us.

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Some other designs before the client chose the final version:

I like this one because it's very straight-forward. There's the Israeli flag with the bottom (stylized) stripe doubling as the soil which is giving way to seedlings.

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 This is a fun one and might make a nice poster with additional colors.

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Maybe too straight-forward? I like the figurative meaning of the earlier designs and this one requires no interpretation- it's a little too obvious. I included this concept because I like the symmetry of the design.

Icarus/Octopus

My homage to Matisse's Icarus paper cut. A poster, print or postcard is available at DeviantArt.

Characters: Doodle Roll

I received a call from Jan at Big Blue Dot (a branding company for kids I've wanted to work with for years) to create characters for a new product called Doodle Roll. I was given a lot of room to be creative with these characters and I hope you agree that they turned out fun and friendly! In fact, if you go to the Doodle Roll website (see below) you can watch them move (a bit)!

 

Below is a page of second round sketches from which the client chose the top 6 characters for me to create a final illustration.

Final illustrations were created in Adobe Freehand and Adobe Illustrator (I was in the middle of completing a switch to Illustrator at the time of this project).

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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

French Fries

Supersized fries may be gone from McDonalds but there's still an expanding (pun intended!) need for supersized pants.

(And for a funny extra-large anecdote, check out this article on how a pair of over-sized pant(ie)s actually prevented a house fire. I guess there's some good in the bad.)

Buff's Pub's New Shirt

Buff's Pub in Newton, MA is selling a new t-shirt I designed. For those not from the area, the font is the same one used by the Boston Red Sox baseball team. The Pub is something of a mini sports bar so it just made sense to connect the two images (and in the interest of full disclosure, Dave M. from Buff's came up with the concept).

Now, I'm not suggesting you should go to Buff's just to buy the t-shirt, but considering Buff's has (in my humble opinion) THE BEST buffalo wings, it's certainly worth a trip.

And here are some long-sleeved shirts I designed late last year. Most of these shirts have sold out.

Update: The day after I posted this blog update, I got a call from Buff's to reorder the Sox shirts- the shirts are hot!

Business of Art

Header illustration and modified design for an event I helped produce for the Boston Chapter of the Graphic Artists Guild. I was highly influenced by Bob Staake who I mentioned before as an influence on my Eddie Spaghetti illustration. If you click Bob's link, turn off your sound. (People- please don't force visitors to your website to listen to music!)

The idea here is that creative people in general don't like to deal with the 'business' part of their business and that will only hurt them. So here's a guy deeply entrenched in being creative, who is worried about having to do the business stuff...

Character: 3-eyed Purple Jumping Monster

Adobe Illustrator CS5 has some great new tools and I thought I'd try them out with this monster dude. While this guy's body looks painted, all of the color is actually vector! If you know the difference between vector and raster art, you'll realize just how cool this really is. To watch a tutorial on 5 of the new features, click here.

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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

Step Carefully

When walking behind a slimy monster, be sure to carefully step over the tail. Don't do what Han Solo did to Jabba (54 second mark).

Groundhog Day 2011

It's that time of the year again when the Groundhog comes out of his den and looks for his shadow. That is, unless he can't get out of his home because the exit is plugged with icicles and covered with 4 feet of snow...

I live in Boston and we've been inundated with snow to the point where I'm running out of places to put the white (and sometimes yellow) stuff. And that's why I created this particular Groundhog Day cartoon this year. Enjoy!

*You can check out a bunch more Groundhog Day illustrations on this blog by clicking HERE.

By the way, you can check out the official website of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club here.

Characters: Monster with Top Hat

Here's a charming fellow I sketched up the other day. I was interested in creating a bit of texture on his skin which I continued when I added color.

I picture him saying: "Thank you for inviting me over. Your cat was delicious..."

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I’ve been doing a lot of character development lately and from time to time I show off new characters on my blog. Sometimes they’re black and white and sketchy and other times full color and finished. If you want to see more from this series, just click this “characters” tag. You can also see a collection of characters in my Behance portfolio or on my website.

Dr. Brown's Cream Soda

Mmmmm...