"Muse #3"

pencil, biro and ink

Not quite ironically, this is an illustration about my creative juices bubbling up through the constraints of commercial design work. Or should that be overflowing due to not being used during such work?

Quite coincidentally, as a follow on from "Muse #2," I was looking for a piece of grey paper but found a blue offcut of the same piece I'd used 8 years or so before!

3D anaglyph poster

mixed media, Photoshop

This is probably my favourite of all the things I've done. Transcending teen angst conventions to become an illustration with meaning.

Was the product of a teacher who, while relentlessly pushing other students, kept telling me I knew what I had to do and gave me enough rope to hang myself, and come back from the creative dead.

As an artist I could have done a suite of works using this one technique for an exhibition (the same with the previous work), but as an illustrator you do it once for meaning and then move on to develop another style for the next piece...

"The Fingerpuppets of Evil"

vector illustration

Done to compete on the American tshirt website Threadless. It was rejected, probably due to the fact that it had an inverted crucifix.

Magazine illustration 1

acrylic on paper, Photoshop

These were done for a uni project halfway through the first term. I got excited that something could involve illustration - not knowing that it would be another year before either the illustration or excitement happened again!

Magazine illustration 2

acrylic on paper, Photoshop

I particularly enjoyed the rough painting technique after years of anal-retentiveness, and breaking out into some Photoshop trickery for a reason other than for its own sake.

Wrestling mask

vector illustration

Inspired by the movie Nacho Libre and a vague desire to do a lino print. Which then seemed like too much work to actually cut and figure out how to print.

Self pictogram

vector illustration

Included mainly to celebrate the fact that this is no longer an accurate representation!