I collect Star Wars toys and have done since I was a kid. I don't try and analyse why, I just do. In my book, I don't drink or gamble so if I want to buy a cool looking toy I do. I've had friends who were uncomforatble with my toy collection but they usually worked in banks or for airlines. I'm amazed at how many people have a demanding appetite for other people's creativity and yet so little understanding or tolerance of the creative process that went into producing it. The same people who walk out of a carefully planned, artistic animated or sci-fi movie saying "That was shit", with no appreciation of the art that went into it, but demand to see another. Anyways, I digress.

When I first started work at the Disney studio, The Lion King had just been released and one morning someone came in with the first bunch of the 2 inch high pvc figures of the movie characters that anyone had seen. I watched as a group of grown men and women descended on them, holding them up, turning them this way and that, understanding how the characters are built, with a trained artists eye. I felt at home in the workplace for the first time in my life.

I like to say I buy the 12" Star Wars figures by Sideshow toy to use as photo reference for my drawings but really, I just like 'em. As I understand sculpture more, and attempt it more, they are a handy tool, and I understand that I have been learning how to sculpt and draw by looking at them for years without realizing it.

My favourite free art galleries have always been the toy aisles of K-Mart.

However, the Sideshow figures are hideously expensive, and flawed. It's the shoes. They have hard plastic boots and even though the figure has ankle articulation you can only stand them up, which makes for limited poseability, which decreases the value for me.



Without the stand they come with supporting them, they have difficulty in standing in anything other than an upright position.



The recently released General Obiwan has Stormtrooper armour whoich means his ankles can bend and he is more poseable and that got me to thinking, how can I change the others?



So, on the first few freezing nights we have had, frustrated by a drawing I couldn't finish, I put down the pencils and grabbed some scrap fabric and set about hand-making some flexible miniature boots. I don't think I have picked up a needle and thread since about 1989. I even managed to find ( at Joshua's suggestion)some cheap mousepads with rubber tread which could be sliced up to make shoe soles.

I carefully hand-sewed and glued four pairs of experimental boots.



Getting the shape was dificult and they're by no means perfect and I still have to figure out how to get a real toe shape with greater ease, if I make more. But, they now stand pretty much however I want them to. The bodies themselves are remarkable designs and have balance and weight in proportions exactly equal to a real human.

Luke Skywalker:



Mace Windu:



Ki Adi Mundi in fancy pirate style boots:



Obi Wan:



So, it whiled away a couple of freezing nights in front of the radio and heater. I thought twice about actually posting this but since hardly anyone is reading these days I did anyway, and yesterday people were wishing me "May the Fourth Be With You".



I hope you enjoyed by Uber-Geeky Craft Project.

I havent had any experience in turning my drawn characters into 3D objects although the idea of doing so has been kicking around in my head for a while.I was introduced to Sculpy by a friend and bought a few packets of Sculpy and then it sat under the desk for 18 months.On Saturday night,frustrated with a drawing I was trying to finsih that just wasn't getting anywhere,I pulled the handsome black box out from under the desk and set about making something for the first time.I made a dog(complete with wire frame and tin foil armature)but I thought he was drivative and amateurish,and I was embarassed at having made something that looked lke a child did it.

I promptly tore it back up and out of the same clay came Karl.I decided that was his name and that he would probabaly have a voice like Ray Romano( I know Romano has already voiced an animated charcacter but I can't recall who).Stuck for how to sculpt his whiskers I salvaged some from the bath scrubber and an old brush.I now owe my housemate a new bath scrubber but when inspiration strikes you just have to say art made me do it.It works for Woody Allen.

This is Karl.He's an otter.I made him.











Clicking on any of the pictures willt ake you to my flickr where there are a few more.

He is close enough to this drawing I made for Joshua when we first met which is now in his apartment.





I cna totally see him mass produced as a vinyl toy.Let me know your thoughts!

My first attempt at sculpting a human face.She is only about the size of two quarters( thats an Australian 20 cent piece in the pic) and although I don't have the right tools I was able tog et some good detail.I researched online and you can make adequate tools out of bits of wire and chopsticks.



Dolls head shown for comparison. I also used this doll's head as a guide to get the shape and contours of the cheekbones, brows and jaw etc. The eyes were very, very difficult to get accurate at such a small scale. I will definitely be making further attempts at this.



I don't think I did too badly for a first attempt.

Coleman Trebor, an obscure Jedi character from "Attack of the Clones".

I sketched him using the 3 and 3/4 inch action figure as a model since finding decent reference pictures of him is difficult. Using photos of the 3D characters as reference is difficult since they never show enough detail and have a muddy appearance.

.......and another from a few weeks ago. This one is rather elven, a little Lord of the Rings than your regular Jedi. I am trying more to create my own rather than do more of the movie characters.



Clicking on the image takes you to my flickr.

Another Jedi of my own design, showing work in progress to finished sketch.



I also use the Sideshow Star Wars figures as photo reference( which really is just an excuse to buy them) for folds and fabric and such, which is better now since I completely remade their boots by hand so they can be posed more easily( I'll post how I made the boots another time).



I still don't have a scanner so I'm just photographing stuff from above. A tip: don't plug the wrong power cord into your scanner cos if smoke comes out it's probably not a good sign.

Here's how he turned out anyway. A Jedi with a slightly more elaborate costume than usual. Maybe he's from a time before the Jedi became austere and serious.

I would like a job at LucasArts or Dark Horse comics plz.Please! I'll do anything!



Clicking on any of the pics takes you to my flickr page where there are alot more pics and art!

Her name is Saturday Night, because that is when she was born.

Sora Bulq, another Jedi seen all-too-briefly in "Attack of the Clones"

Saesee Tiin, a Jedi knight seen briefly in the last 3 Star Wars films. Clicking on the pic will take you to my flickr page with more drawings.

Aayla Secura, a female Twi'lek Jedi featured in the last two Star Wars movies.Created by Dark Horse comics,George lucas apparently liked her so much he decided to include her in the films,the only time such a thing has happened.

A Jedi character called Bultar Swan, seen briefly in "Attack of the Clones"

Braids

Recent Scribbles

I have been back at the drawing board and no real inspiration yet but have been happily scribbling Jedi....

Walking home in the snow......

I finally finished this drawing.It is amazing what you can get done when you have some time alone.Having time to myself to draw in the evenings lately has really made me realise how important a need it is for me to create art.

This is my girl-in-kimono-and-her-cat theme again which I look forward to continuing...again this is photographed poorly until I can get a bigger scanner.

Work in Progress

Here are some work in progress shots of a drawing I am currently working on,continuing the Japanese girl and cat duo that I've created.The drawing is not entirely finished,and I had to photograph it from above,with my phone,because my camera isnt working.,and i cant scan it,because the drawing wont fit on my scanner,and thats not working either!This is why I dont like using technology and prefer pencils!!!

Portrait of a young Jewish man

I finally finsihed this portrait which I began some time ago.He has sat on my desk unfinished at my old hosue and now that I moved and I've had some peace and quiet he is finished.He is based on photographs which appear in Roman Vishniac's book "A Vanished World".The drawing was too ig for the scanner so I had to take a bad photograph,so the quality is low and you cant see the detail.I'm very pleased with how this simple yet powerful image came out.

Disney MCP Figurines

I've created another blog to share information about my interest in Disney collectables,in particular the range made by MCP in Australia,and other Disney collectabels that I either collect or take an interest in.

You'll find it at http://disneymcp.blogspot.com/

Down in the park
Any day of the week
Bears are playing
Hide and seek

A young female astronaut.

Blue Lady

On A Saturday Morning

On a Saturday morning
Somewhere in France
A man sipped coffee
In stripey pants

Well if the Olympic opening ceremony were riveting I wouldn't be sitting here sketching while I'm watching it now would I?

Portrait of a young woman,from an old sketchbook.

A while ago I started drawing jedi characters alot as an exercise in drawing alot more and sharpening my creative skills again.I created one character,an alien jedi who wore a blindfold.This jedi relied on the force to be its eyes and ears.At this stage the character was neither male nor female,I hadnt decided beyond the sketch I had done.

I didnt pick up the sketchbook agin for a while,then did a couple of quick sketches the other night attempting to decide how a more realistic version of the characer might look.

By the time I did the sketch below left I thought this was the look I was going for,but I needed some more reference.It was hard to create a lifelike sketch from inside my head.

Using some sculpy and the Assaj Ventress figure I did a quick sculpt based on my drawing,complete with blindfold.I grabbed my cameraphone and took a few snaps to work from.






So,a few more hours later I had a finished pencil sketch of what I wanted this character to look like.Although she is similar to Aayla Secura(a character created by Dark Horse comics who eventually was written into the last 2 Star Wars films),her lekku(the tentacles on her head)sit forward on each side of her forehead instead of behind the head,and these are what she uses to sense what is going on around her.

Madonna

An old pencil portrait of Madonna that I did a long time ago.I found it while going through old folios after moving house.

Conversation

I spent all day in earnest conversation with someone.Whenever we speak,there is never a dull moment,we never run out of things to say.There's never a moments silence,we just talk and talk.It just flows naturally.Isnt it great when you find someone who is that easy to talk to?You dont notice the time fly by.

So after I was inspired to pick up my pencil and tried to draw different expressions and elements from the conversation.Its been a while so this was good practice!

I havent posted to this blog in an age,mostly because I thought nobody was looking.Also my cat(and major source of inspiration) was run over and killed.Oh yeah and I fell crazy in love and skype way too often to pick up a pencil.

I will continue soon!When I have some new drawings done and Im not too lazy to reach under my desk and plug the scanner back in.......

30X30 Jedi : Day 6

Im running behind!My excuse is a dodgy internet connection and yesterdays 40 degree heat.Add to that my room was the only one not getting any air conditioning cos the vent was closed(and I didnt realise) and I barely slept a wink last night!

I started a rough of a manly young padawan with an eye patch,but gave in due to the heat.I tried him again tonight and here is a cleaned up(but not necessarily final)version.For Jeff,whose eye patch was the inspiration.

30X30 Jedi : Day 5

She looks a little like a character in Return of the Sith called Barriss Offee,one of the female Jedi healers who didnt get alot of screen time.I really enjoyed doing this one.

30X30 Jedi : Day 4

A day late but drawn in ten minutes.

30X30 Jedi: Day 3

A Twi'lek babe of the Sith?You betcha!

30X30 Jedi : Day Two

Original character design,inspired by Maori Moko and shown here actual size.Made possible only by having KISS:Psycho Circus up very,very loud!

I've seen alot of people do a thing on their livejournal called 30X30,where they do 30 posts in 30 days.I've moved,the drawing desk is set up to go,and I've got some time on my hands,so...I'm embarking on a little art project.

My project combines my love of Star wars and all things geeky with my love of drawing.I've been really inspired by the work done on the series of Jedi character 12" action figures made by the Sideshow Toycompany.The level of detail and commitment to authenticity is amazing.I thought about making 30x30 an art exercise and a test of my drawing discipline,so:

"30x30 JEDI: Thirty Jedi in Thirty Days" is my mission!

I'm gonna do a mix of original designs of my own and characters from the movies or comics.It can be quick sketches or detailed but they have to be started and completed within the 30 day period,thats my only rule.I'm going into it hoping I can keep up with the challenge of drawing and posting everyday for a month,and not running out of ideas!

Starting ummmmmmmm......NOW!

Here's one of the people who inspired this character,my ex-flatmate Ayuri and my cat Thumper,who were inseperable!I've had several japanese girls living with me and theye ach inspired this series.

Here's a work in progress as I'm finally getting around to doing some work on this series of the Japanese girl character and her cat.This is my first attempt at a properly rendered drawing of these two,and I liked the idea of watching them walk away from us thru the snow.Since this scan I've worked it a bit more and will show the results as I do more.I thought it might be an ok thing to do some work-in-progress posts as I do it.

I started without a clear idea of what I wanted ot to look like,so that means I end up overworking certain areas and then removing them,which I've already done here.

I also wish it didnt take me so long to complete a drawing,but I've just moved house. I'm going to lower the line of horizon that they are standing on to make the cat more of a silhouette,and fix her obi to make it more genuine.You'll see that in the next scan.....

I really otter post more often!

This was a drawing done as a gift for *someone* who loves otters very very much.I wasnt sure what otters looked like exactly so I googled a few pics and had a look on flickr(both an incredible instant reference source) and this is what I came up with.I remembered seeing otters in Disney's "Pocahontas" so I had a look at those but was attemtping my own style here,true to nature,but with an animated look.I think I pulled it off.

The closer I get to 40 the more important it is becoming in my mind to do for a living what makes me happy.Just waiting for the next opportunity......waiting........waiting.........

Listening to 80's freestyle,sipping coffee,eating chocloate,and drawing some bears heads.Nice.There was a particular type of eye I was attempting to learn.Tonight's rough scribbles,after two days training at the new job.

Cherry Blossoms

My second attempt at a rough of these two characters.Bear in mind these are only on thin animation paper,which doesnt lend itself to intense detail in the shading,its very flat and smooth paper.When I've fleshed these out a little more I can make some attempts at a more finished style....and then maybe in coulour as well.Still I am pleased with what I've attempted so far.

If you happen to come across this page and you like my stuff please leave a comment!I have no idea who if anyone looks at this blog and it'd be nice to have some idea....you dont have to be a blogger member to comment!

Click image to see actual size.

Inspired by seeing my flatmate Ayuri,with her flowing black hair, walking around the house carrying my pure white cat, I began to make some quick sketches playing with the shapes and the contrasting black and white of the hair and the cat.I finished this quickie sketch(while listening to Bernadette Peters at Carnegie Hall) but intend to explore this theme further,I like these two little characters!

I do also need to learn how to scan correctly.......

Too big for the scanner so I had to photograph this one on the wall!

We are all odd birds in our own way.

I wandered past the pet store and there were some Beagle cross Bassett Hound pups.I guess they stuck in my head cos when I sat down to draw these came out!Cant get the "Disney" outta my pencil lately,not that its a bad thing.One day real drawing will be fashionable again,and we wont have to watch any more films of cars with mouths.

A personal favourite drawing,and a favourite comic character,Nightwing.

Smoking Girl,an old one but I like the detail in the mysterious city denizens to the right.They seem to be looking directly at us even though they have no facial features.

A quick sketch done while listening to Goapele.Her music is really inspiring to me.Have a listen at http://www.goapele.com

Man with Beard,circa 1995(?)

An abandoned costume sketch.

Some Star wars inspired art,a very old sketch of bounty hunter Boussh.I'll never forget sitting in the theatre in 1983 and when this character takes off it's helmet and Princess Leia was underneath!

Been scanning the bottom of the barrel of old sketches,found this caricature of Barbra Streisand.

Just who is DoubleDog!?!?

Some cats,some dogs.
From my old sketchbook.

Whoops!Ive been quite remiss in not keeping up to dat with posting anything on this site.I did intend for it to herald a leap back inot my drawing!Above is a quick sketch from Xmas and more to come soon!

Me with my true friend and inspiration.Watching animals move around in their world is truly inspiring to me.Without cats and dogs we would have not evolved or survived as a species.

I decided it was about time I started participating in Illustration Friday!!http://www.illustrationfriday.com/index.php
This weeks theme is "Mask".
I did something very quickly,since its my first time.

I dont know what it is with me and rabbits and lions lately.Or what these two are doing!

Here's a more recent sketch of Wonder Woman that I did.I am heavily into the style of Adam Hughes and Alex Ross and this is evident here!This is my "other" style,the one that isnt cartoon animals.More to come!

I was fascinated reading everyone's stories of the different ways in which they were trying to either to accomodate or incorporate Christmas into their Jewish holiday and family celebrations,or simply put it behind them.It prompted me to do this quick sketch,and wish everyone a Happy season however they choose to celebrate it.

I told him not to stay out late and definitely not to smoke.

Some quick sketches of my cat.The second sketch really sums him up.That's how he looks when he's saying "You cant make me" or "You are not paying me enough attention".

I didnt realise it had been 20 whole days since I postede,but now the scanner is up and running so I have no excuse to either (a) do more drawing or (b)post them as soon as I do them,and post some older work as well.

So this is new,just a quick sketch of a lion with flight goggles on.If we find his plane,we might even go somewhere with this...

Two more really really old ink and watercolour drawings.

More from the 80s.

I think living on the water I became obsessed with mermaids.I was living in my first flat in Balmain,at the bottom of Elliot street,right on Sydney Harbour,in a huge 1950's public housing estate that still stands.I could watch boats come and go from every room and always hear the lapping of the sea against the rocks just three floors below.Pelicans would land below my window on the lawn.It was a magical,very lucky time in my life.

I drew an awful lot of mermaids then.The second drawing is from a story about an ice queen and her penguin minions.I got my first real job after a long period of unemployment at this time.I was working in a bookstore,Abbeys books in York street in the city,which was alot of fun although I had alot of difficulty living on my own and running my own life at just 18.But at Abbeys there were always alot of great books for inspiration and I was looking at alot of Erte illustrations and classic childrens books.I think these drawings of mine still stand up despite some very strange anatomy.

When I was 18 I had my first apartment and since I was living on my own it was the first place I was really able to concentrate on my drawing.It was the first place where I thought maybe I could make a living doing it.So I would work all week and then on Friday and Saturday nights I would stay home,put on my favourite music and draw till the wee hours.Thanks to the person who bought me that filter coffee machine!

This is one example from that time,done with a Rotring pen. It was all mermaids and genies in those days.

The first rough sketch where Sleeper appeared.And yes,I know that looks just like a Moomintroll sitting there on the seat!I LOVE Moomintrolls and the Moomin books are a huge inspiration to me.

Here's a composite of roughs of some bunny characters.Or are they chihuahuas?Who can say!

I dont know if anyone is viewing these but if you can leave a comment please do so!

This little guy is Sleeper,a cat character I created.He just kind of,well....sleeps alot.Anywhere.Everywhere.

One hundred million years ago when I applied to the traineeship at Walt Disney I had to submit about 7 drawings for consideration.I picked out what I thought was my best work,and threw this one in at the last minute.This was the one they said that clinched my being accepted to the program.

This is a personal favourite,and the original was given to someone who at the time was making me as happy as the mouse is in this picture.

Bear in a boat

Here's another of these bears this time in a boat.Dont really know where I was going with this one,or where he's going in the boat.

Another bear,who is he waiting for in the rain?

I'm not keen on the stance on this one,but never got round to fixing it.I am very keen on his experession,he seems resigned and yet hopeful, and I was very happy with the way he turned out overall.It can take the most minimal pencil line to create the strongest emotion in a character's face.

With creating the fur,the way I create that very soft looking fur and the soft edges of the linework is to use an average 2B pencil and kind of genty roll it over the paper,not going for any solid line or cross-hatching.I'm a huge fan of Disney's "Winnie the Pooh" style and also the original Sheppard illustrations so these bears have abit of that in them.

Bears

For a while,in a creative period in about 2003, I had a thing for drawing bears.I was in a safe space domestically and my drawing flourished.It doesnt do so well when I am not feeling settled and comfortable,but when I am,the creativity flows.At the moment,it aint flowing!

At the time I drew this I was trying out some ideas for character design and greeting cards.It had been a while since I had moved to Melbourne and basically given up on finding any paid work in an animation studio.I'd become busy with other career moves,things that were for a while successful and new which distracted me from the need to draw.I think that time is now over.Getting a new scanner soon courtesy of my good friend Grant over http://www.afrenasia.com so I should be able to post some more recent work,and post things as I do them.

I decided after seeing all the great artist blogs on blogger to set up my own to showcase not only my own artwork but also the artists I love,and in doing so inspire myself to create more drawings and characters!Maybe it will inspire some others as well!

The above drawing was done in 2003,all pencil.