#182 Seven Wonders Sketches Part One

Back around 2009, Nick Francel and I conceived of a series

of prints - probably silk screened, though we considered etchings -

of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World coming to life and

duking it out in a giant monster battle of ancient and epic proportions.

Back then, we did some sketches and divided up the wonders,

but we never got to the actual making stuff together part.

When we met up again in 2011 in Boston, we did a few more 

sketches, and tweaked the ideas a little, but again, no further.

Unfortunately, the original sketches for most of the wonders were 

lost to time and - most likely - the back of a flat-file in St. Louis.

However, I do have one of Nick's sketches from our time in Boston:

(Here we were toying with the idea of making them worm's-eye-views.

But I am bad at foreshortening so we abandoned that.)

We divided up responsibilities, each doing one Wonder per battle:

Nick:                           Jun:

- Hanging Gardens   VS.   Pyramids -

- Temple of Artemis   VS.   Statue of Zeus -

- Colossus of Rhodes   VS.   Lighthouse of Alexandria -

- Collaborative Mausoleum of Halicarnassus Zombie Apocalypse -

In any case, I loved this idea, and think about it often.

With that in mind, I started working on all of them again last month.

And now I have sketches done for everything except for Zeus and Artemis.

I have also rearranged the battles, so that it is as follows: 

Mausoleum VS. Pyramids

Colossus VS. Lighthouse

Zeus + Artemis VS. Gardens

I am posting some of the sketches now here, but I plan on making them 

into etchings eventually. Unfortunately the Cité does not have etching 

facilities, otherwise I would be making the prints as we speak.

Here are some mock ups made with sketches:

This will also have both sides producing giant waves and boats.

The Colossus's boats will have Greek Fire and he might also be blowing fire 

from his torch. The Lighthouse will also have some arrows stuck in him.

I forgot that in my sketches back in 2009, I also had the Sphinx

helping the Pyramids. I will probably add that for the etching.

The Mausoleum was drawn on a much smaller scale, so in the final

there would be a lot more details of statues and such, and many 

more lions and zombie skeletons.

#181 Thick Nexx

I made some doodles of a wide-necked guy and a guy with lots 

of neck wrinkles. The latter was inspired by an dude I saw in the

subway when I was living in New York in 2009. See below.

These might've turned out better if they were done in pencil. O wellz.

#180 The Pig

Animalia: Day 128

The Pig

Trying to do more graphic style. Obviously indebted to Mignola.

I was also consciously avoiding drawing a cute pig.

Too many of the pictures of pigs on the internet are cute.

+ colors.

Tomorrow (not really tho, no scanner): the Platypus.

#179 The Phronima

Animalia: Day 127

The Phronima

The phronima is a deep sea thing with lots of leggies and things.

They're translucent and small and wiggly so in pictures and videos

it is hard to tell exactly how many legs and thangs they have.

They also eat and hollow out the bodies of salps, or barrel-

shaped plankton, and then use the carcasses as vessels in which 

they lay their young.

Here is a vid of a phronima.

Supposedly the xenomorph in Alien was partly based on them.

Not sure if I believe it, but the head does bear some resemblance 

to the Alien queen.

Reversed the image for the colors, and did them pretty quickly,

but I am rather happy with how it turned out. I don't think I have

done this for any of my other animal drawings, so that's exciting.

Tomorrow: the Pig.

#178 The Parrot

Animalia: Day 126

The Parrot

Playing with body/head ratios. Also, you can sneak peek 

tomorrow's animal drawing through the paper... whoops.

Struggled with how bright to make the colors and experimented 

with a very bright and saturated, and then a desaturated, lightened 

version. Ended up settling on a middle ground, leaning towards
more saturated. But happy with the result, regardless.

Tomorrow: the Phronima.

#177 The Panther

Animalia: Day 125

The Panther

Everything about panthers was giving me trouble.

Face shape, making them look mean instead of cute, legs, body, etc. 

So one of the doodles turned out alright and I went with it.

Minimal color, which for some reason still took forever;

made lots of tiny choices regarding placement of highlights, 

color, opacity, softness, etc. Not sure it paid off...

Tomorrow: the Parrot.

#176 The Pangolin

Animalia: Day 124

 The Pangolin

I should really start doing backgrounds... 

Eh, maybs not.

The pangolinnnn.

Tomorrow: the Panther.

#175 The Panda

Animalia: Day 123 

The Panda

A friend / fellow resident let me use her scanner!

So there should be a steady stream of drawings for the next few days.

I didn't want to make a cutesy cute panda, but had a hard time

making him look vicious, so I put him on a pile of skulls.

Tomorrow: the Pangolin.

#174 Godzilla Mugs

Don't have ready access to a scanner 

so no Animalia drawing today, but here is this instead:

A series of mugs that I made last Summer while back in Kentucky.

I apparently forgot to post them to the blog.

Godzilla was first, and thus, the least refined in technique.

Also, the only one made without reference images.

Of course, Hedorah was next, seeing as he is my favorite Godzilla monster.

Gigan was next, another favorite. 

I chipped the tip of his left claw when glazing him though...

And the colors are a bit off.

Then Megalon. A fav as well, I think perhaps my fav during my childhood.

The two vinyl Godzilla figures I cherished the most growing up were

probably Megalon and Hedorah, though also maybe the original Mechagodzilla.

I debated making a Jet Jaguar to complete the Godzilla Vs. Megalon cast.

I ended up using some of my leftover clay to make 

a little Mothra tray, but I don't have an image.

In any case, pretty proud of how these turned out, 

even if some of the colors are a bit off.

EDIT:

Some of my Hedorah things.

#173 The Pachycephalosaurus

Animalia: Day 122 

The Pachycephalosaurus

Finished the one of the left, then experimented with 

ink textures and patterns, didn't turn out great.

So just kept the one on the left.

I need to work on backgrounds, I suppose...

Tomorrow (probably not, it's Bastille day!): the Panda.

#172 The Oviraptor

Animalia: Day 121 

The Oviraptor

Here is the black and white unedited:

I did the big one in brush pen, and after it was finished,

I realized I had neglected the ovi- in oviraptor.

So, I drew the little sketch at the bottom right in homage of Birdo.

Also, there is a HORSE The Band song about Birdo, which at the
beginning samples a bit of Gollum from the animated Hobbit movie.

Color update will be added later, perhaps tomorrow.

EDIT:
Colors!

I wanted to add some yellows and lime greens,
but wasn't able to make it look good. Wompadoooo.

Tomorrow (maybe? might fall behind): the Pachycephalosaurus.

#171 The Otter

Animalia: Day 120

The Otter

Silverpoint on terraskin, again. 

(I tried to capture some Tracy Morgan-ness in the otter at top left.)

And then traced and colored digitally.

Tomorrow (probably actually!): the Oviraptor.

#170 The Ostrich

Animalia: Day 119

The Ostrich

Preliminary doodle.

I did the sketches on the left first, then wanted to exaggerate the

small head, so I did the thumbnail sketch at the bottom.

Then I tried to blow that up, which was not entirely successful.

So then I photoshopped it to be roughly the proportions I wanted.

I tried coloring too, but it was a mess, so you get the grayscale (er, silver).

I am in Paris right now in residency at the Cité Internationale Des Arts,

making drawings and what not, but more on that in another post.

I did these animal drawings a few months ago, but they are silverpoints,

which are apparently difficult to document. 

My scanner blew out the images, and photographing them yielded 

mixed results, but that is what I ended up using.

Anyways, silverpoint on Terraskin, which is paper made from stone.

Tomorrow (maybe actually?!): the Otter.