Work Sketch

Something for work.

Sketching

Made some nice progress on this one tonight.

Guitar mermaid decal walk through using Lazertran.

My friends Jonny and Lacey Rojas, made an artistic request from me not long ago.  Rather than a traditional wedding guest book at their reception they wanted to have all their guests sign a guitar to later be displayed in their home.  Jonny is a musician hence the guitar, and Lacey loves the ocean and has a fondness for mermaids so... they wanted me to paint or draw a mermaid on their guitar.  I took on the challenge, and rather than reinventing the wheel on this, I did my research to see what the traditional methods are to adding art to guitars, and ended up creating a water-slide decal that I applied to the body.  Here are the steps:

First I sketched the mermaid and made sure my friends were happy with it.  I went for an art nuveau look inspired by Mucha.  The tail ended up on a separate sheet.  I tend to almost always draw larger than my sketchbook.

After having scanned the image, I aligned the pieces in photoshop to make sure the tail attached at the correct angle that I wanted it to appear on the guitar.

(Photo by Cristina Starr)

Then, I painted the colors in using photoshop.

I then printed the mermaid at several different sizes on plain paper, making sure I had the correct size for the guitar before printing on my transfer paper ( I used lazertran inkjet decal paper).  Once I was sure the size was right, I printed on my Lazertran transfer paper, and cut the mermaid to fit the space on the guitar.

I then proceeded outside with the guitar, my printouts, and the following items: a bowl of warm water, some paper towels, some rubbing alcohol, and a polyurethane spray varnish.

Then, I wiped down the surface of the guitar with the rubbing alcohol, prepping it and making sure it was clean. (I had sanded out some scratches and divots in the surface of the guitar prior to this)

 I then submerged the lazertran pieces in warm water, for about 15 seconds, until the backing began to separate from the decal.

Then using my fingers I slid the backing away from the transfer and applied the transfer onto the guitar.  Lazertran is sturdy, and I was able to slide it around on the surface of the guitar until I had it in the proper position.  I was also able to push any air bubbles out to the edges by gently pushing them with my fingers.

This done, I waited for the transfer to dry.  It dries opaque, so you can see the progress.

Once completely dry, I taped off the areas of the guitar I did not want to spray the polyurethane on.  I even shoved a paper towel inside the body to guard from over spray.

After this I sprayed several coats of the polyurethane over the decal and face of the guitar body.  After the first coat, the decal again became transparent.  I sprayed additional coats to ensure the decal lasted and also to help blend the elevated paper in with the rest of the guitar body.  I don't have any pictures of this process because I didn't want to get polyurethane on my phone.  You can use either a paint on or spray on polyurethane.  I chose the spray type, so I wouldn't have to worry about brush strokes.  Make sure you follow all directions of whichever polyurethane you use, and always apply in a well ventilated (in my case outdoors) area.

And with tape removed, you can see the fuzzy areas where the varnish is still drying :

The polyurethane dried quickly but took overnight to stop smelling.  I left the guitar in the garage to protect it from the elements overnight, and protect me from the fumes.

The finished guitar, nice and dry and shiny:

And the happy couple with the guitar...

I'll try to get them to send me an updated photo of the guitar with all their guests signatures on it as well.

Zombie sketch

Doodle from today when a big file was saving.

EDIT: This is what I ended up doing with this zombie. 

Illustration Friday: Water

Last minute illustration friday post before the new theme comes out tomorrow.  This is a portion of a project I was working on that got shelved.  I can't say what it was for because the other parts will still get made.  I really enjoyed this portion of the overall project and I think it works for the water theme this week.

EDIT: And apparently I'm already too late.  When does IF change their theme?  Aparently not on Fridays anymore.

Illustration Friday: Carry

Yes I know it's not Friday... Illustration Friday is a website that gives a new theme every week for illustrators around the world to find inspiration from to draw during the week.  This week's theme was Carry.  I did this on the bus... and laid in some quick colors tonight.  I imagine the cat was stuck in a tree and she used her rocket pack... oh never mind you probably figured that out on your own.

Story Illustrations

These are some of my favorite story illustrations from last season at Lakeshore.  I did a lot of really fun books, all in vector for them.  All images are copyright Lakeshore of course.

Happy 4th of July!

Cristina and I have both put together art pieces that will be on display at the Good Friday services for our church, Rock Harbor Fullerton.  You should join us.  Friday, April 6th, 5:30pm & 7:30pm
Springfield Banquet Center
501 N. Harbor Blvd., Fullerton

Gallery Show

This is the gallery show I have a piece in.  The opening recepetion will be on Saturday night April 7th from 5:00 to 8:00 at my alma mader Cal State Fullerton in their Begovitch gallery.  You should come out and join us.  They are even encouraging people to dress in Victorian / Steampunk fashions, so it should be quite fun.

Ready for the gallery.

After two hours of mat cutting, it's ready to be dropped off.  I ended up using a colored piece of illustration board to mat because the frame wasn't very deep.

Homunculus Illustration

Illustration I did for an upcoming gallery show based on some steam punk books. My illo is based off the book Homunculus by Blaylock (which I have never read, but was given a synopsis to prep from since it's been out of print for a while). Pencil with digital color.

New Castle Illustration!

Finally had the time to scan this and get it up.  Not the best scan, but it will have to do for now.  It's always a pain scanning large illos.  Hope you all like it.

Princess with Eider Duck

Final two Skateboard Decks

Ok, I finally finnished these up. Day 6 is probably my least favorite so far. That day is very wordy, which meant I was very limited in my composition. Plus I rarely like the way I draw humans. The links to purchase them are below: http://www.zazzle.com/genesis_day_6_skate_deck_skateboard-186342741224490398

and,

http://www.zazzle.com/genesis_day_7_skate_deck_skateboard-186880967376982128

Cars

Here are some car studies I've been working on. The last one is a quick study I did in Flash based on the sketch in the upper left of the second image.

Animated futuristic background

Two versions of this. First a static version so you can see what it looks like when it's not moving. Then an animated video version.

Rat enjoying tea.

Illustration Friday: Beneath

More Skateboards

Hello Everyone, here's the next three skateboards in my series. I know it's been a while, hopefully it won't take as long to get the last two done.

They are as follows,

Day 3: Creation of the Plants

Day 4: Creation of the Sun, Moon, and Stars

Day 5: Creation of the birds of the air and sea creatures

All the boards in the series so far can be purchased at my zazzle store here: http://www.zazzle.com/starrart/gifts?cg=196387112256446263