Aaron M Sketch Blog

JohnK blog

2012-01-27T18:32:00.000-08:00

Good points from John K, the creator of "Ren & Stimpy"...

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2012/01/does-anyone-still-have-real-job.html

Space Art

2011-11-10T21:06:00.000-08:00

Pieces from my art at Mile-Hi Con 2011 in Denver...

MileHi Con 43

2011-10-28T22:58:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who bought artwork and/or visited at MileHi Con!

Animation Backgrounds

2011-10-07T00:17:00.000-07:00

Experiments in an animation backround style, in acrylic paint. Inspired obviously by the great Dr. Seuss, as well as background artists Bill Wray ( http://madaboutcartoons.blogspot.com/ ) and Scott Wills ( http://animationbgs.blogspot.com/ ), whose blogs are...awesome!

Bamboo Paintings

2011-10-06T23:43:00.000-07:00

Many Thanks to Pekoe Sip House for having me show there in September. In the interest of simplicity, I might just be combining the Bamboo blog in with this, my illustration blog. It's kind of a fuzzy line anyway, between fine art and illustration.

Random Storyboards...

2011-07-28T20:00:00.000-07:00

marker experiments with storyboards in the 16X9 or widescreen formats...(I think it's 2.35:1) just for fun and/or practice...

Spy Op Animatics

2011-06-10T17:41:00.000-07:00

This is one of my first animatics, as I add this to my storyboarding services/capabilities. More is to come...
This is a promotional for my comic book entitled "Spy Op"... I was also playing with the graphic possibilities of comic books, and it ended up reminding me of an artsy credit opening like a Hitchcock movie

Black & White Comps

2011-06-04T15:23:00.000-07:00

Comps I'd like to make into paintings soon, just for practice...

Portraits

2011-06-04T01:07:00.000-07:00

I'm experimenting with portraits here and with black & white shading.... I kind of liked the results....
just fan art of course from the Dark Night.

Ahoy There, Matey

2011-04-19T15:29:00.000-07:00

These were some of my ideas for a STARFEST program cover. Alas, they chose to go with a different artist, but that's alright, since it did turn out to be a great cover. Check out http://www.starland.com/
A great Sci-Fi Festival, now joined with COMIC FEST, makes for a pretty fun convention.

Christmas Cards

2010-11-13T00:17:00.000-08:00

It's that time of year again.......

Christmas cards. At the moment I suppose I'm inspired by classic animation backgrounds. These are in acrylic paint. Much appreciation to artists like Scott Wills for some of the inspiration. His amazing backgrounds can be seen here: http://animationbgs.blogspot.com/ Mary Blair also comes to mind...

Dry Brush

2010-11-01T23:14:00.000-07:00

More studies in Acrylic paints.......mixing stuff I've learned from "Space Art" and from studying animation background art.....

Drew: The Man Behind The Poster Trailer

2010-10-21T13:52:00.000-07:00

Raiders of the Lost Art

2010-10-21T13:50:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm not in Hollywood, but what artist hasn't noticed that back before the end of the eighties there used to be many, many movie posters that were actually hand painted or drawn. That seems to have changed to a standard of photographs of the stars. There must be some reason for the change, maybe the "digital age" of photography, effects, etc, so that everything has to look extremely "slick" and digital.

Here is a video from Youtube, about artist Drew Struzan, who looks like will be having a documentary made about him coming out soon. Struzan has created many movie posters we all know and love, ever since the 70's. Perhaps his most recent was for Indiana Jones 4. As an artist, I've been inspired by his artwork, not necessarily to make movie posters (although I've given it a shot), but to just make good art, using the classical principles of art.

Who knows? Maybe at some point there will be a come-back of painted movie posters. Fashions and trends do come and go, especially (I would guess) in Hollywood and advertising. The place I see more artists immitating Drew, or doing great posters otherwise, is in the comic book industry these days.
Of course, Photoshop is here to stay, so maybe the future movie posters will have to incorporate the computer. For me, drawing on the computer, pen tablet even, is still a bit like drawing with boxing gloves on.

(artwork by Drew Struzan from http://www.drewstruzan.com/ )

website for documentary film: http://drewthemovie.com/

(I'm not affiliated with these guys, just blogging)

Space Art

2010-10-05T19:29:00.000-07:00

"Space Art" by Michael Carroll, is one of the coolest art "how to" books I've seen. These are my versions of the first two projects...

Ripple Sketch Cards

2010-06-16T14:03:00.000-07:00

"Ripple" Sketch Cards for the Illustration Friday website and Ripple blog.

The top one is six sketch cards that can be fit together into one big picture. I am very happy to say that they have all sold, and all proceeds benefit The Institute for Marine Mammal Studies and The International Bird Rescue Research Center. Visit the blog at http://ripplesketches.blogspot.com/. Many thanks to Kelly Light for a great idea that will help the animal victims in the Gulf.

Acrylic Paints

2010-06-11T10:25:00.000-07:00

Some experiments in Acrylic Paint, with pencil and pen...

coming soon to a comic book near you

2010-03-22T00:19:00.000-07:00

Some characters from my comic book (or "zine"), "Spy-Op", self-published, digest-zine-size. I handed a few out at Comic Fest, Denver. Great little festival, in it's 2nd year running in Denver.

Canvas Paintings

2009-11-09T22:55:00.000-08:00

Some recent acrylic paintings, mostly small, 6x6 canvas, except for the Espresso piece, which was 16 x 16 or so, a commission for my next door neighbors. And here.........

..........is the sketch for the Espresso piece, approved before I painted it in acrylic on canvas.

Master Studies

2009-10-08T23:24:00.000-07:00

One of the most enjoyable parts of illustrating is the research that goes into a project. These sketches, or studies, were for a Christmas card for a client who happened to like the old Coca-Cola ads from the 1930's and 40's featuring Santa Clause. I found a great little book on the art of Coca-Cola ads during the World War II years, and also did a bit of research on the web of course. I discovered an artist I had not known before, Haddon Sundblom, who created this iconic version of Santa Clause for Coca-Cola around 1931. The images are still seen everywhere. These other characters are also from Coke ads from 1939 and 1942. I did these "master studies" to study the mood, feel, or attitude of these characters. As an illustrator I think Sundblom would be considered a master in the field, along with Rockwell, Perish, Layendecker, and others. I don't hear his name as often though, and there aught to be a book made about him. It was a fun trip back to another time.

Space Traveler

2009-09-21T12:47:00.000-07:00

A couple of storyboards for practice/fun here, inspired by a book called "In the Future" about entertainment/concept design, from designstudiopress.com

Dark Island

2009-09-17T21:30:00.000-07:00

This pic is another piece of "fan art" from my own reading of the "Dawn treader". I thought about storyboarding scenes from the book for the fun of it, since I'm a fan, but that might infringe on some rights somewhere for the people who are shooting the movie. So I'll leave it as "fan art".

Reepicheep Plays Chess

2009-09-03T21:31:00.000-07:00

A bit of fan art here, from "Voyage of the Dawn Treader", just my own illustration. Of course the guys who designed him for "Caspian" did a genious job.

Coffee

2009-07-19T11:57:00.001-07:00

This is a sketch for a new project I'm working on, a commission. Theme of all things coffee, primarily Espresso.

Courtyard

2009-03-30T11:28:00.000-07:00

This is a fairly quick marker & pencil sketch, at my apartment, exploring landscape and building design.

Storyboards

2009-03-09T17:41:00.000-07:00

More storyboards from the 2006 film "Moonshine", made in Colorado.
Directed By Stephen McKissen, starring Paul-Christian Edris and Adam Romsdahl.

Cartoon Characters

2009-01-29T22:02:00.000-08:00

Characters for upcoming books by author Steve Curtin. These were great fun to do, they are in somewhat of a manga style, with my own style thrown in.

Western Shootout - Art by Aaron McKissen

2008-10-11T13:47:00.000-07:00

Acrylic & Colored Pencil. This is done somewhat in the style of the amazing movie poster artist Drew Struzan (Indiana Jones, Star Wars). This is a great Colorado actor in character for a short film shot in Colorado. More info coming soon.

Art By Aaron McKissen

2008-10-05T16:47:00.000-07:00

Action Adventure Storyboards

2008-04-11T13:06:00.000-07:00

These are some live action presentation boards done in Denver for Pelican Arts & Animation.

Starry Night

2008-02-21T19:14:00.000-08:00

Backyard Astronomy. Done in watercolor & pencil, then Photoshop.

More Storyboards

2008-02-18T12:37:00.000-08:00

Moonshine

2008-02-16T01:33:00.001-08:00

"Moonshine", Director Stephen McKissen, was screened at the STARZ Denver International Film Festival 2006.

Tales & Lengends!

2008-01-28T13:43:00.000-08:00

Illustration of the subject "Tales and Lengends" for Illustration Friday.com .2008. Aaron McKissen