We're all movie stars

Original idea was to incorporate well known movie stars into a merged illustration but it didn't look very good.

I tried jumbling it up a bit but I didn't really get any inspiration from it

Which is when I decided to use Monroe as a structure and link her in with a darker side of what movie stars are like.

This drawing didn't look amazing to begin with but as I laid in detail it started to gain atmosphere.

I started to add a little colour to try and bold out the look.

It started looking like the rocky horror picture show, but I was linking the movie star appeal with day of the dead, the mexican tradition which incorporates sugar skulls in with celebrating the dead. I thought this would be an interesting approach to link the two together.

I wanted to try using purple as a primary colour.

I added texture with a thin pointed ended stroke brush, using 3 tones.

I laid down a foundation colour

Then a darker pantone mixed in with an even darker one just after.

I chose an ivory kind of colour to use for skin tone/ skull.

then began to fill in texture.

The illustration started coming together when I added in a light blonde.

Then filled it in and made the hair look wavey and gave it some real floor.

For the background I chose a sky blue and tried a circle.

It was important that the type linked in with this illustration, I chose a font which flowed and added a dark blue stroke and then began to outline it in white to make it really pop.

I am very pleased with the illustration and love the outcome.

5 down (red) 5 to go (black)

Chelsea Smile

'We all carry these things inside that no one else can see, they tie us down like anchors. They drown us at sea'

Football season is over

'Party till you pass out, drink till your dead'

Sleep with one eye open

'For as long as I remember, you sold everything you owned, but now you sold our friendship, your on your fucking own'

Suicide season

'If only sorrow could build a staircase, or tears could show the way, we would climb our way to heaven and bring him home again'

Diamonds aren't forever

'We will never sleep cause sleep is for the weak'

Crucify me

'I am the ocean, I am the sea, there is a world inside of me'

Comedown

'Just like a pack of wolves, the skies were once paved with gold, now they rain on us all'

Death breath

'We lived fast and died pretty'

Traitors never play hangman

'We're all movie stars'

It never ends

'Everything I touch turns to stone'

Everything I touch, turns to stone

Everything I touch turns to stone makes me immediately think of Medusa who in Greek mythology turned whoever bestowed upon her into stone, the goddess was said to have the hair of snakes but was more beautiful than the god of beauty, so this curse was struck upon her.

I thought giving her a fun cut kind of hair style (short on oneside and long on the other) would be pretty cool and quite modern.

I drew out the coils of her hair into thick dread lock like bangles.

I really like the idea of having a snake head biting, but I believe that the amount that would be paid for a T shirt is not worth adding so much detail as of its time consumption.

I thought that three snake heads was an appropriate amount to gather that it is medusa.

I really locked in with the detail of the lips and love the outcome and glossy shine affect.

I thought a pale green would be a zombie and serpent like colour to use for her and would be a really good idea to carry out.

Her eyes needed to stick out, I think using a red on green combo mixes evil and really stands out.

From a distance it is difficult to see the amount of detail on the snake and face but when put baring in mind the image would never really be this small.

as can be seen, quite a lot of detail is put in around the scales.

and stretched along the whole body.

Red eyes seemed appropriate to add as they are the same colour as medusas in this illustration. I drew a greek engraving like type face with two tones of colour shooting out from the snakes mouth like venom.

When done it looked like this, Im pleased with the outcome although it is not my favourite illustration so far.

Stairway to heaven

as the theme was to do with climbing a stairway to heaven linking in with pain I came up with the idea of a masonic themed piece where there is a eye with wings to resemble heaven with a staircase behind, from the eye there are tears which flood down the stairs and the top is that of a pyramid. The backing will be rays.

I started off by drawing out the wings, A simple vector animation.

I then shaded them in giving them a feather like effect.

To save time and make the image look a lot neater I simply replicated toe wing and reflected it to create two.

I then started on the eye and coloured it in in black and white.

After that was complete, I combine both the eye and wings together to make a bold piece which stood out.

The stairs were a bit of a pain bit I drew them out using 3 different brushes and thicknesses. 0.5 0.25 and 0.10.

I added depth at the corners of the stairs.

Then tied in the strokes to give a shaded edge effect.

Once done and coloured, I added the three images together to build up the illustration.

I added my first bit of colour, which was a golden pyramid top, and a sky blue for the tears running down the stairs.

I also completed a type which appeared as though it was a welcome mat to the staircase to heaven.

Something was still missing os I added a grey scale of rays shooting out from the centre of the eye and outlined the border in white.

Still unconfident I added a black behind the image just so it all stood out as one solid piece.

I am very happy with this illustration although I think the backing colour is essential in wether or not this illustration will be a success.

Suicide season

'If only sorrow could build a staircase, or tears could show the way, we would climb our way to heaven and bring him home again'

the layout and the colour

I chose to try this illustration on another tank top, at the moment I am finding that putting these designs on basic coloured clothing works a lot better than other colours, the green top looks interesting although I find that black and white look much more appropriate.

I personally think that black in this case is the correct choice in design.

white looks a bit to empty where as black gives a space like feel (It being darth vader)

Sleep with one eye open 'For as long as I remember, you sold everything you owned, but now you sold our friendship, your on your fucking own'

Sleep with one eye open is a song about betrayal which made me think about different people and scenarios in which someone had betrayed someone else. I thought about Jesus and Judas which is the most famous betrayal recorder, which is when I decided to do an illustration featuring half of Jesus's face and half of another character.

Most commonly the other character would be a devil like creature, I was originally going to use Judas as the bad man, but with deeper thought I knew I could do something that hadn't be done before, for some random reason thinking about good and bad made me think of the famous quote from star wars to do with hate leading to fear, fear - suffering and suffering the dark side, which then linked in with how Anikan Skywalker was quite a 21st century man who betrayed everyone he knew and led to him becoming a monster known as Darth Vader.

I thought that linking these two faces together would create a really interesting outcome.

I started off by sketching out some hair and facial structure.

The next step was some facial detail, I drew out a beard which is a famous feature which makes you think of Jesus, long hair and a beard.

To clarify it was him I was drawing I drew a halo above his head to show that this is the side of good.

Whilst in an early linear structure I drew out the start of vaders head.

Then created a strong derail in shading to create depth.

After that was done, it was time to add the first coat of colour to both, I did vader first which was simple, I used 3 coats of grey and some white for a glossy shine.

Starting off with Jesus's facial hair was great as it gave inspiration to how far I could take detail with the illustration in colour.

I chose a pale yellow for skin colour, this gave a china doll pale kind of look which in a lot of descriptions is how he looked.

Then I added a simple bit of shading for more depth.

After all the colouring was done I realised I needed something to go over Darth Vaders head, obviously not a halo so as a halo is round and has no sharp edges I drew a zig zag with sharp corners to use as a symbol to describe him.

Type was important, I drew out drop dead first to get an idea of how much room I had to do the type, I thought as I was linking star wars in, I could try type similar to the movies starts with the text floating off in the distance getting bigger then smaller.

I drew a structure and divided 8 columns out and free hand drew out letters in each one to spell out drop dead.

I then filled in the white areas with black and type yellow and red. Yellow to symbolise good and red to symbolise evil.

I thought that something was still missing so I added a background with rays from heaven and hell. I also added some stitching and inner flesh to the centre of Jesus and Vader to create a link to them both rather than a rough painted edge.

I added lots of brush strokes and tone to the type to make it really stand out, and added some colour to the bottom to make a strong shape for the illustration, I switched the red and yellow over at the bottom to make the picture stand out, also everyone good has some evil and everyone bad has some good, we are all human.

as can be seen this is the texture of the type zoomed in.

and this is the bottom piece of the illustration with a diamond bottom like finish.

I felt that some of the detail could not be seen so I zoomed in to the photo for a better look at the illustrations depth.

I chose to keep the eye white as I believe it creates more of a holy character and is a lot more interesting than a vector pupil.

This is the illustration complete and I am very pleased with it and believe it to be my best one so far.