Kid Koala
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Oranges, Purples, Teals!
🕑 Added 2020-11-20 19:05:03 +0000 UTCDear Patrons,
I hope this message finds you well where you are. I’ve been spending most of the daylight hours in the workshop painting and working on designs for the silly characters that will inhabit the Creatures of the Late Afternoon album artwork. What you see here are some color tests of a few of the blob creatures. There are others with fins, scales, wings and antennae but I thought I’d start with some of these “blobbier” ones!
I also picked up 2 large 4’ x 4’ canvases to do the gatefold album artwork and board game. They’re still downstairs as I’m not quite ready to start painting at that scale yet. I’ve literally never painted at that super large scale before and am still figuring out how to put them on the wall. But I wanted to have it at a scale where I could do all the fonts/typography for the board game spaces using paint.
My first few albums and books were pretty much drawn in 2 tone designs or grey scales, and the drawings were done using either fine tip pens or .005 mm point scrapers. Also many of the album covers were drawn on 8 x 11 sheets of typing paper or smaller.
Carpal’s album cover was drawn on a little piece of paper on the airplane tray table as I was flying to London (alone) to deliver the master of the album. I remember the people seated next to me looking over at what I was drawing. They were probably thinking “That bookshelf sucks.” LOL
Also, it’s a record shelf... but you knew that, right?
So for this album at least, I’m graduating to FULL COLOR design. What?! First, mixing the album in stereo and now this??? Craziness!
Corinne and the daughters have been schooling me on how to mix colors. They taught me how to make teal today. This is progress for someone who usually thinks in lighter and darker greys.
Anyhow, It’s a bit like learning a new language for my eyeballs. Right now I can barely put a sentence together. I am having a lot of fun working at this larger scale though. It’s oddly counterintuitive for me. I mean, scratching has always been about microscopically fine motor coordination.
You should have seen Maple and I try to get those giant canvases home from the art store in the car. It was like a Mr. Bean episode. Haaaaa!
More on all of this later! Thank you for your support! Have a great weekend everyone!
E
Comments
Kid Koala
Aw thanks David! Yeah it was a comedy of errors for us trying to get the canvases home! Art and silliness go together at our household. Yesterday, one of the kids knocked over the container of paintbrush rinsing water onto the canvas which was on the floor. Didn't find it until this morning but it melted all the gouache off the canvas. so I had to repaint it. LOL! Still learning! Also, I just saw your tshirt design is all sold out at the ZBTFD shop! Ack! I just missed it! Let me know when you do another one and DM me a link or something! I don't want to miss the next one! E
David
Ohhh been there trying to get a large canvas home from the art store! (Once tried three successively large vehicles before it was manageable!) Loving the monsters!
Kid Koala
Thanks Jonathan! These are super useful tips! Didn't even think of doing a type ratio legend! I'm definitely going to do that. Imagine if it went to print and was completely too small to read!? We would have had to include a magnifying glass with the board game! LOL. Cheers for saving me from that debacle!
Jonathan Crevier
Best tips when working larger scales: use wrist or arm movements instead of fingers, take a few steps back often and since you are working with type as well, sketch a print size mockup of your layout and text, then photocopy enlarge a part with smaller type to match ratio of canvas (this will serve as a good starting point to ensure your type will be big enough with wide enough stroke to display correctly on the printed product).
