Useless Trinkets - Vol 1
Here's a little something I did in an attempt to move away from character lead illustrations and onto something a little more commercial. Titled 'Useless Trinkets', the project focuses on items that at some stage or another have played a prominent role in my life.
I remember when we were like 10 years old on a school trip to Calais. Everybody's parents gave them £10s worth of Francs (I'm that old) and for whatever reason we all came back with Tamagotchis.
Technically more of a Sega kid growing up however you just can't deny how iconic that original Playstation controller is. Video games were definitely a big part of my youth, and to an extent influence my work to this day.
Roughly 10 years ago I pretended to play bass guitar in a London psych garage band. I wasn't much good, could never stop drawing long enough to learn the instrument proper but had an amazing time regardless. First guitar was a delightful royal blue Squire Precision Bass.
Pencil sketches. I can get pretty particular and the Playstation pad took time to line everything up right. All freehand.
First Ink. I always start with a think line even though I inevitably trace over them with a thicker one.
Thick lines in place and some embellishments using the thin lines again.
The original finished trio. Really wasn't feeling it and cast them aside for a month or so.
Started messing around with some backdrops, ideally relevant to the subject matter. New for me as I usually go completely abstract. My fav is the latter, inspired by my teenage love of punk. Cut up a bunch of shapes and threw them at the scanner.
What I ended up with. Breakthrough came when I started using multiple skeletons in different colours.
Of course sometimes you can spend forever tweaking, which is why it's always nice having an art director making decisions for you.
And there you have it! This is definitely the most in depth I've ever gone into my process. I didn't realise how much of it I recorded untilI hunted through my files. Just takes little time organising them is all!