Brian Moore's Sketchblog

Here's the finished version of the green guy painting. Gouache on cardstock, cut-out, approx. 4" x 4"

My real interest was in trying to paint the weird lizard skin on our green guy ... I sort of pooped out when I got to what he was looking at; hence the perfunctory kick-line girl.

And here's a cute scan of the lil' green guy on my hand. Someday, I must get a decent digital camera for this kind of thing.

Finally gave up on this one. It's a color version of an ink drawing I made earlier. Gouache on cardstock.

I've found that generally when I'm not happy with a painting, it's because I didn't get enough color variety into it. Sometimes it means I just need to buy a larger variety of paints. I bought what seemed like a ton of watercolors before I felt like I had a palette with enough range. I'm working with a smaller set of gouache colors, so maybe I should expand that.

I also didn't think quite hard enough about the color before forging ahead with this one. Gouache is more forgiving than watercolor - you can really slop it on - but it also gets muddy hella quick if you don't have a goal in mind. Well, the next painting will be better.

Logged a few more hours on the Quest for The Ideal Paper over the weekend, trying out everything I had on hand in the studio: plain typing paper, Bristol, card stock, Arches (that is, the Good, Expensive Stuff) ... At some point I found a cache of sample packs of watercolor paper, that I had completely forgotten about.

This page is all on Arches 140 lb. "En-Tout-Cas" ("All-Purpose"). Nice stuff.

I'm sorry to have missed MOCCA this year - it sounds like it's packed with cool events and attending artists. Maybe next year ...

Meta: According to Movable Type, this is the 100th entry on this blog. Hooray for persistence.

I had a grand day out on Saturday which included a trip to the paper counter at Pearl Art Supply, so here's a new watercolor sketch to kick the tires. It's Winsor & Newton hot-pressed 140lb., which may be my new fave paper. Shown here is Shaenon Garrity's Helen Narbon, who has apparently forgotten that she left a Hot Pocket in her fusion-powered microwave oven. Well, either Dave or Artie will clean up the mess.

And here's an earlier attempt at Helen, painted in gouache.

(It would take me too long to do 40 Helens, sorry ...)

Here's a test painting for a recent illustration gig. Lately I've been playing with having large areas of black ink in my watercolors - it makes a nice graphic contrast that I can build the painting around. (Which artist was it that called black "the prince of colors"?)

And here's a slight re-design of Micki from Smithson. I'm still playing with the features of most of the characters, trying to tighten up their designs. Micki looks a little angry here, but I kind of like her revamped hairstyle.

Without exactly intending to do so, I've started a new webcomic called (appropriately enough) Unintentional. (The previous sketchblog entry was the first panel of the story proper.) It updates Monday through Friday on WebComicsNation. Now's your chance to get in on the ground floor of the story, which so far features a guy in an old-fashioned swimsuit, a severed head, and a strange, steampunked-out roadster.

A quick, caricature-y painting of the punkiest girl on campus (from Smithson.)

This is the second time I've painted these scenes - I've been trying to get the color and light where I want it. I feel like these are closer than the first version. Nice saturated gouache. Since I'm concentrating on the painting more than the drawing, they're a little sketchy (that's a toy robot that the kid is holding in the top painting.)

The Holidaze Are Upon Us and the work is piling up, so here's a painting from the archives. This was my idea for a mascot/logo for the proposed webcomics anthology site, Rocket Pirates. (Smithson was slated to be part of the initial RP lineup.)

I don't dig the squidgy paint - this was an early effort in gouache - but I do dig the eyepatch-and-cyborg-eye combo. I have no idea where the rocket in the eye idea came from.

More research work for the Unintentional revamp. Based on a photo taken at Alcatraz!

Three attempts at a painting - top left and bottom are watercolor, top right is gouache. From the same series as the guy on the balcony, earlier. I can't quite get the background color of the plane right, though I think the last version (the bottom watercolor) is on the right track.

A visitor to my studio would conclude that I must like mustard, judging from the number of empty bottles holding things. Mustard and piroulenes.

A sketch for an upcoming series of illustrations about Mr. Gates' impending retirement from Microsoft. I also did a gouache sketch, but it came out looking more like David Letterman (circa late '80s.) So I'll save that one for my future Letterman illustration gigs.

New doodles.

Here's a color panel from my upcoming webcomic. (Watch this page for news and updates.)

I go back and forth about painting areas of pure black ink in my comics. Until recently I'd go for a very dark blue or purple instead, in an effort to keep everything saturated with color. But I like how this came out.

What happens in the final panel?????

More ink and watercolor experiments.