Flicker and Billow

Mr. Chris Ware

2011-11-21T16:41:00.000-08:00

Zach Condon of Beirut

2011-08-11T18:29:00.000-07:00

When I'm Small

2011-06-28T02:58:00.000-07:00

Illustration for the song, "When I'm Small" by Phantogram for the notorious class. Gouache painting, pen/ink, and the machine. Gotta fix the painting up a bit. Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUr4eaG3Ask&feature=grec_index

Comic, Sketch, and Comp

2011-06-09T20:30:00.000-07:00

Excited about a comic

A Mexican Girl From Baldwin Park

2011-04-27T22:43:00.000-07:00

Painting on polaroid + illustrator

Still

2011-04-16T19:06:00.001-07:00

2011-04-16T18:57:00.000-07:00

More than one way, if we're brave and still

More Sketches and Drawings

2011-04-09T21:22:00.000-07:00

Moleskine Painting

2011-04-03T23:14:00.000-07:00

Actually did some painting on my own.

My First Comic

2011-03-15T13:12:00.001-07:00

Did this a long while ago

Type

2011-03-10T21:02:00.001-08:00

Franz Ferdinand

2011-02-26T23:20:00.001-08:00

Lots of stumbling around with drawing, comp, and photoshop, the next one will be better.

Sketchbook

2011-02-02T17:44:00.000-08:00

Head drawings from photographs and still images

Snowflake / Chinese Typeface?

2011-01-14T19:36:00.000-08:00

Working on my first typeface. The type was originally based off of snowflakes or the hexagon, but I subconsciously began to design with chinese motifs in mind. It will only be caps and as I complete the alphabet, i'll tweak and add color. Hopefully my next typeface will have a more solid concept, but this has been a good learning experience so far.

My Jacked Up Polaroid

2011-01-07T04:36:00.001-08:00

New Folklore and Violence

2010-10-17T20:28:00.000-07:00

Printmaking + Hollowmice

2010-08-23T19:52:00.000-07:00

Illustration For the short story, Hollowmen by Thomas Wolfe done in fw acrylic inks.
Woodblock, 4 layer screen print
Woodblock, screenprint, and xerox toner transfer
3 Layer Screenprint
2 Plate etching and aquatint

Comp for Printmaking Final

2010-08-11T21:16:00.000-07:00

Have been happy with the work I've been making lately, but here we go. A comp for a Woodblock, and 3 layer screen print, hopefully...

Childhood Chinatown Parade

2010-04-24T00:44:00.001-07:00

From illustrative storytelling

Watercolor Tattoo

2010-04-17T01:03:00.001-07:00

Design or Drawing?

2010-03-21T18:03:00.001-07:00

Gig poster for Emily Haines and the Soft Skeleton. Coming across a weird crossroads at art center. Not sure what kind of illustrator I want to become. Shouldn't be really forcing such an issue but I feel like I should know by now.

Shiz and more Shiz

2010-03-15T23:40:00.000-07:00

A semantic piece from image and idea

A couple of character designs from color and story. We have to redesign the movie The Prestige by Chris Nolan. I am doing a hipster version. Haven't been really happy with my work this term. Drawing has become really fussy and tight. I need a break.

Astro

2010-02-26T17:42:00.000-08:00

Something that kept me busy for a second over break

The Visitor Comp

2010-02-17T20:54:00.000-08:00

Beirut CD Cover

2010-01-13T22:17:00.001-08:00

A final piece for expressive type. The assignment was to the design a cd cover for a musician or music group we liked. I chose Beirut because I felt their music and background could provide a broad and interesting visual vocabulary to work with. Their music is inspired by eastern European folk music. We were ask to illustrate how the music individually felt to us instead of redesigning an old album cover, or illustrating the common-general visual description of the music. The music is dense in narrative with tragic overtones. Alot of longing also. So i came up with the concept of using antique overly embellished pistols as a vehicle for the type. A dated weapon, beautifully crafted and decorated, used to kill. The "B" in Beirut mimics the silhouette of the stryker of an antique pistol.

On a side note, while working on this particular piece in class, our amazing professor Peter Greco asked the question, "why are all weapons are beautifully designed." The more I thought about this, the more it seemed to be true. I still can't bring a weapon to mind that I felt was poorly designed aesthetically. It seems we like to put alot of thought and beauty into something when we feel like harming and killing each other. Food for thought.

The picture is a crappy scan of a crappy print

Work In Progress

2009-11-23T00:20:00.000-08:00

A work in progress for expressive type. I have some exciting ideas for this piece. Hopefully it will come out well.

Some Old Stuff

2009-11-08T13:54:00.000-08:00

An old piece from drawing and composition
Mixed media on heavy weight

A

2009-10-31T20:51:00.000-07:00

Fashion Illustration

2009-09-28T21:33:00.000-07:00

Ever since being beguiled by Gustav Klimt, I've always wanted to do a fashion illustration with patterns. The piece was not as successful as I wanted it to be but it was quite the learning experiencing. A lot of push and pull with colors and composition, although I did not have much to work with in the original drawing. Another lesson learned is to have alot or preferably everything planned out from the very beginning. Our digital illustration professor said that Adobe Illustrator is not a program that will get your creative juices flowing. So you have to be prepared when planning to use it.

So the assignment was to livetrace (argh!) an ink drawing. Livetrace has the uncanny ability to suck the life out of anything. Or maybe I just do not know how to use it correctly. I referenced a fashion blog, Childhood Flames again to help me with the drawing. Here is the inked drawing.
I've also learned quite a bit about patterns. The negative space becomes very important as it strongly affects the color average of the pattern. This then can affect the composition. I then realized you have to be very meticulous and fine tune all the tiny details if you want a pattern to do what it can do. Hopefully I'll get some good practice of this in the future and begin screenprinting some images with these patterns.

So I won't disappear

2009-09-25T00:24:00.001-07:00

I am a Ghost

2009-09-05T18:20:00.001-07:00

I have been a ghost. Here is some work from drawing concepts class.Artist emulation, Taiyo MatsumotoArtist emulation - Igon Shiele
Before and After final for drawing concepts

Pattern Fetish

2009-07-16T21:27:00.001-07:00

I've been recently obsessed with patterns since taking design 2 with Jon Nguyen. Not really making complicated patterns yet. I really enjoy the negative space created by the patterns themselves. And hopefully I will be able to integrate some of these elements into future works. I will be definitely be uploading more soon.

On a side note, school has been ridiculously difficult. Stress headaches, insomnia, panic, and mayhem. It also recently has been very humbling. Growing and learning very fast, coupled with small spurts of success tends to breed a stealthy hubris in me. But listening to our professors speak about art and a few spectacular failures here and there really brings me down to earth. We all still have a long ways to.

Sketchbook + New Portfolio Book Designs

2009-06-03T22:45:00.000-07:00

A couple of old sketches in the moleskine. These two are gonna take part in a couple of digital portfolio pieces. More on that in the future.

Here is also a newer design for 2nd term Portfolio book. Work in progress

Portfolio + Bookbinding

2009-05-21T20:59:00.000-07:00

I am currently assembling and designing a portfolio by means of a hand-made binded book. This is my virgin voyage into bookbinding and book design. I am going to over-design everything, allowing myself to make mistakes and hopefully learn from them. Here are a couple of preliminary designs for the front cover.
Some obvious chinese decorative arts rip. I might actually re-design the whole thing as this is just a mock-up and a reconnaissance into the world of graphics design. It will be titled Billowing Knives I. I am also going to try my hand at a little relief embossing, hopefully that goes well, and more on that later on.

Here's a design for the page #s of the book. Hopefully this will look a lot better shrunken and in print. Some suggestions or feedback would be greatly appreciated from all you 0 people who read this.

Fashion + Hurtful Things

2009-05-10T16:32:00.001-07:00

The only productive thing I was able to accomplish over school break. This is currently in the Home and Garden Exhibition at the Echo Curio. Show is open now through May 30th. You can go here: www.echocurio.com for more info.

I also used photos over at childhood flames as references for this particular piece. Go visit childhood flames, an amazing fashion blog with great photographs.

Here are also a couple preliminary sketchbook doodles. This might develop into a nice body of work if the ideas evolve a bit more.

An Introduction

2009-05-10T16:12:00.000-07:00

Hello. This is my art journal and blog. Anything from sketch doodles, work process, to news (art related) will be posted here. The underlining purpose of this blog is to develop more professional habits. I will try to post diligently weekly.

-Tony