Vera

 

 

  A character from a personal project I've been working on! 

Eris

My latest design. I had an artist block about three weeks ago and I found myself digging through old sketches. Just anything that I could get my hands on before college. Something that I could remember drawing for the sake of just that - drawing. It was pretty difficult, because most of the drawings were really bad. Like, terrible, but some were charming and fun. I found an old piece of a fairy playing with a frog marionette. I started to re-vamp that idea, but didn't like where it was going, so I suddenly remembered Eris from Sinbad, and my mothers words of wisdom "draw what inspires you" and thus, this piece came about. Probably the first piece I've actually been proud of in years.

Telling A Story

As silly as this little thing called love.

Finding My "Niche"

After studying several artists and truly pinpointing the kind of styles that make my heart melt, I really started to narrow down what types of works I wanted to produce. I found that I wanted to do more "character concepts" and more "fan based" artwork so that the viewers have more to identify with. I did two pieces that I think sum up that idea.

I designed a caracature of the singer Kimbra

I also designed a character that represented the kind of women I look up to or admire. I think there is something just so gorgeous about a tattooed lady.

Playing Catch-Up

Clearly it's been a while since I've updated this thing. I've a whole lot of things I'd like to share, so I'll just start

After graduation I spent some time with a company called Checkpoint where I produced a series of vintage posters for a social game. I'm quite proud of the poster above. I think it's pretty sweet. After my time at Checkpoint I started freelancing and trying to focus on my craft. I realized that a lot of my love for art comes from experimenting with different styles and rendering methods. I love the idea of being versatile in my craft. Sure, I know that it's beneficial to have a signature art style, but I'd like to think that as an artist I can be versatile while still maintaining a "Melanie-esk" look. Here are few random pieces from over the past few months in no particular order.

Nymphs of the Seasons - Colored

Finally finished these cuties.

Nymphs of the Seasons - line-art

So this past Sunday I found myself spending the day at a Renaissance Fair in Sante Fe. It was very fun, as Ren Fair's usually are, but this past one there was something I hadn't seen before. They had these gorgeous women painted up as these creates called "Fantasticals" - I took a picture of every one I could find and found myself more inspired than I had been in a while. I guess I've tried to keep myself away from cliche like things such as faeries, etc, but I realize that it's okay to find love in something that is kind of cliche, as long as you have the wit about you to make it personalized and unique. So today I found myself creating images in my head that I HAD to put on paper.

As you can see, these "Fantasticals" went all out. She was by far the brightest one, but there were a ton of very intricate costumes for these things! So after a while, I came up with my own designs; Nymphs of the Seasons.

I'm hoping to get all the coloring done by tomorrow night, we shall see. ~ Mel