 33 album covers.
posted: March 9, 2010
The Society of Illustrators annual show of advertising and institutional category just opened last week here in New York (runs up to March 20).
I have two pieces in the show, both of which were album covers created for a British music magazine The Word. They have supplement CD filled with new music every month. To have two of my favorite covers out of 33 covers I created monthly, was a good finale for the project. The project that started close to three years ago, recently ended with the magazine redesign as of February issue of this year. This monthly gig came during their last redesign. Matthew Ball, a Scottish freelance art director and former Rolling Stone AD who I used to work with often, kindly pulled me into this project. What I thought would only last for a short period, ended up as accumulation of 33 images. I think I got some good pieces out of them which lead to some other jobs and projects. 
above are two images accepted into The Society of Illustrators advertising and institutional show. They were both created for The Word magazine supplement CD Now Hear This!
Readership of the magazine is mainly young men, so the only art direction they gave me was to have "sexy girl with music instruments". I had a lot of fun with this lighthearted project every month. I think I did pretty much every variation I think of in the theme within that 32 covers. Things do end when they need to end. It was time for a change.
In this occasion, I decided to post some of the covers I was happy with. You can also see cover image archive here. Big thank you to Matthew Ball, editor Mark Ellen, AD Jonathan Sellers, production editor Mike Johnson, and last but not least Jerry Parkins who made sure my payments don't get delayed every month. The new The Word looks really good with illustrated covers by André Carrilho. Take a look when you are at (international) newsstands. 
I decided to put all the past covers out and take a photo. Wow, I made so many in less than three years... 
above are some of my favorite coverss. Many of them ended up reused in different projects later. 
We were so used to working together, most of the month, our process got very simple: one sketch, one final. This, of course, does not happen often with other clients.             28 comments |
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1/100 (belated) Head for Haiti
posted: March 4, 2010
Many of fellow Drawgers have posted their head drawings/paintings already. My belated contribution... black/blue/green ink and red seal on watercolor paper.
100 Heads for Haiti is a group show organized by Dave Plunkert and Spur Design. Each head, done by various illustrators, will be sold for just $100 each for charity purpose to raise money for Doctors without Borders. Show opening Saturday, April 12th at SPUR Gallery, Baltimore, MD. 
Please buy my head and help Doctors Without Borders (a charity I never forget to donate to every year)
I have moved to New York form Tokyo 11 years ago. The first apartment I found was on Upper East Side with a Haitian roommate. We only lived together for three months, but we became a long time friends since. She has cooked me Haitian dishes, taught me how to prepare Haitian mint tea, and told me about her family.
I have never been to Haiti, but I feel close to the country because of her. To create this image, I researched the word Haiti in Chinese. It is written as "海地". 海 means ocean and 地 means land. What a beautiful name. So I drew in her diving glasses one side ocean and one side land. 
pencil rough sketch Pink Slip
posted: March 2, 2010
This illustration was done for March issue of MORE, a magazine for grown up women with career and family, about this exact topic. The story is titled: 'Fired at 50'. It focuses on the emotional struggle of women who have lost their long term jobs. It felt so 'real' to me. March happens to be a transitional month when winter slowly turns into spring. So I decided to use season as metapher of women's emotional struggle. Claudia Almeida was the Art director. This has been a long cold winter with a lot of snow for North-Easterners, but we all know spring is right around the corner! 
four ideas were submitted. 
black and white drawing, ink on watercolor paper. 
coloring on Photoshop. Reversing the dark and light was not my initial plan but along the way, I found this solution worked the best. When a new trial works, it is always a nice feeling. 
final illustration. snowflakes and cherry petals were separate drawings added as layers on Photoshop. Published in MORE Magazine March issue Waiting For Spring
posted: February 11, 2010
When trees start to get light green new leaves, and flowers start blooming everywhere, that is my favorite season. I have been dreaming about Spring ever since this long winter started. When SooJin Buzelli called me for PLANSPONSOR cover with the theme of "the worst is over", this was the idea which came to my mind immediately: my longing for spring... Process post of this image felt perfectly appropriate today when you cannot walk outside New York City without a good pair of rubber boots. 
three ideas submitted. I would have been happy to do the other two as well. I really like drawing plants (and suitcases). 
these are my inspirations. bunch of shabby-chic door photos downloaded from internet. Although, I rarely use one specific photo as reference, so the final result was mix and match of them all. 
original b/w drawing on watercolor paper. I normally finish everything on the drawing stage, but this one is very much half-done. Soft snow does not need harsh outlines. 
final illustration. As you can compare with the original drawing, all the snow is added directly on Photoshop stage. Butterflies were drawn separately as well. 
Photoshop progress stage. This illustration had so many layers, I have a lot of folders, and there are some more folders inside folders to have everything organized and so that I can keep track of everything. 
Close-up of the trees in original drawig and in final Photoshop file. separate layers of gray-white were added to add depth to snow, and outlines were softened. I even added one more tree behind the third one on the right to give idea of space. 
Final cover. Creative Director: SooJin Buzelli. Loving the type treatment woven into the scarves.
By the way, I do draw snow scenes a lot. This goes back to when I was in graduate school and I was getting good at drawing figures but terrible at putting them in environment.
Thomas Woodruff, my thesis adviser, gave me an assignment to put people interacting in some kind of environment. I got panic, and drew this (left). It made me realize that drawing snow scene was: 1. Easy 2. Fun. I ended up drawing a whole bunch. Now, I am proud to say I can put people in any environment. So, thank you Tom. And this first snow trial eventually got me a gig to do the New York Times Travel Section (AD: Barbara Richer) cover (right), my first big job. Well, I should probably love snow. 
My first environment (=snow) attempt when I was in graduate school (left). And memorable first 'big' gig that brought me (right). |
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