I'm an illustrator based in South Wales. This blog will showcase current projects, works in progrees, and wierd, wonderful or inspirational stuff that I come across.

Welcome, and feel free to explore :)



This work by Thalia Evans is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.
Based on a work at swirlything.livejournal.com.

Here's how I laid out the comic pages. I think the usual way is to draft out the script first, but I actually found it easier to have a basic storyline in mind and then sketch out thumbnails, before working the script out from those- it's easier to see how the pages will flow that way.



Of course these scribbles won't mean much to anyone but me!

The original character design really wasn't suitable for a comic... I needed something that keeps the basic design intact, but is simple enough to draw repeatedly. And the face needed to be MUCH more expressive.
( character design work.... )

Going to start really dumping stuff in here now the deadline's coming up.

Just as a reminder as to what it's all about, here are a few pages from the 'field journal' I put together last year- that I'm revisiting for this project....



( more..... )


A bit hard to tell, but this was the story of an alien explorer who visits Earth and, not understanding a single thing about the place, misinterprets everything.
Originally the dinosaur-like alien looked like this: (he's on the right; the floating nautilus is his pet/scouter/baby spaceship.)



I was going for a detailed etching type look here. Obviously though, there's no way that level of complexity is going to be feasable in a comic.
Will post updated designs next.

http://tomsepe.com/whirlygig.html

Enough said :)



(last post for today... promise)

http://steampunkworkshop.com

I came across this site while looking around- it's not totally relevant to the Narrative project comic, since Mantell's machines are organic rather than metallic- but the whole sepia-toned, clockworky/steampunk feel is sort of what I'm going for.
The site's worth a look anyway though, there's some amazing stuff there...

Like this-
*not my work*
Electrolyte-etched brass trilobite. There's a walkthough on how this was made- I'd be tempted to have a go, but don't have the equipment- and I'd probably burn/gas myself.

And this:
*not my work*

Fully-working PC keyboard made from typewriter keys, among other things. Again, with a walkthrough. I want one...


(ps: All this project talk might not make sense at the moment, as there's a lot of backdated entries I'm still finishing up and adding. So keep checking back to see those when I post them.)

More textures. Scanned in some of my rocks and fossils collection again- I know, I do this a lot! But I fnd they're always useful for image textures, some really interesting shapes there, especially when scanned at high resolution.

I'm not sure if I'll use these in the comic or whether the paper textures will be enough. We'll see how the colouring goes, I don't want to overdo it!

 
( more..... )
I like spirals. Can you tell? :)

Keeping with the original olde-worlde theme of the previous narrative project- plain white backgrounds for pages are boring! So, going with the distressed paper idea again. I've tried to create stained book pages digitally a few times, but it never looks quite real... I want the staining a bit more random and realistic looking this time.

So it's time to get the coffee out again. I folded and tore a few pages of cream laid paper and then soaked them in tea and coffee (yes, I know, every ten year old in the country does this at some point... but I still like the effect, it makes interesting background textures for images. Besides I'm a ten year old at heart anyway :) )

   
( more pages )
I think I'll end up re-using these a lot. I might make a book out of the actual sheets of paper...

I like skeletons.

I also like imagining what various animals would look like a few million years in the future, so here's one I came up with- part of an uni project to invent a mammal skeleton, but I might use this little guy again sometime.



What would happen if Amazon river dolphins found their way into a part-submerged cave system, survived, and evolved? You might get something like this blind cave dolphin. It's small, feeds on fish and insects, and uses its elongated flippers to probe into rock crevices to reach prey. :)

( More bones from various projects.... )

Putting the link up here for the people at uni who were interested. Opencanvas is a straighforward but really useful little graphics program that was reccomended to me by friends, i've found it -very- handy for quickly sketching out designs using the tablet. It's what I used for the BOOM design.

Version 1 is free to download and supports collaborative drawing over a network.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenCanvas

http://wistinga.online.fr/opencanvas/

And version 4, approx £40 (if the currency converter's right)

http://www.portalgraphics.net/en/

Just been putting the finishing touches on a little digital portfolio for uni... nice and simple, in keeping with the design i've got for this blog. This isn't actually online, but I'm thinking of using this sort of layout/look and feel for my new website when I eventually get it done- opinions?

http://www.adambrockbank.com/

Adam Brockbank is an illustrator/storyboard artist for films such as Harry Potter, Inkheart, the Borrowers, etc. The site has lots of good examples of concept art and storyboards, really interesting stuff!

A couple of banner designs I did for the website http://unitedfurdom.co.uk/
Four anthropomorphic heraldic animals representing Wales (dragon) England (lion) Scotland (unicorn) and Northern Ireland (stag).

I'm not sure if these are going to be used or not, yet.

This page came in much more useful though. Some handy infor about how comics are laid out here...

http://my.safaribooksonline.com/30000LTI00237

The page has extracts from the book Web Comics for Teens by Michael Duggan. Looks interesting, I might look into getting hold of the whole book...

http://www.cooltoolawards.com/software/multimedia/comicbookcreator.htm

Ouch. Here's what I'm NOT doing for this project...

Nothing wrong with using photos, and I probably will, but things like this just grate on me for some reason. Seems lazy at te very least.

http://www.stripcreator.com/make.php

and this is horrible!

:(

Illustration for a flyer/poster for our upcoming second-year show. Details TBA!
This may need editing/redoing, must check in the show meeting tomorrow....

But I got to blow up the campus 8D



OpenCanvas and Photoshop

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=qhQEipT4qLcC&q=how+to+draw+comics&dq=how+to+draw+comics&pgis=1

How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way, by Stan Lee & John Buscema.

It's a bit dated and quite cheesy, but does have some good perspective exercises and is handy for researching how the typical superhero comic is set up.

The alien's  crest is meant to look a bit like an explorer's pith helmet... but I've had comments that actually, he looks more like a soldier. This really isn't what I'm going for!

Must make sure his crest looks more like this:

http://www.pith-helmet.co.uk/index.html





...rather than like a soldier's helmet.