Update & Archived Portraits

My Portfolio Site has been updated! 2 pieces each are added under Illustration and Portraits, so feel free to check them out! As always, any input/comments are much appreciated.

I retired 4 pieces from under Portraits, simply because they're pretty old (made around fall 05 - spring 06), plus I don't feel like they necessarily represent my current style. I'm dumping them here though for archival sake.


Mr. Bean; oil on CP illustration board.


The governator; oil on CP illustration board.


Danny Elfman; ink on HP illustration board.


George Lucas; gouache & color pencils on CP illustration board.
^ This was my VERY first time using gouache..ever! Now it's one of my favorite media.

Another Silver!

My Robbie Williams piece won another Silver! This time at the Savannah ADDY's, for a student category Elements of Advertising: Illustration. Hooray!

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I'm dumping a bunch of random doodles I've been compiling over the past few days. The reason they're so yellow-ish is because I'm having troubles with my scanner, so I just photographed them instead:




^ I really like this last one. I'm working on a mural concept for a circus, so I'm going to try to integrate him somewhere!

New URL

....YES.

My Sketch Blog is now @ http://yukikoadachi.blogspot.com! The old URL (http://yukikoadachi.com/blog.html) should still work, but it will be in the previous boring template (with the subdirectory link Blogger doesn't let me customize the layout of the page... which is random and lame).
*edit* I deleted the old URL.

Anyway, if everybody could re-link me I'd appreciate it!

P.S. I'm -hoping- to update my main site with new work + info by the end of the month... so stay tuned.

Contemplation

A week-old doodles that I've been meaning to scan in. I have a ton more doodles AND finished pieces that I need to post. I will probably add stuff to my main site before the month ends.

Weee! Huh?

I think it's really important for any artist to take a break from their current projects/assignments, and doodle things that have absolutely nothing to do with anything.

By the way, my boyfriend Sean Cooley has revamped his portfolio site at Ardour Designs. He's a graphic designer and has a completely different style than mine, but is super talented so I thought I'd show him off. So yeah, check it out!

Zoo Mural Art Concept

A value comp I did for a zoo mural. It's kind of hard to see in a sketch so small, but it shows a bunch of animals partying, dressed as another animal. I'll probably keep the colors naturalistic so there's no confusion as to what animal's what (it's already so busy!).

By the way, here's another illustrator link: Matt Phelan. He's a children's book illustrator, and I'm actually doing a report on him. He works mainly in watercolors + ink to produce simple yet unique imagery. I mean, how adorable is this??

I love his sketchy look! I tend to overwork in my final pieces, so I admire how he's able to keep the loose quality of his sketches whilst defining a certain environment/atmosphere.

Silver & Celebrities.

Like I mentioned last December, one of my illustrations had been nominated as a finalist for the 2nd annual SCADDY Awards. Well, yesterday was the ceremony, and I got a Silver Award for it! Yay! Also I was informed that I became the finalist for the local Savannah ADDY Awards as well. So double yay!

Here is the with-type version of the piece I won for:


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For my caricature class, we have to come up with 2 celebrity images, one horizontal and one vertical. Being a shameless avid Hannah Montana & High School Musical fan, I decided to do Miley Cyrus & Zac Efron. Here are the sketches:

^ Yeah, half Hannah Montana/half Miley... sort of creepy.


And a sneak peek of the color comp sketches in progress:

Yes, I have a TON of references.

Upload Overload.

Alright, I've got a lot to post today:

First off, here are initial sketches (from life) of my fellow classmates in my caricature class:


And here are the final finished pieces:

One had to be graphic/geometrical (top, dyes) and the other one more naturalistic (bottom, graphite).

We also did a fun little in-class exercise today, where we had to draw the Statue of Liberty in various facial expressions:

They were definitely fun to do! Why can't Lady Liberty actually look like one of those in real life? :D

Up next are a few random doodles in my sketchbook:

My personal (=not for class) sketchbook is a small 6"x6" square format, so I tend to just put it on my lap and draw things from all sorts of angles... hence the sideways bears... Sorry, I guess you'll just have to tilt your head sideways!

Another one, drawn during a long winded critique...*yawn*:


Finally, my friend Shiho Hoshino put up pictures of her worktable on her blog the other day, so I thought I'd be a little copycat and put my own up:

You can sort of see the finished version of the piece I had been working on...the sketch is in the previous post. I'll be sure to post a good res scan of that soon!

Springin' Into Action!

Here is a comp sketch of theme park mural art concept I've been working on for Portfolio class:



Just started the final piece. It's going to have a very bright spring-y feel, and I'm using mostly concentrated dyes to get that kind of vibrance!

As for the concept, I just wanted to draw something fun and appealing to children (and not tying myself down to THEME PARK subjects). So what's more fun than a girl and her dog (in a space suit..) skipping through a plain on a rainbow-y path?? And random mushroom-y creatures sprouting?

Girls & Yusuke Nakamura

Been drawing a lot of girls lately. It's a weird trend/cycle (?) that comes and goes: sometimes I draw animals for weeks, sometimes I draw boys non-stop, and right now I'm drawing mostly girls.

Speaking of drawing girls, 中村祐介(Yusuke Nakamura) is an amazing illustrator, mostly famous for doing artwork for the band Asian Kung-Fu Generation. He also does bookcovers, shirt designs, and various other freelance work. His graphic style of drawing girls within a design is truly phenomenal. More of his stuff can be viewed here.



I emailed him several years ago to tell him how much I love his work, and he was so nice and humble in his response. It's nice when really talented artists don't let their success get to their head, and stay grounded. I'd like to be like that one day (well first I need to get famous...).