Ballad for The Batman

I'd often wondered if Batman ever sings his own theme song while cruising around Gotham City. What would such a upbeat tune sound like in that raspy Dark Knight growl?  

So yeah, thats where my mind has been. How's everyone else been doing with their summer?

Princesses and Power Rangers

In preparation for Wednesday’s Sketch Day I did a few practice runs to make sure I could produce drawings in about ten minutes. I featured these sketches on my table so that people would see what kind of art I do as well as inspire their choices.

 The Fourth and Eleventh Doctor were
originally going to be a part of my Sci-Fi Father's Day Card

Deadliest Predators: T-1000 and T-Rex! 

I tried to lure in the family demographic with these doodles of the Power Rangers or Elsa and Olaf from “Frozen” (effectively finishing a project that I’d started back in January)

Strangely enough it was Dave Andres sitting right next to me who kept getting the Disney Princess requests. Maybe because I was the closest to the entrance he got the spill over from my line. 

Party Progress, Portraits and Other Pictures

I'm a little late with this week's post. I finished rendering for the figures in my long-gestating "Party of Two" project and was debating whether to hold off showing it off until next week when I would (ideally) have the whole thing finished. I decided that given how much time I devoted to the project this week alone, I may as well try and get a bit of feedback before jumping into the home stretch. 

Some of the bigger changes since last time include making the sky all black and replacing the tree with a street light to try  put more focus on the couple and make the space they're in seem more tranquil. 

Continuing my trend of drawing portraits from "talking head" interviews, here are two giants of science fiction television, Patrick Stewart and Rod Serling. 

Just for fun, I skimmed though the "Misc" folder in my inspiration files, drawing rough thumbnails of whatever struck me as the most interesting. I think this could make for an interesting exercise in brainstorming ideas if I were looking though a collection of pictures that had a consistent subject or artist.

Now I want to hear from you. What do you think of the things I share in these posts? What do you like the most and what would you like to see more?

Stocking Stuffer Sketches

Merry Christmas Friends! I had hoped to unveil my latest protect, but its taking a little longer than expected. In the meantime here are some "stocking stuffers" for you to enjoy. Sketches of people from December get togethers and gatherings as well as rough ideas from this year's Christmas cards.

The Penguin Project

Here's a project that I was working on around the time I was also working on the Harley Quinn page. It was a collaborative effort with a client looking to create a webcomic about the domestic life of penguins. Here we have Frank, a stay at home dad and his wife Margie, the corporate breadwinner. (We didn't have a name for this series going in, but I would have campaigned for a pun name like "Ice Pop".)

Unfortunately its been weeks since I last heard from my collaborator so I think this comic may be effectively sunk. However I thought I might share some sketches and talk about my thoughts to perhaps serve as an example to future clients as to how I work through my projects.

My earliest ideas weren't much more than actual penguins in human clothes, albeit very boxy. They got a little rounder and more anthropomorphized in later drawings.

This is Frank. I thought it would good to establish his character by showing him taking on a typical "Dad" activity. I choose grilling because it was the last thing you would expect to see a penguin do. 

I also tried to distance these drawing from being animals just wearing clothes by juxtaposing components from one part of their character into another. In this case, I shaped the orange patterning on the back of a penguin's head to try and resemble the kind of crown you would see on a middle aged balding man. The coloring on his chest was also meant to emulate manly chest hair.

  

This is Margie. Since she was supposed to appear very professional I looked to photos of classy actresses like Meryl Strep and Glenn Close for inspiration. This was helpful when it came to designing hair without resorting to just putting a penguin in a wig. Plus it was another great opportunity to blend two aspects of the character together, by flowing the black and white patterning from a penguin directly into her business suit.

My sketch of her on the left came off as looking too snobby especially with all the upward lines in her hair. For my second sketch I shortened her beak and made her hair bigger, but also simpler.

Introduction, Influences and Interests

Greetings follow denizens of the Internet! Last week we got class back in session, so no we have the chance to get to know each other a little better.

My name is Erik Allan Johnson, a freelance illustrator currently living in Michigan. I attended the Columbus College of Art and Design were I received my Bachelor's degree in Illustration with a minor in art history.

My exceptionally tidy studio space.

There has been long standing speculation to where my artistic talent originated. My family has a long history of people with a strong urge to understand how things work. My contribution to this legacy is my fascination with the unique and personal nature of telling stories. When I read a comic or watch a movie, I'm always trying to identify the mechanics of the narrative and recognize how we communicate ideas.

My favorite subjects to draw are human figures and faces. I find portraits fun because they can be so loose and expressive and yet at the same time be chiseled with distinct and often geometric features.

Comics were my initial introduction to the wide world of commercial art. While I have spent years gaining inspiration from dozens of other artists, illustrators, and even drawing directly from life, that kind of style is still a major influence on the look of my work. I tend to gravitate towards crisp lines and play with contrast between black and white forms likely in inspired by comics like Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes or Will Eisner's The Spirit.

 

That's not to say I don't work in color or with non human subjects on occasion.

More about me and my work can be seen on these other sites:

* To see my full portfolio, check out my official website
* To keep up with my latest work, either follow this blog, my Facebook Fan Page or my DeviantArt Gallery.
* To see the kind of stuff that inspires me, check out my Pinterest

Get to know some of the other League Members:
* Goodwill Geek is a kid at heart.
* Miss M reveals her real name!
* Geek Show Ink will have you know that Green is his favorite color.
* This Space For Rent shares a brief bio

Summer Studies 2013

A collection of portraits I drew over the past few months while at the church's summer Bible study for students.

Sketchdump

I've seen a number of scanned sketchbook pages on DeviantArt called "Sketchdumps" to let viewers know what you're doing between projects. While I think the name is a bit off putting, heres a sample of some more of my warm up sketches from this past week for your enjoyment.

Food Court Faces

There are few things more satisfying than drawing from life, even more so when you draw IN PEN! I managed to sketch a few of my friends as well as some fresh faces while in between bites of my Italian BMT sandwich at the Food Court. Just a little something to warm up for some new projects I hope to have up soon.

Super Bowl Sketches

I thought "The Big Game" was an event, but then I got invited back for the much bigger Super Bowl Party, or rather my homemade cookies were invited back and I just got to tag along. Good Company and plenty of fresh faces, just what I like to see. Now if only they could sit still for longer.

On left; Becky, on the upper right; Jesse. 

On the bottom; Ben's Beard.

Halftime turned up the heat on these studies.

I couldn't remember the last time I'd seen Ben smile. I knew it was a moment that needed to be captured immediately, hence why the glasses and ears are incomplete. I imagined he was saying to himself, "I just want to keep smiling forever!" I just wish I could remember what commercial it was that caused him to break out in a case of The Grins.

A couple of more Mercedes.

Once Olivia stopped checking her phone every five seconds, she stayed remarkably still.

Last one of Becky

I know they didn't play this year, but I couldn't resist sticking in this nerdy clip about the Super Bowl:

The Big Game

Yesterday, I was invited by my neighbors to watch "The Big Game" (The Oakland Bowl to be exact) I don't know or care about football in the slightest but though it would be a good break from my routine for the start of the new year as well as an opportunity to skim free food and draw some people just sitting around. The crowd was antsy at first but when the game went into triple overtime, the physical enthusiasm started to wane.

Portraits. So many unique noses.

Betty Transfixed

Paul Relaxing, Dan Chanting

Katie Noir 

Sunday Sketches

Earlier this week I started work on a new illustration for SleepCare involving people sitting at a dinner table and I spent most of the weekend sketching how make a sitting scene look dynamic, or at the very least... interesting.

So when I was asked by some friends if I wanted to have lunch with them at the mall food court this afternoon, I just couldn't help but observe how people sat casually in chairs and just how different it was from the reference photos I was looking at over the weekend were people were posed in chairs.

Gesture drawings are something I've kind of slumped on the past year now that I'm out of school so spontaneous sketches like these taken from outside the home, especially fast and with a pen felt like a breath of fresh air and quite a rewarding experience. I wondered why I didn't do this more often, and then I had to get gas for my car and one glimpse of those prices reminded me why I don't get out much.

Egyptian Exhibit

During the doldrums of the "waiting for phone or e-mail reply" stage of freelance illustration, I drove down the local museum's new exhibit on Egyptian artifacts, or rather replica's of Egyptian artifacts from King Tut's tomb.

Manifest Destiny

Heres a glimpse at my latest project, which could take a substantial amount of time. Midland Christian School was pleased with the painting I did for their Santa Parade Float that I was asked to paint a mural for their sixth grade classroom depicting great moments in American history.

Depicting so many famous moments, people and conflicts proved to be incredibly complicated and would be just shy of impossible to finish by the time school was ready to start in the fall, so I simplified the idea, focusing on transportation and expansion. Starting with the arrival of settlers, traveling westward by wagon, blasting through mountain to forge the railroads, before we slip into the twentieth century with the building of skyscrapers and a copper Lady Liberty waits to welcome a new generation of settlers while we find new means of expansion in the automobile, airplane and finally the space shuttle.

The plan is for the mural to go in a corner, hence the dividing line between mountains and city, with the  stars and stripes of the American flag connecting the two halves.

The final project will be an estimated 8 x 16 feet in size.

Be sure and check out my previous murals here.