Steph's Brain Farts (NSFW): 11/17 - Creatures and CTN

[Taj]

Steph i love that Rockwell piece, it's great to see your take on it.
Not that it hasn't been mentioned before but all your colors seem to be in the same value even though people are on different plane in the picture (i.e. gorilla and kids foreground, dad and car mid ground, and mom background) you should try to play with the value of these colors and maybe even change the colors in some places Value effects depth more then color...infact value truly expresses depth color just gives it a punch and can affect the composition. Can't wait to see it textured, maybe it will bring out the depth in the picture more and help with the values cant wait to see something truly amazing, like we know to expect .

[Steph Laberis]

Taj Thanks for the crit dude! For some reason I have been reluctant to really expand my value range in my work, so hopefully I can grow a pair of value balls for the next piece and pay better attention to that

Coinpurse Haha, it may well be.

28chelseaslater So glad all has arrived safely! Yeti has gotten soooooo many compliments since he got here, he's a valued member of the family. Unfortunately I am just not able to afford New Zealand this year, but if you find your self at WonderCon, APE or Comic Con, we could likely cross paths. I would love to meet you too!

kelly x Thanks Kelly Has the other piece sold, I hope I hope?

picksel Glad it put a smile on your face, thank you!

Onir Thanks so much for the crit dude After seeing Wall-E, I am even more encouraged to keep trying for Pixar, so I truly appreciate the well-wishes. With the UPA stuff, I haven't watches a lot in my recent years, although I am aware that's where McCracken draws a lot of influence from. I do have a book called "Cartoon Modern" which is a collection of a lot of UPA and UPA-era work. It's a regular on my bookshelf!

Carnifex Thanks dude! Every dysfunctional family needs to be illustrated at least once in a lifetime. And I didn't see the "boobs" title issue till you pointed it out, now I don't want to change it

Chiko Thanks so much!

Ok, another dumpy. Here's the cover art for my art book WHICH YOU SHOULD TOTALLY BUY AT SOME POINT IN YOUR LIFE! I also stuck a PugFish in there in shallow hopes of boosting sales... and of course, to further exploit nature's little atrocity, the Pug.

Hope you guys like!

[kelly x]

not yet but some interest this week-end - cross fingers and toes!

[Steph Laberis]

kelly x Thanks hon, will most definitely be hoping!

Weighing in with June's overdue Steph of the Month. Someone on the forums once joked that he was worried about me, what with drawing all that cute stuff, where did all the rage and bad stuff go?

Like every other human, it aaaaaaalllllll goes inside. Here's an example - how I spent my month of June. Such a damn waste to worry so much ._. Geh. Time for a rest.

Book starts shipping in a little over a week though, much love to everyone who has pre-ordered

[Sinix]

Combining your strong illustrator stuff with various textures does an awesome job of showcasing it. Really enjoying the style.

[Onir]

Oh so you have Cartoon Modern! Great book, used it to write a paper on UPA last semester. Yea though, I just figured I'd ask about UPA since I know you've got a really strong stylistic approach and have a background in animation. I've yet to see Wall-E actually (I'm a bad animation student hehe), but I'm gonna try my hardest to get out to it!

Great pieces in these last couple of posts, interesting range of emotions as well hehe. The cover art is amazing, love the expressions and poses on all 3 characters. Really playful, seems like a great way to introduce your work hehe. I must say that I looove the look of the pugcrab; keeping the line work there in a subtle way as you have and still utilizing the texture has a really nice visual effect. You've also gotten quite adept as capturing the funny look pugs seem to keep hehe.

Is this last one all digital? The more I look at it the more certain elements look like real paper to me. Great attention to detail with the shadows and texture, as well as the idea of depth from layering. Honestly, my favorite part of the piece is the tablet hehe. Not sure why, but the way you made it really sticks out to me. If I can offer a crit, for some reason the large arrow arms of the clock are keeping me up in the triangle created by the clock, pig, and calendar. It's nice in a way, as it helps you from getting trapped in the face of the character, but seeing that area first (probably because I was scrolling down when I initially saw it) kinda stuck me up there. Probably just me in the end though Great work as always!

[Izi]

hmm

well I saw the DFTO piece, and I laughed and said "OH MY GOD" out loud...

good reaction I think

edit:
stay frosty

Oh, monkey piece - make the car red, get rid of the dog, I thought the suitcase was a falling building in the background, so maybe make the surrounding sky darker...hope that helps. I don't know if these will work but that's what I would try if it were mine...

[lennon]

hey! great stuff!
Perhaps they didn't do you no justice putting you 4 stars, your cartoons are great and you now how to draw the rest.
Very interesting work, I'll probably came back later.

[Carnifex]

hehe,wow...all my bad stuff goes into my drawings....still...that pugcrab feels disturbingly accurate/lifelike... (little mouth thingies...)

[0kelvin]

Book preordered! Cephalopods and boobs, two things I love dearly.

You've pumped out a ton of fantastic work lately. My family went on a lot of road trips when I was a kid too, so the car trip one really brings back a lot of memories. The latest self portrait is great too. The broken heart mended with tape is a great bittersweet detail.

I'm such a Steph fanboy.


Eric

[Jasonwclark]

I really love "Don't Flash the Octopus."

Just finished reading through it right now. I got all choked up when I came across this one, with the broken piggy bank and scotch tape holding your heart together; and then almost lost it when I came to the one with you eating the toast and jam. Its so cute and sad at the same time...
I hope things are feeling a little better now.

The mermaids totally made me swoon though, and the sexy Centaurs too. I think the printed colors on the Gorilla in the rain also turned out really well; and the crab with the doggy biscuit is easily the most adorable thing I've seen all year. Very impressed, just wanted to tell you.

If you're not familiar with I Ching, which I wasn't until I met someone special, the lines won't make sense but it's the hexagram for "Nourishment". It has a lot of meaning to me now and will as time passes.

I like the book of changes too. Divinaton texts like that are fascinating to me, though I've never actually done it with coins or lots to read the hexagrams (just sort of open the book to a random page and go from there.) Have you ever read Heraclitus of Ephesus? He's a western thinker, but his philosophy reminds of passages I've read in the I Ching. You might dig it.

Have fun this weekend and don't forget to go to the beach while you're down here.

[Asatira]

Doggy crab!

[BubbaGump]

http://conceptart.org/forums/attachm...1&d=1215137554

Reminds me of a paper sculpture. And paper sculptures rule...

[kelly x]

post post post - need to see yo mad skills chick!! Sold another one... give us more!!! Dude you rock our gallery. Shay is a partner 50/50 in this place we call a gallery!! Also we painted it Royal blue and white and now have more customers!!! Dude you rock, come to my SB!!

[a la bapsi]

looked through your sketchbook.
i might be bringing this thread back from the dead, but
your work is heartbreakingly sweet
and so are you. ;^;
haha even the naughty ones xD

[BubbaGump]

Hey wow! I saw your stuff in Mattesi's Character design book! I didn't know you post here.

Great stuff in this sketchbook!

[[void]]

Awesome stuff steph, the paper cut out style is more convincing than ever it gives them a nice tactile feel. Hope all's well.

[serio]

Awesome cartoony stuff.

[Steph Laberis]

Hey everyone! I am still alive and of sound health Thank you so much for the words of support and encouragement... especially when this SB was falling into its occasional bout of neglect. I've had a hard time finding a reason to get out of bed some days within the last few months (let alone find inspiration and reasons to draw...!) but was pleasantly surprised with an abundance of paid work recently and have found a few sparks here and there. In other words, I feel poopy but I still have some ideas hanging around. ^_~

So while I wish I had epic, experimental and daring updates for this book, you're gonna have to settle for more self portraits, a few thumbs for a comic idea and studies for this month's Steph o' the Month. And oh yeah, last month's So'tM. You might have seen it in the FF section, or you might not. Fun facts: the sepia self po' was drawn during a panic attack and the So'tM will be featured at the Axiotron booth at MacWorld this January in the form of a 16 foot printed banner. If you're in the area, swing by to see it or better yet, swing by to say hi to me as I will be doing art demos in the booth to promote ModBooks.

So yeah. Letting things settle before the holidays and scrambling for some new direction. But at the very least, I have paid off my bills for this year and managed to save a bit of dough, which in this day and age, is a big accomplishment in and of itself. Jeebus.

Much love and thank you for looking.

[Dished]

yehyyy!! steph update nice to hear youre still alive and kicking ! that me in sixty years doodle is cool haha

great work as always bud! take care

[Steph Laberis]

Thank you Dawn! Still trying to keep up momentum and all. Be sure to gimme your email addy btw, so I can send you a holiday card this year

Another quickie update - went to the SF zoo yesterday for a friend's birthday and had a good sketch run! I think I am really sacrificing form for movement in my gestures though, so that's something to pay attention to in the future.

[kelly x]

Your back?? Or just checking in?? Hi Steph everyone misses your cuteness

[Steph Laberis]

Kelly: I guess it's just checking in, I don't have the audacity to promise that I'll be a regular on here since so much is in flux! But I'll try to post whenever possible. Which will be more than once a month. I hope.

So... checking in with a little TMI. I've got to further alienate the testosterone from my SB, right? This should do the trick!

P.S... GAH, why can't I think up any good holiday card ideas? For the record, this wasn't one of them...

[Patch]

You may be trying to alienate, but that was just damn funny. Your storytelling skillz are madd yo.

[0kelvin]

Haha, Steph, that is hilarious. Only you can take a subject like that and make it so charming.

Seriously, we have to catch up. I miss you a ton!


Eric

[lefran]

hey steph, great stuff! i love the forest pic

[Clochette]

Steeeph! I reached my print of yours! I love it so! And the best was the little note with the cuuute tiny self portrait with it! Hehe Thanks a lot!
Your sketches are very funny! I love the sleepy rhino!

[HunterKiller_]

Fantastic sketches.
Digging the centaur babes... Crap, does that make me a furry?

[Bill]

Great sketches. I especially like the Zoo page as I know first hand that Giraffes can be really hard. The piece the puppy looks great, like you are getting even better with the collage/cutout(?) style. Pixar won't be able to resist for long!

[purb36]

duuuuuuuude. i know i've stopped in here before, have no idea if ive ever said anything though. but, DAAAAAANG, YO! these are SWEEEEEEEET. so when you gonna come out to the boston sketchgroup? and what's this macworld thing you're talking about? and where is it at? oh wait, you're based in berkeley now. bummer. still, hit us up sometime, let us know if you have any time with the few days you're still out here. and keep puttin out that hottness. happy new year, dude! take care, stef!