COMIC-BOOK PROJECT (UPDATE 5)

Some of the characters. Hit the picture for a larger version.

COMIC-BOOK PROJECT (UPDATE4)

Thanks goes to Sigurd Kristiansen for design and layout. Also Power (Seres crew) for the tags.

Comic-book project (Update2)

Production is now in full swing. Special thanks goes to Graffiti-writer Power of Seres crew for giving the characters in this story their particular style of writing.

Penga' Per - Den Fräsha prinsen av saltsjöbaden

Stockholm rapper Penga' Per and beat-maker Gonza released their promo album yesterday. I did the cover art for it earlier this summer. I tried to go for a 80's look on it.

It's a tight album and i recommend checking it out. It can be downloaded HERE! It's free!

penga per

The talented new young Swedish rapper with a taste for Golden-age Hip Hop. None of these are completely done yet, but i haven't really figured out what to do with them yet, so..

characters for a new project 2011

In the back of my mind i was probably thinking about the Streetfighter characters. Some of these are a collaboration between me and Joachim Barrum.

Fransisco Perez Collaboration

Fransisco added some really neat colors and atmosphere to this line-drawing.

See more of Fransisco's work HERE

Pyro

Sometimes i just cannot go to bed until i finish something.

My methods when drawing

People ask how i work from time to time, so i thought i'd reveal some of my methods. 1. Ideas: Sitting down with a pencil and blank sheets of paper is probably the obvious thing to do. It's often a movie, music, book or some other artists work that sparks it off. Then the doodling begins. I rarely think of how the sketch looks. It is meant to be just for you. I like when the sketch is open to impretation so i try not to be too specific. Keeping it loose is the key here. After going through 4-5 sheets of sketches there's usually 1 idea good enough to explore further. I think it's important to have a good feeling about it. If there's something in it that bugs me i'll do another one instead of trying to fix it. For sketching i always use a HB-pencils. (Above)The initial rough sketch. 2.Cleaning up the sketch This idea was rather diffuse and it was picked out mainly just because i liked the poses. There is no idea behind the characters at all. Just people standing in different poses. After looking at it for a short while i started to started to Think of how i wanted the characters to look. Then i started off with leaving out the stuff i didn't want (like the big gun). Transferring the rough sketch into something more defined and cleaner went pretty smooth. In the past i often freezed up and did 5 or 6 tries before getting it done properly. Often the joy of doing it went away for each new try so the result often ended up stiff and boring. Now i try not to think to much and just get it done. After the characters were done i wanted a background. so i did a random one. If you can imagine some sort of story to the picture then it works. It might look thought out, but it's not :) (Above)The cleaned up version. 3.Inking & detailing The inked sketch were drawn on a A4-sheet so there was really not much room for details. Also the arm on the bird-man were too long so i changed the arm again giving him a more relaxed pose. The characters were printed out bigger than the original (so that they filled the A4 sheet completely). This way it would be easier to add details when inking. I used a light-table to trace the drawing with a pen using the print as a base. I like to start fresh and rarely ink over a pencil-sketch. It keeps the original clean. While tracing i corrected some mistakes and addrd details. I did the characters and background separate as you never know if you'd wanna change the placement of the characters. Finally i scan the 2 drawings and adjust the brightness/ contrast as the lines rarely turns out completely black. You'd want it as sharp as possible. What i usually do is to duplicate the layer (mostly) 3 or 4 times and set them to multiply. Its turns the lines completely black, but it also makes the white grey. To brighten it up again simply just duplicate the layer again and put it on top of the others and set it to overlay. Voila! Next i i use the magic-wand tool and cut out the characters then move it over to the background. The tools i use when inking is always the same: three pens with different thicknesses. 0.1 for the finer lines, 0,3 For the thicker lines and then a medium thick black marker for the bigger black areas. (Above)The finished inked drawing. That's it. Hope it can be of any help!

hiphop - Faktaløve (childrens book)

Øyvind Holen has written yet another book about Hip Hop. This one is slimmer and is aimed for a younger group of readers than the last one. The target is 7-9 year olds. It didnt require as much art as the other book, but i managed to do a few illustrations in it as well as the cover. Here is one version of the cover:

The cover that was used can be seen HERE. Personally i prefer the colors in the one above + the fact that RUN DMC and Chuck D is in it:) But who'd wanna learn about those old-timers these days, right?

DJ Kool herc (2008)

A pen-drawing from the book "HIPHOP" Read more about it HERE.

Jaxxons (2001)

Published in the Star wars gamer magazine. This illustration was based on some old Star wars Marvel comic-characters from the 70's. Not my designs. Made in Photoshop.Green rabbit anyone?

The illustrations of dager jeg har glemt (part5)

Part5 - Finishing it all (Last part)

I had to finish it in just 4 days before leaving and i had 12 drawings left.

Some of the finished drawings before scanning and adjusting the brightness/contrast.

Also the cover also had to be made. I choosed a simple solution: Just use what i had. So i ended up choosing a few drawings and stuck them together. I got it approved and colored it quickly in Photoshop. The rest of the time long evenings were spent at work and the last day i did'nt sleep at all, but i managed to send everything over to the designer just hours before boarding the plane.

Left: Elements composed together. Right: Finished cover.

After i got back a box of books arrived in the post and it was fun to leaf through the finished pages. The designer - Erlend Askhov did a great job combining the text with the pictures and he even added some special design-elements in it as well. 

Freia (2009-2010

These pictures were commissioned by Screenplay and were used for a game on Freias site. Screenplay did all the interface and actual game-graphics themselves. They also developed the site and created the idea for it.

I worked on these with Joachim Barrum and Chester Lawrence. The initial sketches for the scenery and the characters were done by me, Joachim took a swipe with his Photoshop brushes and me and Chester finished them. Sometimes we "rotated" the tasks and swapped the pictures among ourself so i guess these pictures is a good example of the typical Artplant style. A weird fusion between mine, Chester and Joachim's styles. We're used to work this way and it is pretty effective. When you grow tired on the one you're working with or you have problems with something in it, just swap!

We used Joachim's custom-brushes for all the pictures as we wanted a painted look to them.

This one was mostly done by me and Chester.

Me and Chester again.

Mostly Chester and Joachim's work, but i was involved in it aswell.

This one was completely done by me Joachim.

The Freia site won a Sølvtaggen award in March 2010.

The illustrations of dager jeg har glemt (part3)

Part3: Preparing

I immediately started browsing through every panel in the storyboards to see what reference was needed. I've never used this much reference before and has never since.  Anyway, it's good to be prepared and try to eliminate as many x-factors as you can. The most obvious reference material that would be needed was people suitable for the roles of the characters, but there was also stuff like cars, buildings, police-uniforms, a dog, interior sets and even toys so i started browsing the internet for pictures. Just a few years ago we'd use books and Polaroids.

Some of the reference used.

For the reference on humans i gathered them as i went along. Sometimes i used a mirror, but for the most part i used photographs of my girlfriend and co-workers posing for me. Sometimes i discovered that it was impossible to pose just like in the boards so i had to do minor changes as i went along.  Another challenge was to change the clothing and appearance of the models to make them look like the characters from the book. For some of the explicit scenes i had to look in the obvious places, but most were just too porn and would not fit at all. So...After continuously browsing adult sites for 1 evening(honest!) i finally managed to find the reference i needed on google (doh!).

Chester Lawrence striking a pose for this specific drawing of David. I used 4 different people for David. Halfway into production i used Hans-Petter Harveg as he is (as anyone that knows him would tell you) - very animated! So he really brought the character to life.

Part4: Finding a routine for the the production of drawings