NannerBoy

This character showed up in my sketchbook. Not sure where it came from or what it's supposed to be. I eventually decided that this must be banana boy: long lost banana mascot of old times. Looks like a sad version of the Morton's salt girl. Still, I must have found it charming in some way.

Throwin' Up NannerHorns

Not sure what prompted the devil horns in this original sketch. Bang Camaro's 'Push Push Lady Lightning'? This sort of thing isn't my normal style. I've been thinking about that hard-edged, squared-off, look. This was sort of an experiment to take something round and make it square. I scanned the image and vectored the pen strokes with the Bezier tool. Not too bad. A little sloppy - but that's the point, right?

I use a small sketchbook (about 3x5") and whatever pencils happen to be lying around when I'm not at home. My personal preference is a blunted 4B pencil with a blending stump and knead-able eraser. My tool of choice for this page, however, was the Tombow ABT N15 double-sided felt tip pen. It's a rad little marker with a nice, firm, detailing tip and a soft tip that feels like a brush dipped in ink. Better still, none of the marks bleed through any paper thicker than cheap news print!

The Tall Grass

Some newsprint and a worn down 4B Royal Graphite pencil, an old idea in my head, Toro y Moi blasting through the speakers of my PC, anxiety and insecurity with a dash of inspiration - Tuesday evening.

The daily project was a difficult habit to form. I'm still not sure that it was ever regular enough to be called habit. However, it was a simple thing to stop.

There was no good reason to take the last two weeks off. I stopped doing a lot of things, actually. I've neglected the dishes in the sink and the clothes in the laundry room. I've allowed things to fall out of place. I've stopped putting effort into so many things. I relaxed.

I don't wish to keep going that way. I don't want to give up on my life, to become fat and ignorant. I don't want to reflect on the start of this project as the good times, as the peak of my creative existence. So...the break is over. I'm rested, and I'm ready.

I'm putting off the vector portion of the sticker tonight so I can work on a couple side projects. One of them has to do with jewelry design. I can talk about the others at some later point.

Updates...

To resume tomorrow evening. See you then.

NannerDamask

The damask pattern. Just like plaid, the name doesn't describe or define the pattern, rather the materials and method used to create it. The pattern we refer to as damask actually has a ton of different variants. I didn't come up with this particular one, but it would be fun to break down the basic idea and create my own...

Nanner..huh huh...uh...how's it goin'?

Beavis and Butthead were a pretty big deal to me in middle school/early high school. There was a period of time on MTV where reality tv hadn't quite caught on, and there was still enough room in the schedule for...you know...music videos. There were a ton of original, off-the-wall shows to look forward to back then: Sifl and Ollie, The State, Liquid Television, The Jon Stewart Show, Loveline, and that dating show with Jenny McCarthy, to name a few. I've seen every episode of Beavis and Butthead from that era - multiple times in fact. Those episodes still make me laugh.
I'm catching up on the newest season, and I love everything I've seen so far. It's bizarre how those guys still fit in with modern pop-culture. 

Exhausted

I've been banging my head against this one for a while now. I had a similar design in mind about two months ago related to Adventure Time. I was never able to choose an appropriate or cool word for such a small format. Thinking about Dhalsim, it all worked out.

Some days, I can get started on this stuff and never stop. Days like today, I feel drained in every possible way. Vectors are coming soon.

Nanner...tomato?

The maximum tomato from the Kirby series. Always a welcome sight to troubled Dreamland travelers and smash brawlers. Kirby turns twenty this year, hence all the stickers.

I wanted to mix it up a bit with color schemes, themes, and orientation. I was thinking about the practical use of these stickers - you know, putting them on fruit and vegetables. I began to think up some weird fruit that doesn't exist, then I thought about what the stickers would look like. Eventually, this idea took hold.

Because the concept was more elaborate than the actual design of the thing, I decided to create a simple illustration of the sticker in action. I haven't gotten to really dig deep into the use of gradients or blurred paths in Inkscape, since the start of this project. From the outset, I was determined to avoid continuous tone and color schemes of more than three colors. This was a fun exception though. It didn't take long to get it in this workable condition. Sure, the stem looks flat, the cast shadow is misshaped, and there's no bounce light reflection on the bottom of the tomato, but it's done. It's out of my head. It's not a forgotten idea lost to procrastination.

Look forward to similar things here and there.

Nanner Angry Sun

I haven't done any sprite art in a while. I've learned some tricks with guides and snapping that have definitely smoothed out the process. This one seemed appropriate for the approaching season.

NannerJellyFish

Finished up the jellyfish from yesterday's post. This evening, I set up an easel and went crazy with vine charcoal. Here's a quick study for yoga master Dhalsim. The scan was a bit off center (I'm using large newsprint, so I couldn't fit the whole drawing in my all-in-one), but I kind of like the "negative space" it created. I want to refine the pose and flesh it out with some research before it gets to vector form. This is going to be a fun one.

Strictly Analog

Just working out a sketch tonight. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.

Nanners & Sworcery

Inspired by the logo for Super Bros. Sword & Sworcery EP - a game I'm nearing the end of. I have been absolutely floored by the overall presentation of this game. It's not entirely long, but every moment is full of great music and awesome visuals.

NannerWeekend

More experiments with threshold and high-pass (thanks, David). Also, Avengers was a really great movie. Considering everything going on right now, it was great to get out and enjoy such an awesome superhero movie.

NannerMakeUp

Choro Q week leftovers. I'm not thrilled with this one.I don't think I had a solid plan to carry out all of the shapes and design. There are some weird, ambiguous edges and proportional nightmares. It feels good to finally get around to these designs, though.

NannerPirate

A pirate with a big, bushy, beard. Just sort of happened. It appeared the way a lot of these funny faces do - by chance. I tried something new with the beard, experimenting with a technique inspired by Chris Spooner at Spoon Graphics.

I got tired of the old banner, so I made a placeholder for a new one. I wasn't planning on keeping the other one around anyway.

My hands are covered in a fine layer of vine charcoal, my eyes are exhausted, and I think the day is over.