Mike Nesmith

Mike Nesmith, the coolest Monkee, pioneer of country rock and music television. He is also responsible for producing cult movie- Repo Man. I currently have his greatest hits "Listen to the Band" on continuous roatation. Check it out, well worth picking up.

BBC Radio 2 are currently playing a short programme about Mike- listen here

Cat Laughs - Comedy Festival brochure cover

I got a call out of the blue asking if I'd be interested in this job after the client had searched a few sites and were impressed with what they saw on mine-- a picture of a hammer...

After meeting with the client all became clear. Their concept was all worked out- a wooden crate almost bursting as the contents tried to get out. For this they decided they needed;

a) someone who could draw wood and
b) someone who could draw shiny metal

The original idea was to have the crate suspended on a chain, with additional chains wrapped around it.

I did a quick rough




The idea was that the festival itself is escaping from the crate. So I had to think what can I show to represent stand-up comics? What indeed? It's a profession that uses few props- clown shoes etc were a no-no ( "too evil" said the client, revealing perhaps a little insight into his psyche). I settled on microphones and...other microphones. The pages of script were abandoned. We quickly decided that suspending the cage this way would get in the way of the logo so I decided to place the crate on the stage. I was also concerned that the whole thing had a bit of a 'Deerhunter' soldiers in a cage vibe. The beer bottle also had to go.

So with the crate now on the stage I reworked the crate to look less frightening and added a few more limbs.

This approach got the go-ahead


I tidied it up a bit and added cool medieval metal hinges...



Which I immediately had to remove(too medieval). The cat seemed a bit too distracted from the proceedings so we tried getting him involved..


There he is, slashing at the microphone lead. As it turns out this was deemed a bit too vicious looking. I also added the chains idea- and promptly deleted them again (hooray for photoshop layers). My stroke of genius here is the addtion of that universal symbol for "funny"- the rubber chicken.

Alas, this too got removed..strict guidelines regarding...



cruelty to animals..

So there you have it. A little bit of resizing and it was done.

I really enjoyed this job and working with the guys.

The festival is happening in Kilkenny in June

Details here

This was painted in Photoshop CS3 using a Wacom intuos III

Ms Devil

Another old one. Inspired by Coops devil girls and classic pin up art

Charidee

I did this for Threshold, the housing charity. I was more than happy to do a freebee for them as they've helped me and lots of people I know in the past. It took a surprising amount of changes and updates to finish this as the person who initiated it left midway through. in the end they used a hybrid of my original sketch and the finished artwork (!) I wasn't very pleased with the final result but i hope it helped them raise some cash anyway.

My initial rough version


A second version showing some changes the client wanted


I don't have the finished one to hand..but you get this gist

I'm glad to have helped..even a little

karma people

it's all about the karma

What's happening

Looking through my hard drive I notice I have dozens of half finished paintings. Over the next while I'm getting my arse in gear and finishing them off. The WW2 pinup below is one of these. She's been languishing naked, with no legs since sometime last year.
Poor thing.

Hooray for war

Here's one in the style( well trying to be..) of classic pin up artists like Gil Elvgren and Baron Von Lind

Life's a beach

just a cute girl who ain't gonna let a bit of rain get her down

Harley Quinn

DC comics Harley Quinn