Astro Doodles

oK.....sooo....

I could perhaps maybe be possibly tempted to draw some more Astrofunk :)

Been enjoying scribbling away with some new Caligraphy pens - which I used for all of the below - u get a great fresh line with a real mixture if weight to it, more energy. Obviously it means if you make a mistake u either try to disguise it or start over, but hey that's part of the risk reward with these guys! Then I splashed some quick colour in photoshop to punch a few things out.....


But yeah, I am toying with a new Astrofunk idea, looking at what I would want to do....it would definitely be shorter in page count, and I'd probably start looking at just a real short 5 to 8 page thing and see how that goes. Anyway, it's been fun drawing Bad dude Byakko again, it would be cool to pit him against a huge monster. - Thoughts?

Back in a couple days with more stuff!
- Over and out!

RaB

Brush with a Giant Robot

Evenin' all...

So I'm trying to do some more digital painting, and this one is just a quick test with some new Custom brushes. Just fly straight in, not really knowing what you're gonna paint, and see what happens. My first attempt didn't fly, but this one started to look ok, so gradually added more elements - all the foreground stuff wasn't there initially, but the value range wasn't large enough, so got some darker blacks in there. Think this one turned out ok...I like that although it looks like the humans are worshipping the robot dude you're not sure whether their gonna fight it or not......hopefully keep going with practising more of this kind of stuff, plus got a few more things in the pipeline. Lovin the photoshop right now!

The Old Republic

IT'S A TRAP!

ok, so I bumped into a couple of Stormtroopers today in hmv, somehow managing not to buy the Blu-Ray complete StarWars saga there on the spot....must wait until payday!
Anyway, it made me wanna come home and finish this off, been doing it on and off in the background for a week or two. EA's 'The Old Republic' looks awesome, and the 3 trailers released so far are epic beyond phantom menace proportions ( actually Attack of the Clones is my least favourite but don't get me started on that! ) This guy, Darth Malgus, really lept out in the first trailer as this bad ass Vader esque sith lord, throwing his saber around and generally kickin' ass! So I thought I'd sketch him up in a much more cartoony style than any of the official art you'll see, and get some of that saber action into the pic.
It's not even that late tonight, so I might just go back to photoshop and do something else! ...Just got to figure out what? hmmm...

FLY CASUAL!

Dragon Quicky

Mornin!

I've been awake for hours today...woke up at 5.00am and could not get back to sleep. Too many ideas going through my head...I've been reading a few more comics recently, and it's been giving me the old itch. So rather than go back to bed this morning I ended up doodling Astrofunk! ( with Countdown on in the background ) . It was a lot of fun, and I've got a few ideas I'm messing around with on what I would do if I draw some more. But that's another story, maybe I'll stick some doodles up here soon.

For now, this is a quick digital painting practice - spotted a cool picture of a piranha online, and it was the basis for a dragon creature inspired by aquatic creatures. I like the idea of painting up a full body shot of this dude, maybe eating a Shark to show how massive he is, but this head study took maybe 1 hour or so, around that. I've been looking at creature design a little more recently, so will have some similar stuff up here again shortly.

Have a good weekend all!

SK8 Merc

Yo - back once again with another quickie. Didn't spend too long on this as I've got loads of more important stuff to be getting on with drawing and painting, and I've done stuff like this before, but it was a lunch break sketch I thought I'd colour up simply. I do like the idea of doing something with Skateboarding bad-asses, flying down a half pipe shooting stuff....nice. Gonna go get on with another pic! Back again very soon!

Ross

ps - The background graf texture is from my mate Max's texture site, link below, cool stuff. Cheers Max!

Max Textures

Z O M B A B E !

Hey - I did say Arnie style 'I'd be back' , and here I am - just a quickie with a hotty - Zombabe to be precise. Just a quick doodle that I decided to paint up, not spending too long over it at all, just havin' a laugh - the most fun was figuring out what to write - I came up with some pretty dodgy dirty weird stuff along the way - but that probably doesn't surprise most of you who know me! Back with some more on...Sunday night I think. Adios!

Ross

GRUNKK!

..no idea what that means sorry - and I didn't spend too long thinking about it either, but it's the name I've given to this guy. He's based on a couple of quick sketches which I've also stuck up here, thought he could be good fun to paint up, so got on with it! Got loads in the pipeline there should be a real onslaught of pics coming yer way in the next few weeks..so stay tuned!

Back real soon!

Ross

Spare Parts

..yet more from the Spare Parts Archives!

If u like what u see go try the game on XBLA/PSN ! It's great fun!

XBOX SPARE PARTS

Anyways, here's a mixture of stuff....a little more environment work with the Demo level mountain top that you're ship crash lands upon ( notice placeholder ship rough - just not unique enough! ) , there's also another robot ( the girly one! ) , some enemy stuff in the form of the Spider Monkeyz various incarnations, and a little glimpse of some backstory, with the Krokks that inspired some of the levels and backstory throughout the game.

Enjoy!

MONSTERS!!

....under the Bed!

Been a bit slow with the posts in the last couple of weeks, which I will blame on my sons birthday and as such playing too much Dinosaurs/Batman/Starwars games n stuff. Nice :)

Anyways, I should have lots more in the coming weeks, got a bunch more Spare Parts stuff to stick up shortly, plus some Deathly Hallows 2 stuff comin, plus about 5 things I'm in the middle of in the ol' photoshop. So expect more regular doses of sketchtasticity!

But for now, here's a link to a short film for which I did some concept work. I can't stick any pictures up here or it'll kinda spoil it, but it's only a couple of minutes long so give it a watch! Plus it's really good, and was a pleasure to be part of the production, helmed by my good buddy John Fairfield. When he's famous hopefully he won't forget this! :)



Yoy can check out the film here


MONSTERS UNDER THE BED!


Back real soon!

Ross

Sketching...

Been doodling a lot recently, which is always fun....got a few ideas I wanna try and kick into development and pursue, but most of these here are just random scribbles from the train/sofa/bed/toilet.

ok not the toilet.

Back soon!

-Ross

Party time!

Just a quick post of a fun little piece I just finished - my son Elliot turns 4 next month, and I got tasked with putting together an invite - Jungle themed! RAAR!
So here's what I came up with, which Elliot seems to giggle at, so client happy = job well done :)

Man that was fun!

Ross

PS - I just updated the pic by removing details...sorry interweb yer just not all invited! :)

GameKeeper

Another doodle that I decided to colour, similar to the Pirate below...just took the first sketch straight into Photoshop, and mucked around with lighting and stuff.

In other news, I've got a new PC set up at home - feels a bit more studio esque now - albeit a small messy studio ! So hopefully I'll be posting some more stuff regularly, and painting away into the wee hours.

Back soon

Ross

Tarot Sketches

Howdy Went to another life drawing session at my local pub last night, this time Tarot themed. So lot's of fantastic poses inspired by the themes of the Tarot deck, and basically a great night. I'd recommend checking out a session if u can, they are run by the very talented Jake Spicer and are held regularly in Brighton, just occassionally venturing upto Guildford to entertain us. Always good to get back to basics and get some practice in! ..especially accoimpanied by a couple of pints!

Indiana Jones....

Throw me the idol!!

So a few days ago it was the 30th anniversary of pretty much the greatest adventure movie ever put to film - Raiders of the Lost Ark. So that seemed like a pretty good excuse to start scribbling Dr.Jones. Got the dvd out, bit of googling of Harrison, and the sketch pad was out. Right off I wanted to focus on the Idol, the opening sequence is probably my favourite bit of the movie, and it's such an iconic moment that I wanted to use it's power....but then I started to think about how many freaky skulls and corpses there are in this movie that u kind of forget about...for a family movie there's a lot of those guys in there, and most of the raiders pics I've seen haven't featured these prominently. So then these guys got added...and the imposing ball of doom just seemed to make sense.

Anyways, it was a quickie really , didn't want to overwork it...just focus on composition and the feeling of adventure. Who can believe this movie is 30 years old, still looks amazing. Even the melting faces :)

Back soon!


Ross

Conrad Concept

Howdy! Thought I'd stick up some more of my work from Spare Parts. When we found out Simon Pegg was going to be lending his supreme talents to the game it was pretty exciting - when I found out I was gonna be desiging the character he voices - well that was hot dang awesome. As the pic shows, originally we were going to make this guy in 3D , like a floating retro computer terminal thing. Eventually the design moved to 2D , and also started to reflect more of an actual face rather than a more abstract lifeless object. So we went with something that definitely had a hint of Simon to his look, with the little moustache that also lends itself to the expression set. We ended up with the fun little digital hologram face - how's that for a slice of fried gold! :) I've also put up the Krofax starship - for this one I looked at a variety of inspirations, including Wierd bugs, Prawn like molusk things , the Sydney opera house, and a cool hotel in India. Drawing spaceships is never dull! Last one is another of the robots - this one more Samurai inspired, again sticking to the template to fit the animation skeleton for all robots, but pushing it where we could. One of the more bad-ass of the bots! Back soon with...stuff! Adios!

In space....

..no one can hear me draw!



Maaaan, drawing Xenomorphs is fun. A friend said to me the other day that ALIEN is his second favourite movie, and he's Bang on, it is amazing, and my favourite of all the xenomorph movies. So when I was asked to draw this for a friend I defnitely researched more of the classic Ridley Alien, and the background was inspired by the Nostromo, particualrly the mother room with it's orange dotted lights everywhere.
I used to draw these things all the time as a teenager, the Dark Horse comics ( or the titan uk equivalent ) were awesome, and I couldn't get enough. Particularly loved 'Labyrinth' with beaufiful art by Killian Plunkett, no on Clone Wars. So it was surprisingly enjoyable to come back to drawing one of these again properly after all those years. Cheers to Josh for getting me into it! Got some more Spare Parts stuff coming very soon, plus other bits n bobs!

Oh - thought I'd include the original drawing also - you can't beat pencil n paper!!



This is RAB...signing off :)

Aaaarrrrr...

Ok, so recently I've been trying to sketch in a diferent way, where rather than drawing lots of quick scribbles trying to maybe design a character like a pirate, I've just sat down and slowly drawn out a sketch, taking more time to consider each line. So this guy wasn't designed so to speak, just a one off drawing that I did whilst parked on the sofa, and thought 'he could be fun to colour'. So that's what I've done. I'm enjoying it as a diferent approach to doodling, requires more concentration and thought but worth it. Got another one of these almost done, will be up here in a few days. Just loving the drawing right now!

Oh...and a Xenomorph on the way! MOTHER!!!!

-Ross

Clone Wars

Howdy - Quick post before I run to catch a train - I've been working on a CloneWars pin-up based on the trilogy of episodes starring the NightSisters and the wicked Savage Oppress. He's the main focus of the pic, so I spent a little longer on his pose, finally got to one I was happy with, so it's now in the colour and lighting stages, but the pinup itself still has a few other characters required, so don't expect to see it up here for a month or so...but it was great fun sketching this guy, there's been a lot more cool new characters introduced in the last series of Clone Wars, and I've really been enjoying the show, worth checking out. Back soon with a Pirate!

Gotta Dash! - Ross

She-Warrior!

...or 'Orc Fucka' as u might wanna call her. Up to you.


Been working on this one for a while, finally put some time into the finishing touches....you can see the early sketch in one of the sketchbook posts below....I might put up a development progress thing of the stages this thing went through, from scribble to line to flat colour to lighting etc. Been a lot of fun, she's I suppose just my take on Red Sonja really...with a couple of tattoos, went slightly celtic/mayan with those, liked the blockier look, i was gonna go with a proper tattoo sleeve, but it looked too modern.

Got another couple pieces not too disimilar to this one, so it could be a busy week on the ol' blog!

Reptilian Ogre

Thought I'd try painting up one of the sketches that I posted a few weeks ago, so I went for this fat bad man. Thing. I don't paint up stuff in this style that often, so it's definitely good to get practice, trying to lean away from cartoony stuff a little more for a change is probably good for me. It's a little overcooked but hopefully the next one is quicker and easier. Got a few days off so gonna try to tidy the desk, clear the lightbox, resist the x-box, and get some more drawing and painting done.

Back soon!

HOT GONK FOOTY

NOT the third of my Jabbas Palace postcards, but a quick side doodle of the torturous droid 8D8. Gotta love the screaming Gonk droid in this scene from ROTJ, had a lot a fun fuckin around with this. Got a couple more pics in the pipeline, maybe get another up this week, and of course the third postcard is on its way. Adios!

JET SET RADIO 10 - TWEAKED!

Yo! soooo....yup, I know I posted the original version of this poster a good few months ago...but I glanced at it the other night, and it bothered me. I think I rushed it to meet the anniversary deadline, and my original teaser image of Gum skating away from us was stronger than my final pinup of the gang, so I thought I could definitely make a good stab at fixing it up.

The main things that bugged me were lighting and the the wierd border that smacked of photoshop a little too much. So I've gone in and played around, hopefully it's more dramatic and exciting now, and just works better as a pinup. Glad I went back to it! I've put up a comparison so you can play spot the diference! Have fun!

Actually...wowzas, I just checked and I posted the original almost a year ago! Time Flies eh!

Spare Parts Concepts

Howdy folks...

Finally getting around to putting up some concept work from the game I finished last year.
It's been out on xbox live for a few months, and was one of the most enjoyable projects I've ever had the good fortune to work on. I was lead concept, and although I occassionally got the odd concept artist to help me out, it was quite a small team, which meant I got to draw and colour a lot of the cool stuff myself. SPACESHIPS! ROBOTS! AWESOME! :)

So first up I'm gonna stick some stuff from the 'Hub Ship', basically the crashed ship wherein you start the game, and your main hub area that you return to again and again. I'm also gonna put up one of my favourite of the alternate robot characters - Issa4c. He's heavily influenced by retro 70's/early eighties robots, and basically rocks.

So I'll be back in a few days with some more stuffs, like the villains spacecraft and some more environment stuff....if you haven't tried the game go check it out .

Cheers!

Ross

Jedi Pic 2 - Rebo Band

These guys rock - literally! These guys have always been one of the coolest things about the jabba scene in Jedi, and I've based this pic on the original version, so the lyrics are what i reckon she 's singing with a little help from the internet. It's not that I don't like the special edition version, I think it's very cool, but in CG-ing Sy Snootles herself I think she lost something, ok she gained much more animation and movement, but she has a cool puppet look in the original that I referenced when sketching this up.

Plus how cool is Max Rebo! A blue elephant dude on a flashing lights organ piano bowl thing! He's the Billy Joel of Jabba's Palace! ( google it kids )

Anyway, a heck load of fun drawing these guys - now just the last of the 3 'Postcards from Jabba's Palace' to do....although I sketched up the Amanananamanaman version I am tempted to draw Hooded Luke instead, force choking a pig. hmmm....

Boushhhhh

Howdy

First of my starwars pics is finally coloured, just been squeezing in the odd hour here and there to gradually work it up. Decided not to clean up the pencils on this one, just coloured straight over, if there's no need then why waste time! Originally had more browns and oranges in chewie and boushh closer to their actual colour schemes, but decided it was more atmospheric and ominous pushing it all more towards the blues and greens of the dark palace. Always loved Leias disguise, fantastic design, and was a great toy when I was....31 ;)
I think I actually got Leia Boushh in a bag of 8 figures for a pound in woolworths all those years ago, when they had surplus stock after Jedi had come out. Happy days!

More astrofunk coming soon maybes, but probably Sy Snootles next! Adios!

Ross

Return of the sketches

Howdy

Just a quick tease of some new sketches that are work in progress....I'm in the middle of three Return of the Jedi sketches, all Jabbas' Palace themed, which is just great fun to draw, and was always one of my favourite moments in the movies, with such a wealth of cool characters. Anyways, been sitting over the lightdesk most evenings, so now just gotta do the photoshop leg of things.....back soon with some finished product!

no Strings Attached

Quick post from a life drawing night last week....

Rowan and I spent a night at the keystone for 'Strings', a life drawing class themed around puppets and mannequins - which meant that there was the odd puppet string thrown over the model, and every song included the words 'puppet','string', 'doll' or...well u get the picture. Needless to say, Cliff Richards 'livin doll' was played too many times!

However, the class was excellent, and yet again it proved the old equation worked.

Sketchbook + Naked ladies x Beer = Awesome.

Drawing turned out pretty well, unfortunately most were too big to scan, so I took photos instead, hence the low average quality of images. Anyways...got Return of the Jedi on, off to draw some StarWars....back in a couple of days with something hairier. :)

Cold as ice....

Howdy

I got back in contact with an old comics buddy recently, and wound up with a comic flavoured request - could I fill a 3 page gap in 3 weeks. Black n white, A5...so I thought 'yeah why not'.

A week and a half later I still hadn't nailed the exact story I was gonna draw, and was throwing around about 4 ideas.

Skip to the deadline at the beginning of this week, and those 3 pages had somehow become 8!
Anyway, it was a lot of fun working on a real quick comic project, so I've put the first 3 pages up here...you'll have to wait until the release of the comic to see the rest....it's gonna be part of the second 'Birdsong' anthology, wiht a bunch of short stories by some very talented folks - I'll be sure to put links and details up here when it's out.

Think I've got a digital painting needing finished, so might get onto that now if I get the chance - back real soon with more scribblings! Lemme know what ya think of the Frozen preview...

cheers

Ross

More sketchbook stuff

Back again! ....

Been trying to draw as much as possible recently, and really enjoying just scribbling away, hence another post of sketchbook random stuff. Again, some of this will remain a sketch, might work up a couple ( the barbarian chick is currently sitting in a half painted state ....one day i might return to her ! )... my forgotten love! :) Most of my sketching these days is on layout paper rather than in actual sketchbooks, i love that i can just tear it out a page and muck about with it, get it on the lightbox, play around more. But I end up with piles of loose sheets of sketches, which is kinda why these sketchbook pages have the layouts I've gone for......currently finishing off a short 8-page comic for an anthology due out soon, so should be posting some of that next week, plus maybe finally some painting stuff. Have a good weekend all!

-Ross

Pulp Fuzzball

Evening...morning....or wait, it is pretty late, goodnight! I just jumped in my quantum accelerator and vanished, awakened in the past with a mirror image that was not my own, bought this classic Captain Fuzzball comic book, came back to the future via a lightning strike and the help of a perverted hologram and BAM - stuck it up here on the blog. Orrr....I did a quick Captain fuzzball sketch on a lunchbreak a few weeks ago, started playing around with it, limited astrofunk colours palette, retro comic stylings, and ended up with this. Not to say that there's a new Captain Fuzzball comic coming anytime soon, but u never know. This was great fun anyway. Back in the next few days with more comic stuff and some doodles - see ya then! - Ross

FOR YOUR EYES ONLY.......

..ONLY FOR U!...

.the passions that collide in me, wild abandon something something...

gotta love Bond themes!

anyway....listening to some Bond classics as I finally post some new artwork. Been pretty slack this year, but I have been scribbling a lot, so I figrued I'd put some of those together into a little sketchbook sheet. Some of these may make it further, some will perish in history! But I'm trying to draw as much as possible, and really enjoying it, got a ton of ideas going on but isn't that the fun ? Juggling all the crazy stuff?!?

Always have an escape plan :)

Ross

ASTROFUNK issue 2 - SOLD OUT!

Howdy folks - Just a quick note to say I have zero copies left of Issue 2 of ASTROFUNK! Thanks to everyone who picked up a copy, muchos appreciated. Hopefully I will get more of issue 2 re-printed soon, but at the moment you'll have to make do with ordering issue 1 if youwant any funk - of which I still have a few copies left.

But fear not - if you're desperate for an Astrofunk flavoured fix you can still download the online edition of Issue 1 from SuperRealDigital at the link below

Super Real Digital - Astrofunk 1

Issue 2 will also be available for download there real soon!


As for issue 3 - I've been doodling some Astrofunk recently, so you never know, it might happen in the near future..... I'll be getting a lot more artwork up here in the next few weeks anyways, so check back in with the sketchtasticness real soon! Adios!

Ross

Spare Parts: Launch Trailer (HD)

Today is the day! SPARE PARTS is finally out, now available on
XBOX live or PSN, at a measley 800 points - around 6.20 - what
a bargain! :) This is the new launch trailer, which the guys here
at ea did an amazing job with, so give it a watch then go download
the game, it's a lot of fun!

Cheers

Ross

Spare Parts - Concept Review

so this is a new Viral video for Spare Parts, which is about to appear on PSN and XBOX LIVE very shortly, and shows...well, maybe some of the fun we had whilst working on this game with some great people. Even the crazy ones in this video :)

So I will be posting lots of Spare Parts related stuff over the next few weeks, there's also a nice little feature on XBLA just now with Inside Xbox, plus some Themes and Wallpapers up on PSN, so everything is ramping up. Good times!

Back soon!

Ross

Spare Parts: Simon Pegg Interview

Howdy folks

It's been a while, and I've not even finished off the last post...but wanted to quickly throw this up here, nice little interview with Mr. Simon Pegg, who voices one of the main characters in Spare Parts. It was very very cool getting to design the character of Con-Rad knowing it would be Pegg, and certainly influenced its design. The video shows off some cool footage of the game, and if you keep your eyes peeled you might even spot some of my concept art towards the end. The game should be out real soon, so I'll keep everyone posted on that also...

Might eventually post some new artwork up here soon! Maybe Santa will bring me a new sketchbook!!!