Artist Highlight: Jake Wyatt

It's been ages since I last posted a blog highlighting the work of another artist. I saw Jake Wyatt's short film, Metro first in 2012 and thought it was wonderful, but I recently stumbled across his tumblr and I'm just spellbound. Gaze upon the magnificence of his work. His work on the Necropolis web comic in particular just makes my heart ache. Brilliant draftsmanship, texture, ethereal color, and unusual storytelling. I've found a kindred spirit. Cheers, Mr. Wyatt.

Panels from Necropolis by Jake Wyatt

Isaak sculpt: Drawing and sculpting

Every time I look at the sculptures and maquettes of Kent Melton (a great sculptor I was introduced to recently) you understand why Disney and Pixar and recently Laika have trusted his 2d to 3d translations for decades.
Whenever I sculpt a drawing, the relationship between the two practices is always quite striking. I never feel that I need the sculpt to look exactly like the drawing. I'm looking to capture the spirit of the drawing and hopefully improve on the definition of its personality.
When done most of my personal sculpts become references I use for a project either 2d animation or comics. Having a sculpt to refer to for drawing proportions and technical details is great, but more importantly the sculpt is a solid base to build on. The sculpt gives me insight for better visual consistency, weight distribution in my drawings, expression, etc and even aids muscle memory involved in drawing the character. To summarize, the manner in which the two practices inform one another is just a fantastic cycle.

Artist Research: Nicolas Bouvier

Bouvier is a French illustrator/concept artist that now lives and works in Dallas, Texas working for ID software. He traveled extensively when he was young and perhaps this influenced his love for landscape, architecture, and various cultures. He has worked on several projects including Alone in the Dark 4, Prince of Persia 2 or Ubisoft, for Darkworks-Studio that have collaborated with Namco and Capcom. He has also worked in Montreal to work for Ubisoft on Assassin's Creed. He has also been illustrating book covers in France and England throughout hi life. Examples include: Lou Anders and PYR publishing. I find his work intriguing because he is able to depict the most complex and otherworldly scenes effortlessly and still imbibing the illustrations with energy and life.
his blog
his site

Artist Research: Sam Weber

Weber is an American Illustrator born in Alaska, but grew up in Ontario, Canada. He attended the Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary and then moved to NY for graduate school at the School of Visual Arts. He worked as and assistant art director for the OpEd page at the New York Times for two years after graduating. Right now he mostly does freelance illustration. He has published work for Atlantic monthly, New York Times Book Review, Time, Rolling Stone, SEE magazine, Business Week, The New York Times, Playboy and a host of other clients lining up for him. Weber's use of ethereal imagery and realistically depicted figures is an interesting combination that seems to evoke thoughts of individuals that are trying to fit into their place in an environment. His use of flatly rendered graphic elements and rendered elements also works effectively representing unsettling and uncanny looking imagery.
his site

Artist Research: Murray Kimber

Kimber is a Canadian illustrator and graduate of the Alberta College of Art and Design in 1988. He became a freelance illustrator for subsequent years working as a children's book for packaging, billboards, postage stamps, etc and then began teaching for 5 years until 1997 when he moved to Mexico with his wife. He returned to British Columbia, Canada in 2001. His clients include the Vancouver Opera, American Express, Canada Post, GM, the U.S. Tennis Open. His work seems built for the iconographic/ communicating ideas in a deceivingly simple manner of stylizing forms. He has a great manner of oil application and his color choices always strongly emphasize the emotional tone of his illustrations.

Artist Research: Kevin Michael Dalton

Kevin Michael Dalton is an American freelance illustrator born in 1983 in Detroit Michigan. After high school Dalton enrolled in the College for Creative Studies and tutored under David Chai for 2 years learning animation and character design. He now works on commissions and freelance illustration like Flight volume:4 comic. He lives and works in North Hollywood, California
His working method is a such:
"I tend to use regular white copy paper 8x11 for starting things out or Bristol if I'm trying to be extra fancy or selling work. I ruff out the drawing pretty hard in red col-erase, go over it with pencil or ink, I knock out the red in Photoshop (this saves for lightboxing), then I use Photoshop to color mostly since it’s the fastest. But whenever I got the time I like to use prisma color markers, watercolors, and any other traditional medium that suits the mood. That’s where the real fun is at, sitting waiting for things to dry, smelling the paints, getting it on your hands, it really touches your inner child. I tend to now more than ever just color digitally using gradients, cuts, and the airbrush tool. Since my work is mostly 2-dimensional I think this way fits it the most." source
Dalton's character design and color usage are his strongest attributes I think a lot can be learned from his working method too. His characters hold a lot of personality and visual interest which all illustrators strive for. His style of drawing also translates into animation which is a quality I'm very interested in too.
his site

Artist Research: Svetlin Velinov

Velinov is a 29 year old Bulgarian illustrator/concept artist that lives and works in Sofia, Bulgaria. He graduated at the New Bulgarian University in Sofia with a concentration in animation in 2003 after a brief stint at the National Academy of Arts.He was trained with a staunch adherence to the academic styles of painting, but later abandoned it in favor of digital media which he now uses exclusively. His work has been featured in the CG Society's Gallery of Choice Awards, on Conceptart.org, in Format Magazine, Death Jr. 2 for Konami, World of Warcraft for Blizzard entertainment, etc. Velinov has a very lively and dynamic style and is one of those cg artist pushing the media to its fullest potential. His style has also garnered attention from Dark Horse comics and a future project is in talks.
Interview with Velinov
his site

Artist Research: Michael Kutsche

Michael Kutsche is a German illustrator/concept artist, animator/designer that lives and works in Berlin. He has been working in the visual effects industry since 1998 working in advertising, video games, and feature films. His passion is creating character concepts and Kutsche uses the programs Painter, Photoshop, XSI in conjunction with each other to bring his illustrations to fruition. His style varies depending on the project he's working on, but usually retains a level of polish and inspired character development. His clients include SEGA, BMW, The Creative Assembly, Sony Ericsson, Fiftyeight3D, Publicis, etc.
his site

Artist Research: Alex Toth

Alex Toth is arguably the most influential illustrator's illustrator in the last 50 years. Toth's work spans from comics, to animation, toy design, storyboarding for movies and tv, and even teaching. Toth's work was revered amongst his peers and the subsequent generations of illustrators that followed. Artists like mark Chiarello, Tim Sale, and Paul Pope to name a few are greatly influnced by his work. His work for Hanna Barbera designing characters for Johnny Quest, Scooby Doo, The Herculoids, Space Ghost and many more ensure that every kid in the born in the last 40 years has seen his work. Some of Toth's influences include Howard Pyle and Milton Caniff. Toth's story telling and most of all spell bindingly elegant design sensibilities set him apart. He is a true legend. Alex Toth lived from 1928- 2006.

See his work here
There is also a great podcast tribute here over on Sidebarnation

Artist Research: George Pratt

George Pratt was born in 1960, October 30th in Beaumont, Texas. He moved to NY to study Drawing and Painting at the Pratt institute where he also taught later in his career. He also taught at the Joe Kubert school in New Jersey. His work appears in private collections throughout the world. His graphic novels like Enemy Ace: War Idyllic for DC Comics/ Warner books have garnered several awards and nominations and have been translated into many languages and have won numerous awards, most notably the Eisner Award for Best Multimedia Artist. He teaches full-time at Ringling School of Art & Design, Sarasota, Florida and each summer with The Illustration Academy. I really enjoy Pratt's use of color, a juxtaposition of muddied chromatic grays with muted colors producing tension which in tern creates form, space, and story telling.
his site

Artist Research: Sterling Hundley

Born in 1976 Sterling Hundley is an American illustrator and painter that graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1998. Even as a student Hundley's work was sought after by the CMYK, Step by Step magazine. In the summers of 1998 and 1999 he attended the Illustration Academy where he is now a full time instructor over summers. His work is publeished in in the pages of Communication Arts magazine, American Illustration, Print Magazine, the Los Angeles Society of Illustrators, 3 x 3, Graphis, etc. Some of his clients include: Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Arena Stage, Bungie, Topps, Marvel, Atlantic Monthly, the Grammys, GQ, the New Yorker, the Progressive, Vibe, the New York Times,etc. He has exhibited is work round the world and i a juror for the Society of Illustrators, Society of Illustrators Scholarship and 3x3 magazine. He is truly a prolific artist that many respect and sometimes revere and has much to do with the sense of style that he infuses into his art work. He bends perspective and space to provide more interesting compositions and uses planes of color and shape to define form. His use of collaged textures also often times works seamlessly with his paintings.
his site
his blog

Artist Research: Mark English

Mark English is an American illustrator/painter born in Hubbard, Texas in 1933. He attended the University of Texas and graduated from The Art Center College in Los Angles in 1960. His work has featured over decades in several publications as McCalls, Time, Sports Illustrated, Redbook, Atlantic Monthly. His client list is as such: IBM, U.S. Park Service, RCA, GE, Ford, GM, and Honeywell. In 1995 Mark began painting for galleries solely even though he had already exhibited for solo shows and group shows throughout the United States, Canada, and Japan. He was inducted to The Illustrators Hall of Fame in New York in 1983. I tend not to like painting styles that use a lot of luminescence and transparency to convey their point, but English just does it well.
His Site
Illustration Academy demonstration.