Valkyrie Warrior Commision.

Another commission from Heroes Con.. No specific character, just a valkyrie.. The client wanted this done for his daughter, so I wanted to give it a feminine but dignified, strong feel to it..

Heroes Con Art Show

I did this for the Heroes Con Art Show.. This was a fun piece that I painted at the Studio Revolver Booth during the show on saturday..

This photo is courtest of PatCave. I don't know his real name but click on the link to see more Heroes Con artshow pictures.

ArtOrder B&W Vampires

Done for the weekly sketch contest over at ArtOrder. This weeks theme was as you can guess, a pen and ink image of two D&D vampires..

It's much too early in the morn for too much exposition, so I'll keep it short and sweet.. Maybe I'll add some colorful exposition after I arise.

OKAY... Got some sleep, and so far I'm starting off this week on a great foot.. Only good new trickling in right now..

How about some insight on this piece.. I feel like talking about it because it was a pretty long journey from conception to finish.. Time-wise I only took a day from idea to finish, but I went to a lot of different places creatively to get to the end goal.

I started with visions of Franklin Booth and Charles Dana Gibson, and even a little Heirich Kley. I knew that I wanted it to look real and very tangible, but from the beginning I knew I wouldn't be able to get a lotof good ref, even if shot some- which I did..

The thing with armor is that no matter what ref you shoot, you won't see most of th body and you're always making up stuff with armour, so you're aways creating without a safety net.

I thought about getting some scratchboard so I could do this right, but I didn't want to have to learn a new technique when the subject was already kicking my but.. So I started with just straight pen and ink .. And at first I started doing the "comic think" just tracing the outlines and adding shadows.. But I reminded myself that didn't want any outlines, and to just paint the shadows with the black.

Note that I did do a prelim thumbnail, but veeeeeery rough, of the shadow play.. While it didn't help with details, it helped me balance the distribution of light and dark.. I tried to match it with the thumbnail, because I could make out the thmbnail fairly easily, and I knew if the final matched, the composition would at least be taken care of.

At a point I was finished laying down the black, but I was very disappointed with the picture at this stage.. So i grabbed some Titanium White acrylic and started re-establishing some positive, white, areas.. The picture felt better, but the white was just too white.. So then i went back over it with some black lines, but much more delicate than before. BTW, painting on the acrylic white was easier than painting on the paper..

And for the rest of the illustration process I went back and forth between white and black.. sometimes painting over an area two or three times..

I made a mistake and overlooked the size specifications in the original assignment, so I had to add some background to the top and bottom.

Well. That's that.. hope this might help you if you try this technique.. I'm very interested in trying out scratchboard now.. But I have to say this process was pretty fun and organic.. I'd just like to find a more opaque paint other than acrylic.. I had to put down two or three layers to really cover up the black ink.( if anyone has some ideas, hit me up.)

Death.. The character not the concept.

I just finished this commision. My first picture of Death ever.. She lends herself to be drawn and painted quite easily.. I like the simple costume.

If you notice.. I'm still pimping Brian Stelfreezes's gouache/watercolor technique that I learn at his workshop last year.

When I'm doing commissions, I'm finding that I pay much more attention to composition and temperature than modeling the forms.. I try to control the temperature of the skin tones and other aspects of the image, and try to model a little as possible. This definitely allows me to have more fun with the picture.

Big in Japan: True Story.

I don't use my blog for personal stories, but this is a tale so tall that I chuckle even just thinking about it.. These events that transpired in the year of two thousand and zero are not endorsed by Blogger and Tariq Hassan makes no claim toward the verifiablility of any anecdote that follow this non-binding and unprofessional intro...

A long long time ago in land far far away( from me now) I was just another Gaijin American trying to make it Big in Japan. I started in Tokyo, and eventually ended up in Osaka, using my trusty Japan Rail Pass that allowed me to walked on any Shinkansen and zip across the country, FREE(it cost several hundred in the states, but one Shink ride could cost that much)

Anyway, at this point I was stilll "small in Japan" so with the paltry sum of yen I possesed, I found the most affordable, um.. cheapest place to stay in Osaka. INTRODUCING the Namba Park Guest House. It was basically a one building slum that was probably owned by low level Yakuza ( but absolutely safe, like pretty much everything in Japan, except for food poisoning.. oops, I digress)

The Namba Park Guest House was truly a sight to see with marble counters( installed several decades previous), wood floors( scuffed), leather sofa( maybe found in the dumpster), Cable TV( the tv actually was pretty good), washers and dryers( in the apt bldg across the street) and personal sleeping quarters( imagine 3X3 foot squares cut into the wall that go back 6ft, and each having it's own door.)

We called the sleeping quarters "the coffins". Imagine a mourge. The squares were 2 tall and 4 across, and opened the door and climbed in.. And this Mourge was a the back of the "house" separated by it's own door.. Claustrophobics had to beware. ( a lot of shenanigans went on in those coffins.. I heard.. :).

Okay just a little more set-up.. Even wackier than the Namba Park Guest House was the collection of characters that lived there. There was Rob( nice laid back from Oz, Australia), Illiterate Phil( Robs best friend from Oz also who spoke in an intelligible Australian accent), literate Phil( from Tanzania, who spoke very clearly and was fluent in Japanese having gone to University there, but bitter at his lack of opportunities in Japan) Japanese guy( can't remember his name, but he would dress up in a pink bunny suit with a tail when they went out on the town-I think he was low level yakuza), and then there were always people in a out hanging around- kinda like friends. I never knew who was actually living there, and who just sat on the sofa all day. Okay.. I'll cut the set-up short.

One day, I'm down and out with some sort of flu/cold/make you feel awful bug. So I'm on the leather sofa just feeling bad. And then someone, I think Rob-nice australian, tell me some dude outside is looking for a black guy.. I guess he knew this would be one of the few places to find one in Osaka(in tokyo that would be no problem) And I ask, "for what".. And the tells me he's looking for a black dude to be in a music video. And of course, being small in Japan, I had to inquire abut the monetary reward for doing such a thing like a music video.. And tells me 10,000 yen, around 100 bucks, and I said "ten thousand yen!?!? GREAT!! I'll do it!" ( remember I was still small in Japan) Quick story, I talk with the dude( I'll call him Producer X) and he says he'll be back in a week or something blah blah.

A week or so later, Producer X does show up, true to his work.. BUT.. The producer or director( someone important to the video shoot) is passing a stone.. He's really apologetic about "wasting my time"( he did know I was small in Japan and had no time to waste) I was pretty happy about the situation because he bought me lunch in the diner down the street.( still small, remember) He said lets do it in a month.

During that month, many significant events transpire

After doing some small "English teaching" jobs, illegally with only a tourist visa, in and around Osaka I lucked out and found a longer term illegal job that paid me enough to happily subsist on rice and bread( there was a bakery across from the small school) Only problem was that rice very expensive there, in my opinion.

At this point I was living at the Greenpeace In Kyoto( no connection whatsever with Greenpeace) It was a slight step up- I actually had a really bunk bed there.. I was in a shared space, but I usually was the only one there, so it was like having my own room. The psychotic house owner/house mom Chikako didn't make things easy, but she definitely made them fun.

Okay Month passes, and I go back to the Namba Park Guest House at the time that I agreed on with Producer X, and yes he also shows up.. And another adventure begins.. Of course the end result is the video that you see- but I'll fill in the details of that later.

But this is the turn that took me on the path that made me Big in Japan!!

Female Loki

I did this commission over the weekend at Heroes. Its was for Brian Methot. He told me to choose a character and Casey Edwards, sitting next to me, said what about female Loki.. And I really dug that so here is the final head sketch.

Poison Ivy

This Poison Ivy was done fairly quickly as a last shot to get a new print ready for Heroes Con.. I liked how it come out.. but I can also see some areas that could be done better.

But in the end, I found a nice organic process when I did this one.. I'd like to do some more pics of other characters in this style..

BTW, I have prints left.. Drop me a line at my email if you're interested.

CROM!!

Okay.. It's not Conan.. But I didn't have any better names. I did this for a call for B&W entries over at ArtOrder.

The process for this picture is a something new for me.. I very used to starting and finishing an illustration in Photoshop.. But usually for linework I always go with actuall pen and paper and then scan it.

I wanted to simulate a scratch board technique, ala Booth, but without having to actually use scratchboard.. So to begin this images I did a lot of getsture sketches, read blobs of black, and then painted white on top of them the pul out details. I did a lot of back and forth between the white and black and scraped quite a few concepts before coming to this one. Also, each character and the background are all on separate layers..

Invincible!

I've been wanting to do something invincible related for a while now.. This color sketch only put a small dent in that longing.. I'd like to do something a lot more involved.. When I get time, I'll be on it..

Microsoft: Piracy Perils

Just another Microsoft video. Art Courtest of Studio Revolver, animated by Lustre Communications. I mainly worked on the storyboards and some of the background illustrations.

Blast From the Past: Kaneeedaaaaaaaa!!!!!

I did these guys, waaay waaaaaay back. I think around 2001 when I was in Japan.. A guy that published a English language mag hooked up with me a talked about doing some illustrations for an Akira article..

It was on of those strange Japan situations( that happened quite often to me when I was there) and in the end, he didn't use the.. They were unpaid from the get go, so I didn't care much since I liked the illustrations.

I didn't want to go all "Otomo" on the drawings( a reference to the artist that wrote and drew the comic), so I went very "design-y" for these..

Vote For Riq at ArtOrder.

So.. How do you vote?

1. Go to the ArtOrder blog(this links to the exact page you need to go to).

2. Scroll to be bottom of the thread and post a comment similar to this text " I'm ( your name) and I think Tariq did a bang-up job for this competition. I think he's a great guy and I vote for him hands down.". And make sure you leave your name in your comment.( unless you are signed into blogger)

4. Sit back and enjoy the euphoria of helping out a friend in need.

5. Get back to work slacker!

6. Repeat next week.

White Wolf: Wicked Dead.

More images from this project.

ArtOrder : Exchange Challenge

Done for the weekly sketch competition over at ArtOrder. This week I had to choose a silhoutte, not done by myself, from the competition two weeks ago, and fully flesh it out..

I chose the silhoutte by Dana Henderson. I really liked the gesture and movement of the figure I chose.. It was fun figuring out what should go where and trying to make everything come together.

So.. How do you vote?

1. Check out my illustration over at ArtOrder(this links to the exact page you need to go to).

2. Scroll to be bottom of the thread and post a comment something like this text " I'm ( your name) and I think Tariq did a bang-up job for this competition. I think he's a great guy and I vote for him hands down.".

4. Sit back and enjoy the euphoria of helping out a friend in need.

5. Repeat next week.

More White Wolf Malfeas

More images from the same project.

More Wicked Dead

More from Stuff I've done for White Wolf vampires line.

White Wolf : Malfeas

Here is another project I did for White Wolf for a different line other than the Vampires.. I got to draw monsters and ghouls for this project. Here are some of the pieces.

White Wolf: Wicked Dead

This is a project I completed for White Wolf in January. There were 12 Illustrations in all.. Here are my favorite three..

I had so many of these do that I had to streamline my technique somewhat, and I added something new as well. I mainly did all of the shading on paper, and did a lot of highlights and clean-up on in photoshop..

For the whole project, I adapted watercolor technique I learned at Brian Stelfreeze's watercolor workshop, and used Dioxazine Purple to start off all of the shading. I then used Paynes gray for any further darker tones.

My favorite image of these is the cowboy.. I got some great reference from Chris and Miracole Burns. Chris had the ultimate cowboy props to use for reference.

I'll post more in the future.

Counterfeit Confidential.

Just another Microsoft video. Art Courtest of Studio Revolver, animated by Lustre Communications. I mainly worked on the storyboards and some of the background illustrations.

Storyboard Project

Here are a few frame from some recent advertising work.. But these board were for only use for a presentation that in the end was animated using flash( this part was not done be me.)

I haven't done storyboards for quite a while, and previously markers were my medium of choice.. It didn't seem right to do these with markers, so I figured out a way to emulate my marker technique on computer.. It worked fairly well for me, but it definitely wasn't as fast.

But I did get more efficient towards the end.. And I think this will be the way I'll do them from now on.