All in Good Time (if Polly doesn't get Too Tired)

Everything that is good does not only take time, it takes too much time. I believe that the entire value of something is decided by how much Too Much Time it took (not mentioning the eternal values created by exceeding a budget with the loudest bang possible). Nevertheless, illustration is a craft that demands Speed, and thus the Illustrator has been experimenting with more pencil+digital lately, as in this late 18:th Century dress. (Resized detail from a perpetual book project; I think that I've mentioned it; good mainly for trying out this kind of stuff.) In theory, you find the pencil dancing hurriedly over the paper, immediately followed by scanning, Swosh!, and guaranteedly smudgeless yet quick sploshes of digital paint. But if you want it to splosh nicely...

...you have to spend quite some time with it anyway; letting the highlight play its part, allowing the shadows to form the dress into nice flows and creases.

The same goes for the equally perpetual oil painting that I've spent some time with now; scales and all. I believe that I could finish it off fairly quickly, but I'm told it's no hurry, and I believe that the time between painting the details makes the details better. (I think this concept is called Ma in Japanese.)

You can see that the underpainting of green, black and white is shaped into scales with light overpainting, wet on wet. Oily, all but smudgeless. (There is also a pagoda or something in being.)

This is not to say that everything that you spend Too Much Time with automatically becomes valuable. You might, for instance, spend Too Much of the oily ma-time doing Cold Calling -- the bane of every freelancer -- and too much writing about it instead of merely doodling this feeling; something like this:

And now Polly is very tired. (Polly is thus drawn in very sloppy Digital.) See you in February.

Wanted: Salesperson/Agent

This seasoned artist is looking for an extremely upbeat, socially gifted and terminally persistent Salesperson/Agent for selling his skills dearly to any place where illustrations, commercial or even finer arts might be needed.
Terms: Straight and generous commission, set by mutual agreement.
Payment in advance: Not at all. (Non-selling salespersons need not bother.)
Please send your résumé, i.e. experience + personal qualifications, to

oj.ceder[squiggle]gmail.com

(It might be of interest that Yours Sincerely is a member of the The association of Swedish illustrators and graphic designers and runs his business through his very well-registered sole proprietorship; Firma Joakim Ceder based in Stockholm, Sweden.)



And now for something completely different. You'll be very happy to know that Whale and Mission Impossible is still for sale as a poster. Here you may see the work on the original (if there's such a thing as a digital original) -- Look! :)




Last and perhaps least, the Dragon Painting is still in (slow) progress. This week: a foot, or claw.

The right side of Nipponiana will become more peaceful, I think. At least I hope so.

Things That Go Swoosh...

...seems to be the theme for this week. For instance, a katana, or Samurai sword, might go Swoosh fabulously well. (The bright spots that you see are wet paint, still glittering; the Beauty of True Work.)



Other Swooshers might, for instance, be bats. Their heads were clandestinely pencilled at "Vetekatten", a popular café in downtown Stockholm, and I turned them into flapping beings of the Night on the spot. They are receiving some electric colouring right now, and someday, they might swoosh around in a book of mine. (One of those perpetual projects.)



Part of the charm is that they'll have no idea about this.

Slow Progress w. Mt. Fuji and the Battle of Life

This week has been beyond description privately -- and it's still only Monday since a few hours back -- so I haven't got much done on the oval dragon painting. But I am planning a swordfight near Mt. Fuji (is that Hokusai enough?)...



...and add little details, so don't say Die.



I might get the opportunity to add a visual comment to this aforesaid private chaos some glad day when this chaos is over; but thus one can't describe chaos, for then it isn't chaos anymore. -- Q. E. D.