Gromit Unleashed

Most people around the world have heard the names 'Wallace & Gromit', and if you are local to the city of Bristol (UK) then its something you have grown up with. Local animation company 'Aardman Animations' have started a project to help raise money for Bristol's Children's Hospital's 'Grand Appeal'. The project is to have 70 five foot tall Gromits dotted all around bristol, each of which will be decorated by a mix of famous and local artists, in a bid to raise awareness of the appeal and to raise money through a charity auction that takes place in september.

I can happily say i have not one, but two of my designs have been chosen. This all came about as an work led opportunity through a group effort at RED©, the design agency i work for. I wont have to do it all alone, I will be overseeing the creations and will have help from fellow colleagues. I can safely say it is by no means a small undertaking, and i am very nervous, but proud to have gotten this far. At this point i can not say what the designs are, but i can show you the Gromits unpainted and some examples of finished ones.

As you can see the scale of the Gromits make them quite a formidable canvas. The Gromits shown above were by iconic designer Paul Smith, with his ultra-contemporary stripes and Cath Kidston, who has decorated Gromit in her renowned floral print. Simon Tofield, award-winning illustrator and animator of the cartoon series Simon’s Cat has covered Gromit in mini cat illustrations and the animation director of Disney's ground-breaking Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Richard Williams, has adorned Gromit in dazzlingly bright rainbow hues. Also Vivian Westwood will be designing one, so no pressure then.

On a personal note, I am very happy to support the 'Grand Appeal'. When my son was born, I had to deliver him myself at home without medical help. When the panic subsided I saw that he was born with some of his bowels on the outside. So within 2 hours of his birth he was rushed into surgery at Bristol's Children's Hospital where they patched my son up, it took three weeks of intensive care. The hospital staff were amazing and helped us through this tough time. My son will be five this year, and that is thanks to the amazing doctors and nurses at the hospital, I can never repay them for what they did for my son and my family. 

I hope I can produce two Gromits so awesome that they make lots of money for the hospital.

For more information on Gromit Unleashed (click here) or if you want to support the 'Grand Appeal' (click here). 

Thanks for reading.

"Do or do not, there is no try!"

As the geeks and nerds was well aware that the saturday just past was May the 4th, or as it is known by bucket heads and bathrobe fan boys, Star Wars day.

This year a small group of us led by our fearless rebel leader Andy Richmond of 'The Ninth Art', curated a pop up shop for one day only in the fair city of Bath (UK). Myself Red 4 (aka Porkin's) and the talented Wynn Ryder (Han), the equally talented Mark Pearce (Wedge Antilles), and the ever crafty Tweeny (Leia), flanked by Boba Fett & trooper TK-421.

This rag tag group of villainous / rebel scum managed to get together a decent amount of original artwork and geeky craft to sell to the general public in celebration of Star Wars.

This is a selection of work for sale. The bowling pin, vinyl toy, helmet & Darth Maul print are works of mine.

Boba Fett by Wynn Ryder

A great selection of one off art by Wynn Ryder, spot the elephant in the room.

A selection of art from Wynn Ryder & Andy Richmond.

My R2-Warhol cans. cute little 3x3 inch framed prints, some were given away to encourage custom.

yes your eyes do not deceive you, these guys were actually outside promoting us.

Searching for rebel scum in the heart of Bath.

its not all work, work, work. 

Its about hearts & minds.

A close up of my art. 

The adorable 'Chewtoro', probably my quickest vinyl toy mod ever, and he went to a very good home.

Darth Mungo signing off.

Gold Leader

I am involved in a star wars pop up gallery this may the 4th weekend. This is my latest piece Gold Leader, I always seem to concentrate on the imperials, so it was nice to do something more rebellious.

If you like this you can buy it over at Society 6.

10,000 PAGE VIEWS

Today I have hit 10,000 page views which is amazing, so lets see if we can get to 50,000 with more than seven followers.

whoop whoop

SKYFALL

Probably one of the finest Bond films ever made, Sam Mendes made an amazing and memorable masterpiece. I loved the story, the villain, the cinematography, as a designer the opening credits are especially sublime. To which the latter inspired my take on the film poster.

FIGHT THE DEAD, FEAR THE LIVING

I LOVE THE WALKING DEAD!

I have been watching the walking dead since day one, and have loved every dark minute of it. I have wanted to do some art based on the show, and after watching the season 3 finale I felt inspired.

I felt it was only fair to chose the most influential of characters from each series, and make it about them. My favorite is Rick's poster I love the idea that the "dont open, dead inside" is a really good metaphor for ricks state of mind by the third season.

All photography property of AMC

Dancing at Lughnasa Image

A quick job for my girlfriends next show in the summer, had a couple of hours to come up with something for the theatres brochure, and this is it. a little negative space.

10 Years of Theatre Design

I only just realised that i have been designing theatre posters for ten years now!

 This was like most things something i fell into by accident. I have always been inspired by movie posters especially the work of Drew Struzan (the man is a god), and by the modern rock poster. I have always wanted to push the quite stuffy, classic theatre poster design down this more visual route, I have always felt that the poster is the first visual hit, so if it looks amateur you would be less likely to spend you money on that particular show. So with that in mind i have strived to give a more cinematic or rock poster design, riff on popular culture and try and bring theatre from this 'Elitist' social standing back to a   open forum for everyone.

My early work is quite dated now, but some of the ideas are still strong, I always try to design with a concept behind the piece but sometimes the client just wants classical. The work has definitely improved with age and experience. I now hear people saying 'I saw the poster and wanted to check out the show' or 'These guys are amateur?!! but their set up looks so professional!' this means i have done my job properly.

The posters below are in no particular order, but please note the Wyrd Sisters poster the image was licensed to me by the extremely talented Paul Kidby.

The Bluebird

I was recently asked to come up with a illustration for a new show by theatre company Butterfly Psyche. They are producing a christmas show for winter 2013, and needed a strong image to sell the show. I gave the client some initial rough sketches and they selected the route shown below.

Initially i was going to do a stylised photoshop image but was recently inspired by Aaron Horkey & Ken Taylor who are both amazing illustrators who blow my mind with everything they produce. So i went about producing possible the most detailed vector illustration I have attempted for the last 10 years.

I am extremely happy with the final image and cant wait to finish the poster for the client.

A couple of close ups

Thanks for looking

Project Sleepy Time

I was asked to design some labels for for a new product range by one of my clients. He wanted individual labels for the five categories of product, he wanted them to look different but still feel part of a range. The idea is you by a essential oil spray, which you spray around the room of your young child before the bedtime routine. So by the time you finished reading a bedtime story for your bambini they will be relaxed and have a great nights sleep.

So what you see below is the fruits of my labour, I found it daunting at the start because i'm not an illustrator by trade, but i do try.

Thanks for looking.