It's that time of year again.

Christmas is coming soon, so naturally I'm working on a dragon story illustration. This is just the head bit.  The dragon is supposed to look intimidated.

How about alien guys?

So, are alien girls hot, or just wierd?

Preston Blair is the cartoonist I learned the most from growing up.  His bulldog, the one in the Tom and Jerry cartoons, is one of the most copied. It appears as a sports mascot, on car decals, tattoos, etc.  I thought I'd take a shot at a bull dog of my own.

I've painted Santorum up as a religious icon for constantly blowing the fundamentalist dog whistle.  Now he's saying that a college education makes you a secular snob.

I should finish up my military mec-bot, but I can't resist a caricature of the next candidate from the Republican clown car, sanctimonious Santorum.  Here's the greyscale. I'll apply color over it next.

And here he is, along with a little pond water to sit in.  That was fun but I get the feeling that experienced professionals can bang these things out in a few hours.  Or maybe speed painting just makes it seem that way.  Gotta try Camtasia soon.

The robot is getting a little tedious to work on. Possibly because I'm not that familiar with rendering mechanical bits.  I'm taking a break to relax with painting up this little froggy sketch.

Getting close.  Adding a human figure helps relate to the scale.  There's a knack to drawing mechanical bits that takes practice just like drawing organic forms.

I love science fiction, but haven't done much art work with tech/mech elements.  So I think I'll try working up the giant robot.

Ive been watching the great instructional videos from UTube on creating concept art.  Especially Feng Zhu.  Check him out on http://www.fengzhudesign.com/.
They all recommend doing little monochromatic gestural sketches to work up ideas. Leonardo used to do this as well.  So I'm giving it a try.