Hidden Picture – River Bank

April 17, 2024April 4, 2024Leave a comment

I recently completed a project for Utah-based Fish for Garbage, a nonprofit organization that mobilizes communities through waterway cleanups and watershed education. They commissioned me to create a series of illustrations for a children’s activity book.

This image is the second of two hidden picture puzzles. I saved this one until last because it’s my favorite. That’s the same duck from several pages ago. Having him visible both above and below the waterline really sold the idea that he was floating on the water and what was underneath was the underwater view. And just look at those duck feet! So cute!

I’m really not an expert at drawing fish, but I work from references and do my best. The client said the one brown trout I drew had a longer snout than the other, which is actually called a kype and is sought after by fishermen. I don’t really know enough about them to do that intentionally, but I’m so glad it turned out to be a feature and not a bug. Serendipity.

Can you find all 8 items? There’s a cigarette butt, a tin can, a plastic spoon, a plastic drinking straw, a deflated balloon, a deflated inner tube, a plastic bag, and a flip-flop sandal. The client said they find a surprising number of uninflated inner tubes at their cleanup events.

I will say that, between this one and the previous illustration, I spent SO much time drawing little circles for all that gravel. But it was worth it!

A hidden picture puzzle scene showing both underwater and above water views of a river bank.

Hidden Picture – Hiking Trail

April 15, 2024April 4, 2024Leave a comment

This image is the first of two a hidden picture puzzles. Can you find all 8 items? There’s a soda bottle, a drink cup, a flip-flop sandal, a chip bag, a soda can, a plastic fork, a deflated balloon, and a set of 6-pack rings. The hidden items were chosen because they’re items often found during the organization’s cleanup events.

This image is a version of the illustration that was used as the cover image. The cover image was in color and without the hidden items. But it still has the same expansive view and variety of wild animals.

Overflowing Trash Bin

April 7, 2024April 4, 2024Leave a comment

This image was a small spot illustration depicting an overflowing trash bin. It will be used to illustrate one way trash can get into the environment unintentionally.

Tangled Duck

April 5, 2024April 4, 2024Leave a comment

This image was a small spot illustration. It was based on a previous illustration I created as a portfolio piece depicting a girl cutting a balloon string from a tangled duck. That’s the illustration that initially attracted the client to my work. In this case, the duck was drawn to be a mallard.

Remember, balloons are fun, but if they get out into the environment, they can be a deadly hazard to wildlife which may swallow or become entangled in them.

Girl Rescuing Duck

August 15, 2021August 15, 2021Leave a comment

a.k.a. Don’t litter the sky!

Here’s an illustration of a girl with a pocket knife preparing to cut a duck loose from a balloon string it’s tangled in.

When you release a helium balloon into the sky, you’re actually littering. That balloon has to come down somewhere and many times it causes trouble for wildlife when it does. Animals often try to eat it and can get choked or tangled in the process. It can kill them.

A girl kneels, preparing to cut a tangled balloon string off of a trapped duck with a pocket knife.

Inktober 2020 #12 – Disgusting

October 12, 2020September 25, 20206 Comments

Okay, so full disclosure. I’m actually working ahead on these. You’re seeing them published on the right day in October, but I’m writing this on September 14th. I’m trying to do one of these a day, but I’m doing it ahead of time in case other work comes up to delay me or one turns out to take way longer than the half-day I’m trying to restrict myself to.

This one definitely took longer than I meant to spend. This was a two-day drawing. Mostly because it took me forever to figure out how I wanted to do those waves. I re-did them so many times. But I think I’m pretty much happy with it now.

Anyway, so today we have the prompt: disgusting. This whole drawing is pretty disgusting, right?

A ink drawing of a polluted beach covered with trash and dead sea life. A power plant is visible in the background and a pipe is dripping something foul-looking on the right. Two seagulls are picking through the trash.

Recycling Book – Page 1, Image 2

January 22, 2020January 2, 2020Leave a comment

Here’s the second of two illustrations for the first page of a coloring book about recycling commissioned by Positive Promotions for Earth Day. The box in this acts as a frame around a word puzzle to be added in production.

Boy stands next to a recycling bin with a question mark over his head

Recycling Book – Page 1, Image 1

January 20, 2020January 2, 2020Leave a comment

Here’s the first of two illustrations for the first page of a coloring book about recycling commissioned by Positive Promotions for Earth Day. Words will be added to the speech bubbles in production.

Children bring recyclables to a recycling bin

Recycling Book – Cover Art

January 18, 2020January 2, 2020Leave a comment

I recently completed an educational coloring book project for Positive Promotions to be printed in time for Earth Day 2020. This was an unusual project in two ways.

First, it was not a new work, but a reillustration of an existing book originally illustrated 25 years ago. The previous illustrations were perfectly nice, but in a somewhat dated style. They wanted to update it. So, in many scenes, I was more-or-less copying a previous illustrator’s work, but in a modern style. A few elements were even just tracework, merely updating the line style to match my illustrations. There are no copyright or plagiarism issues because the publisher owned full rights to the previous work and instructed me to copy it. However, I have excluded the most direct copies from what I’m sharing here because I feel weird claiming that as my work. The samples I’ll share here for this project will only be the work that’s completely original or significantly different from the source material.

The second unusual part of this project was that it was a rush job. The project was one color cover image and 15 pages of black and white illustrations, usually several illustrations per page, all work to be done in two weeks, start to finish. So, this job was completed at top speed, working weekends and way more hours per day than I want to admit. Then, on top of that, there was a miscommunication on the ages of the characters that caused me to have to go back and redraw parts of most of the sketches before I could move on to the finals. Whew! This was a stressful project. But I got it done!

Anyhow, here’s the first image. This was for the cover and is the only color illustration in the project.

Three children toss recyclables into a divided bin