FALLOUT: Lanius- Final Callout

About 4 hours ago on the Fallout: Lanius Facebook page, the following announcement was made:

" This is our FINAL CALLOUT for Art Department/Costume Assistants for Fallout: Lanius. If you live in Perth, Western Australia and want to be apart of the film dealing with props, costumes, weapons and other cool stuff - now is the time to email Producer Stuart Mackenzie at hobosbreakfast@gmail.com. Be prepared to work hard and have fun! "

 

Production photographs are steadily being added to the Facebook page as well, so please check those out as well as the new Stretch funding perks!

 

 

FALLOUT: Lanius- promo filming completed

The crew has just finished filming the new promo for Fallout: Lanius. There was blood, gore and lots of skirts falling down.

Please check out the website at: http://falloutlanius.wordpress.com/ or like FALLOUT: LANIUS on Facebook for more information.

November update

Lately I've been carving props for Fallout: Lanius, which begins filming this month.

That has been all I'm doing at the moment regarding producing any physical artwork. Hopefully I can produce so more plaster carvings not related to the movie to post here with a photographic walkthrough.

November means that Nanowrimo is here too. According to the challenge I am now attempting to write a 50,000 word novel in a month. I do plan for this novel to be illustrated so there will be some sketches posted over the month. For a week in the middle of the month I'll also be in Melbourne for the Young Australian Artist and Writers Awards.

Because I was voted my college's Liason Officer for 2013, I need to design and produce shirts and jumpers for next year by February.

Out bush we also found a goat. She is heavily pregnant and we expect her to drop kids within weeks, provided the weather clears up. She should be carrying twins as currently she appears to have two basketballs lodged in her gut.

That's all for now.

In the Beech Forest Launch

We were very fortunate to be able to launch In the Beech Forest at the National Literature Conference on Friday the 26th, held in the Fremantle Prison. Thankyou to The Literature Centre, the volunteer staff and to Lesley, who organised the event, and also the Isobelle Carmody, who launched the book for myself and Gary . It was great to have Gary there as he is an incredible speaker. But thanks must be extended to the attendees who gave us their support through buying the books, as well as to the other presenters Shaun Tan, Lucy Christopher, Tony Eaton, Roy James, Julia Lawrinson, Jackie French and Matt Ottley who attended too.

It was a wonderful event with three launches altogether and two solid days of lecturing.  Thankyou as well, Paul, my publisher, for this working opportunity.



Shaun Tan, Matt Ottley, Kim Michelle Toft and more in the one room!

In conjunction with BHP Billiton, the Literature Centre  has organised two FREE events to promote literature for children.

THE ILLUSTRATOR'S JOURNEY ART EXHIBITION
~Sunday 28 October, 2012, 11am to 4pm
An exhibition of work featuring Shaun Tan, Matt Ottley, Kim Michelle Toft and more. Selected prints  and original works will be available, along with the books featured.

At the last SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) meeting we got a sneak peek at the exhibition and it looks amazing. If you are interested in art or illustration I would highly recommend that you attend, especially if you would like to see a bit more of Shaun's behind the scenes work on certain picture books.

THE LITERATURE CENTRE'S FAMILY OPEN DAY
~ Sunday 2 December 2012, 11am to 4pm
Features special guests James Foley and the Redfoot Youth Theatre

Shaun's art and book information is here :http://shauntan.net/
Matt's work can be found at: http://www.mattottley.com/
Kim's portfolio as available to view here: http://www.kimtoft.com.au/

For more information on the events or more up and coming, check out The Literature Centre website: www.thelitcentre.org.au.

Fallout: Lanius update- $5000 raised!

Our lovely director Wade has posted a new video update on Youtube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EETdVRMXBYg&feature=g-all-u

so please go and check it out.

The fundraiser at page over at IndieGoGo has just hit $5000, so thankyou to everyone who has been inv olved with that incredible effort. To pledge donations please head to: http://www.indiegogo.com/FalloutLaniusFanFilm

A callout was also released on the Fallout: Lanius Facebook page for anyone who is would like to be an extra in the movie. If interested please go to: http://www.facebook.com/groups/187616564682659/?fref=ts#!/FalloutLanius?fref=ts 

 for more information or to leave a like or comment.

Celebrate Reading National Conference 2012

On Friday the 26th of October and Saturday the 27th of October the Children's Literature Centre in fremantle will be hosting the 2012 Celebrate Reading National Conference. Including lectures from incredible talent including:

- Shaun Tan
- Gary Crew
- Jackie French
- Isobelle Carmody
- Anthony Eaton
- James Roy
- Julia Lawrinson
- Matt Ottley
- Lucy Christopher

There are several book launches and signings happening as well including that of In the Beech Forest (by Gary Crew and myself) which will be launched by Isobelle.

More information will posted as it comes to light including the line up for next year's conference.

Old Work: Ara

This little dragon was drawn around 2008-ish from memory, when I was 15. I had won my first Young Australian Artist of the Year Award (YAAWA) from the Children's Charity Network and Australian Scholarships Group and was at the awards night in Melbourne when I met Marc McBride. Growing up "Deltora Quest" (by Emily Rodda) was the series to read before Harry Potter was released, the former now adapted to an anime series for television. I was and still remain, a big fan of the series and Marc's artwork.

As such, I own all of Marc's drawings books and all of his Deltora Quest related books. Marc noted that he liked my winning YAAWA painting of that year, Society's Puppet, so consequently I promised to send him a poster (which I did). After our conversion Marc also said he'd send me some works that he had lying around, so I gave him my address thinking nothing of it. A while later, a package arrived with three works in it: two cover paintings and the Emerald Dragon drawing from Marc's book, "How to Draw Deltora Dragons". Safe to say this was very unexpected and within a few days I had drawn Ara, the little dragon shown here, the send back to him in thanks.

I have met Marc again and again at YAAWA in the years since and he always seems to be handing out the excess copies of his books to the prize winners. Last year I picked up a copy of "World of Monsters". Finding Ara makes me want to draw more dragons though, maybe some ones from Deltora.



Win a FALLOUT: LANIUS set visit or exclusive skype session

For more information check out: http://falloutlanius.wordpress.com/

To donate funds for Perks, please go to: http://www.indiegogo.com/FalloutLaniusFanFilm

What is Fallout: Lanius?



Image source: www.kotaku.com.au



"FALLOUT: LANIUS" will be a not-for-profit fan made film based on the story of Legate Lanius from the video game Fallout: New Vegas. Shot locally, it will largely be created by Australian artists across a range of industries and will even feature one of the voice actors from the game, Mitch Lewis.

Fallout: New Vegas was a game I played to no end when it was first released back in 2010, including most of the DLC packs such as Dead Money. Through various contacts I was placed to help out with the film which is very exciting. To help the project the only way I can I will be posting here regular updates about the production which can also be found at the movie's site: http://falloutlanius.wordpress.com/2012/04/

At the moment the project is in the funding phase through Indiegogo at http://www.indiegogo.com/FalloutLaniusFanFilm

using various tiers costing between $5 to $1000 with Perks including: free movie downloads and DVDs, autographed posters, Caesar's medallion and even the prop of the Sword of the East (which has sold out).

 If you are at all interested in the film please check out the link above and send the crew your support. Also, please check out the movie's website for production updates and competitions!

This blog is not dead.

This morning my publisher sent me a link to another Beech Forest feature:

http://www.kidslife.com.au/Page.aspx?ID=3862

which gave me the prompt I needed to get the blog active again. Several things have come up to cause this blog to not receive an appropriate amount of attention from myself including not only university (which finishes in two weeks for hte year) but a few other projects as well.

Recently I've done some designs for Fallout: Lanius, a fan-movie based on the game Fallout New Vegas, but more on that later. I had also promised myself to finish the current novel I was working on, but instead, last night, planned another one. In consequence there is a lot of art work lying around to be photographed or scanned and uploaded here, most of it sculpture work from university.

This week on Friday, Oct. 5, I'll be signing copies of In the Beech Forest at Dymocks in Fremantle, 129 High st. Mall, so if you're in the area please come along!

The last of the Running Horses

 Finally the last of the monoprints for The Running Horses are complete!  I definitely want to explore monoprinting further on another project and do some more resolved work rather than this sketchy style and with colour. I don't have much else to say about them really other than I hope they are enjoyed and on to the publication process.

Both of these prints were on A2 Archers and took only 2 hours each including prep and printing.



The first stage of sketching using rag to mock up the anatomy of the horse.

Now begins the refinement of the image. With this series I've found it best to folow the musculature fo the horse in order to describe its form.

Another Atlas

Another experiment with Atlas.

This one was difficult to complete because I changed the viscosity of the etching ink to one that was very unfamiliar. The plate was covered in typical etching ink first, the sketched into with a rag. I wanted to try adding coloured ink, so I thinned it with oil to help the red mix with the black. In consequence, portions of the black ink became thin as well and slippery on the poly plate.

More Horse Monoprints

The Lamps: Castle Gates

The Lamps: Castle Gates. 2012. watercolour, graphite and chinagraph on 150 gsm watercolour paper. A3

Sometimes you can become bored with black and white pictures, so I drew the above as an experimental piece. It is simply graphite on watercolour paper that was tinted with a combination of red, orange and yellow and finished with Staedtler chinagraph pencils to recover whites for highlighting. There is a storyboard behind the drawing as it is the conceptual grounding for the project.

Another 29 to go...

The Centaur

This monoprint was done as an experiment for my painting class during Sem1 at university. The ink was thinned with oil so that the coloured portions would mix with the thicker black base, which succeeded, but only to present the new difficulty of saving any grey tones. I suspect that this work will be concept to revisit when the time presents itself.

The reference for the human pose can be found at: http://www.posespace.com/. I would greatly recommend this site to those wanting to study human anatomy.

The Making of Atlas

What have I been doing during my univeristy holidays? Not much of anything solid really. I have, however, sketched storyboards for six separate wordless picture books, re-written half a novel and have started doing the final images for another two picture books. I was complaining in my college dining hall about not completing anything polished when one friend said "Why don't you just DO something?"

The result is the above.

As I have said, nothing is complete but it is comforting to know that I now have these projects that I can come back to or sell in the future and throughout the rest of my degree. Luckily this apiffany occured about two weeks before my second year print folio was due, so I have managed to incoporate one of those storyboards into that oevure. The Three Headed Horse was included in this late addition as my test image for 4 point colour separation screen printing. A few days ago though, when doing a new storyboard, I decided to rename it Atlas.

Atlas began as a brief for a magazine cover. I was able to do just about what ever I liked and took inspiration from "Les deux faces de l'âme" by Wotjek Siudmak. The image can be found at the artist's website: http://www.siudmak.com/. He is one of my favourite illustrators.  

I completed a rough sketch of the composition in charcoal. The plan was to appropriate Siudmak's general composition as a starting point before adding the 3 horse heads to the outside. Horses were used in the composition as I own a pair, making referencing a lot simpler.

One of the few conditions I was given was that the image had to be colourful. I don't use colour very often, so the next step was to do a colour sketch to figure out what colour would be used where.

Using Photoshop I have collaged my reference photographs together to get a better idea of the pose of Atlas.

Atlas was to be drawn small, so this drawing is only about A4 in size. It was drawn in 2B and block shaded, so that when the base coat is applied I can still see the lines. I find this is the best time to apply a thin layer of workable fixative to the work, so the pencil does not lift and mix with the upper coats of paint.

I used acrylic paint for the base colours.

 Polychromos colour pencils were used to build up the work. These pencils are very oily and blend easily, so a layer of white was done first, then a combination of yellow and orange. At this point blue is included to the shadows with a layer of black.

One of my new story boards includes Atlas a key feature in the story, so it will probably be revisited in the future.

The magazine cover that Atlas was originally made for can be found at the OZ Kids in Print website: http://www.ozkids.com.au/cssMagazine.php?id=2012_05

David Bromley's Kaleidoscope

If you are in Claremont during the next month you should pop by the Quarter to see Bromley's new show. It's on the 2nd level and showcases a large variety of works from his female portraits to 50's inspired paintings of children. Some are as small as a laptop and others large enough to fill a wall, with a collection of what looked to be bronze sculptures at the heart of the exhibition. Most of the works have already sold but it is a great opportunity to see his works up close, particularly if you are like me and are interested in seeing how the paintings are done.

Print Folio Semester 1, Year 1, Submission

 

Today I handed in the last of my univeristy folios for the semester. These photos are of my print making folio set up, ready for my speech and marking.  

 Above Right: On the pillar is my anthropometry test. Primarily associated with Yves Klein, one covers human body in paint and runs at a wall covered in paper. It was fun but it took an incredibly long shower to get the paint off. My first ever monoprint is on the top left of the main wall, with some etchings and 4 point screen print tests. There were no tables left so I had to improvise: with the aid of three stools and two of my folios I managed to make a table for my journals and storyboard.

Below Right: My largest monoprint at just under two metres long. Underneath are some drypoint experiments with various way of printing including some chine colle.

New Beech Forest Review; Shaun Tan: Suburban Odyssey

I received the link to a new In the Beech Forest review today by the Sydney Morning Herald at http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/light-shines-in-the-darkness-20120607-1zx6p.html. The reviewer, Candida Baker, most generously wrote,

 " This beautifully designed hardback is reminiscent of Shaun Tan's books in the complexity and layering of its text and illustrations. An ideal read for children and adults alike, particularly young boys."

I must note here that such a thing could never be possible: Tan's oeuvre  is both unique and beautiful, never to be rivalled. On the weekend I had the pleasure to see his exhition: Suburban Odyssey, at the Fremantle Arts Centre (see: http://www.fac.org.au/events/110/shaun-tan-suburban-odyssey?mid=12). I thought it featured a small number of works but they were of high quality. I sat there for several hours studying how Tan applied the paint media to the wood and ground of the canvases and his use of colour and motion in line. There are large refined works of several metres in length, a collection of small plate plein air studies of various subjects, two of his sketchbooks to view as well as a series of composition studies, some from The Lost Thing. If you are in Perth between 19 May 2012 - 15 July 2012 , I would recommend a visit to the exhibition. The gallery cafe is also a nice visit, as I was allowed to sit in the courtyard and paint for another 2 hours or so on a single coffee. If you like/need ambience or coffee to work, it's a great place to visit. Some of his older books such as The Viewer and The Memorial (Gary Crew) and the Rabbits (John Marsden) are for sale as well in the FAC book shop and reception.

End of Semester Folios

 It's that time again when 3 folios from my degree are due on the same day. I took over my wing hallway at college to organise and fix them, resorting to hairspray when my fixative ran out to stay the nearly 100 charcoal drawings I had to cut down to 20 for presentation. My print folio is due tomorrow so my Sunday will be spent organising journals and my presentation, speech notes and cropping the paper. I know thtat sounds easy but when one is over two metres long its a hassle. Until then, below are some warm up drawings from my Drawing class at university. Each one would've taken about 2 minutes to do, in ink and charcoal.

Mr Charisma with Pipes

This is the first image I have completed for a series designed in my univeristy print class using horses as a motif to explore space (the primary reason being that I own two and have photos of them, thereby dodging copyright issues when referencing). This was a practice as it is my first A1 monoprint and took only 3 hours! I can do a graphite of this size in 20 so I'm loving the media. The image appeaeras to have scratches because the poly I used as a plate was an old slip between steel sheets I found in a scrap yard.

3 headed horse

Now that university has settled down, I have some sketches left over to show you. I'll upload these over the next week in portions with the first one below. This one was done for a magazine cover.

Acrylic and color pencil on cartridge paper.

I"ll have some monotypes uploaded soon.

Unboxed

I unboxed my first copies of the Beech Forest a few days ago! They have that lovely new book smell.

I'm Back (with a new book).

I've re-started my old blog: The Art of Den L. Scheer 2 after a two year break. I'm now out of high school and studying Fine Arts at Curtin University, Western Australia.

A few things have happened since I abandoned my last blog but probably the most notable is that my debut picture book was published in May. It is called In the Beech Forest and was written by the legend Gary Crew (the Water Tower) and published by another legend Paul Collins over at Ford Street Publishing in Melbourne.

The book can be purchased from most large book retailers.

I'll be at the St Hildas ASG Autumn Bazaar at the Chidley Campus on Saturday 11 between 10:30 and 2:30pm in Mosman Park if anybody locally wants to buy a  book directly from me and have it signed.  I'll also post updates regarding signings and other author/illustration conferences I will be attending.

Regarding the subjects of the blog, I plan to be posting a variety of things: art features, sketches, new books from myself and other people, vintage fairs, books sales and anything else I find interesting.

Thankyou to everybody who follows this blog and I hope you enjoy reading !