Doug Ray
I illustrated 12 portraits for Adweek recently for a feature about Media All Stars. I illustrated the portrait above of Doug Ray for a full page. He is the President of Carat North America and holds the media accounts for Pfizer and GM. The rest of the portraits below were placed throughout the article. Here are 6 of my favorite portraits. You can see the article and the rest of the portraits online here.
Media All Stars
The Inquisition of Mr. Marvel
This is one of my favorite pieces of the year that I’ve been asked to work on. I grew up reading comic books, and many of the comics I collected had characters created by Stan Lee (and Jack Kirby sometimes, too).
So when I was contacted by Grantland Quarterly to illustrate a story about Stan Lee, titled ‘The Inquisition of Mr. Marvel’, I was really excited to do it. It was a great read (check it out here). Like many early comic book character creators, Stan has lost the ownership of the superheroes he created and has no claim to the billions of dollars his creations make Marvel and Disney today. For the most part he’s accepted it and maintained his role as a comic book ambassador or even a mascot – the face of Marvel comics.
I illustrated all the frames around the portrait as well and those were a lot of fun. It’s amazing how portraits come together sometimes. Stan Lee without his ruby-colored glasses just isn’t Stan Lee.
I have a portrait of Adam Savage (Mythbusters) in the new issue of Wired Magazine. The version at the top is the one they went with, but I submitted a couple different versions in case they worked better in their layout.
I have some more drawings in the same issue. I’ll post those here soon! It’s always great to work for Wired Magazine.
Business Hall of Fame 2011
These five portraits were drawn for the Washingtonian‘s annual Business Hall of Fame feature. In the past they had commissioned oil paintings but this year decided to go with something different (and I’m glad they did!).
Here’s how the portrait of Gloria Bohan looks in the layout. I love how the blue of the portraits is carried throughout the feature.
King Pigeon Letterpress Card - Papillon Press
I illustrated this handsome King Pigeon for Papillon Press. I have a love/hate relationship with pigeons thanks to their insistence on pooping all over my balcony a few years ago. I battled them to reclaim my balcony in Ottawa. They pooped on it, cooed on it, built nests and laid eggs on it. It was a never ending struggle to sit out there peacefully. I invested in plastic pigeon spikes but they would just land between them. I developed some homemade inventions to keep them away but they kept coming. I couldn’t do anything to keep them away – and then we moved. I was finally rid of them!
On the first day we moved into our apartment in Brooklyn I looked out the window and saw an entire telephone wire covered in pigeons in the backyard. I think they followed me.
So that’s the hate. On the other hand, they’re so much fun to draw.
This illustration was printed by Papillon Press on eco-friendly Legion Bamboo paper and is now for sale in their Etsy shop.
King Pigeon Letterpress Card
Men who work (and play) on water
These three men have jobs or hobbies that see them spend a lot of their time on the water. Each portrait accompanies a third-person description of their jobs and hobbies.
Up top we have Don Phelps, captain of the Anderson Ferry, shuttling people across the Ohio River from Cincinnati to Kentucky. The ferry has been in operation since 1817!
Next is Lt. Rick Hatton, of the Boone County Water Rescue Team, who rescues people from water accidents, or dives to find those who have died.
Lastly, we have Henry Dorfman, the Founder of “Cincy Paddlers.” They paddle the Ohio River and other lakes and rivers in the Cincinnati area.
I always love reading stories like these.
Little Bear
These images were made a little while ago for a children’s book called Little Bear. The story is about an Inuit woman who adopts an orphaned polar bear and raises him to adulthood before sending him back into the wild (cue the tears).
The story had so many opportunities for me to make interesting images and I had a great time illustrating the fur hoods and parkas, boots and igloos. I could draw those things all day. And I did, for a couple weeks. Thankfully, Chantal came across an old parka when I started working on thumbnails and that was a lifesaver for creating photo reference.
We went outside last November and each took turns posing wearing the parka, big boots and mittens. The day after we took all the photos, about 60 of them, it snowed. To have snow in the photos for reference would have been amazing, but some things you just have to fake!
Andrey Ternovskiy, founder of Chatroulette
On the cover of Inc. Magazine
I am very excited about this month’s issue of Inc. Magazine that features one of my portraits on their cover. The little black and green portrait is of Andrey Ternovskiy, the founder of Chatroulette.
This was a pretty quick turnaround. I got the job at about 6pm and it was due the next morning. I work the portraits pretty small, between 3 to 3.5 inches for the size of the face. I have a bunch of new portraits in the works and I will be posting a bit more about the process soon. For more of portraits, visit my website.
Hope you’re enjoying your summer so far!
Lollygagger & Whippersnapper
Troublemakers : Letterpress cards
I illustrated some of my favorite words for this set of 4 letterpress printed cards of Troublemakers. This set was produced as a promotional piece and I only printed about 40 sets. If you got one of these bad boys in the mail, I hope you held onto it! I’ve had some great responses from them so far and I’ve been happy to see them finding good homes.
As some of you may know, my wife runs a letterpress company called Papillon Press. I printed these cards myself on our old Chandler and Price, but Chantal is the color-mixing master.
I also put together a video of the letterpress process from ink mixing to printing to trimming. A ton of work went into these as you will see!
Troublemakers : Letterpress cards
Skullduggery
Lollygagger
If you’re interested in purchasing a set of your own Troublemakers, I have a few sets left and some individual cards available in my shop.
Vancouver Magazine
These guys were drawn for Vancouver Magazine‘s Restaurant Awards issue. The black lines were drawn in ink on super smooth Bristol paper, the grey tones were drawn on a separate layer of vellum and the two layers were pieced together in Photoshop. More portraits to come soon!
Joel Kimmel's Illustration Blog 