GUESS ZOO?

Hullo fellow art lovers! Today I bring to you my latest computer illustration excursion. I was given an assignment to redo the packaging/cover art of any game I choose. So in commemoration to one of my favorite board games I played as a child, I chose to redo Milton Bradley's Guess Who? Except instead of doing what's already been done I decided to change the game from a Mystery Face Recognition Game to a Mystery Animal Guessing Game and thus changed the title of the game to Guess ZOO?, which fit more appropriately. I drew inspiration for the style I would approach this project with from looking up cute animal games, especially from this newer aged game called the Sneaky, Snacky Squirrel Game, which can be seen below. So cute. :3 

Guess Zoo? box package art

The face cards (4/30)

The first two cards I did were the penguin and the fox which fit more into the style I used for the cover art. The ladybug and the peacock, were the last two I did and I admit that I rendered them out to the point that they don't fit into the style anymore. So I have to redo those, but I still like them as is. :] As stand alone illustrations at least. 

The background pattern on the box art. I was planning to include more items like the bear and penguin habitats, and each row would have different-styled fences. 

Terrible terrible redo that Hasbro released a couple years back. the vector art is terrible. The original wasn't really that bad, honestly. 

This game, I want it! So cute, so cute! XD

Okie dokies. Til next time folks. Soon to come, the process work for my game concept design project that I finished before this one. 

Love, Erica

Some new thesis paintings.

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. Way TOO long. I've been so caught up with preparing a portfolio for Zynga and researching other companies that I'm planning on applying to. But those are all just excuses. :] So to make up for it, I present to you guys some process work and some final paintings for my thesis, Lost & Found.

These were done all in watercolor on 140lb Fluid watercolor paper. These are the final colors for pgs 2-7. 

Final b&w color script with text. 

Final storyboards.

Final storyboard color studies. After many changes I decided to keep the overall scheme in the analogous yellow-orange to yellow green w/ the cools kept to the main characters. I've chosen the interior spaces and the sunset/night time scenes as my opportunities to introduce some cooler more thematic color schemes.

Here are the final b&w drawings for the above paintings.

I've been spending so much time worrying over what will become of me after I graduate and where I'll end up. But I've decided that it's useless to spend my time worrying whether I'm good enough to get in to this company and that. It's really just time to create art with full force and just apply to everywhere. I'm confident there's somebody out there who will see something in my artwork and would be happy to have me join them in their efforts in creating awesome artwork together. 

My plans to paint all of the total 32 pages of my book in order to print out my book in full color through blurb.com has been toned down a little more in consideration of the fact that I had to put a lot of my efforts into creating portfolios for Zynga. I was a little blind-sighted, I will admit by my passion for publishing my first book and getting out there for the whole world to see, instead of focusing on how I would get a job and what I would do as soon as I graduated for money. Instead of focusing on companies and narrowing down my art to be geared towards a specific job I just focused on doing what I was passionate about, writing and illustrating my own children's book. But well, I'm trying to make up for lost time and I have determined that I will try to focus my artwork towards the growing smaller studios in California that are developing Ipad Game apps. And in doing so I am hoping that I will find friends and pick up the knowledge and skills on how to turn my own book into an interactive ebook. And so that will be my cause. 

It's only after I stopped to focus on the immediate future and the fear of not finding work that I had to narrow my efforts into a plan on job searching. So my thesis and children's book will be put on the back burners and will come secondary for now. But it will always be on my mind, and I will always be working towards making it better. I'm just saying that I don't think it will all come as immediately as I first thought it would be. So I will be settling for doing 6-8  two-page spreads and as many one page paintings I can create before April 18. And then I will composite my color paintings along with the remaining b&w drawings into one cohesive book and have that printed out for my thesis. It's the best I can do & I will try my best to get everything done on time, along with building more portfolio pieces in my computer illustration class. 

So until next time. :] I feel much better now that I've written all of this down. It's like writing up a contract with myself so that I can't back down now. :] More work to come!! SOON! some computer illustration stuff as soon as I rework some things. :] 

Love, Erica.