I should change the name of this blog to be 'Yearly Jack-O-Lantern Design Blog.'
Yep. Still doing this. Here's this year's set:
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It's that time of year again! Here's yet another contact sheet of random jack-o-lantern pumpkin designs:
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It's that time of year again! Here's this year's contact sheet of goofy jack-o-lantern pumpkin designs:
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It seems like the last few years have been showcasing some new developments. Three years ago was the 10 year anniversary so I shared my process, and last year was special due to turning some old and new designs into commissioned tote bags. So what was new this year you ask? Well, this year I transferred my pumpkin design template document TO THE CLOUD!
Last year gave me the kick in the butt I needed to upgrade my process. So now I'm working off of Photoshop Creative Cloud, (and in a much higher resolution thanks to an upgraded pumpkin image I got for the commission last year). And thanks to being in the cloud, and being able to work interchangeably between devices, this year marks the first year I could draw pumpkin faces while relaxing on the couch thanks to being able to work on my iPad Pro!
Happy Halloween Everyone! Once again, the same deal goes as every year: if anybody actually decides to attempt to carve any of these (like Stephanie, Nicole, Josh, Megan, and I, Laura, Nikki, or Mike, Nicole, and Bonnie, did) please send me pictures at evan.m.boucher@gmail.com and I'll post them up here! That goes for previous years' pumpkin designs as well. You have until the end of the month! I will post all physical Jack-O-Lantern carvings together on Halloween.
I was invited by the fine folks in Digital Marketing at DreamWorks Animation to create a drawing of my choice for them to showcase on social media for Christmas last year. They said it could be anything of my choice but had to be something in the spirit of the season, and if I could fit in some DreamWorks characters, that would be great.
I had recently acquired an iPad and this was one of my first drawings on it, learning Photoshop for iPad as I went. Here's what I came up with:
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I was also happy for the people who picked up my little nod to Dave the Octopus from Penguins of Madagascar (who will always hold a special part in my heart since I put so much work into rigging him many years ago).
And apologies for those who were upset that I did my own Santa Claus design instead of using North from Rise of the Guardians. I definitely considered it, but ultimately didn't want to worry too much about doing justice to another artist's character design, and wanted to focus on doing an original Santa design of my own. This also helped me complete the project as I had a lot going on the end of last year.
Anyway, that's my little story about this drawing. It was fun to try out new workflows, and use the iPad to get it done quicker than my typical digital painting workflow.
Evan
This summer I started experimenting with using watercolors in the hope to start doing more drawing while out hiking and birdwatching:
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| Great Egret |
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| Red-footed Booby |
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| Giraffatitan brancai sketch |
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| Giraffatitan brancai + watercolors |
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| Red Knot |
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| Raven |
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| Thalassodromeus sethi |
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| Helmeted Hornbill |
I thought last year was a great experience to push my artistic skills out of my comfort zone, and so decided to participate in Inktober again this year. I really embraced the limitations of the physical media and focused on being consistent over perfection. I also tried pushing myself further by playing with watercolors and other mixed traditional media this year. I like some more than others for sure, but am happy to have completed it among all the other things I'm working on. For ease of acces, here's my complete Inktober 2021 compiled in one place:
Prompt 1: Crystal
Hey Everyone! Don't worry I didn't forget to do my annual pumpkin designs! Yes it may appear that way, seeing as it's now November, but there's something different in store for this year (literally), and when you add the worldwide shipping delays to the equation, we're unfortunately a bit late.
So what's the deal?
Well, earlier this spring, I was contacted by Publix Super Markets Inc. with a request to license some of my jack-o-lantern designs for some Halloween-themed reusable tote bags! They were inquiring about the very first two contact sheets, and upon informing them that I had over 10 years worth of these things, they stuck to their initial request of the 2010 and 2011 sheets.
There was one little complication though. Since I have been using the same template for over a decade, the resolution of my typical designs aren't very high at all. I remember finding a public domain pumpkin image as the background back in the day, but it was pretty low resolution and I can't even seem to track down the original anymore (even with reverse image searches).
The great folks at Publix had a solution, and bought a high res stock image for me, with the understanding that I would up-res and clean up the original facial expressions so they would work when printing (thank goodness for keeping the original photoshop files for all these years!)
So here we have new HD versions of my 10 and 11 year old designs:
For Comparison, here's the original low-res versions:
But WAIT! There's MORE! They also asked if they could commission an entirely new set for them, including one with their logo on it. So this year's designs are literally brought to you by Publix Super Markets, Inc:
Despite this project having wrapped up all the way back in April, because of production and shipping delays, it took a while to get the totes into the stores, and I wanted to wait to post until I had some in my hands. The team at Publix ended up picking and choosing various designs from all three contact sheets and mixing and matching:
I think they look great, don't you? They should be available in Publix stores around the country NOW! (Although I've been informed that they're actually selling out! So get them while you can!)
This turned out to be a great experience for me. I find it fun to see such old drawings that I did as a fun request from a friend bringing joy to people a decade later. As an artist, I look back on these old contact sheets and see them as simple unrefined works - and yet here they are today, still resonating people. It's a good reminder to stay humble and while it's great to constantly be pushing yourself as an artist, your current skills don't invalidate your old work.
So again, sorry for the delay, but HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!
As always, feel free to check out previous year designs here:
