Matt's Monster Madness 2014

Check out my latest daily monster sketches in the embedded sway below... Swipe up to view more and double-click images to see them larger! Go here if the embedded sway doesn't work https://sway.com/GVFZRK_LyCeVz8B9

Black and White Simplified Style

I have been working on a various designs for an evangelistic study since the first of the year. The study was created by a missionary in Peru. here are some of the final black and white images that will serve as the study's illustrations.

Jump VBS - Journeys of Paul

This is a quick sketch for an upcoming Jump VBS curriculum about the missionary journeys of Paul. Here Paul has been shipwrecked! Glub glub!

The Crucifixion Sketch

Here's a quick sketch I did today.

Character Design of Moses for Children's Curriculum

Here's a character design for Moses at various stages of his life that I did for an International Children's Curriculum I am working on.

Artist Notes - Done with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lbs, 100 brightness)

Birds of a Feather

Birds I sketched.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 29 - Frankenstein's Monster

Day 29 - Frankenstein's Monster.
After a grueling process of science and madness Dr. Frankenstein raises his monstrous creation during a lightning storm. Does his feat of organized chaos work?

Artist Notes - Pencil sketch with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28 lb, 100 brightness). Captured on my Motorola Xoom in sepia mode. Then uploaded on Dropbox for access.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 25 - Monster Within

Day 25 - Monster Within.

He sits a docile innocent kitty. What lurks underneath? Behind his large doe eyes and his adorable smile? Could it be a monster within this little one?

Artist Notes - Pencil sketch done with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lbs, 100 brightness). Captured in mono on my Motorola Xoom. Uploaded to Dropbox.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 24 - The Mummy

Day 24 - The Mummy.

This is one mummy you won't run crying to when you stub your toe!

Artist Notes - Sketched with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness). Captured with a monotone filter on my Motorola Xoom tablet. Uploaded to Dropbox and cropped in Windows Live Photo Gallery.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 20 - Abominable Snowman

Day 20 - Abominable Snowman.

Here's another of my favorite legendary monsters. The Yeti, Arctic Bigfoot or the Abominable Snowman. Here's a link to learn more - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeti.

Artist Notes - Pencil sketch done with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness). Camera captured onto my Motorola Xoom and uploaded to Dropbox. Then I used Windows Live Photo Gallery for some light editing (crop here, brightening there).

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 19 - Slimey

Day 19 - Slimey. I just started sketching and this little squirmy guy came out.

Artist Notes - Sketched with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness). I used Windows Live Photo Gallery to do some light editing.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 13 - Hook Man

Day 13 is the Urban Legend Hook Man. Everyone's heard the story of the escaped lunatic convict that had a hook for a hand and the couples he would stalk that were out of gas on the side of a lonely highway. Here's the Hook Man himself. Maybe Scooby and the gang could catch him.

Artist Notes - Pencil sketch done with a 2B Graphic Derwent pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness).

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 09 - OU Players

Monster #9 is an OU football player, because to a Texas player they are monsters! This is in honor of OU's 55-17 win over Texas yesterday in football, simultaneously making my day and moving the Sooners one step closer to the National Championship.

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Artist Notes - This sketch was done with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper. Then captured onto my Android Honeycomb powered Motorola Xoom tablet. Then uploaded to Dropbox.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 08 - Who's the Dummy?

Here's Monster #8, a simple ventriloquist dummy. I actually like them, but I know many people that find them creepy. This is for you. In either case, if you walked down the hall and something about two and a half feet tall was peering around the corner at you, then you'd probably pass out. Especially if you thought you were the only one in the house.

"Where's Bobby?"

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Artist Notes - This was sketched with a 2B Graphic Derwent pencil onto Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness). Then captured onto my Android Honeycomb powered Motorola Xoom tablet and uploaded to dropbox.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 07 - Mermaid/Siren

Monster #07 the Mermaid/Siren. From the depths of the oceans, seaman feared this creature most than any other. The beautiful dreaded siren with a call to men that could not be rejected. Here is my interpretation of one.

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Artist Notes - Sketched with a 2B Derwent Graphic Pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness). Then colored with Prismacolor colored pencils. After that, scanned onto my Dell Windows 7 laptop and prepped for upload in CorelDraw X5. I also added the fangs and claws in CorelDraw. Below is a list of the Prismacolors I used:

Mermaid:
Metallic Gold
Rose
Black
Peach
Light Peach
Goldenrod
Light Aqua
Dark Brown

Mermaid's Tail:
Metallic Gold
Light Aqua
True Blue
Chartreuse

Water:
Ultramarine
Light Aqua
True Blue
White

Sky:
Light Cerulean Blue
True Blue

More NOLA Article Art

As mentioned in a previous post, A Study of New Orleans, I wrote an article for our organization's annual magazine entitled TELL. My article was on a mission serving in the New Orleans area and I have been working on various contributing artwork for it.  Here's a few more.

I took the two I recently made and combined them as a combo seen above. Maybe I'll add in the trumpeteer that I had recently done so I can have a silhouette jazz trio.
Artist Notes - these were pencil sketches with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper (28lb, 100 brightness) then scanned onto my Dell Windows 7 Laptop into CorelDraw X5 for coversion into silhouette.

October Monster Madness - Day 05 - Snakes Alive

This is the entry for day five. I call it Snakes Alive. I wonder what's in that belly of his? Click it to see the full size.

Artist Notes - Pencil Sketch on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper with a 2B Derwent Graphic pencil from England.

October Monster Madness 2011 - Day 01 - Jack the Pumpkinhead

I mentioned this a few weeks ago, but in 2008 I took on a personal challenge that for the month of October I would draw a different monster sketch every day and upload it. I've decided to do that again this year. Last time I used mainly one method, which was sketch it, scan it, covert it in CorelDraw, color it and finish it. This year, I hope to utilize a variety of methods - tablet sketch, black and white pencil sketch, CorelDraw, painted, maybe clay - we'll see what I end up with.

To kick things off, here is my first one for October. He's the main character of a children's book I wrote and illustrated called Jack the Pumpkinhead and you can get it at www.lulu.com/mcrosser.

Artist Notes - Done as a pencil sketch in a Dentist Office waiting room - maybe a dentist could be one of my monsters, hmm. Then I scanned it onto my Xoom tablet and traced it and colored it in Sketchbook Mobile Pro.

A Study of New Orleans

I read recently, where Disney artists like Glen Keane, draw hundreds of drawings before they land on the character or design they want. I'm preparing some layout designs for an article on mission work in New Orleans and here are some of what I intend to be dozens, if not hundreds, of drawings in prep for that.

It's a simple figure blowing Jazz on a trumpet done in different styles.

The first one is the original pencil sketch --

The next one is just a simple silhouette --

Taking the silhouette to the next level, I placed it on a blue background --

Then I took the original sketch and imported onto my Xoom tablet where I colorized it using Sketchbook Mobile Pro --

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Artist Notes - Original sketch done with  Derwent Graphic 2B pencil on Hammermill Color Copy Digital paper that is 28lb weight and 100 brightness. The silhouettes were done in CorelDraw X5 on a Windows 7 laptop. The colorized version was done on a Honeycomb enabled Motorola Xoom tablet.

A Boy and His Shadow

What does a boy do when he is dressed like a pirate and shadows are boucing around the room? He lets his imagination run away with him of course! Here's a quick sketch I did this evening from an idea that popped into my head while working today. I couldn't wait to finish working so I could sketch this out. I was going to ink it, but the pencil starting looking real good and I haven't really sketched something like this in awhile. So here it is. What do you think?

Artist notes - Sketch done on Hammermill Paper Color Copy Digital, 100 brightness/28 lb with a Kimberly 2B pencil.