Christa with deer antler necklace drawing

It was great working with the talented artist and model, Christa at the Sony Life Drawing Workshop this week. She is a talented artist/ photographer, and makes her own props, like the deer antler necklace featured in this drawing. Here is a link to the models photography portfolio: Balm in Gilead

This drawing is 18 x 24 inches on Strathmore toned grey paper, and is drawn with carmine red, black and terracotta color pencils. I used white china marker for the white highlights. This drawing took about 40 minutes, but of course I wished I could draw Christa for hours!

Sole Survivor of the Yarnell Fire - illustration and sketches

Brendan McDonough for Phoenix New Times - Graham Smith

"If anyone knows why the Granite Mountain Hotshots left a safe area on top of the Weaver Mountains west of Yarnell and descended into a box canyon that became the worst death trap in the nationwide history of such crews, it's Brendan McDonough.

The only survivor of the 20-member hotshot crew that perished in the Yarnell Hill Fire on June 30, 2013, McDonough, 23, is in the unique position to have heard some, if not all, of the discussions between Granite Mountain Supervisor Eric Marsh and Captain Jesse Steed in the moments before Marsh, Steed, and the others died."

Thumbnailing is the funnest part. I like to draw lots of them.

Brendan was the lookout for the Hot Shot team.

Illustration assignments for the weeklies like the Phoenix New Times come and go quickly. Art Directors and their editors like to see sketches within a day or two, and the final art a few days after that. The whole process takes about a week.

Tip: For a cover, always provide lots of extra area in the artwork (a bleed), at the top and sides of your illustration to allow the art director to room to design, and or crop the illustration to fit the layout.

Link to Yarnell Fire article by: John Dougherty in the Phoenix New Times. Art Director: Peter Storch.

Twitter Shaming illustration for Boston Globe

Twitter Shaming - Graham Smith

The Boston Globe asked me to illustrate some current events for the Sunday Arts section. It was so much fun illustrating a bunch of awful people who have said terribly racist, or homophobic remarks in public recently, and drawing the writer that shames them via twitter wearing pink slippers, was the icing on the cake.

In case you haven't been keeping up, here's what the mounted heads said, that got them is so much trouble:        Read the article in the Boston Globe.

Donald Sterling (Clippers owner)

"It bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you're associating with black people"

Janelle Ambrosia (Dollar store racist lady)

"I called you a n****r. You're a n****r. Nasty f*****g n****r."    Watch the video.

Justine Sacco (pr executive)

"Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!"

Clint McCance (Arkansas school board member)

"I like that fags can't procreate. I also enjoy that they often give each other AIDS and die...I would disown my kids they were gay."

Janice Daniels (former mayor of Troy Michigan)

 "I think I am going to throw away my I Love New York carrying bag now that queers can get married there." 

Cliven Bundy 

“I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro.”

Wall of Shame - illustration process from Graham Smith on Vimeo.

Pencil sketch - Graham Smith

Illustration Process: First, I sketch the idea really roughly, in pencil. Then I refine the sketch, trying to get the scribbles to look like the people I 'm drawing. That's the refined sketch above. Next step, I've been doing a little differently than the traditional old school method of tracing on a lightbox. Instead, I scan the sketch, and print it onto nicer paper. In this case, Strathmore Smooth Bristol paper. Then I ink the print, which is below, and color the illustration digitally.

ink drawing - Graham Smith

Cliven Bundy (detail) - Graham Smith

Donald Sterling (detail) - Graham Smith

Janice Daniels (detail) - Graham Smith

The Twitter shamer (detail) - Graham Smith

Twitter desk (detail) - Graham Smith

G.

Drawing a Haunted House

Haunted House for Boston Globe from Graham Smith on Vimeo.

Houses that are hundreds of years old must have at least a few ghost roaming around, thought the owner of this 350 year old shaker, so she called a number of psychics to discover the otherworldly forces floating about.

Art Director Ryan Huddle called me to illustrate this fun topic for the Boston Globe. It was fun to draw, and to bring this illustration to life using fall colors. So, I made a little video while I was working.

Haunted House for Boston Globe: Graham Smith

Haunted House (detail): Graham Smith

How to Illustrate a War Story

Beer for Data - Illustration Process from Graham Smith on Vimeo.

"It was a dark time in a long, drawn-out war. Afghanistan was festering with resentment. The Pentagon brass were desperate. It was the kind of last-ditch moment when authorities start throwing an era’s weirdest ideas at its most hopeless bureaucratic mistakes."

Pacific Standard hired me to illustrate an article about the war in Afghanistan, and a bunch of "Burners" lead by Dr. David Warner, the called the Synergy Strike Force. They succeeded in trying to "hack the war", only miles from the treacherous Tora Bora Mountains, from the only bar in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

This story begins in Wartime Afghanistan, with a few smart guys building schools and installing solar generators. It ends with the burning of Koran's at Bagram Airforce base by US soldiers, and the riots that erupted afterwards.

Once stateside, the story is returns to another burning, a bittersweet ceremony where the Burning Man's Temple was razed, deep in Nevada's Black Rock desert. Goodbyes were said to those lost in the war.

Their story, by Brian Calvert is heroic and amazing. Read the Article.

Illustrating a reality based series about the war is a great responsibility, and a super fun project!

But where to start? How do you know what to draw? What is the illustration process?

Research: Illustrations are based on written descriptions from the article, and reference photos culled from the interwebs. It is helpful to research the objects in a reality based illustration. I read the manuscript and highlight the descriptive passages, then list all the objects to be illustrated, and Google them.

Ideas: Draw thumbnails: The goal is to put your thoughts on paper, and to generate ideas by letting facts, graphic themes, and subconscious ideas link from one little drawing to the next - evolving as they go. This is a really fun part of the process, where any idea, no matter what, gets drawn in a little box.

Edit: The best thumbnails are enlarged, and refined into bigger pencil sketches. They are reviewed by the art and editorial staff, and placed into temporary layouts to get a sense of how the illustrations will live inside the design.

Refine: Sketches are usually developed with anything handy, and fast. In this case, graphite. The rough pencil sketches are used as a guide for the more carefully done ink drawing.

Draw: On approval, the chosen sketch is redrawn with ink on a separate piece of translucent vellum or paper. A quill pen, and india ink are used to draw each illustration.

Finish: Color, and mono-printed textures are are added digitally in Photoshop, as is the final  resizing, and preparation for printing. The final print ready, Photoshop files are delivered via internet.

While I'm drawing, I'm also filming.

An iPhone camera captures time-lapse footage while attached to a overhead desk lamp. Between each drawing, I reposition my low end DSLR, (Canon T4i /650D) to film a different angle, setting the exposure, and depth of field, before resuming to draw. The footage is knocked together in iMovie.

Sophia on Brown Paper

Sophia: Graham Smith

I've been having a great time drawing on brown paper bags from the grocery store. The paper is "free" and turning them into little artworks, is my contribution to the recycling effort. To prepare the surface, I gesso the center roughly, leaving a bit of a border surrounding the page.

These are quick studies of the model Sophia, done in 20, 10, and 2 minutes each, drawn at the Life Drawing Workshop I teach at Sony. 

I use conté crayon, and or black and red colored pencils to capture the model's expressive poses quickly.

2 minute warm up drawings

- G

Pen doodle video

Sketchbook 35 - ink sketch from Graham Smith on Vimeo.

Here's a quick pen doodle from Sketchbook 35.

I drew it with a Lamy Safari fountain pen in a small homemade sketchbook at our Wednesday night hangout, Sketchbook Sessions. I prepare the Strathmore 50 pound sketch paper by washing it with a thin mixture of acrylic paint and water, which gives it a nice textural tone, and a crisp surface to ink on.

20 Minutes or Less: Life Drawings

Bridget Rose

I like drawing people from life the best. There is something about the short time limitation that forces me to solve graphic problems in the drawing immediately, instead of incrementally, like I would do in an assignment illustration.

Immediacy brings life and vitality to a drawing. Colored pencil and chalk over acrylic washed paper.

Bridget Rose

Briana

Briana

Bree

Ian

Zara

Michael


- G

MARKS: Volume One

MARKS: Volume One

Size: 8.75" x 12.25"
Price: $25
Pages: 48. Full color
Signed.

_______________________________________________

_______________________________________________

I just finished designing "MARKS Volume One"- a 48 page, hard cover art book, containing a collection of life drawings, illustrations, and sketchbook experiments I have created over the last 2 years.

Graham Smith's MARKS Volume One, contains private life drawings, sketchbook experiments, and includes examples of my professional illustration work. The common thread throughout the work are my expressive mark making techniques, regardless of the media. I'm in love with the line! MARKS Vol. One, is my love letter to drawing the figure.

Graham Smith's marks Vol. 1 - book trailer from Graham Smith on Vimeo.



The infamous, Alberto Ruiz noticed my life drawings last Comic Con, and being a sucker for old school figure drawing, offered to publish a small run of them. He gave me 2 months to design a book, and deliver it to Xupuy Edicionés, his publishing company in Quito, Ecuador.

The Process:

I learned a lot about making a book. The biggest technical hurdle was improving the way I photograph artwork. After of years of fiddling around, I asked a professional to trouble shoot my DIY photo studio. Long story short, with some simple photography gear, common sense, and some fancy photographic diffusion plastic, an artist can photograph their artwork in-house.

To design the book, Xupuy Edcionés provides 2 Photoshop templates, 1 for a single page, and another for a 2 page spread. It is the artists job to fill those 48 pages with the best they have. Carte Blanche. Alberto Ruiz, the publisher,  takes care of the rest, supervising the books design, production and printing, in order to be "The Best Publisher of Essential Eye Candy The World Has Ever Known!"

How do you find the time to draw stuff?

A little bit at a time. Once a week, I'd venture out of my studio to brush up on my life drawing for a 3 hour session. Every week I would draw a few more, until I had a little pile going. After a couple years, the pile was pretty big.  I selected a few of my favorite drawings to put in the book. It's amazing what you can accomplish in only 3 hours per week!

I love drawing in my sketchbook, everyday. I even make my own sketchbooks, now. Inside their pages is where I invent color combinations, draw from my imagination, collect notes, and do drawing experiments. No one ever sees those sketchbooks, so I sorted through and a few, and selected some painting and drawing experiments to show you, in the book. Here is a sneak peak!

Want to see more?

Video:   Unboxing:   The night a giant pallet of boxes arrived.

Video:   Book Signing Party:     Friends, models, artists, beer and music.

Review:

Got an autographed copy of "Mark", what a collection of best work done by famous artist Graham Smith! All drawings, either in BW charcoal or colorful mixed medias, are carefully structured and rendered/painted. I saw how Graham drew figures in studio. He always wanted to have a good drawing angle and composition. Sometime he had to change his seat frequently in order to find a better angle. Besides all nice layouts, his line quality is what a professional artist should learn and master. Very dynamic and full of energy.The book contains figure drawings and illustrations in various styles that are inspirational to young artists for thinking outside of the box. The last, but not least, is the anatomy knowledge showed in the book. Graham fully controlled every inch of his figure drawings and demonstrated how anatomy knowledge should be used to depict muscle shapes, body rhythms, and figure poses. This is a five-star book an artist must have! 

Dr. Wei Xu  - Writer, Teacher, Scientist, Mathematician, Artist 

Let's Draw! Video

Graham Smith - Sizzle Reel from Graham Smith on Vimeo.

Let's Draw! A video portfolio of illustration, life drawings, and sketchbook experiments by illustrator Graham Smith.

Kurt Cobain - cover illustration

Kurt Cobain: Graham Smith

Even though I was overbooked with assignments, when the call to illustrate Nirvana's Kurt Cobain for a 90's revival issue of the Phoenix New Times came in, I said yes, and worried about where to find the time, later! Read the article, by Chris Parker.

Art Director Peter Storch was full of great ideas that got me all pumped up to draw the portrait. But, as we developed the sketches, it seemed that some of the concepts were not really true to the ideals Kurt Cobain stood for as an artist. He died at 27 years old, feeling very misunderstood, and we wanted to be sensitive to that.

Detail - Kurt Cobain - Graham Smith

One of the ideas that didn't make it out of the rough stage, was an image of Kurt wearing buttons of popular bands from the 90's. Kurt would have hated to be a billboard, so we chucked the idea.

All my 90's era plaid shirts have all been recycled by craft projects or given away; but the Art Director kept one of his favorites, and sent me a scan.

I repainted his favorite old plaid shirt by hand, because the photo looked funny with the drawing. (I was a textile designer back in the day, so I knew just what to do.)

Once the portrait was finished, I crumpled, folded, and distressed a piece of paper to use as the masthead. Peter fine tuned it, and another collaboration was complete.

Young Kurt Cobain and his Fender - sketch: Graham Smith

Kurt Cobain, ink in process: Graham Smith

A big drop of ink fell right on his nose when I was darkening his eye sockets. The drop followed the ink lines conturing his face, and ended up looking like a black tear. I left the ink tear alone, instead of editing it out with Photoshop. Sometimes, mistakes are the best part.

- G