William Marchant

TigerHawks - MU & KU Fans Coming Together for the Cure!

I did these shirts for the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in St. Louis this past Saturday.  Our team/group was made up of half Mizzou fans and half Kansas fans.  So we thought that combining the two rival mascots would be pretty neat...and something that really has never been done; at least that I've seen.  My brother said it best when I showed him the shirts, "It's bittersweet."  We thought about doing "JayTigers" but that didn't have a nice ring to it...plus Mizzou needs to go first, right!  Sidenote: When designing the logo, it was a pleasure cutting off the jayhawk's head!

So the shirts were a big hit at the race/walk!  A lot of people were even stopping us to take pictures, haha.

But, on the more important side, the race was an AMAZING experience.  I've never been a part of something that large and for such a great cause.  There was a part of the walk where the people in front of you were on an incline and you could see the massive river of people cutting through downtown St. Louis (picture below)...you couldn't help but get teary-eyed.  

There is not a single person that I know who hasn't been some way connected to breast cancer...whether it was a mom who passed away, a grandma who survived, or even just a friend who had a scare.  I was thinking while we were walking the 5K, it's been like 30 years since the Susan Komen for the Cure began, and I really hope that this race doesn't go on year after year and get to a 50th Anniversary race.  It would be nice if a cure was found and there was a big "finale" race or something.  Or if it became "We Found a Cure!" race...that would be awesome!

That's what I hope for at least.

Adult Swim, Before Cartoon Network!

This is one of those Golden Oldies that simply has to live on!

Why can't cartoons be like this nowadays...something the kids can REALLY benefit from!

 

St. Louis Artists' Guild Collectors Choice X

Collectors Choice X offers an opportunity for art collectors. With the purchase of one ticket, two people can attend two parties, plus receive one piece of art valued at $250 or more. Tickets are limited to the number of donated original art works. (You are guaranteed one piece of art for each ticket you hold.)

Opening Party & Silent Auction: Friday, May 20, 2011, 6:00pm – 9:00pm
6:00pm – 7:00pm (artists, ticket holders and VIP), 7:00pm – 9:00pm (open to public)

Catering St. Louis provides hors d’oeuvres, wine and refreshments while you review your favorite art pieces donated by regional artists.

Live music by St. Louis Classical Guitar Society.

Selection of Collectors Choice Art: Sunday, June 12, 2011
Doors Open 11:00am Art Selection begins 1:00pm

Names of ticket buyers are chosen at random and when your name is called you can choose one of the available pieces of art! (One piece of art for each ticket purchased.)

Live music by Barefoot Jones.

Tickets: $165

Read more about Collectors Choice

For additional information, please call 314-727-6266.

"Crap for the Crapper" - New Free Web Comic!

Crap for the Crapper is now a free web comic!  Well, that is if you think it should be free.  You can still "pay what you want" at the bottom right of the site...if you think I deserve a cut.  But if you think it should be free, then it is!  Hardcopies and ePubs are still available, and new ones will be published as hardcopies in the future.  But, under the new setup, I will be posting two brand new comic spreads each week.  Right now, The WG Part One is on its fourth installment.  Next up will be the premiere of the much anticipated Hammer'd.  

So please go check it out now and be sure to sign up for the mailing list and get new comics straight to your email inbox.  I promise I won't flood your inbox will crappy spam...just 1 or 2 comic spreads a week!

GO TO CRAP NOW!

 

How does he DO that?: The Secrets of Drawing a Face

Here's a GREAT video on one caricature artist's process.  He goes pretty in depth about his study of one particular subject, Conan O'Brien.  It runs a bit long, about a half hour, but it is totally worth it if you are interested enough to start watching!

 

VIEW ORIGINAL ARTICLE I GOT THIS FROM!

 

"Get Behind Me Conan" - Museum of Conan Art (MoCA)

This is one of my newest illos done for the the Fan Art section of TeamCoCo.com.  

Basically, I wanted to do something that would make Conan and Andy (Richter) laugh.  I thought of doing it like the White Stripes' "Get Behind me Satan" album cover since Conan is such a fan of Jack.  Giving Andy tits was, for me at least, the icing on the cake.  I'm pretty happy with how it turned out...and I'm VERY happy that it got on the site.  Now, hopefully I'll see it on TV in the near future when they come back from commercial break.

Go check out the other great stuff in the MoCA!!!  There's some really great stuff!

LOOKS GREAT! is the New William Marchant Illustration & Design

It became apparent to me that this site, WilliamMarchant.com, may seem a bit jumbled.  There's a lot that I do so there is a lot going on on my website.

In an effort to make things simple, straight forward, and clean, I am launching a re-branding of myself under the model www.LooksGreat.biz!  Looks Great (LLC pending) will serve as my main portfolio/resume website and WilliamMarchant.com will be converted to my blog.  While I do like this site, I really beleive that in the long run, Looks Great will be easier for new visitors to understand and navigate.

A link to my blog will be added to the new site soon, but I am still figuring out the best way to link the two sites...so I am just keeping them separate for the time being.

So go check out my new site and let me know what you think by voting for your favorite on Facebook!

MARCH 2011 St. Louis Illustrators Meeting A New Mobile Art Form

I specifically remember seeing the New Yorker cover to the left by David Hockney last Fall and saying to my girlfriend, "What the hell is that doing on the cover of the New Yorker!"  I then read that it was done on an iPhone and sent directly to the A.D. from the phone...to which I responded, "Who gives a crap?  It looks like shit."

Well, last night's meeting of the St. Louis Artists' Guild Illustrators Section gave me a whole new perspective on the medium.  Michael Anderson, architectural illustrator and Plein Air landscape painter, gave a presentation on his iPad about such "mobile drawings."  Anderson presented two programs/applications that he uses: Brushes and Sketchbook Pro.  (His iPhone, iPad, and Tablet creations are seen below)

I came to respect this medium, first, because of its Impressionist qualities.  Yes, the illustration for the New Yorker cover isn't the coolest illustration I've ever seen, nor is it a style that is particularly striking to me.  But it gets across an idea.  It is a picture of a spoon in a bowl on a table with a chair pulled in.  That's that...you have a picture of something that was created by a person drawing on a digital device.  While this may not seem too ground breaking, consider the alternative: A picture of a spoon in a bowl on a table that was drawn loosely with a pencil.  That's not too special either...it's been done.  But I beg a mainstream viewer to point to the last time they saw/heard of someone drawing the cover of a major publication on a freakin' smartphone.  To me, the method makes the picture become something special.

Recent Commission Work

I was happy to get away from the computer for a bit last week and work on a commission for a couple acrylic paintings.  The commission was for a large abstract painting for an office.  The result is what you see above...two 36"x36" paintings.  We agreed that two 3'x3' paintings would allow for more flexibility than one 5'x4' or something.

Now, the photographs honestly don't do them much justice...the photos actually make them look more cosmic (like outter space) than they truly are.  For some reason, photos can't pick up the feeling, texture, and nuances of abstracts.  But I did my best at adjusting the color in Photoshop to give you the best representation as possible.

The colors are largely based on the colors already in the office and its furniture.  But I added some more brilliant hues to bring the office to life a bit.

Below are some pics I snapped during the process (or click "Continue Reading...")  I had never really done abstracts like this before...at least at this scale. It was harder than I thought.  Though things like this may look like somebody just starts slinging paint on a canvas...there's actually a lot more to it than that.  With the base of the paintings (the blue part), I was actually very deliberate in my changes from dark to light.  Plus I had to do a lot of planning on where the splatters went and what color should go where.  To repeat myself, it's not just flinging paint where ever you feel like it.  If you do that (which I did a couple times) it'll come out lookin like dog crap (which I then had to take more time to cover up.)

Moral of the story...after doing these I have much more respect for painters out there who I used to view as Pollock imposters.

I'M NOW ON ELANCE (So go hire me!)

I finally went back and fully setup my account on Elance.com.  I had been putting it off for some time since I signed up because it looked a bit intimidating.  But after reading a few reviews and comments about the service, I decided to go for it.

Hopefully a few of my first proposals will get accepted and I can come back and tell you how they go!  But for right now, it looks like there's a lot more work out there than I thought!  And Elance does a great job of
    presenting all those opportunities!

CLICK HERE TO VIEW MY ELANCE PROFILE