Kristy Guenther Illustration

New Studio

2011-10-08T06:55:00.000-07:00

We are finally getting settled into the new place, and my new studio is just about set up. I am oh so excited about it. So are the cats. Possibly for this reason:

More fun stuff to come!

Back to the Blog...

2011-10-02T10:01:00.000-07:00

I realized today that it's been nearly a year since I've made a blog post. Turns out that getting married is highly time consuming! (Note the blog name change)

I'll be getting back to it once the studio in my new place is all set up. Hopefully that's soon! Stay tuned, I think I may even have some relatively new work to show currently buried in that mess known as moving

Something different!

2010-11-19T17:17:00.000-08:00

I'm taking a break from my illustrated Bible timeline tonight to work on color comps for the children's book I'm doing. Here's a couple of the spreads, with general color added digitally. Eventually I will be painting them with acrylic, but digital color was quicker to add for proposal purposes. They are two of the less story-specific, more aesthetic ones.

Current Project

2010-11-05T15:16:00.001-07:00

So what I am working on is an illustrated Bible timeline. I have 30-something vignettes to do for the Old Testament, and 15 or so for the New.

I've kind of begun working these paintings like an assembly line. I work on one and work it till I have made some good headway (or have become too annoyed with it to look at it for a while), and then I move on. Before I knew it I had 20 nearly completed spot illustrations. Its pretty cool!

When I'm all done I'll be putting them in Illustrator and making it look like and actual time line.

The best part of painting with acrylic

2010-09-24T13:48:00.000-07:00

Admit it. You look forward to peeling the paint from your palettes when it dries.

It's been a while!

2010-08-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

It's been a whole 2 months since I've updated this blog. Didn't mean to neglect it, but everything is so crazy. It's a good crazy though, because it is art related.

There are two major jobs I am working on right now...One being an illustrated Bible timeline for children, and the other a children's book. Both are at the sketch stage now, and I have a ton to do in the next few months. Right now I am working on getting my timeline sketches into a roughly timeline-ish form.

Anyway, these are a couple of my sketches. Hopefully I will have something other than just sketches to show on here sometime in the near future when the chaos dies down.

Some News, and The Beginnings of My 1st Attempt at Digital

2010-06-19T21:51:00.000-07:00

So for starters... Here is the preliminary underpainting for a piece I started in Photoshop. Has a long way to go, clearly. But I'm enjoying it. Also noticing my style using digital media is really different than my watercolor-y painting style. Don't really know how to change that--or whether or not it bothers me.

Also, heard this week that I get to illustrate a series of children's books! An author friend of mine has been working with a Christian organization on starting a children's line, and the fact that she has an agent I guess made it easier for her to choose her own illustrator. I'll know more details next month about the project, and about pay, etc. Hoping this will give me some great experience, and help me get freelance work in the future.

I Have a Tablet!

2010-06-04T16:33:00.000-07:00

Digital art has always been veeerry daunting to me. Probably because I always tried to do it with a mouse. Once during college I played around with a tablet on Photoshop and I felt like maybe it would make things easier.

For my birthday my wonderful boyfriend bought me my very own tablet (already cat-hair christened, as you can see). Only done one sketch so far but I gotta tell you, I don't think I will be strictly using only physical media any more.

Thinking Real Thoughts!

2010-05-26T08:50:00.000-07:00

Its been a year since I graduated from RIT!

Feels like it's been longer. Seeing everyone graduate this year has made me want to evaluate what (if anything) I have done in the past year...

-Got a full time job: not art related but very enjoyable
-Might get to illustrate a book! Will hopefully be hearing back from the publisher in June
-Made a website and am still updating this blog (*Gasp*)
-Started drawings for a bunch of illustrations I want to do (at least I have ideas in my head...?)
-Made a potential connection in Hallmark
-Sent out a couple portfolios. Or like 3. Not enough.

What I need to do:

-CLEAN MY STUDIO. I have 5 years worth of clutter (and spiders) in there that needs to go.
-Actually sit down and paint all my started illustrations.
-Send out MORE portfolios. Lots and lots
-Redesign my business card. I'm kind of not all that excited about mine.

But...sometimes I just don't want to do much after work.
And there are people I want to spend time with, books I want to read (which I should do more of, sometimes I think I'm getting stupid), video games I want to play, things I want to do. At this rate, how am I going to get illustration stuff done? Aahhh.
Gotta keep reminding myself that freedom from school doesn't mean freedom from learning and challenging myself and keeping myself motivated. Because I won't let myself fall into the group that went to art school and never did anything with it for the rest of their lives. I know my fellow RIT illustrators will agree.

No pictures in this post, just thoughts. Sometimes I think real thoughts!

This will make sense once I explain it

2010-05-20T17:58:00.001-07:00

Ok. So my father is a software engineer. There is a ubiquitous assumption running through the management that the first round of code submission will be flawless.

Management is wrong. So Dad, along with the rest of the code writers have been joking that Management lives in a mystical fairy land full of rainbows and unicorns-- and that they should just stick the software cd on the unicorns horn for it to deliver, and call it a day.

This joke now manifests itself as a request for a painting. Which they will scan, blow up, and hang in the lab. I'm honored actually, as silly and fun as it was to do.

What's Next

2010-04-05T19:42:00.001-07:00

Too many black and white posts, I need to actually paint something. Here are a few things I am going to start painting. Nothing very involved. I have some more complicated ideas swirling around but they have not yet had time to be given an outlet. So, we're sticking with the simple.

I like the zoo. Mainly because I can take my own photo reference. It's not as if anyone can easily copyright an elephant's face, but I prefer to go off of my own photos.

So an elephant, a goat, and....a creamsicle ~per a request :-)~

I don't like how he's looking at me.

2010-04-01T12:21:00.000-07:00

Little bugger at the zoo

Tattoo

2010-03-31T13:09:00.000-07:00

Did this a while ago and never posted it. Its a tattoo I designed for a friend (covers the whole side of his torso, i feel bad for the tattooist...). He likes bears :-) The below is a beginning sketch of it. The above is the finished design

Doodles

2010-02-22T17:40:00.001-08:00

Oh wow. A blog update. I've been gone too long. Thought I would draw some humans for a change!

Portfolio Page

2009-06-16T16:58:00.000-07:00

Hello Folks...

I have been working on getting a website together. But until I finish that and become able to afford a monthly hosting fee I've put together a portfolio page on blogger. Check it out!

Kristy Martin's Portfolio

2009-05-05T13:42:00.000-07:00

Hey kids! Today we are going to learn how to take a crappy painting and turn it into a not so crappy painting. Above is a painting that I think has potential, but that parrot in the center looks pretty bad. So here's the new parrot I'm going to superimpose on top.

That's much better! Next is the completed new piece:
Yay!

2009-04-07T13:39:00.000-07:00

New Idea

2009-04-04T17:43:00.000-07:00

I've surprised myself lately by coming up with a few of my own, non assigned pieces. A lot of times I have trouble with self-motivated projects. Here's a sketch for a new idea, which is going to be lots of fun to do.

I am also finished with the piece that is shown in progress in my previous post. That will be up soon.

Progress

2009-03-30T19:52:00.001-07:00

Sorry about the poorly lit photos.... Here's what I have so far

Sketchbook Stealer

2009-03-30T15:18:00.000-07:00

Somebody wants a piece of the action

A Real Post This Time

2009-03-27T13:56:00.000-07:00

Okay. So I am applying to American Greetings for an internship this summer. I'm working on some new pieces to send them. Like, more greeting cardy stuff. Because something tells me wildlife illustration and editorials wont really get me on their good side.....Here's a couple started pieces.

My Artistic Life in a Nutshell

2009-03-24T17:16:00.000-07:00

At the moment I am utterly devoid of motivation. It's bad news. Having only two classes is a trying thing, especially for an artist who is used to tons of deadlines. Imagine my lack of drive once school is completely over...

Anyway, here is a filler post. Last week I was going through all the art I have done during college and picking out everything that I felt good about and enjoyed doing. This was a part of my Portfolio Prep class. Here was the result: a room full of art and a multitude of tactics devised in order to keep the cat from trying to take a nap on it.

Looking at this picture it doesn't seem like a lot of art, but most of it is from junior and senior year. So, almost 30 successful pieces in two years is not too bad.

More Rawr.

2009-02-07T15:53:00.000-08:00

This is what I'm working on for my mailer. Liquid frisket is wonderful. I would also just like to say that when I am posting and I hit "preview" it would be nice if the preview looked like the actual post. Grr.

Rawr.

2009-02-07T15:42:00.000-08:00

I'm doing a tattoo design of a bear for one of my friends. Ive just started off with a bunch of drawings of bears to get ideas coming. Next I'll be working on getting them nice and stylized and into a more tattoo-like design.

2009-01-28T01:23:00.000-08:00

And here's the finished product! I want to wait a long time before painting food again.

2009-01-19T11:46:00.000-08:00

This is in progress, obviously. It is an advertising spread for Java's coffee shop. I have to finish the painting and add the text and logo. I'm quite happy with it so far, especially because I am using acrylics w/o a grisaille and it is still working out.

Submitted for your consideration....

2009-01-19T11:44:00.000-08:00

Some fish. That is all.

Grisaille makes my life worth living!

2009-01-12T11:41:00.001-08:00

I have tried and tried so many times to improve my painting technique. But most every time I paint, I end up using colored pencil on top of it because I don't feel that I am able to achieve the finished quality or realism I am looking for. At least, that used to be the case.

This quarter I took an Intro to Painting: Acrylics class. I am a senior, but that class is only required for Fine Art students, not Illustrators. But we learned a technique called a grisaille, where one uses black acrylic like watercolor and builds up the values in black and white before glazing over it in color. I'm in love.

That was when I realized that my problem is a lack of proper lights and darks when I paint. But by starting out in gray tones, I am able to concentrate on contrast first. Then the color part is easy.

The above are some examples of this technique (they are unfinished). I wish I could have posted them at the grisaille stage as well but I was without the use of my camera for a while.

Doodles

2009-01-12T11:32:00.001-08:00

Yes, there are fish swimming by my head. Leave me alone.

2008-12-26T19:31:00.001-08:00

Something about drawing deranged animals. Going to try to do this more!

2008-12-25T12:33:00.000-08:00

I'm bummed because I left my camera at my aunt's house, and I haven't been able to post anything. Its more annoying because I wanted to photograph several stages of a painting, but now I'll just have to post finished stuff.

Oh well. Everyone have a wonderful (insert holiday)! For me though, it's Merry Christmas. So deal with it.

Squirrelly...

2008-12-21T21:05:00.000-08:00

I don't know why I keep drawing squirrels. For some reason I find them easy to stylize. I'd like to be able to do that with anything I draw.

The one below is closer to the style I'm looking for. I love drawing photo-realistically, but this is more expressive.

I need to draw something besides squirrels.

Anyway, Merry Christmas!

Ridiculous creatures

2008-12-16T08:17:00.000-08:00

Reptiles and amphibians are my favorite thing to draw and paint. Sometimes they're just hilarious. The lizard on top was a drawing from a trip to the zoo a few months back. He looks thrilled to have such a huge gut.

This is a plumed basilisk, done with gouache and colored pencil on 300# watercolor paper.

Editorial

2008-12-15T11:18:00.000-08:00

Example of a successful piece, in my opinion. Its is an editorial illustration for Rare Book Review, and the article is about the study of reptiles. Let me emphasize that the text content is not my work. I did the illustration and spread design.

Just me and a thousand ways of thinking

2008-12-15T10:21:00.000-08:00

So this a photo of what is behind my house.
Didn't realize it was there till recently, and I've never seen it in the winter. I decided the
other day that I wanted to go walking back there and found that there were still a couple trails. But not enough to keep the plants from attacking me.

I also found out that your legs go numb after a while.

So this was my doodling I did after I came home.

Need some lights on, Some distraction

2008-12-15T09:42:00.001-08:00

I have had an interesting experience these last few years. Namely, I have come to the realization that I am an incompetent artist. That isn't very surprising because I've been treating school like it will never end.

That's silly, of course. But now I am almost ready to graduate and have started scrambling in an effort to learn all of the things I have put off.

Hopefully, blogging will help to keep me on track. Someone might be looking at it, which is motivation enough to keep posting!