A couple of weeks ago, I was commissioned to do a portrait of An Wang, co-founder of Wang Laboratories and creator (along with Way Dong Woo) of the pulse transfer controlling device in 1949.

For this portrait, I focused on a close-up 3/4 view of Wang in a suit and bow tie with his patented circuitry as a background pattern.

A set of thumbnail sketches allowed me to explore translating his features into line and investigate composition and posture. I used this to create a sketch for the likeness.

Next, I sketched out some circuitry to use as the background pattern.

I combined this with the likeness sketch to create the final rough sketch to show to the client.

For the next step, I painted shapes with gouache for the head, suit, tie, and background. For this step, I was only concerned with the edge quality, the shape, and the texture within the shape from the brush strokes and subtle color value variations. I scanned these gouache shapes in grayscale.

Following the gouache step, I created the line work using a Pentel brush pen. I made an alternative line drawing for some of the facial features. In the first ink drawing, I made three left cheek edge lines intending to choose one of them, but then decided to leave all three.

I used the sketch in Photoshop as a guide for placing the gouache and ink elements.

In Photoshop, I converted the gouache elements to Index Color, limiting them to only two values; a medium gray and a dark gray. I then selected each of these grays and converted them each to a color that matched their value.

Next, I introduced a third value for the face texture and then began replacing the sketch with the scanned ink line work.

I decided to make the darker background and bow tie value match the face texture value.

Up until now, I had been working with a monochromatic red palette. For the final illustration though, I wanted the background to be a second color, and first tried a dull bluish hue…

…but then decided on an acid green…

…and finished by completing the final background circuitry pattern.

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I did a quick assignment for the Wall Street Journal this week, a piece for their October 1 issue for a story about how the market is affecting divorce arrangements.

I really wanted to do the bird cage sketch but the art director wisely chose the house sketch and completely avoided discussing the cat sketch.

Below is my Colorforms version, all the vector paths separated.

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The previous dentist chair sketch was ink work for this illustration, an assignment from the Washington Post for an illustration to accompany an editorial about defunding the United States Institute of Peace.

Below are the thumbnails. This was a quick deadline, one day for sketches, two days for art. I started out with a peace symbol but moved to a dove/olive branch. The biting and scissors represent pruning, cutting; the defunding part.

Below is the rough sketch sent to the client, a dove dropping an olive branch that is being cut by a pair of scissors.

Here are a couple of scissors sketches (done in the dentist waiting room).

Here are olive branch sketches (done in the dentist chair, waiting for the novocaine to kick in).

Here is the final ink work (done just before the drill).

Later, I scanned and rearranged the above ink work to create the following composition. Also added a worry brow for the dove.

For the background, I painted an area of gouache using magenta and white. I only have magenta, blue, and white gouache at the moment. I tend to use these gouache elements as value only and either grayscale it or adjust the hue after scanning.

The illustration was grayscale so I converted the goauche into a light gray.

And here again is the final illustration.

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I have three illustrations in the March 2011 issue of The Oxford American. This issue is about the author Barry Hannah who died one year ago this month.

Here’s some of the process, ink and gouache, assembled in Photoshop.

Here’s a repeating pattern tile I made from the drops.

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Here is the sketch for the illo, for a story about universal remote controls, how they don’t necessarily work that well. I arranged the letter buttons to suggest the shape of the remote, and to allow some of the letter buttons to overlap the thumb and finger to imply that it wasn’t working. The floating letters suggest a flimsy, rickety construction, as if pushing a button causes it to move and move around the other buttons.

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Last month I was commissioned to create an illo for the College of Visual Arts’ Lifelong learning brochure.

I thought the illo should represent learning in an abstract, decorative manner. A pattern from it would be repeated within the brochure.

After twenty or so thumbnails, I decided to let the pattern determine the image and arrived at a silhouette profile with a star and circle pattern representing synapses within the brain while simultaneously suggesting space giving it a bit of a sci-fi feel.

Below is the final approved sketch.

I sent this fpo to the designer for palette and layout considerations.

I used a brush pen to make some stars and circles for the decorative pattern part of the image, along with a dash line.

Below is the illo in-progress, nearly finished.

And this is the finished illo, with bleed.

Below is the finished illo cropped for the brochure.

I arranged the star and circle shapes into a repeating pattern that resembled the placement of the star and circle shapes within the illo.

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My concept sketches focused on a broken arm wrapped in a cast along with a view of the brain also wrapped in a cast. Tim chose the sketch with the price tags.

Below is line work created with a Pentel brush pen.

This is preliminary stage, line work with color and texture.

And here is the finished illustration.

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I was happy and honored this summer to be commissioned by Brian Gray to do an illustration for Liberty Magazine. The story was about religious persecution in the country of Eritrea.

My concept sketches began with the ideas of covering, silencing, guns and then focused on confinement. Brian liked the hand-cuffed hands confined by the larger hand and suggested adding the Eritrea flag in the sleeve.

I created the initial line work for the illustration in Photoshop using a Wacom tablet and then made some additional lines work using a Pentel brush pen. I scanned in the line work and then added color and texture layers in Photoshop.

The visibility of the line work depends on its color. Some of it is the same color as one of its neighboring areas of colors, making that edge appear not to have a line separating the two color areas. And some of the line work color is different from either bordering color area so that it is visible as a line.

I was pleased with this stage of the image, and for the print version added the sleeve with the Eritrea flag. Here’s a link to the story and art online.

Brian Gray runs ProFile Stock, a rights-managed licensing site that includes an incredible cadre of illustrators.

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