It's always fun to compare the actual commercial to my animatic or storyboard.
Animatic from Nuts.com TV Spot
Being a Courtroom Artist
Pat King during his first appearance in court.
While updating my social media accounts, I was intending on simply posting some of my current court art from the past year. However, I began to reflect on how and why I came to drawing in court to begin with and thought I would share it here as well.
It was never something I wanted to do in the first place, and frankly I was nervous about going into court and maybe failing miserably at it.
My first opportunity to do a court sketch came from the Ottawa Citizen at the Ontario Courthouse downtown. After moving from metro Toronto to an Ottawa suburb, I was looking for any excuse get out of the house and at the very least grab a coffee and sandwich at a Starbucks or café downtown.
Reflecting back on this now, I realize my motivation wasn't just getting out of the house, it was saying "yes" to a new opportunity. I wasn't doing it for the money - I was doing it because it was new, scary, and a challenge. Actually, as it turns out, it wasn't that scary. The courts arewelcoming and I got to work along side some great reporters and producers.
Mike Duffy in the final days of his court appearance.
I've done some really good drawings and a lot of awful ones too. The not so great ones I try not to critique too harshly, instead judge them on the situation and the time I had to do them in. Overall my average is pretty good and has led to more doors being opened for me as well as my 15 minutes of fame being interviewed on Canada Am and CBC radio.
Over the years I've drawn some really bad people, a lot that weren’t bad but had made wrong choices and some that people thought were bad but ultimately proved their innocence.
No matter the subject, it's all very interesting and though you can’t really make a great living as a courtroom artist, it's turned out to be a great part-time job and I love doing it.
Tamara Lich during one of her many bail hearings.
Storyboard work from the end of 2018.
Vector Storyboard
Coffee Mate
Coffee Mate
Government of Canada
Mitsubishi
Some recent work.
Match MG Canada - Snickers
The Richards Group - 7UP
Match MG Canada - Lindros
Sapporo Storyboard and TV Spot
It's always satisfying to know that a storyboard I worked on had a small part bringing a commercial to TV. #Sapporo #Storyboard #Storyboarding #Illustration
Recent work done for the The Royal Agricultural Winter Fair.
Comps used for concept.
Some of the final vector artwork.
Toronto Maple Leafs Top 100 Poster Process
Last year I was lucky enough to be contacted by the Toronto Maple Leafs to design and illustrate a poster commemorating the top 100 Maple Leafs of all time. The posters were sold at Canadian Tire stores throughout the GTA with proceeds going to Canadian Tire JumpStart.
As a hockey fan this was a pretty cool gig but not without its challenges. The main one was that I would have to illustrate a hundred of the top Maple Leafs of all time, as voted by the fans, and it had to be done in a month. On top of the that I had to figure out how I was going to showcase each player without emphasizing one over another.
This was one of those gigs were you say ‘sure I can do it’ but you’re wary of the deadline. I wanted to paint this so badly but the deadline and the scope of the project made it pretty evident I would have to do something outside of the box.
This meant I wasn’t going to be able to illustrate it completely in Corel Painter. I would have to utilize Adobe Photoshop and "gradients" would be the key. Now I just had to come up with the design.
After a number of concepts the final idea was so simple and it fit the criteria of "not emphasizing one player over another". Before I even sketched it I knew the Leafs would love it. Thankfully my confidence was rewarded.
At this point, time was getting tight. On top of that the final list of players had yet to be decided. At least I had the top twenty to start with and Dave Keon was number one. The first two rows were tough. I had a lot of work sitting the players on the bench because I would have to draw their legs. After that was completed, it was a lot easier to do the rest because I just needed their waist up and I could duplicate the uniforms.
Now here’s my confession. As I said earlier… I would have loved to have drawn the whole thing from scratch but there was no way.
My solution or what I would like to say “technique” was to assemble the best photo reference I could find, clean them up, smooth out any pixelation and draw in anything that was missing. I wanted the players at this stage to be in greyscale for a number of reasons. First, I was colouring them using gradients in Adobe Photoshop so having them in greyscale would allow me to colour them with the same colour palette. Uniformity was important to give the illusion of the players all being together for the team photo and with the 10 decades of reference, the photos were all of various resolutions and quality. Now the process of colouring became an assembly line.
Which was huge because I was able to employ my friend and fellow illustrator Trevor Johnston to help apply colour.
The final stage was then placing the players together onto the background (which I painted separately). I used Corel Painter for all the drawing and painting and it came in very handy applying the finishing touches. A lot of work went in to creating the soft edges that blended the players together and into their surroundings.
Concept 1
Approved Concept
Seating Chart
Johnny Bower Test
Dave Keon Test
Mike Duffy Trial Archive
The end is insight for Sen. Mike Duffy's long running trial. With that, I finally compiled all the colour digital sketches from my 61 days at the trial. (Actually 60, I missed one day to attend my son's Christmas pageant.)
Now I'm on to cataloging the corresponding pencil sketches that I used from my sketch book.
Leaf Captains Giclee Canvas Prints for Sale!
I have 1 large canvas and 3 medium size canvases for sale in Ottawa.
Large Canvas 22"x28" : $150
Medium Canvas 18"x24" : sold out
Daniel Afredsson WIP (Work In Progress)
I started this one about a year ago as practise then I kinda liked it... tried to finish it...then I hated it... and then put it away. Now I thought if I find sometime I'll try to finally finish it over the Christmas Holidays. I still need to finish the little Alfie and I'd like to add snow coming off his skate blade. I'd be interested in some feedback.
Mike Duffy court sketch from November 25th
Heather and Mike Duffy. She has been by his side everyday of the trial.
Media: Pencil on Heavyweight paper from my sketchbook. Colour is added digitally using Corel Painter 2016.
Notes: One of my personal favourites because my sketch was solid which made it very easy to finish up quickly.
It's Done!
Another drawing from "Go Ahead And Dream".
This is actually a vignette. I'm including my reference this time.
Another page from "Go Ahead and Dream"
Back at it... "Go Ahead and Dream"
© Greg Banning 2011