Franck Ribéry "Jewel of French Football"

Tonight I'm continuing my soccer player series by posting a caricatured manipulation of Franck Ribéry. Franck was born 7 April 1983 and is a French football player who currently plays for Bundesliga club Bayern Munich. Ribéry primarily plays as a winger, preferably on the left side, and is known for "pace, energy, skill and precise passing." I had a pretty good source pic for this one so I was able to post it at my normal full scale which is 1280 pixels wide. He was good practice and a lot of fun. If you want to learn more about Ribéry, his name is a link to his Wikipedia page. I'll have something a little different tomorrow.

Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Martin Palermo ~ Scream in the Rain

This is a very quick, loose caricature study and experimental piece of Martin Palermo. I had a little fun tonight and carried this caricature in a little different direction than was intended. The image I started with was very rough so I decided to keep it loose and play around. I'm sure he's a little skinnier than some of you would like but it just seemed appropriate. The image below is what I started with. I actually wasn't going to do a soccer player tonight. I did a caricature of Leslie Nielsen earlier to honor his passing with the intentions of posting it tonight but I ended up entering it into a contest, so I won't post it here until the contest is over.

I hope you enjoyed. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Rio Ferdinand

Rio Gavin Ferdinand (born 7 November 1978) is an English footballer. He plays at center back for Manchester United in the Premier League and in 2010, became captain of the England national football team. He has amassed 78 caps for England in total, and has been a member of three FIFA World Cup squads. I imagine you football fans know much more about him than that. It was a snippet from Wikipedia. His name is a link to his Wikipedia page if you want to learn more about him.
Tonight's project was a full body caricature of Rio Ferdinand. I seldom do a full body caricature like this. Normally when I do a caricature manipulation, I use a completely different body. I thought this image was cool with the rain, so I decided to keep it in tact and manipulate the whole picture. It created a couple of challenges but was a lot of fun. I'm providing the original image below for comparison.



I've had requests to do a caricature of Diego Maradona but I can't seem to find a good image. Help!
Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

A De-motivational Poster "False Hope"

This was an entry at FreakingNew.com for a contest called "Thanks for nothing". The object was to Create de-motivational poster satirically thanking somebody and to make it mimic the classic motivational posters with a black background, image in the middle, followed by the title word(s), and de-motivational message below. This contest allowed using material from a previous manipulation, which was an exception. Mine was a de-motivational poster called False Hope. It took gold.

Tomorrow, more soccer. I hope you enjoyed. Thanks for dropping by and have a great day!

Ronaldo de Assis Moreira ~ Ronaldinho

Well, I promised you soccer players and tonight I'm posting two caricatures I've done of what I'm told are famous soccer players. Above is Ronaldo de Assis Moreira or Ronaldinho, born 21 March 1980 in Porto Alegre, commonly known as Ronaldinho or Ronaldinho Gaúcho. A Brazilian footballer who plays for Italian Serie A club A.C. Milan and the Brazilian national team. I don't know a thing about him accept when I google his name, there were some really cruel caricatures of him with over exaggerating his lips and famous teeth. I tried to be a little nicer to him.

Carles Puyol i Saforcada ~ Carles Puyol

Below we have Carles Puyol i Saforcada or Carles Puyol, born 13 April 1978. A Spanish footballer who plays for FC Barcelona and the Spanish national team. Puyol was a very quick study but I spent a little more time on Ronaldinho. I do know one thing; these guys are incredible athletes and pretty good caricature material. I got a very positive responce from yesterday's post of Pele so I think I'll be doing a few of these soccer players or "footballers". I hope the little information I provided about these atheletes is correct. If not or if you want to know more about them, their names are links to their Wikipedia pages.

I hope you enjoyed. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Edson Arantes do Nascimento ~ Pele

This is a caricatured manipulation I did tonight of world famous soccer player Edson Arantes do Nascimento or Pelé to you soccer fans. I had a request to caricature some soccer players or football to most of you out there. Being from the U.S., I don't know a thing about soccer, but even I know who Pelé is. I remember watching him as a kid. He was an incredible player. This was a very quick study, but I will be doing a series of soccer players from around the world. There are lots of great subjects for caricatures in the soccer world. Hope you enjoy, and I hope this will appeal more to you international readers. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

Pamela Wilson ~ A Compelling Narrative

My work this evening could star in one of those "Fail" videos, so instead of putting you through that misery I'm going to give you something much better. I’m featuring one of my favorite artists this evening, Pamela Wilson. Otherworldly, dreamlike, haunting, dark, and hilarious absurdities are a few of the words used to describe some of the works of this incredible artist. I'm including a short Bio and a few of her works, but you will want to visit her web site to see more of her brilliant artwork and learn more about this amazing and very unique artist.

Pamela Wilson’s works of art transcend the commonplace to enter the realm of the sublime and otherworldly. She develops haunting images that evoke moods and memories inspired by real life, and which create a remarkably compelling narrative. The physical and emotional isolation of her characters has emerged as a hallmark of her work. She has much to say of the dark and hilarious absurdities we must often endure... while we are creating ourselves.

Primarily a figurative painter, Wilson has worked in many other mediums, including photography, printmaking, and assemblage. She received her MFA from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she was awarded a Regents Fellowship, the Abrams Project Grant, and a Regents Award for her Thesis Exhibition. She is currently Mentor Faculty at Laguna College of Art & Design, Laguna, CA, as part of the MFA Program.

Wilson has exhibited consistently since 1992 in galleries in New York, Chicago, Miami, Philadelphia, California, and Santa Fe. She has been included in many museum exhibitions, including the National Museum for Women in the Arts, Washington DC, and a solo exhibition at the Arnot Art Museum, Elmira, NY. Her work is included in many prestigious collections. She is currently represented by Sarah Bain Gallery, Anaheim, CA, and Evoke Contemporary Gallery, Santa Fe, NM.

I hope you enjoyed this brief peek into the life and work of Pamela Wilson. Please take the time to visit her web site where you will find a wonderful Portfolio, Bio, Résumé as well as an excellent feature and interview with the Ramshackle Review.

The Web Site and Portfolio of Pamela Wilson

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

A Caricature Study of The Rolling Stones

Tonight's project was a caricature study of The Rolling Stones. These guys are great caricature subjects. Every one of them has a load of character. They all have really interesting features begging to be exaggerated. I consider this a mild caricature. I typically exaggerate a little more and put the head on a smaller body, but since I was using the existing bodies from the source pic, I tamed it just a bit. I've wanted to do these guys for a long time but hesitated because I thought it would be an enormous amount of work but it wasn't bad at all. I completed it in one evening. They were a lot of fun and I'll have to do more of them in the future. This manipulation was inspired by Sebastian Kruger's caricature works of the Stones. He became quite attached to the group and did numerous caricatures and paintings of them especially Keith Richards. His works range from super realism to extreme caricatures and usually on a huge scale. I can't do justice to them like Kruger. His paintings of The Stones are amazing. Check out the quick video at the end of this post. It will give a pretty good overview of the work he did with the Stones. By the way, he hasn't stopped.

This is the source pic I used: Photographer Mark Seliger

These guys were really fun to do and a great learning experience. Practice, practice, practice. I'm determined to get good at this. I read an interesting quote today that kind of sums it up, getting good at something I mean. I don't know who it's by but I thought it was really cool and answeres the question that a lot of people have about whether or not they can achieve a certain goal. "The question is not how far. The question is, do you possess the constitution, the depth of faith, to go as far as is needed?" That says a lot because I believe anyone can achive thier particular goal if they have enough passion for it and are willing to go as far as it takes to reach it. Well, time to call it a day. I hope you enjoyed.

Check this video out:

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

Caricature Study of Lil' Wayne

I decided to do a caricature study tonight of Lil' Wayne. I used him in one other manipulation before and did a subtle caricature on his face, but I wanted to do a more complete caricature. He's a great subject with those big droopy eyes, plump lips and diamond grill. This one was strictly for practice but tomorrow; it's back to contest manipulations. I hope you enjoyed. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

The Incredible Works of Richard Macdonald

I'm a lover of all sorts of art and I thought I would feature my all time favorite Sculptor and Artist Richard Macdonald. This amazing world-renowned artist is the greatest living Sculptor, if not of all time in my opinion. I'm posting his bio as well as a two videos, one of which is of his gallery at the Bellagio in Los Vegas comprising the largest collection of his work in the world. If you are ever in the area, you must see his work. Seeing it in person is absolutely incredible. I am fortunate enough to have seen some of his works at another gallery. You will also want to visit his web site, which I will list below. Enjoy, and be inspired!

Richard MacDonald is world-renowned for artistry that reveals a profound understanding of the human experience and which celebrates the ascendancy of the human spirit. His fascination of the human form and with mankind's broad emotional range has inspired him to create dynamic, sensitive works; each infused with a quality that withstands the passage of time, of taste, of trend. Born and raised in California during an unkind era for figurative art, MacDonald was tossed into artistic waters by his uncle, then a leading graphic designer. Primed by his childhood and formally trained in Professional Arts at the Art Center, College of Design, Richard MacDonald forged an alchemy of experience to become an artist whose drawings, paintings and sculpture portray the passion inherent in the triumph of the human condition.

The inspiration behind MacDonald's 1996 tour de force, "The Flair," a 26-foot gymnast caught in the execution of the maneuver, actually emerged from a painting he created for the 1984 Olympics. And although he based his design on the studies he did of Kurt Thomas for the painting, The Flair's essence lies more in the struggle, determination and hours of training, all brought to that instant when performance is everything. Therein lies the metaphor for his own artistic achievements. Richard MacDonald went on to create, among other masterworks, "Momentum", a 15-foot, 15-ton sculpture created in celebration of the 100th playing of the U.S. Open golf championship at Pebble Beach.

When not creating art, he travels on behalf of it, extensively and internationally, forging relationships with other countries, other creators. His work is collected by such people as former U.S. President Bill Clinton and Senator Hillary Clinton, Linda and Stewart Resnick, William Payne, Dean Koontz, Richard Marx, Leanne Rimes, and opera legend Luciano Pavarotti. The absence of opportunity and training in figurative sculpture has created a void not only in the preservation of fine art, but in the persistence of life, which MacDonald, a natural teacher and devoted mentor, works relentlessly to fill. He works tirelessly to increase the appreciation and understanding of figurative art throughout the world. Richard MacDonald also graciously gives of his art and his time to hundreds of charitable organizations; among those Boys and Girls Clubs of America, Make a Wish Foundation, and New York's "Free Arts for Abused Children," which was a charity event sponsored by Cirque du Soleil and Lincoln Automotive. His commitment to fostering the future of post-modern, neo-figurative art is realized not only in creating monuments to human triumph, but by imparting his knowledge and technique, his experience and his lessons to emerging international and national professional artists through intensive master classes on location at his own 25,000 square foot studio complex.

As he passes the torch, he ensures his legacy. The artist's international reach has now captivated Shanghai, China, which recently recognized his accomplishments with a prestigious award and invited him to install his life-sized sculpture "Three Graces" in Central Green Park, a 1,500-acre expanse that softens Shanghai's new cosmopolitan financial center of Pudong. "China is important to the world in that they are a force and on the move," MacDonald said. "Exposing them to figurative art opens up a potential for artistic expression far greater than anyone would ever have dreamed possible until today. It is this very spirit of the struggle and determination to triumph that inspires creative expression. This is the message, I think, that will endure through my work."

Richard at the Bellagio

I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into the life of a living Master. Please take the time to visit his web site below, you'll be glad you did I promise. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Richard Macdonald's Web Site

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

Steve Harvey at the Apollo

This is a caricatured photo manipulation I did of Steve Harvey at the Apollo Theatre. That's where I remember him from as a host there. I was looking for something to practice on tonight and couldn't resist that huge smile Steve has and those big teeth. He has great character and was a lot of fun to do. This is the image of Steve that I started with. I'm going to try my best to do one of these manipulations each night before turning in. I have a lot to learn and it will only come by doing. I also intend to post more straight forward manipulations for those of you who aren't much into caricatures, but what ever I do, it seldom turns out serious. I tend to do better with humor. Well, off to bed. Thanks for stopping by, hope you enjoyed and have great day!!

Chef Claudio Paolini

This is a caricatured manipulation I did tonight of my biggest fan, Claudio Paolini. Claudio and I are friends on Facebook and he has been asking me to do a caricature of him. My wife and I laughed when we saw the emailed request. My wife said, "Does he really understand what he's getting himself  into?" Well, regardless he's into it, I just hope he likes it. I don't know if he's a chef or not but the outfit just seemed appropriate. Here are the reference photos he sent me to work with:

 I hope you like it Claudio! Thanks for stopping by friends and have a great day!

Memories

I'm still sick this evening so I'll make this very short. This was my 32nd Freak Show contest entry at FreakingNews.com. I did something a little different this time by combining photo manipulation with caricatures and aging, which is totally new to me. This is the first time I've attempted to age a person. I'm pretty pleased with the way this one came out. Be sure and view full, lots of detail. BTW: It took gold. 

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

Featured Artist ~ Jason Seiler

I'm posting a featured artist tonight because I'm a little under the weather and not feeling up to doing caricature manipulations at the moment. Jason Seiler is one of my all time favorite caricature artists. Most of you probably know of him or his work. For those of you who don't know Jason's work, you're in for a treat. I'm posting a bio of Jason Seiler and a two part video, that if you haven't seen will give you some great pointers on digital painting techniques, caricatures themselves and some of Jason's little tricks he uses to achieve likeness. The videos are approx. 7 minutes and 9 1/2 minutes, but they are well worth your time. I hope you enjoy. Have a great day and be inspired.

Take it away Jason!

BIO

Jason Seiler began his professional career in a rather unorthodox way. After getting in trouble for drawing parodies of his history teacher in high school, Jason’s quick-thinking principle hired him to draw caricatures of different faculty members. A professional artist was born. Jason went on to study fine art illustration at the American Academy of Art in Chicago for two years before beginning his professional work in earnest. Jason's humorous illustrations have been featured as covers and interior pieces for TIME, Business Week, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Weekly Standard, MAD magazine, GOLF magazine, KING magazine, Revolver, Guitar Player, The Village Voice, Penguin Group, Disney, The New York Observer, D Magazine, The Bloomberg Market, New Line Cinema, Universal Pictures, Aardman Animation, and Sony Image, among others. Jason also worked as a character designer on Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland, helping to create such characters as the Red Queen, the Tweedles, the Bandersnatch and more.

Jason has published two books of his art: Caricature the Art of Jason Seiler and the coffee-table book, SEILER 2008-2009, featuring many of his humorous portraits and illustrations. Jason has also produced an instructional DVD entitled, Sketching with Jason Seiler.

Jason’s work has been exhibited several times at the Society of Illustrators in New York as well as at the Society of Illustrators West, where Jason was awarded the silver medal for his portrait of Elvis Costello. His work has also been exhibited in Communication Arts Magazine, American Illustration 29 annual, Taschen’s Illustration Now! 3, and the book, Digital Masters (2010).

Jason is a member of the Society of Illustrators NY. He has been an art instructor for several years with Schoolism, the online art school created by Imaginism Studios in Toronto. Jason currently lives in Chicago with his lovely wife, Kat, and his two irresistibly beautiful daughters, Isabeau and Ava.

For anyone intersted in knowing more about this incredible artist, please visit this link:

JASON SEILER'S PORTFOLIO

Alan Greenspan II

It's been a long day. I finished my 32nd Freak Show entry for FreakingNews.com Photoshop contest this afternoon and it won't be posted on my blog until the contest ends, so that one is on the way. With that out of the way, I had to find something for this post. I had so much fun with Alan Greenspan the last time, I decided to caricature him again. This is the original pic of him. I tried a little different angle this time exaggerating his sagging cheeks and that thing he does with his lips. He's a great subject. This one was a little more difficult because the source pic was a bit noisy. I cleaned it up as best I could, removing the noise and trying to add back contrast and detail that was lost. I'm not totally satisfied with the way it came out. It's just not as crisp as I would like but it was a learning experience and that's always a good thing. Hope you enjoy, have a great day!

Caricature and Aging Study

This is a very rough work in progress. I've done a caricature and aging study of Hillary and Obama. This will eventually be worked into a finished piece. I got a good bit done tonight considering I started four hours ago with two plain photos. I actually had more done than this but I'm waiting until it's complete to reveal anymore. This was a pretty straight forward caricature for the both of them and then I started on the aging process which is new to me. This is the first time I've attempted aging a person. As I said, this is very rough and unfinished. The final product will have the correct contrast, color, saturation and details. I just wanted to give you a sneak preview of what's to come. Well, that's enough for one night, off to bed now. Hope you enjoy and have a great day!

Alan Greenspan

I got tired of the contests and all tonight and decided to do something for myself. I set out to find someone with good features to caricature and I came across this picture of Alan Greenspan. He has great character in his face and plenty of cool textures, wrinkles, age spots and a great expression. I don't know a thing about the guy, politics is not my thing, but he was a good subject to practice on. These manipulated caricatures of people with glasses adds quite a bit of difficulty. I have to remove the glasses, clone the face back where the glasses were and then after the caricature process, put the glasses back on. A ltllte tricky but worth it in the end. Hope you enjoy. Thanks for stopping in and have a great day!

Miss Perky

This was a very quick and loose caricature study of a pretty young lady with beautiful eyes and a great smile. It's not in a finished state by any means. It was strictly an exercise to loosen me up. I spent a good part of the day fixing a web page and I hate writing code so this was a good change of pace. The main goal was to enhance her expression and features without losing her personality. I'm really just getting into caricatures, (only a few months now) and I have a lot to learn so I'll keep cranking them out because I really have a passion for this type of work and hope to be good at it one day. Meanwhile I'm having a ball. I'll get back to more serious caricatures tomorrow. I also have a couple of things in progress that I will be posting in a few days.

I didn't make this but I thought it was funny. I found it on DeviantArt.com. A lot of people collect these stamps. Gotta' love Mr. Bean. I just wish I could find more quality images of him to destroy :). Have a great day!

Woody, Howard and Scarlett

This was a caricature study of Woody Allen done fro practice, but I like Woody's features so I decided to use him for my bio and for my Facebook ID. 

This is the before and after image od Woody Allen and Scarlett Johansson. They were a lot of fun.

This was a quick study of Howard Stern and a gift for a friend from FreakingNews.com, DeviantArt.com and Facebook.

Presidential Briefing

This was an entry in my 31st Freak Show contest at FreakingNews.com. I did something a little different this time blending caricature and surrealism with a political edge to it. It won gold.

I hope you enjoyed. Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

A Caricature Study of Robert De Niro

This is a caricature study I did last night of Robert De Niro. I'm trying to do one study every night on top of my regular manipulations and everything else I have to get done during the day. This is the image of De Niro I started with. This was a very fast manipulation. It was not meant to be a finished piece. My intention was to keep it loose. Sometimes I tend to over do a manipulation and the caricature ends up looking stiff. It was strictly a learning experience. It could stand improvement, but I'm happy with what I took away from it.

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

A Caricature Study of Andy Rooney

This is a caricature study I did last night of Andy Rooney just for practice. Couldn't pass up those famous eye brows.

A caricature study of Jay Leno

This is a caricature fairly quick study of Jay Leno I did last night for practice. I'm experimenting with some different techniques of manipulating the photo, especially when I'm doing extreme exageration as in Jay's chin. You tend to get stretch marks and blurring when morphing images and I'm learning how to keep that pixel blurring to a minimum when using _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ . Can't give away my secrets just yet. Of course, high resolution images help especially at the size I do most of my manipulations. I like to show lots of detail when posssible and generally the final image is 1280 pixels wide. This one ia a bit shy of that. Here is the original image of Leno.

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

The Scream

This was an entry in a contest at FreakingNews.com called "Modern Vermeer ". I love this shot of hillary and have been wanting to use it in a manipulation. I always enjoy manipulating artwork. It's one of my favorite subjects. I was experimenting with new techniques of achieving a believable cracked paint effect. I'm not quite there yet but I learned a good bit from this one. The next one will be cool. It took silver.

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

Pirate Bean

Back by popular demand: (Mr. Bean). This is a caricatured manipulation of Mr. Bean as a pirate. It was my 30th Freak Show entry at FreakingNews.com. Mr. Bean is by far the most favorited character, (on my DeviantArt.com page) I have ever manipulated. This one has lots of detail and was allot of fun to do. It took bronze.

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!

The Most Right Reverend Jeremiah Wright ... Wrong!

A fairly quick caricatured manipulation of Reverend Jeremiah Wright. This one was just for fun. I couldn't pass up the awesome pic he had up on Google. Preach it Rev.! 

A caricature study of Mr. Bean

This is a caricature study of Mr. Bean I did just for practice. I decided to do Mr. Bean again because he is by far my most favorited subject on DeviantArt.com. It was strange doing Mr. Bean because you're exagerating the already exaggerated. The man is a walking caricature. He's allot of fun though. I will be working this caricature into a finished piece very soon.

 Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!