Extreme Exaggeration Caricature Study

Today I'm posting an experimental piece. I guess all of my work is experimental but I wanted to attempt another extreme exaggeration. The first one I tried of ... well, I'd better not say, was a total failure. In this caricature, I used a source image that I've used a couple of times in the past. It's an interesting figure and the costume is cool so there are many directions I can take this guy. My goal here was to make the nose at least 50% of the total face. I didn't quite get there but it's close and I think I could have if I had pushed it far enough. I just got to a point where I felt like it was time to stop. I try to listen to my instincts in cases like this especially since I have no clue what I'm doing. I do like the line in the shape of his face and I tried to make that line very prominent and clean. That's one of the reasons for the drop shadow and the darkening of the background, to further define that line. Of course, the intent was not likeness in this case, strictly an experiment to see how far I could push a profile without it looking totally stupid. Absurd yes but hopefully not stupid. Anyhow, it was lots of fun and I really learned a lot from this piece and that's what it's all about. These exercises always help when the next commission comes along. 

I'm going to be working more on my web site, RodneyPike.com in the coming days. I have to get a gallery page started there. I will be more selective as to what goes in as the site will hopefully be a professional representation of me and my work. I have some cool things in mind so make sure you bookmark the site. Also remember you can subscribe to the entire site or just the blog there if you like. For the time being, it is a mirror of this blog but that will change as time goes on. I also have plans for totally changing the landing page.

I'm getting more and more requests for tutorials and I wanted to remind everyone of the webinar I did a couple of months back for RetouchPRO Live. The webnar can be accessed here. There will be more of those in the near future as well.

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

Jacques René Chirac

Well, there's a new French President now but I haven't found the right image of him yet. Give him a little time, he's a politician in the lime light, so he'll do something funny soon enough. Meanwhile I was looking for an interesting profile to do and found this image of former French President Jacques Chirac. I liked the angles in is in his face in this profile pic so I really pushed the exaggeration on those angles here. These former French Presidents have great noses for caricatures. I had a hard time deciding what to do with the background because everything I tried was too busy and detracted from the subject. I thought about it for a while and then it came to me. French flags, but not waving anymore as they did when he was President, simply leaning against an old door as he passed. These French subjects are always great fun and the French people are always such good sports. I'm not sure about the outcome on this one yet but it was a fun exercise. I imageine my French friends will tell me. I only spent a few hours on this one as aposed to my usual 2 to 3 days. On to the next one.. Vive la France!

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

Vincent Price Reemembered

Today I'm posting a manipulated caricature of Vincent Price which was requested by one of my many friends at Google+. I wanted to work with a color image but just couldn't find the right one. I decided to use the source image below and do a faded blue monochromatic image and just add color to the eyes.  I saw one done similar of Keith Richards of the Stones by Sebastian Kruger. It's amazing. Well, mine is certainly no Kruger and I'm not totally happy with the way it came out but it was an experiment, so I'll take what I learned from it and move on to the next one. I'm thinking about Steven Tyler of Aerosmith next. I've got to do something with those lips before he gets too old. 

Don't forget to stop by and bookmark my new web site if you haven't already: RodneyPike.com. As always, thanks for the support!!

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

RodneyPike.com Optimized For Mobile Devices

Tonight I'm making a post about my new web site, RodneyPike.com. I've done a little work on the appearance and did some optimization testing for browsers, iPads and iPhones today. Above is a browser view and below are the iPad and iPhone views. I tried to make the previews relative in size, or as close as I could get them so you could view the set sort of how they would appear together. They can be clicked on to view larger but depending on your browser, you may not be able to view the top one in detail. Please stop by the site and bookmark and or subscribe via email or RSS. It has a blog built in which will mirror this blog for the time being, but I eventually will move everything into one all purpose site. Small steps for now though. My blog won't be going anywhere anytime soon if at all. Thanks for the support guys!

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

Tim Burton - One Man Show ~ RodneyPike.com

Tonight I'm posting a caricature manipulation I did of Tim Burton this weekend. It's the second time I've done him but he was so much fun the first time, I had to do another. This time, I tried to bring his work to life just a bit in the background. If this looks strangely similar to the first one to you, that's because it is. It was done from a different photo but he was wearing the exact same outfit as in the first one. I also borrowed the glasses and the eyes from the first caricature because he was looking the wrong way in this source image. I also did quite a bit of work on his hair and whiskers. I was going to post it yesterday but decided to hold it for the first official post on my new web site which launches at noon tomorrow, RodneyPike.com. I've been needing to do this for a while and now it is up. It will change and evolve over time but I have something to work with now and I have my name registered which I really needed to do. The following link, RodneyPike.com will be officially go live at noon tomorrow, Tuesday, May 15th. Please stop by and check it out and don't forget to subscribe. There are several ways you can get the feed quick and simple. Thanks so much for the support guys!

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

RodneyPike.com is Here!

Hello friends! I'm making this post to announce the launch of my new web site, RodneyPike.com. The developer and I have a few loose ends to tighten up, so I will launch it first thing in the morning, May 15th, 2012 which just happens to be my wedding anniversary so it's time to break out the good stuff! I said last year that 2012 was going to be my year and this web site is just the one of the cool things happening. I have some great new commissions on the way with some very prominent international clients so I'm excited about what 2012 will bring. It has already started off with a bang.

My new domain, RodneyPike.com is generously being built, hosted and sponsored by Dustin Salmons of SupremePress.com which is a new hosting platform for content creators. Since my work will now be published through the SPCM Network, my followers can engage with the site through the community @ http://SP.cm as well.

Contact:

Dustin Salmons

Brand Personalization

http://BrandPersonalization.com

SPCM Network

http://SP.cm

Facebook

http://facebook.com/CDSalmons

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

Vic Gundotra - Top Google Executive Slightly Tweeked

Vivek "Vic" Gundotra is Senior Vice-President of Social Business for Google and was previously a general manager at Microsoft. I had the pleasure of meeting him this week in a Google+ Hangout. He's a super nice guy and very down to earth. It's nice to know we have someone at the top of the google ladder who not only cares about us little guys, but takes the time to visit with us in a very personal setting. Vic wasn't the easiest caricature I've done. I did several sketches of him trying to decide which way to go with the exaggeration. He has a nice smile, strong jawline and pretty thick eyebrows, but that's about all I had to work with. He's one of those guys you just can't make too ugly, so I decided to go very subtle which I think works best for him. Besides, he knows where to find me and I didn't want to offend jim. :) Oh and the guy in the background... don't ask me how he got in there...??? Below is the original source image.

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

Fat and Arrogant

Quite a while back, I did a caricature study similar to this simply called Arrogant. It was an experiment on exaggerating the facial features that made this guy look arrogant. I decided to do another version with a different twist. The first one was quite skinny as in the source image so I did a fat version this time called "Far and Arrogant". I think the first one screams arrogant a bit more than this one does but this image shows the improvement of my exaggeration skills and is much more precise and clean. 

Here's the older version below:

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