N' YaBass - Duck the Zipper Cover with Font.

Here's the first draft of the album cover with text. Wanted to go for a very comic book action hero kind of feel with a little bit of gonzo Ralph Steadman splash, for Duck's Name. Here's what I came up with. I'd post more explanation, but I've got to run out the door.

If you want to hear the album, it's on Sound Cloud
N'YaBass - Duck the Zipper

Duck the Zipper - CD Cover

So I finally decided, after talking with the DJ, Jesse Gillmore (aka N'YaBass), That I was going to just stick with the theme that I've been developing and do something simple. Here's the outcome. I'm pretty excited about it. A bit of artistic idolatry went into this particular piece, but I knew that I wanted something that was rugged and gritty. So here's the character, Duck the Zipper, holding a Desert Eagle. This is the gun that Jesse said he liked the most. I also figured that if he was going to be a motorcycle hero that he'd need to be able to shoot with his left hand so that he could still control the throttle. Overall, I think it turned out pretty awesome. Let's see what the client thinks.

If you want to hear the album, it's on Sound Cloud
N'YaBass - Duck the Zipper

Dyna Wide Glide: back end Modification

Due to a request from my client, I've brought down the back end of the bike and dropped the fender over the back tire about 3 inches (based on the amount of space between the tire and the fender.) So now the fender is just barely hovering over the back tire. The modification is pretty subtle but you can see the difference best if you're looking at the left rear blinker and the chain. This gives the back end a little bit more of a tapering aero-dynamic feeling rather than being so high off of the ground.

Dyna Wide Glide - Process update!

Just wanted to share where I am with the Dyna pin up. Haven't exactly gotten the go-ahead from the t-shirt printer, they seem to be stuck with color separation on the taillights of Easy Glider, which features a Harley Road Glide. They're telling me that there are too many different types of red inside the taillight and they can't print it properly, or something. I don't know, sounds kind of bogus to me, if they can print pictures onto a t-shirt from some crappy stand inside of a mall, why can't these guys figure out how to do it, as well? Either way, I'm getting back in gear and just going to work on this piece until it's finished. Then we can work out the problems later on.

With this piece I'm finding out the kick-ass foot gear is essential for female riders and a good picture. So I did some research and came up with some sweet looking boots for our sexy Dyna girl to be wearing. I also threw in some fingerless gloves to match and get an all-around bad ass feel to the whole thing. I was also asked to remove the left mirror, since that's what's planned for the actual bike that's being used in the painting. If you look at the last process shot and compare, you'll notice the difference.

Dyna Wide Glide - Pinc Tacos pinup #6

Well, it was bound to happen; The guys at Pinc Tacos liked the American Ironhorse pin up "One Hot Burnout," so much that they now want to get their own bikes put into a picture with a very attractive young model. This one focuses around a 96 cubic inch Dyna Wide Glide. He just got a new seat put on made of Ostrich leather from a company called Bitchin' Stitchin' here in Denver. So, naturally, we both felt that it was best to put a redhead on the bike, seeing as how the bike is a dark maroon with bright red pinstriping, very similar to the deep gooseberry paint on my 1500 Vulcan Drifter. So here's a process shot of where I'm at before I start really tightening things up and making it shine. I'm also in the process of redoing the Pinc Tacos neon sign so that it looks more like an actual gas tube neon sign. More to come.

Duck The Zipper - New Sketches!

I've been having some fun doing more thumbnails and half-assed sketches of this character. I haven't quite figured out his story, yet. I'm sort of thinking he's kind of this gear-head superhero who's a mechanic during the day and a vigilante at night. Kind of an amalgam of Ghost Rider, Punisher, Batman, the Crow, Spawn and probably some other of my favorite heroes. I guess I should probably talk to DJ N'YABASS about the ideas for a story. I'm listening to Duck the Zipper, right now. You can find the whole album on Soundcloud.com
N'YABASS - Duck The Zipper
N'YABASS described the album as the emotions inside the head of Duck the Zipper. There's definitely a bit of narration in the album from start to finish. It all wraps up with some sad love-songy kind of longing for a girl, so next I'm going to try to maybe throw in a female character and see how that evolves.

Duck The Zipper - aka Merganser aka Morgue the Zipper

So I've been fiddling around all day with this Duck idea, and I've come up with some strange and interesting solutions that have very little to do with the DJ's initial idea. I just kind of let myself go in any old direction that my pencil felt like and this is where I ended up. The first series was what you might expect to see, an anthropomorphic duck creature thrown into a zoot suit for good measure. But as I started doing my thumbnails and getting some action out of the bird, I began thinking to myself, "What if the bird is a symbol, Like BATMAN! So instead of being a bird, the character just has bird-like equipment and he's actually more of a Kick-ass superhero type of character. So what kind of equipment would make him cool, birdlike, and stealthy? How about a wicked looking bird helmet! I know, right? that's what I said. Freakin Sweet! So I sketched it out and then decided to do a full body character study and colored it up a bit in photoshop. These probably aren't sketches that will stick around for the final draft, but process is as process does and I just wanted to show you all what kind of fun you can have with a pencil.

Duck the Zipper - A Hooded Merganser

My brother Jesse is a DJ who goes by the name N'YaBass. He's on the verge of putting out his first Album entitled "Duck the Zipper" about the emotions of his own fictional character of the same name. We had a discussion about the character and he asked me what ideas I had and if I would create an image that he could use for his Album Cover. The first thing that I thought of when I heard "duck" was that I definitely don't want to make yet another Daffy, Donald, or even Howard rip off. So I told Jesse that we need a new distinctive duck like a Wood Duck or a Merganser. He hadn't heard of a Wood Duck and thought that I literally meant a duck carved out of wood. I described the birds to him and he said "Cool." So I've been stewing over this for a night and I started working on some thumbnails and some other sketches of ducks. I had a list of other ducks including the Harlequin Duck, the Bufflehead, and the Barrow's Goldeneye. All very distinctive and ornate waterfowl in their own right, but I decided that the Hooded Merganser was the way to go. I saw many Common Merganser when I was in Alaska, last summer and remembered how much my grandmother really got excited when they came around the cabin.

A little info on the Hooded Merganser: The Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus) is the smallest of the three merganser species occurring in North America. Male hooded mergansers have a large white crest surrounded by black. The top of the head, neck and back are all black, and the chest, breast and belly are white. Wavy black lines can be seen on the tawny sides and flanks. The hindback, rump and tail are dark brown. The long, narrow, serrated bill is black. The iris is bright yellow and the legs and feet are dull yellow.

These ducks feed by diving and swimming under water to collect small fish, crustaceans and aquatic insects.

I Liked this picture because all of the rest of the pictures were really nice and fluffy. This one shows the true and terrible nature of the savage male Merganser, preying upon this helpless crustacean. HAHAHAA!