Greetings y’all,
Just a reminder that the blog has moved to be integrated with the illustration website at
www.davehouchin-illustration.com
Simply follow the link at the top of the page when you get there. Hope you all had a great Easter, and make the most of your bank holiday Monday – why not check out all the new blog posts at the other site to relax?
Dave 
Latest Entries »
Evening all,
In an attempt to pull a few different promotion streams together into one managable place, I’m moving the blog to my main website where you can see new work and posts. You can find it at www.davehouchin-illustration.com and I very much hope to see you there.
All the best, Dave
Hideho, neighbours.
Today I shall mostly be cleaning up images, finalising mailer designs and doing reportage – but just wanted to let you know I’ve just moved into the 21st Century and joined Twitter. As soon as I’ve figured out quite what is going on, I’ll make sure to upload work on-the-go, but in the meantime feel free to follow me @Houchbacca or just search for me by name by ‘Dave Houchin’.
In the (more current) meantime, please enjoy a couple of sketches I did from a house mailer – this one was a cube with all the people living there on each side. This is myself and girlfriend, and it began a quite nice tradition of creating a different mailer each time we moved to let people know the new address (just telling people is so passe…)
It's a good afternoon from me...
...and it's good afternoon from her.
I wish you all fabulous Sunday, and that it’s as sunny as here in Yorkshire. If not a bit warmer.
Dave
"Non, je ne regrette rien."
Evening all.
I’m currently working on some images for a friend’s wedding and hen night invitations which I’ll upload after the events (with their permission, of course), but just thought I’d show a little evidence of the mind’s wandering during the day job. These are some doodles I found I had drawn without realising during my other job, and just thought I’d share as an insight into my thought processes. A few have actually been transferred into my main sketchbook and may grow into full projects – but obviously, it would ruin the surprise to post them now.
For now,I hope you’re having a great weekend, and hope you check back soon.
Dave
ps. As an insight into a 90′s kid – see how many tv/games characters you recognise. Whyever not?
"Who Evolution"
Evening, y’all.
This is just a brief update to assure you that I am beavering away on a few projects at the moment, including some images for a friend’s wedding programme, and will upload them as soon as I can. In the meantime, this is another picture from the same art show as in the previous post, this time using classic Doctor Who as inspiration. If you have somehow not seen this British sci-fi show before, it features a time traveller who can regenerate when killed – a handy premise for using different actors as times change, and previous incarnations move on to new projects. I took this concept and mixed it with the Evolution of Man to illustrate the first 7 doctors moving forward (left to right – William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee (Mollie Sugden?), Tom Baker, Peter Davidson, The Colin Baker, and Sylvester McCoy). I hope you like it, and as ever – check back soon!
All my best, Dave
Ahoy ahoy!
I hope you’re all having a nice week (and the anticipation of Friday is delicious – you can almost taste 5pm!). This blog will be moving soon to link up with my website at www.davehouchin-illustration.com at which point I’m going to upload a few projects I’ve been working on, including a sneak look into the mailer I’m planning on sending to a select few publishers in February (in line with the NY post). In the meantime, I just wanted to post an image I did for an art show here in Sheffield exhibiting local artists.
"Mostly 'armless"
The image was quite obviously a homage to Tenniel’s work, an illustrator who floats back into my consciousness on regular intervals. I was recently looking through old school photos, and saw the same influence. This image was made with indian ink on bristol board, then tinted with watercolour – it’s always healthy to look back at past influences to see where you’re headed (a la scientists envisioning where we’re headed in a few years).
And this is me standing next to 3 of my pictures at the show. Please note, the camera adds 200 pounds.
Check back soon, and have a great Friday! Dave
Over two weeks since the last blog? Oo-er…
Greetings!
As ever (however more justified than usual this time), apologies for the delay in updates: a combination of researching, technology slapping me, and a particularly busy period at the day job have prevented me updating. I have, however, pretty much kept up with other resolutions so far, so we’ll call the board awash.
While I have been away from the blog, there have been a few large events which I should touch on just in case this illustration blog is your only link to the outside world.
- (Above) The Outside World. Specifically, the Sheffield Sunrise on my walk to work.
First and foremost, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) appears to be dead (until February when it is looked at again, possibly in the smaller but still dangerous form of PIPA), which can only be a good thing for the denizens of the web and creatives in general. When Big Business is given the power to take anybody down without due cause or trial, and there have been examples of taking down videos which are original content owned by an artist which has never come near to a breach of copyright, websites taken down for having out-of-copyright music (wherein the author died in the 40′s), sites on a ‘blacklist’ for having a similar name (though completely unrelated) to something once owned by someone, and the evidence that some of the largest downloaders of illegal films and music come from inside the bastions of power, be that the movie giants or the policy makers themselves, you really have to wonder what the underlying motive is. I’m sure I can’t think of a single one…؟**
Truth be told, my main concern is that this is using a sledgehammer to break a walnut, crushing any eventuality of fair use in art that the Powers That Be deem to be against their own interests. Given the current movement (which does not have a name?) of mashups and affectionate re-imaginings of pop culture icons, it’ll be interesting to see how this plays out. I hope progress prevails…
More information and commentary can be found at http://boingboing.net/tag/sopa
Next, although not as high profile may have an impact in the same field, is the judgement in a UK court that the concept behind an image can be copyrighted. The law has always been loathe to copyright an idea, because of the inherent corruption of system and stagnation of creativity it can cause.
The best part of this? The image which claimed copyright and won over another image of the same concept? A London bus with The British Parliament in the background. Because it’s such an original idea to take a picture of an icon***. From the Amateur Photographer website:
“The case, heard at the Patents County Court in London on 12 January, could have serious implications for photographers, according to photographic copyright expert Charles Swan, a lawyer at Swan Turton, who said: ‘His honour Judge Birss QC decided that a photograph of a red London bus against a black and white background of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, with a blank sky, was similar enough to another photograph of the same subject matter to infringe copyright.’
He added: ‘The decision is perhaps surprising, given the commonplace subject matter of the photographs. The judge himself admitted that he found it a difficult question, but in the end he decided that a substantial part of photograph one [Temple Island's image] had been reproduced in photograph two [New English Teas'].’
Swan warned: ‘The Temple Island case is likely to herald more claims of this kind. The judgement should be studied by anyone imitating an existing photograph or commissioning a photograph based on a similar photograph.
‘“Inspiration’ and “reference” are fine in themselves, but there is a line between copying ideas and copying the original expression of ideas which is often a difficult one to draw.’!
Full story at http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/photographers_face_copyright_threat_after_shock_ruling__news_311191.html
This may seem a fairly heavy post (and wordy – the next one shall have more images!), and so I’d like to finish on a happy note. Scientists have found that dolphins at a Seaworld-esque resort mimic whalesong and, potentially, learn to communicate using it despite never coming into contact with a real whale – they have learnt it from the recordings played in the background for those pesky humans. Who’da thunk it? Full story at http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/01/do-dolphins-speak-whale-in-their.html
Check back soon, for some freshly uploaded illustration goodness!
Dave
*Remember when we used to call ourselves webizens? Ha, those were the days…
**This is a punctuation mark meaning irony. Which I have used incorrectly, n’est pas?
***If only there were punctuation for sarcasm.
www.losttype.com/
Evening all,
I hope you’ve all had a good week – the first week back at work after Christmas is always the hardest, and, despite a bank holiday in there, the day job has really taken it out of me (hence a fairly short post). I’ve been looking into distinctive fonts to use in a dummy children’s book to pitch, which is essentially a mock up to show to a publisher. Usually, it would be a rough version of the finished product, with the full story but only a couple of pages fully completed in case revisions are needed for it to be accepted. I came across the website for Lost Type, and they seem to have a really good set-up:
(From the website) “Founded by Riley Cran and Tyler Galpin, originally in a whirlwind 24 hour adventure to distribute a single typeface, Lost Type has blossomed into a full fledged foundry, distributing fonts from designers all over the world, with its unique model. Users have the opportunity to pay whatever they like for a font, you can even type in ‘$0′ for a free download. 100% of funds from these sales go directly to the designers of the fonts, respectively.”
I think this is ideal, because although it is stated as ‘pay what you like’ I prefer ‘pay what you can afford’, as you can go down the $0 route and, once used and a piece of work (by the artist) is paid for, you can go back and emburse the creator of the font. Come the revolution, I’m sure much more business will be done this way. I’m going to push on with some colouring, but will hopefully get chance to post some new work tomorrow evening. As ever, be sure to check back soon!
Dave
Hullo!
As ever, just a quick post – today, to introduce a new project (in the vein of the previous post, in making projects public before completion). Drawing on the enjoyment I found in the Futurama project (http://davehouchin.wordpress.com/2011/12/08/good-news-everyone-part-2/), the current popularity of re-envisionings/pop culture mash-ups , and a few conversations coming from outside illustration, I am going to begin a series named The Periphery Project. An example of what to expect can be found below…
Background mugs of tea really sell the rock and roll image. Also, I've never found a hat that fits my enormous clown head, hence the pose.
The image was created playing with various filters and layers, to emulate the original look of Blues Brothers posters, with the intention being a character who exists within the same universe but who was not brought up in the story (and so celebrating the original). Hence, The Periphery Project – characters who were there but unnoticed. The reason for doing this is to broaden linking between story and character, and (quite frankly) fun. I hope that I’ll learn something with each image, be it technical or on character level and allow more experimentation. Check back soon to see the latest versions, and for some new projects to run along-side.
Also, just as a side-bar: given that cosplay seems tos be growing more and more in legitimacy and artistry (http://unrealitymag.com/index.php/2009/07/08/the-20-most-badass-video-game-cosplay-costumes-ever/) and is splitting into various sub-genres of it’s own (http://www.themarysue.com/female-6th-doctor/), I can’t see it being much longer before people begin creating their own ‘Periphery Characters’ with backstories (as already occurs to an extent within the steampunk sub-genre). Here’s hoping, and you know I’ll be there!
Dave
Hello!
I hope you’ve all had a nice holiday period, filled up on mince-pies and merriment, and are ready to take 2012 by the horns! I’ve been a bit scarce on the blog the last couple of weeks as I’ve been spending time with family, but have resolved to make sure to keep it up to date this year, bringing us to the post’s topic of New Year Resolutions. It borders on redundant when discussing resolutions that most people break theirs within the first week, be it giving up the standard chocolate (which I’ve never managed), or jump-starting a new outlook on life (which is harder than it looks). However, I’m batting around a theory that a large part of this is because they’re often hidden away from public view and, as such, can be put onto the back-burner to do next year (and the next). With that in mind, and without further ado…
2011′s New Year Illustration Resolutions.
1) Push to create something each day, be it a sketch or part of a larger piece.
It really is true that artistic ability is a muscle which must be exercised*.
2) Send out full promotional packs by February.
These should show best recent work, and be targeted (more about this in a subsequent post).
3)Begin at least one ongoing project including a series.
(This may include setting up a shop on the website, or via etsy and it’s ilk).
4) Prepare dummy books of ongoing concepts into a whole for pitching.
ie. Work on creating a whole ‘package’ with each project.
5) No more Less unhealthy food.
This is more of a general one, really (and potentially harder).
6) Reportage, reportage, reportage.
See resolution 1.
January 1st’s 6 steps to being a more productive illustrator – I’m aware that it isn’t comprehensive, but I believe that procrastination is one of the major stumbling blocks in being a creative, and by holding myself to public intentions for the year I hope to avoid this and get to a stage where I can even embellish on them.
If you’ve made some of your own, I hope you can stick to them as well. Be sure to check back soon to see how I’m getting on with them (and give me flack if I’m not doing). All the best for 2012, Dave
*The same can be said of being a geek. The geek is a muscle; you have to exercise it.
