Illustrated Book Quotations

I've recently completed a set of illustrated quotations that I have been working on for well over a year now. I originally started making them to enter them into a competition but it didn't take me long to realise that I had been a bit overly ambitious in my ideas... and here we are quite a number of months later with them finally done!
I really enjoy reading, and I often write down any book quotations I particularly like. I have always wanted to make something that incorporates some of my favorite quotations and so this project was I suppose a chance to experiment and see if I could make something that could live up to these quotations. The final pieces have not turned out how I expected... but overall I'm quite pleased with the result - as hand lettering (physically or in Illustrator) is not a speciality of mine!
So here are the final pieces - alongside their original sketch:

I've ordered a few to sell as greetings cards and I'm thinking of maybe selling some as A4 prints?
I have a lot more quotes I'd like to illustrate, so I do hope to make more of these in the future, but maybe go a bit more simple with my ideas! I love me some books.

I've also added this project to my website if anyone would like to take a peek: Book Quotations on Nafftastic Website

Valentines Vomiting Heart

I made some vomiting hearts for Valentines Day...

...and I'm selling them in my Etsy shop: Nafftastic Shop
So you can tell your partner just how much you love them whilst at the same time expressing your disgust at the holiday of Valentines Day. Hooray!

Shiny New Art Set

I'm back! With some pictures of the awesome watercolour set I got for Crimbo:

The company who made this set are called Sennelier, and its a pretty cool set. I feel like a Victorian painter/illustrator with it!
I also got a gigantic set of watercolour pencils made by Derwent which I am made up with as well...

So last night I painted of another of my 2013 books:

I love using those shades of blue! This was the first time I have ever used masking fluid (or drawing gum) and I love it! Its pretty nifty I do have to say.

Reading List 2013

Well its that time of year again! This time last year I decided to do some 'off the cuff' illustrations of all the books I'd read in the previous year, and this year is no exception! This year I decided to do the illustrations in watercolour, using the new fancy pants watercolour set I got for Christmas; which I will hopefully post a photo up of soon!

Here are books I've illustrated so far...

So there we go! I'm not sure if I'll get a chance to draw any more of the books I read last year, but I will post them up here if I do, as I do have some ideas in mind!
(My favourite book out of this batch was 'Perfume' by Patrick Suskind).

Street Sketchbook Journeys

Happy New Year! I hope everyone has a great one and you all achieve at least one thing you really want to do this year!

Now. Blog writing. I buy and receive a lot of books, I have a shelf full of arty/fiction books looking at me with contempt in their imaginary eyes because I haven't read them yet. One of those books is one I was given on my birthday probably about 2 years ago now called 'Street Sketchbook Journeys' by Tristan Manco. Well, a few weeks ago, I started reading it.

This book is a compendium of some of the most cutting edge graffiti artists functioning today. Now I ain't no big graffiti art fan. I like graffiti art, I've seen some pretty cool stuff, admittedly mostly by Banksy; but this book has really opened my eyes to the diversity of graffiti artists out there. In this book, Tristan Manco mainly looks at the work of artists operating in Mexico and Brazil, but others are featured from the likes of Poland and Ukraine.

Every page is engulfed with large full-colour photos of each respective graffiti artists work, alongside developmental sketches and illustrations. The text feels like it doesn't need to be read, as the images speak for themselves; BUT the text gives you an insight into how each graffiti artist works and their thought processes behind it. What I like is none of the artists sound pretentious, I find when I read about graphic designers/illustrators/artists etc, that they can come across a bit 'high and mighty' when they talk about their work which I feel can ostracise a reader (unintentionally). Whilst the whole point for these graffiti artists is for their work to be accessible by the public and to welcome them into the world of street art, and this feeling is conveyed throughout 'Street Sketchbook Journeys'.

I haven't finished reading this book yet, but I'm really enjoying all the different artists I have discovered so far, some of my favourites are Losdelaefe, Thais Beltrame and Ramon Martins. This books shows a great diversity of styles and I think it is rather inspirational. Definitely a refreshing change.