the bvk blog

Bears Are Picky Eaters

{ 09h52, 6.4.2008 } { 0 comments } { Link }

I picked up my old copy of The Essential Calvin and Hobbes recently, and have been having a blast reading through it again. The date on that book is 1988. I had no idea what half of the words were in those comics back then, but I just loved looking at the pictures... My favourites were the Spaceman Spiff episodes.

Apparently I was extremely influenced by these comics as they reminded me of pretty much everything I drew as a kid. This reminiscing reminded me of how much I freaking loved bears. I'd have books and books on bears. Up to now I've been having trouble about what to draw... so there's my tip of the week for you: If you're ever struggling about what to draw, grab something from your childhood. This was the most fun I've had drawing in a long time.

Ram day!

{ 23h01, 5.21.2008 } { 0 comments } { Link }

Last week I installed some more RAM into the ol' laptop. It went better than this:

Ever get annoyed that I don't post on a regular schedule? So do I. Subscribe to the RSS Feed and you'll be notified whenever I make a new post... For PC users, download an RSS reader like Google's or just do a search for 'free rss reader'. For Mac users, you already have an RSS reader in Safari and Mail. Once you have the reader set up, click the link on the right that looks like this:

Now your reader can subscribe to the blog, and automatically download and organize every new post. Read the instructions that go with whatever RSS reader you've installed, or for Mac users simply bookmark the RSS page or drag the url into Mail.

Presto. Now you can stop checking back here every hour in desperate hopes that I've posted, as I'm sure millions of others do as well.

My next post I'm either going to talk about my new crazy spinning monitor, or the book cover I'm designing & illustrating. Later!

Elevators Weekend

{ 14h16, 5.12.2008 } { 0 comments } { Link }

This weekend was the Elevators Awards put on by the Saskatchewan chapter of the GDC (Society of Graphic Designers of Canada). Chad Kabigting from the ad agency Rethink in Vancouver was one of the judges, and our introduction was a little funny - my wife was sitting next to me dialing her sister on her cell phone, while I just happened to be dialing my friend at the same time, just as Chad was walking up to us...

Har har. We immediately slapped our phones shut to introduce ourselves, and the little joke quickly broke the ice for networking through the event. I look forward to submitting my portfolio and hopefully joining the GDC this year. It's on my list of to-do's.

Chad's presentation at the Awards was on a checklist he uses called 'CRAFT', for brainstorming ad campaign ideas... It stands for Clear, Relevant, Achievable, Fresh, and True. Pretty self-explanatory, and definitely helpful when trying to come up with a clever and successful idea in advertising.

I'll explain this concept a little more on my new blog, which is almost ready to launch directly off my server. It'll have an RSS feed as well so if I'm on a hiatus from blogging, you'll know when I start posting again. That'll be explained as well, so you know how to use it. I'm also going to use it more for notes on Illustration, Design, and Advertising - to both give a better insight into my world, and possibly help out anyone else in the industry.

Check back this week for a link to the new blog!

Blades #4

{ 22h00, 2.7.2008 } { 1 comments } { Link }

Busy busy busy... I feel bad for not posting more regularly, but on the upside business is booming. One of the things I'm adding on my list of to-do's around here is to either make this blog RSS compatible, or host my own RSS compatible blog (which sounds like lots of work), or set up a mailing list where I can send out an email whenever I update.

Anyway enough chit chat, here's the new and final Blades cover for the 07/08 season:

New Shop & Sketches

{ 09h02, 1.21.2008 } { 0 comments } { Link }

The new shop is up and running, since last week actually, but I've been too busy to post here... You can buy the calendar there now, and I'll have prints available as soon as I can get it all set up. The tentative date for that is February first, but my schedule has been filling up quite a bit lately so we'll see how that idea goes!

Here's a page from my sketchbook to keep things going here. The dragon is from my favourite children's book author and illustrator, Bill Peet ("How Droofus the Dragon Lost His Head"):

Happy 2008!

{ 11h05, 1.4.2008 } { 0 comments } { Link }

My new year is starting off with updates - the website, the blog (4 days late... oops), and developing a new store with my late 2008 calendar. If you're a client of mine this past year, you should have received your calendar by now (if not just email me!). Everybody else please be patient as the site should be up in the next week. If you can't wait just send me an email.

Here's a commission from this Christmas:

Mom's Xmas Card

{ 15h00, 12.4.2007 } { 0 comments } { Link }

Every year I make a Christmas card for my mom to send out to all of her clients. It always has a winter activity theme, so this year's was curling. This be the front, minus the big ugly signature of course:

New Blades Cover

{ 10h51, 11.19.2007 } { 3 comments } { Link }

To those who didn't know, Carla and I have bought a house! It's a bit of a fixer-upper so we've been renovating like mad over the past month. That's why my blog has come to a halt - I've only had time for client's work and house work...

Now to kick things off again and get back to a somewhat regular schedule here. First off a shoutout to my hero Bobby Chiu who commented on my last Blades post - that really meant a lot! I've since finished the next edition of the Blades Program. I'm posting the initial sketch too, so you can see where things started:

And here's the final version:

Cars & Buildings

{ 14h24, 9.27.2007 } { 0 comments } { Link }

I'm not sure if I've posted every one of these, but here are my two favourites... The calendar is now finished, and is just awaiting approval from the client. I believe they'll be available off my website, but I'm not quite sure what I'll do yet. I'm closing the CafePress store, as I feel I can produce better prints at a better price myself, with more of a personal touch. So my website will be updated in the next couple of days, where I'll decide how I'll deal with this store idea, and having these calendars available. The store should be running by the end of October.

I feel as though I'm babbling. Babble babble babble!

Blades Program

{ 19h56, 9.18.2007 } { 2 comments } { Link }

Here's the new Saskatoon Blades program cover. It's my most favourite illustration thus far, because of my love of hockey, and because the Blades were the perfect client - they let me run with my idea, and loved the result! The programs are free at every game this year, so if you're in Saskatoon be sure to make it to a game - or four games since the plan is to have four different editions!

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Bears Are Picky Eaters
Ram day!
Elevators Weekend
Blades #4
New Shop & Sketches

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