Hellboy

This is a personal project I've been working on for a while now. I had to put it aside for a couple of weeks while I tackled some other jobs.

Bruce Campbell

Here's a painting I did of one of personal favorites, the great Bruce Campbell. If you haven't seen the Evil Dead films, especially Army of Darkness, then you really need to sign up for Netflix and get watching now. The reference for this illustration, incidentally, comes from Evil Dead 2, to be precise. Above is the final color version. Below I thought you'd like to see the black and white painting that lies beneath. I don't always work with this method, but sometimes you can create some great effects by painting entirely in grayscale first, then use a series of color, overlay and multiply layers in Photoshop to create some very cool effects. I thought the overall caricature ended up having a bit of a Graham Ingels Tales from the Crypt look. The wacky color scheme above shows the heavy influence of the great Basil Gogos, who painted most of the Famous Monsters of Filmland covers when I was growing up.

The Walking Dead

Anyone who knows me, knows how much I loooovvvveee zombies. So it goes without saying that I'm a tremendous fan of the Walking Dead TV show and comics. I really wanted to try something different with my next portfolio piece. I've been working on this on and off for the last two weeks and I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

Frankenstein

I liked how my Bela Lugosi painting came out, so I decided to move onto the next logical choice. Here's my take on Boris Karloff in his most famous role. Once again, I was trying to emulate the look and feel of the Famous Monsters of Filmland covers I like so much.

Bela Lugosi color

I went in and added color to my Lugosi painting. I took my visual cues here from the work of the great illustrator Basil Gogos, who gained fame in the 60's and 70's for painting many amazing covers for Forry Ackerman's Famous Monsters of Filmland. One of the things I loved most about those covers were the artist's remarkable color palettes he used. They were all ultra bright and shouldn't have made any sense, but somehow they did.

Bela Lugosi Black and White

Every year around Halloween I try to do at least one monster painting. This year is the great Bela Lugosi. I think I'm going to try colorizing this and seeing how it goes.

Vamp

Not a lot to say about this one. I was just sort of playing around. It started out as a straight portrait and over time it just sort of morphed into a vampire. This all Photoshop from start to finish.

ImagineFX

 

Another one of my illustrations is in the new issue of ImagineFX Magazine (issue #62, for those keeping score). A few months ago IFX announced they were having a zombie themed issue with a contest that involved painting their Editor-In-Chief Claire Howlett as one of the walking dead. I didn't win the contest, but I was among the four runners-up, which meant I got my illustration printed in the book. It's an honor being recognized, especially considering how fantastic so many of the entries were. And yes, if you look close you may notice for some reason they cut half of my last name off and printed it as Mark Hammer. Oh well, you win some...

Nosferatu - Final

I tweaked a few more details, sharpened up some lines and added a few color tweaks. Here's the final. I'm pretty happy with how this turned out. I think I might try another monster or two in this style.

Nosferatu WIP

I wanted to do at least one monster before Halloween. I'm still working on it, but here's still one of the coolest makeup jobs in film history, Nosferatu.

Zombie Claire - Final

I tweaked some details here and there. Now I'm calling it done.

Zombie Claire

Over on ImagineFX.com, they're having a contest to paint their editor Claire Howlett as a zombie for a future issue of the magazine. Here's what I've done so far. I think I'm mostly done, but I'll probably give it another day and check it with fresh eyes tomorrow to see if it needs any tweaks.

Marty Feldman

Here's a quickie painting I did of the late great Marty Feldman as Igor from Young Frankenstein. This was about two and a half hours in Photoshop.

Zombie Boy

When I was five my mom and dad got divorced. My mom got custody of me and my dad got visitation rights. So when he'd come to pick me up he'd often try to overcompensate by letting me do whatever I want. I was seven years old when he decided to take me to the movies. My choice: Dawn of the Dead. I know, I know. Say what you will about bad parenting, but that pretty much set me up for loving horror movies for the rest of my life. In keeping with this tradition of bad parenting, I decided to use my beloved son as the model for this zombie painting. I know it's kind of sick, but my son loves it. This was about six hours in Photoshop and Corel Painter.

The Bride of Frankenstein

Here's my latest and, as it turns out, one of personal favorites. Just in time for Halloween, here's a digital painting of Elsa Lanchester as The Bride of Frankenstein. About 8 hours in Photoshop.

H.P. Lovecraft

I liked how much my Poe painting came out I decided to do a companion piece featuring one of my other favorite horror writers, H.P. Lovecraft, creator of Cthulu and a pantheon of other dark gods. This was Photoshop, about five hours start to finish.

Edgar Allan Poe

Yesterday in Baltimore they held a mock funeral for Edgar Allan Poe, capping off a series of events commemorating the bicentennial of the great writer's birth. I've been a Poe fan since I was a little kid, so I thought I'd do a quick painting in his honor. This was about two hours in Photoshop.

Vincent Price

I've loved horror movies ever since I was a little kid. I remember staying up to all hours to watch the late night horror show. Very often those movies would star the late great Vincent Price. Here's my tribute to the man. I wanted to let the brush strokes show in this image in order to create the sort of look you'd see in an old movie poster from the 50s or 60s. This was rendered entirely in gray tones with color brushed in over that layer.