"CHER" (1983 / 2011)
Pencils & Photoshop. First off is a pencils drawing I did around 1983. I first saw Cher on TV in August 1971, and immediately developed a crush on her. Simply, I'd never seen a girl who liked like her before! My fascination for her continued throughout the 70's and 80's, especially for her albums TAKE ME HOME, PRISONER, and later, HEART OF STONE. This piece was actually inspired by the back cover of her I PARALYZE album, except for the lack of clothing, of course. Somehow, I never got around to inking this. I finally dug it out in August 2011, and finished it off in Photoshop. I'm very happy with the results!
"ALIMONY" (July 2009)
Mixed media. Shortly after doing the 7 BUNNY ROGET cartoons, I got a couple of ideas for single-panel cartoons to submit to PLAYBOY. Nothing came of them, but I still like the results. This one was inspired to a degree by the Roger Corman film TALES OF TERROR, with a bit of THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH thrown in for good measure.
"SCHWEINSTUKKER" (July 2009)
Mixed media. This was obviously inspired by the Gene Wilder / Mel Brooks film, YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN. I think with the girl I was trying to "channel" the style of Phil Foglio!
"AEROBICS" (March 2013)
Mixed media. The toughest part of this turned out to be figuring out how to use 3D Studio, a very badly-designed program which, although I've built a ton of models with it over the last decade, I hadn't actually used in more than 3-1/2 years. I had to figure out parts of it from scratch all over again!
"ALTERCATION" (March 2013)
Mixed media. It was a pleasant surprise when the writer on this project said he was ready to have me do the 2nd piece right away. 3 days later, here we are. When he mentioned a hallway that could be "metallic", I showed him the cover of 2230 #2, and he said we could use that! So I was able to re-use an existing "set" (to use TV show terminology), and just adjusted the color on it so it would stand out from the main figure's skin tones.
"REFRESHING" (March 2013)
Mixed media. This one turned out to be the most time-consuming so far with regards to the 3D. I wound up doing at least 30 consecutive renderings before I was satisfied, between setting up the background and correctly positioning the 2 dumbells the main figure was holding. The "technician" with the soda glass gave me another excuse to base a character on my art school friend Gina, who, last I heard, was going back to school to become a research scientist.
"RECAPTURED" (April 2013)
Pencils, Inks & Photoshop. Almost to my surprise, I decided to do the rock face and waterfall the 'traditional" way, rather than employing 3D or photography.
"POLE DANCER" (May 2013)
Pencils. The model this was based on was Autumn Raby. Because of her physique, it required closer attention to photo-reference than the last several, but I'm happy to say, nothing here was traced. I think working smaller, on an 8-1/2" x 11" sheet of paper, really helps on that score.
My client decided he preferred the look of pure pencils to the pieces with inks, colors & other mixed media. So be it!
Pencils. Same model (see above).
"POLE DANCER 2" (July 2013)
Pencils. Another view of the earlier model (see above).
All Artwork Copyright (C) Henry R. Kujawa
Some characters and/or movies depicted are all the properties of the various Copyright holders.