Last year I was hired by Goldfish Swim Schools to create a mascot for their company, a goldfish named “Bubbles”. They liked the mascot so much that they’ve since hired me to create a series of stick-on tattoos and coloring book pages for children featuring Bubbles in various costumes and themes. They’ll distribute one per month for an entire year. I recently completed the first coloring book page, with a pirate theme. More to come.
This afternoon I received a package from Highlights! magazine. Inside was a letter informing me I’ve been chosen to receive the Illustrator of the Month Pewter Plate Award, and a shiny silver plate with my name inscribed. Very classy. I’m surprised and very honored. Every issue of Highlights is full of wonderful artwork from several very charming illustrators. It’s a real treat just to be published among them, much less singled out.
The award was for a three-page comic strip story I illustrated for the current issue (January 2013) of Highlights for Children, titled “The Chicken-and-a-Million-Veggies Report”. I can’t publish the entire story here but I can show you a little snippet of the artwork:
2012 was another jam-packed year. In addition to surviving another presidential election and a Mayan apocalypse, my wife and I welcomed our third daughter into the world. I also stayed very busy in the studio working on lots of fun projects for clients in the toy industry (most of which I can’t show), as well as some advertising comp art (such as these samples for the Coca-Cola company through CPC Intersect) and even some courtroom sketching.
Other notable projects included designing a mascot for Goldfish Swim Schools and some character concept work for VeggieTales. I even flexed my animation muscles (scrawny as they are) for VeggieTales creator Phil Vischer and his latest ongoing project, What’s In The Bible? Finally, I capped off the year by illustrating a three-page comic strip story for Highlights Magazine.
In addition to cranking out all that client work, here’s a few other items of interest from the past year…
I was interviewed on the art website DesignMontage.com.
I was a courtroom sketch artist for the hit-and-run trial of Amy Senser, wife of former NFL player Joe Senser. I also launched a website to promote my courtroom sketch work, www.courtroomsketches.com.
I started creating original sketch cards for mailing out to current or potential clients.
I joined the cool kids over at Instagram (username: cedrichohnstadt), where I occasionally post snaps from my sketchbook and other odds and ends.
Though I didn’t do much traveling this year, I did have a table at our two local Twin Cities comic book conventions (SpringCon and FallCon), and for the second year in a row I gave a talk on freelancing at the CTN Animation Expo in Burbank, California.
I got some wonderful original art for my studio from cartoonist and all-around-great-guy John Hambrock (“The Brilliant Mind Of Edison Lee”).
Former Disney animator Tom Bancroft released his new book on character design, Character Mentor, which I highly recommend.
Finally, a few days ago I tied the bow on a newly illustrated Gospel tract for the ministry of Living Waters. I’m looking forward to posting more about that soon.
It’s amazing how quickly a year fills up, and I’m extremely blessed to continue making a living doing what I love. Here’s wishing each and every one of you a very prosperous and happy 2013!
CPC Intersect is a local agency that specialize in event marketing (or experience marketing as it’s called in some circles). They work with a lot of big brands, helping them to design fun interactive events to help promote their products. Sometimes they’ll hire me to whip up a quick sketch or two to help pitch an idea. In the past I’ve helped them out with projects for Coke Zero, Dasani, Del Monte, General Mills, and Fuzik.
Recently they hired me to help pitch some ideas to promote FUZE brand fruit drinks. They asked for b&w line art only. Here’s a couple of the images I did for them. Back in the day they used to call these “marker comps” but since I work 100% digitally and don’t use real markers any more I’m not sure what to call them.
Click on the images to see a larger version.
Famed illustrator and MAD Magazine cartoonist Al Jaffee on being a professional illustrator. Well worth two minutes of your time:
[youtube_sc url=N2hhgbEau5k width=430]
Over the past few months I’ve been doing some FPO comp art illustration for CPC Intersect, a Twin Cities marketing firm that specializes in “experience marketing”. They’re a creative bunch and they’ve got a real spirit of fun that they bring to their projects. I’ve been fortunate enough to help them out with pitches to brands such as Coca-Cola, Dasani, and General Mills.
The deadlines are often crazy tight but in advertising that’s par for the course. I specialize in meeting tight deadlines and I enjoy the challenge.
Above are two samples of recent work I’ve done for them.
