Kristopher Gillespie

Ol' Timer

2012-01-28T15:32:00.000-07:00

I had no plan when I started drawing this so I guess that means that I subconsciously want to be a cowboy.

Claire

2012-01-21T21:46:00.000-07:00

This week I decided to try a new digital painting style and since I haven't drawn or painted my new baby daughter yet I chose her as my subject. I love her eyes so couldn't resist refining them a bit more then the rest of the painting.

R.I.P.

2012-01-11T21:41:00.002-07:00

This week I've decided to post this drawing I did for a book cover. I spent way too much time on it only to realize that it needed to be changed. Because I like how this one turned out and since it will never make it to a final cover I thought I would at least give it a proper burial on my blog.

2012 and the World hasn't Ended!!!

2012-01-04T23:19:00.000-07:00

It's a new year and I've resolved to resurrect my blog. I was never very good about posting work on a regular basis so this year I'm going to post something new every Wednesday. For today's entry I have two pieces that I recently finished: a logo for my kids' elementary school and an insanely dark illustration that somebody commissioned. You figure out which is which.

My Spawns

2010-06-29T19:47:00.005-06:00

I painted these pictures of my kids for my wife for mother's day. It was fun to try something a little different.

Yee Haw

2010-06-29T19:38:00.003-06:00

Here's another book cover I did a while back.

Civil War isn't just a Guns & Roses Song... Who knew?

2009-08-06T11:34:00.006-06:00

This is the cover illustration for the 5th book in the Virginia historical fiction series I've been working on. Yes, once again I am posting something I did for work but my next one will be something of my own... I promise... no seriously, I will. I can't promise it will be up before Christmas though.

Engineering Collage

2009-06-25T14:28:00.004-06:00

I finally got to take a break from the novels at work and I went back to illustrating stuff for our other publications. It was nice to branch out a bit and conceptualize something a bit more design oriented. Unfortunately, it got me off of my routine and I spent a horribly disproportionate amount of time on this one at the expense of everything else that needed to get done.

Completed Cover

2009-05-07T08:06:00.002-06:00

I know this is a big jump from 'Step 2' to the finished product but between the stress of meeting the deadline and the random progression of my work I opted not to try and show any more steps. At first I was roughing in the colors and directional lighting for the figures but then got distracted by the sky which I finished perfectly before going back to work on the figures. At that point, I finished the guys in the background then finished the ground and trench wall behind them. Finally after everything else looked about done, I finished the main character in the foreground. This isn't really representative of the way I work it just happened to be the way this one developed. Anyway, here is the final piece and I feel good about how it turned out.

Step 2

2009-05-07T08:01:00.003-06:00

After the drawing is done I usually like to start by laying down some flat under-paintings for each layer of the illustration.

Revolutionary Drawing

2009-04-20T15:18:00.002-06:00

I mean that literally. This is a drawing of a scene from a book about the American Revolution. It's the next cover for another historical fiction I am doing for work. And although the old man (my last post) was supposed to show my work in progress, it is still in progress (meaning I haven't touched it since I posted it). So in the meantime, here is another work in progress. I'll post the finished version of both of them when they are done. If nothing else it shows two different approaches to an illustration.

An Old Man in Progress

2009-02-27T07:03:00.003-07:00

It has been a while since I last posted anything and it has been a really long time since I posted something that wasn’t work related. It feels good to finally be doing some work of my own again. I’ve been teaching private art lessons and right now we are working on portraits so I thought I would give one a whirl. Also, I have yet to show the progression of any of my work so I thought I would post this one now in its early stages and then I’ll post it again when it’s finished.

Feral Boy

2008-12-17T08:59:00.004-07:00

This is a cover for a book I recently finished painting. My son Cole did some modeling for me in a white button-up shirt holding a broomstick. I'm happy with the way it turned out, though I think Cole is disappointed that I didn't turn him into Darth Maul.

Lady Atwell

2008-09-19T13:40:00.003-06:00

Yet another interior book illustration, this one, of the ever-elegant Lady Atwell. I’m not sure if she is a real person or not but she is described as a pretty classy gal in the book. Anyway, I like how it turned out so I thought I would post it. Some day I would like to post something that is not work related but until then I am just glad to have a job that allows me to draw and paint all day.

The Innards

2008-08-21T07:33:00.014-06:00

I have been terribly unproductive over the last few months, in terms of my personal creative work, so I thought I could at least post some more book illustrations for anyone that is interested. My last two posts were cover illustrations for two books I have been working on and these twelve are the inside (chapter illustrations) for one of those books (the one with the kid, a horse, and the battle at the Alamo).

What color was George Washington's white horse? Brown.

2008-05-09T10:32:00.002-06:00

This is another book cover that I was working on at the same time as the last one I posted. Though, this one took a bit longer because I got carried away making the horse look as realistic as possible and then I had to do that with the rest of the illustration so that it would all look stylistically unified. Anyway, it is for a Virginia historical fiction and the chap on the horse is supposed to be a young George Washington. The guy in the background is a mystery but you'll have to read the book to find out who he is. For that matter, I will have to read it too because I don't really know anything about the books that I am illustrating.

Book Cover

2008-05-05T21:07:00.007-06:00

I work full-time as an in-house illustrator for publishing company in Pleasant Grove called American Legacy Publishing. That's right, I get paid to draw and paint all day! Right now I am working on a series of books and this is an example of one of the covers. I created it from start to finish using Photoshop. It presented me with a lot of challenges but I'm happy with how it turned out. I had intended to deliberately avoid posting any work done at my job because I wanted my blog to motivate me to do my own creative work on the side. However, lately I have been doing a lot of extra work from home and I didn't want to go too long before posting something new. So hopefully I will soon find some time to do more of my own stuff because if I don't you can expect to see more examples of what I am doing from 9 to 5 every day.

Ode to Penny Fathrington

2008-04-06T23:10:00.003-06:00

On the surface, this may seem visually complex. But in actuality, it is the simple expression of my exalted emotions regarding one Penny Fathrington. He is at once mysterious and comfortingly familiar. With a sticky hand full of moist ribbon candy he has warmed hearts, healed homes, and reintroduced the famed Hogzilla into his natural habitat (the farmer’s market). Thankfully Penny’s angelic stories have begun to make their way from the original aging parchment and leather pelt pages to the digital realm of the blogosphere. And you can now enjoy them by clicking here!

In The Beginning

2008-03-21T20:58:00.013-06:00

Starting a blog was my only goal for 2008 which is nice because I won't have to do anything for the rest of the year! My intentions for having a blog can be best summed up by the artist Henri Matisse who once said, "The artist has but one idea. He is born with it and spends a lifetime developing it and making it breathe...and I move along the course of the picture's creation, pushed by an idea that I come to know only gradually as it develops." I have always hung on to that quote because I feel like it really illustrates the way I feel about my work. In me, there is this constant hunger to create something and all of my sketches, drawings and paintings feel like attempts at capturing what exactly that 'something' is. Anyway, I just thought a blog would be a great way to keep me developing my personal work and sort of record the evolution in the process. I sort of feel like Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams trying to figure out what I am supposed to build and I imagine you looking at my work with the same confused looks his neighbors displayed when he started mowing down his corn field.

These are a few pages from my sketchbook that show my "style of the month." The contrast between tight/refined drawing and a loose uncontrolled line really interests me. I enjoy the thrill of potentially destroying a drawing in an attempt to infuse life into it.