patokon blog

Hello! It's me, patokon with an update on some of the work I've been doing lately. This year, my good friend Junya Hanada told me about his plan to open a guest house in Beppu which is about 3.5 hours away from Mifune where we both live. He also told me that he wanted me to design a series of cards featuring local little-known establishments that guests could choose in order to make their own personal itinerary. I was asked to handle design and illustration duties in addition to managing the volunteers who were students from various countries studying at Beppu's Asia-Pacific University. First, let me tell you about the guest house. It is called In Bloom Beppu  and is just a hop, skip, and a jump from Beppu Station. My friend Junya is one of the nicest guys you could ever meet and is doing his best to make In Bloom Beppu a great place to use as a home base for exploring Beppu. This is Junya showing me around the Hell Hot Springs.   This is In Bloom Beppu...

I've been posting on FB ( https://www.facebook.com/patrick.ijimawashburn ) about the earthquakes in Kumamoto. I designed a charity T-shirt to support my recently adopted home. I'm also going to turn these characters into a picture book to help kids find the strength to get through disasters. Wish me luck. The T-shirt design. GAMADAS means "Do your best!" A possible illustration for the picture book. More information will be posted here: http://facebook.com/artistsdo Thanks for your support!

HarleyPool

Check out my illustration for "The Last Leaves" by Derek Wentz! http://lovecraftzine.com/magazine/issues/2015-2/issue-36-autumn-2015/the-last-leaves-by-derek-wentz/

This was designed for Black Sabbath Ressurection and Lone Ones fashion brand originally based in Aoyama. Design was approved by the O man himself. 

Artwork for A.J. Page single "Fireflies" for which I also translated the lyrics into Japanese Singer/Songwriter AJ's HP:  http://www.ajpage.com/fireflies-video Hotaru

Covers done for recent issues of Turbo-Charged Party Animal APAzine. My personal theme: Silent film horror Brigitte Helm, the stunning actress who starred in Metropolis The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, not to be confused with The Cabiner of Dr. Caligari a flick about rock-climbing Dr. Mabuse! Theda Bara, the original Film Femme Fatale

Art for John Thiel's Surprising Stories  Found here: http://surprisingstories.thiels.us/SSV38/Contents.htm (latest ish!) here:  http://surprisingstories.thiels.us/SSV37/Contents.html and here:  http://surprisingstories.thiels.us/SSV36/Contents.html Scavenger  Desire, a Harlot Reversia Trauma Visitor from the North Doing Time I've been using different width art pens on gray and brown paper for some of these and ink and brush for others. There might be a digital one in there as well.

I thought I would share some of the artwork (sans dialog) I did for the Silver Skull book available here . This is the story of El Muerto Jr., son of a great luchadore and secret super hero.

True Detective is one of the creepiest, most atmospheric, most highly nuanced series I've ever seen. My second inktober drawing of the month is an homage to this fascinating and unsettling show.  The show mentions a King in Yellow which is from a book of the same name by Robert W. Chambers (1895).  I've just started reading this book bout a play that if read drives the reader insane and now I can't stop dreaming of Lost Carcosa under the black stars. The King calls to me now...

This year marks the 10th anniversary of my first exhibition which took place at the Setagaya Museum in 2004. In 2007, I held my first solo show, and though I sold most of my pieces, I wasn't quite happy with my level. I continued to learn, grow, and evolve as an artist, but it always felt like something was missing. Since I've moved to Kumamoto, so many things have changed! I've found the right tools and materials, I'm more confident in line and layout, I feel like I've finally found my direction. How did I go from having very little confidence to being consistently happy with my work? Here’s a list of things that helped me get where I am today and which will help me become the artist I want to be in the future: Studying the masters - by copying and not just looking, you will learn lots of new things. I do this with a friend and we discuss what we’ve learned. No longer drawing what I think others will like - you will be more honest to yourself about what r...

I've just started using toned paper. I'm enjoying the hell out of it. I drew 5 or 6 things today just trying out different things. In this post I'll show my retro Godzilla drawings. If you haven't seen the original Japanese version, you are missing out. The English version is usually called Godzilla, King of Monsters while the Japanese version is simply titled Gojira (at least on Hulu Plus).  The materials I'm using to work on this paper are:  Nouvel PIGMA Comicline 08 for even-weight lines Kuretake Fudegokochi brush pen for changeable width lines COPIC for shades and colors.  And finally, I use Uni-ball Signo White gel pen (Thick) for the white highlights.  I'm thinking of switching to white color pencils so I can gradate the highlights.