New Steampunk Motorcycle

I've been gone far too long from posting new work on the site.  I guess that's what happens when you are launching a brand new company and getting the first apps to market.
I've also been up to my eyebrows in writing the story and working through all the challenges that entails.
Anyway, since so many of you visit the site to see the art I've done a new illustration. One of the things I truly love is vintage motorcycles. I've already worked on a preliminary design for the Gyrostator that appears in the story and that gets the most hits on the site.  I wanted to envision another bike that would fit in the world I'm writing but would represent a much more refined design.
I want this bike. It would be handy in heavy traffic.  Nothing says "respect me" like fender mounted pistols.
I really enjoy painting rusted, rough and weathered surfaces and really got into the colors and textures on the huge, iron skull buttress and the large hanging pulley beneath it.
I hope you enjoy.  I've posted the whole image and some close ups of parts of the painting as well.

Cheers, Kevin

PS - If enough of you are interested I'll assemble and post the making of video for this as well.
PSS - I've also got an older post with a much more fantasy bike sketch with a locomotive drive.
PSSS - I've also modeled the high fantasy bike in 3d!

Steampunk Motorcycle Frahnknshtyne

Pistol mounts on front end

Steampunk skull buttress

New Blog about Steampunk Inspirations

Hello Friends and followers.
While writing and drawing Frahnknshtyne I frequently come across other artists, ideas and thinking that help me in the work I'm doing or are just plain inspiring in a steam punk kind of way. I'm establishing a new blog to share those with everyone else. I invite you to visit and sign up if you like. Hope you enjoy and cheers for now, Kevin

Steampunk Inspirations

Viper Wolf before steampunking

From time to time I go back into older illustrations and add to or rethink them.  This is an image for the skull of a mythical creature called a viper wolf that I never fully completed from several years ago.  The Jaw is articulated like that of a rattlesnake and it hunts using a pit viper's ability to sense heat (since it has no eyes and is completely unsighted).

I'm going to be going back into this older illustration and adding mechanism and detail to it just for fun. I love the idea of an animal experimented on to make it more dangerous for nefarious purposes.  This isn't for Frahnknshtyne but is something I thought I'd share with you as I go just for fun.

I have additional images for Frahnknshtyne but many of them are being held back now as the book gets closer to being completed. I'll still be posting some of those soon (but I gotta surprise you with story and art in the completed book).

Cheers, Kevin

Viper Wolf Skull soon to be Steampunked

The Pinkerton and the Princess: Final

Well, here's the completed image. I had a lot of fun with this painting as it brought out a number of interesting ideas.  One such fun detail is that the rifle is actually a rocket launcher using traditional oriental black powder rockets.
I've included a few detail images so you can see the sculpted face of her sky-train as well as some of the fun detail of the rifle.
Cheers:

The Pinkerton and the Princess

Sky Train

Rocket launcher

The Pinkerton and the Princess

sometimes when I'm developing a story, other stories come to mind that would work in the same world.  I'm doing a quick illustration to capture one of those stories that will happen in the world of Frahnknshtyne called "The Pinkerton and the Princess." Here's a sneak peek of part of the image underway.

Steampunk, The Art of Victorian Futurism

Today, I'm very excited! Korero's book "Steampunk, the Art of Victorian Futurism" has been released and I have received my advance copy! Jay Strongman did a fantastic job authoring the book and has collected quite a compendium of Steampunk art and creations.  I am honored that my Frahnknshtyne art is featured in some very high quality prints in the book in quite a few places. Thanks Jay and everyone else who worked putting the book together and thanks for adding to Steampunk's momentum!

Amazing real pistols

 A friend sent me the link to these amazing real pistols.  Just had to repost the link and share them.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fd3_1310419871&jwp_version=5

Frahnknshtyne's weaponized arm

It's been a bit since the last post as I have been writing the book.  I'm well into it and decided to take a break to add some more development art to the site to share with you.  This image shows Frahnknshtyne's arm after he decides to build a weapon into it.  It's exploding out of his woolen cape sleeve and the mechanical mounts (they look like small metal animal hands) have just thrown it forward to be caught by Wyctor in his gloved hand. There's a big surprise in this gun (beyond the fact that it's up his sleeve and it assembles as it ejects) that I'll hold off sharing for the book.
I'll be posting the "making of" video over the next week or so as well.
Cheers, Kevin

And a closer shot of the gun

The Aether Bullet come to life

A few months ago I was contacted by a very talented model builder named Arno Erol.  Arno enjoys model making and some of what he makes are steampunk things.  He asked if he could model the Aether Rifle in 3D and I gave my blessings to go ahead.  I've just received some images showing the realization of the concept of the Aether bullet I originally designed for Lacette's assassin rifle.  Arno has taken some poetic license and it looks like some beautiful work by a talented model maker!  Nicely done Arno.  I'm also including a link to Arno's flickr page showing some of his other cool work.
Arno's other models

Original Aether bullet design

Arno's Aether bullet model view #1

Aether Bullet design view #2

Aether bullet design view #3

Steampunk Frahnknshtyne's hand final

Well, I decided that adding another emotive object into the shot would take away from the singular narrative moment of seeing through Wyctor's eyes the raised hand that isn't your own.  I completed the victorian etching on the metal and pivots and knuckle joints and I think this one is ready for its place in the story.

Steampunk Frahnknsthyne's hand

And here is the "making of" video that briefly covers the steps and thinking to make this painting.

Untitled from kevin mowrer on Vimeo.

Steampunk Frahnknshtyne's hand

I have been busy structuring and writing the story but wanted to post a new image of one of the moments in the narrative.  The first thing our hero sees when he wakes up with his consciousness inside of his own clockwork creation.
I wanted the hand to be a mechanically sophisticated and beautiful object made of steel, brass, bronze and copper with tendons of leather. I also wanted the moment to have a strange church-like victorian operating theater quality to it (with the horror of the moment as well). I'm considering adding a piece of broken mirror or perhaps the locket with his love's image in it  being held between the thumb and fingers  so this may evolve over the next week. I've already reposted the hand itself with changes to the hand mechanism and finger joints.  I will be posting the "making of" video in the next few days so check back for it.

Steampunk Frahnknshtyne hand

Frahnknshtyne, the next phase

Hello friends and visitors.  It has been a number of weeks since the last post on this blog and I apologize for the protracted period of time.  The story work on Frahnknshtyne has entered it's second phase.  The exploration and structuring of the ideas in the story are ready to fully write and fully illustrate the narrative. Up to this point I have been sharing the exploration and discovery with you.  I will continue to post some of the art and story insights as I continue from here so bear with me if the posting happens a bit less frequently.

Perhaps the most exciting news is that the first publishing format has been set.  I have become involved with an exciting new company doing work on the frontier of digital publishing but in a way that truly launches the Meta-story in the best possible fashion.  I am thrilled to be directly contributing to the development of this new digital publishing format and to be wrestling with the combination of both linear and non-linear story telling combined in this single new format.  Because I am a Meta-story expert working on emerging new formats, this opportunity for me, is priceless.  My hope is to have this book to market by end of this year/beginning of next year. As I'm sure most of you can appreciate, balancing the work that pays the bills with the writing and illustrating of something new is always a challenge to manage.

 As visitors to my site you will get to see parts of the Frahnknshtyne book before it comes out but...it is also important to me that everyone gets to experience the unexpected and unknown when the book is published.  For that reason, I'm holding back lots of goodies to share with you in the book itself.  (Wink and a wry smile).

Stay tuned and cheers for now, Kevin

PS - here's a sketchy concept for the dragon ship that I rejected because it was too futuristic.  I can't stand to post without including some kind of sketch for eye-candy.

Dragon ship rejected concept sketch

Steampunk Writers and Artists Guild interview

Recently, Lia Keyes, the founder and creator of the Steampunk Writers and Artists Guild, sent me some questions for an interview for her site.  Click the title of this post to go to that interview and to her wonderful and deeply interesting site.  Check out some of the activities and discussions going on there.  Very exciting to see the story-crafters exchanging ideas and knowledge.
Cheers, Kevin

http://steampunkwriters.ning.com/profiles/blogs/interview-kevin-mowrer-on

Steampunk Lord Praetor

The lord Praetor has been the most challenging of the characters to create so far. I have never been a fan of one-dimensional bad guys with simple world domination madness. I believe storytelling becomes truthful when the evil (or better said, Antagonist) in the story has a point of view and a true belief system. There are catalyzing events and moments that make characters heroic or malevolant. The Lord Praetor is just such a layered, brilliant and fanatical soul. He has been alive longer than any human on the planet as the original recipient of the Aether of others. His wealth is a fortune beyond the size of any government's and he believes in the supremecy and stability of the governance that flows from the Royales. In this portrait, the opulance of his accumulated wealth and empire seem indistinguishable from the man himself. Each flows into the other. Though he knows of the many horrible abominations that have sprung up amongst the ultra rich, he believes these are acceptable given the stability that has reigned for hundreds of years under his rule.

Steampunk Lord Praetor

Here's a close up where you can see the glow from the Aether that masks the pupils.  I had a lot of fun with his glasses.  There is a torc that runs around the back of his head under his hair to allow for no nose bridge.

Lord Praetor close up

I'll be posting the "making of" video in a bit so check back.

Steampunk Slums

The vast, compacted slums of Travaille have been expanding as more and more of the population have become paupers.   It is a dark and labyrinthian place where the bones and bowels of industry trespass blindly into the desperately poor makeshift dwellings of those who live here.  As you would expect, down here there is little police presence and for that reason, the Royales, the ultra rich, frequent the brothels and illegal places looking for "entertainment" to break the monotony of their preternaturally long lives.  There are those here who specialize in their terrible pleasures and if they go too far...few notice when a resident disappears.

This image shows one of the hundreds of multi-layered alleys with their connecting walkways and open flame torches burning off the ever present bi-products of industry.  One of the more ancient of the Royales is descending on the right.  A few of the Royales have absorbed so much Aether that they can do humanly impossible things like fly.

There is more work to be done on this image but it's far enough along to post and then update as I go (so check back).

Here is the "making of" video.  I've included some text to talk about how the art informs the narrative process and vice versa.  For me, being an artist and a writer, it is a key part of my process.

Steampunk slums of Travaille

Steampunk slums of travaille making of from kevin mowrer on Vimeo.