First Ride of the Gyrostator

Hello Friends
Just completed the illustration of Vyctor's first explosive ride on the Gyrostator he invents. To keep things away from prying eyes, he's located this project in the long abandoned carriage house of the L'cole he is attending. Upon firing it up, its power was more than he anticipated and he bursts from the doors into the night roaring down into the sleeping town of Travaille.

First Ride of the Gyrostator painting

I also wanted to play a lot with glow, mist and wet brick and rock. Here's a closer shot of those elements.

Detail of mist and gyrostator

I had a lot of fun painting this on many levels. It involved some pre-modeling of some of the elements in 3D as a quick underlay guide and then lots and lots of layered painting into it. I've always been a huge fan of the work of john Atkinson Grimshaw and his ability to paint those haunted night skies and wanted to have that kind of atmosphere in this painting.

John Atkinson Grimshaw (inspiration)

Cheers, Kevin

Steampunk Skull Muscles

Whew! The final image of the Making of Frahnknshtyne's face is finally done.  It is now a completed Triptych. This middle image shows the crafting of the leather straps and support structure that will drive the final skin to move. Like all things Vyctor does, he is obsessive in the detail and art of it even though it will not be seen. I've been enjoying the ironic nature of these images in the sense that they are a form of "still life" and chronicle one brilliant man's attempt at making a new receptacle for life.
More to come in the book.  Cheers, Kevin

Steampunk Skull Muscles

Steampunk skull triptych

And a fun video so you can see how the face builds up layer by layer.

Steampunk Frankenstein's face

Finally, I've gotten to a face for Frahnknshtyne's creation that is delivering the narrative I was striving for. The mechanical man in my story is not about gore or re-animating dead flesh. It is the result of an obsessive labor to create an artful receptacle worthy of holding the minds of the immortals.

Months ago I posted the highly detailed metallic skull (I've reposted it in this post so you can see the finished product on the same bench and in the same position).

The completed head is made from finely tooled soft leather. Each hair has been stitched into place by hand and the leather face is connected to an intricate series of tiny pulleys and leather straps that act like muscles to drive expression and movement. My next painting is the middle image in this Steampunk Tryptych. It will be the image showing the muscles and controls being built on the face. Can't wait to get to it.

For this painting I wanted a mad and complicated sense of Vyctor, bringing all his artisan skills and victorian technology to bear on making this creation of great and subtle intricacy.

I can't tell you any more as I'd like you to read it in the book (which is coming along very nicely).  I hope you enjoy these ongoing glimpses into the world of Frahnknshtyne.

Be sure to see the just completed middle stage of the making of the Frahnknshtyne head. It's the crafting of the muscle structure you can find here.
cheers, Kevin

Steampunk Frahnknshtyne leather face

Steampunk Frahnknshtyne's metal skull

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

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.