A Big Ol' Art Blog

Phoebe Wilson is an illustrator and art instructor living in the Seattle area. They graduated with a BFA in Visual Communication from NCAD. They enjoy dark, saturated colors, high fantasy books, and talking about themself in the third person.

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Commission for @balderdashing of the immensely powerful Lady Kasma Lestrade! Thanks so much for asking me to draw her!

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“You should accept your task simply for the nobleness of the work–but as we live in a society, you will also be getting paid.” -Dame Chevis Teniel of the Order of Rightful Repose

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Sibling Mel (yes, they're back!) of the Sisters of Mercy, on the cliffs above the city of Bitterdrink.

Based on The Girl I Left Behind Me by Eastman Johnson.

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A portrait of Miss Zaire Albescu, alleged member of the Great House du Fleche in Vox, in the du Fleche sitting room.

(Based on Elizabeth Winthrop Chanler by John Singer Sargent.)

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A hypothetical banner image for the Orca Network! Growing up around the Puget Sound meant that our local marine life was often a topic of conversation. It’s crazy to think we have whales* not only visiting but actually living in such a close body of water. There’s something special about your ferry coming to a dead stop because members of a resident pod are swimming past. 

I wanted both of these images to capture the family orientation that these creatures have, as well as test the question, “How many whales is too many whales?”

*A friend would like to remind me that orcas are not actually whales, to which I replied “fight me”, a tear rolling down my cheek.

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This was intended as an editorial illustration for an article called “The REAL Paleo Diet”, which talked about the foods that paleolithic people would have eaten. At first I thought of small juxtaposition of modern technology in primitive life, but then I realized it wouldn’t be as noteworthy and instead put modern people into the paleolithic setting the article described.

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The Ramayana ended up being one of those stores that stuck with me long after I read it in middle school, and so I went for it when prompted to make an illustration from a religious or mythological story. 

What I enjoyed most from it would have to be “The Engagement of Rama and Sita” from early in the tale. It would be terrible to string the bow of a god in order to marry your sweetheart, but not so much if you’re a god yourself!

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Final project for the final class in my school’s Illustration major. Alexander (The Great?) is someone most people hear about, but don’t know about in detail, so I wanted to spend a little time beforehand learning about him. The notes take up about three pages of my sketchbook, not including the thumbnails and studies I selected for the set.

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It was so hard not to post it right when I "finished" this, but I managed to restrain myself until corrections were made. This was my final for Visual Development. I love the Oz, books, so when the opportunity to do any book I'd like for this class, I took it!

This illustration was specifically designed as a cover, and I even had a book that needed to be rebound. I found that to be one of the primary challenges. As far as composition went, it had to fit as an illustration without text as one whole; it also had to work in separate sections on the front, back and spine, and not cause the text to be illegible.

The other major challenge of this piece was color. I wanted to be truer to the Everything Is Blue property of Munchkinland, but if I had been then the corn would have looked less corn-like. I solved this issue by deepening blue in the shadows of the foremost corn, but leaving the highlights fairly green.

I really enjoyed this class! I'll post a picture of the book once I've recovered it with the updated image.

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"Tsarevich Ivan, The Firebird, and the Grey Wolf" Series. Photoshop CS6, 9"x12".

All three paintings were completed as part of my Digital Painting course this summer. After my Illustration course last winter, in which I produced this painting, I've found myself unable to forget the story.

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An updated version of this image originally posted on my personal blog, after the critiques given in class.