There are many things I love about Eric Fortune’s work.  It’s the combination of realistic and stylized, the play of saturated and desaturated hues, and the strong values present in each piece.  If you scan through his portfolio, you can see how each piece has at least one area of dark value; hair, jacket, or chair.  But juxtaposed with those strong darks are areas of very subtle value changes, maybe a face rendered with grays and bits of color here and there.  It’s a wonderful combination of semi-graphic and illustrative techniques as well as the realistic and fantasy elements that make his work quite inspirational.  Click on one of the images above to see more work on his Web site.

Beautiful, graphical linocuts by Kelly Dyson.  Never having the opportunity to do any printmaking work myself, Kelly’s linocuts really makes me want to give it a try.  I really like the quality of the linework and hand-cut type.  Amazing, beautiful, inspiring work!  Click on one of the images above to see more of her work on her blog.

Audrey Kawasaki’s oil and graphite on wood pieces are absolutely stunning.  I love how the wood textures, sometimes tinted, are integrated into the compositions, making the surface itself an integral part of the piece.  The laser-cut pieces are also amazing, and I really like how she sometimes integrates flat, graphical elements (such as the ravens and feathers in Kazamachi) into the composition.  The subtle skin rendering, and how she treats her figures’ hair, is truly inspiring.

Awesome.  Crazy.  Crazy awesome.  Like Sam Weber, I love her warm darks and desaturated colors.  The way she treats hands is exceptional and the geometric textures she often overlays on her figures and compositions combined with organic swirls and swoop shapes adds a wonderful playful spirit to the somewhat morose (in a good way) people.  Because of Tran, I dropped by the art store a few days ago to pick up some of the same Rives BFK printmaking paper she uses to give it a try.  It has a wonderful texture and I look forward to seeing how it handles watercolor and gouache/colored pencil. Click one of her images above to check out the rest of her work on her blog.

Dan Dos Santos was picked to illustrate the fifth ebook of Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series, and man he didn’t disappoint.  (Does he ever?)  Tor.com has a great process writeup by Irene Gallo with a higher-resolution version available to view at Dragonmount.com.  Dan’s cloth work and details (man that belt is awesome) are always goosebump-worthy and the process writeup/images are great to see.

I stumbled across Erik Jones this evening and was blown away by his work.  He incorporates all sorts of mediums into his paintings.  Some might be watercolor and colored pencil.  Others might be chalk, acrylic, marker, or just straight up house paint.  Regardless of the medium, they all turn out the same way.  Pure awesomesauce and very inspiring.  Be sure to check him out on Deviantart. You can also buy prints and originals on his Web site. Ooh la la!

Crazy illustration skills from artist Jaw Cooper.  One great thing about her blog is how she shows the process from sketch to finish for many of her illustrations.  She’s an incredible draftsperson to boot.  Link via Invert This Space.

Sam Weber did an amazing job with Robert Jordan’s Kindle version of The Shadow Rising (Book 4 of the Wheel of Time series).  The warm darks and the textures in his jacket are drool-worthy.  Sam and this piece are entirely to blame for me breaking out my watercolors and doing some watercolor and acrylic experimentation.  If one of the experiments turns out, I’ll be sure to post it here.  In the meantime however, check out this illustration on Sam’s site.

I’m not a big Halo fan.  I played the first iteration when it was released for the Macintosh, and I read the book it was loosely based on, but when Bungie was purchased by Microsoft and Halo became an Xbox-only franchise, I stopped playing.  However, several Halo 3 commercials were released awhile back and one really caught my eye.  It’s amazingly well done and it is nice to see Chopin being heard by what is certainly not his usual audience.  The final zoom-in shot where the main POI (Point-Of-Interest) is catching that nice, warm light as they’re surrounded by a mass of darker shapes really gets me thinking of some interesting compositions.

Make sure to click the button to view it full-screen:

This post is also the first in a new section on my Web site that I created to talk about what I find inspiring. I’ve seen so many incredibly inspiring things lately that I felt I needed to help bring attention to a few of them. Some you may have already seen, but hopefully you’ll find a new and interesting tidbit now and then that will bring a little light to your day. For those of you who have signed up to be notified via email when this site is updated, if you’d rather not be notified when I post something in the “Inspiration” section, simply navigate to my Web site and click on the “profile” link on the right side of any page (under the “Subscribe to receive an email when this site is updated” header). From your profile options simply uncheck “Inspriation”, click “Update Preferences”, and you will no longer be notified.