I like a lot when creative and generous illustrators share with me their work process. So from this post I will make this blog a space of creative process and illustration.

Here is the new poster I did for the label Monstro Discos. The fantastic Monstreonato is a competition between beginning bands of the city of Goiania. The prize is to have an album recorded and released by Monstro Discos in the best indie rock festival in Brazil, Goiânia Noise Festival.

My first sketches were based on a cliché, which soon abandoned. Despite the final result is quite different from that  something of the idea and ​​the composition remained present. That’s a good reason to draw any silly idea you have, because you can only know how much it worths if you think with the edge of the pencil.

I didn’t like much the idea but i thought that the composition and the idea of the cd as a prize should remain. Then I did a quick sketch of a podium with monsters that enlightened me. So I decided to recover some sketches It was something I had done for Monstro before i knew which event i had to illustrate. I made these sketches as exercise, exploring the symmetry, drawing only half of the characters. Then i used a Photoshop action to mirror the draw and get the characters.

The result surprised me, because when images are mirrored something new is revealed. Even though a spectacular random factor beasts seemed quite convincing. Yes, symmetry makes miracles in our brain. I also saw that the pictures look fine even when very small. These monsters are perfect to use as avatar!

When I used the automatic action of Photoshop contact sheet I saw that the monsters looked good gathered. But I had to make them more homogeneous.

That’s why I drew horizontal and vertical guidelines in my sketchbook. So I got a grid that helped me to have the same size and square shape of the characters.

I was also looking for something more gestural. So I decided to draw directly without a prior sketch. I tried other tools but the one that served me is probably the cheapest of my tools. It is a kind of pen that comes in the bottle cap of the spanish brand Pelican ink. This pen was the only thing I found that slid firmly as I wanted. So that’s how I drew these monsters: by half, as if I drew strange letters.

Then I used Photoshop’s contact sheet to compose the final image, rearranging a few monsters that resembled to the other.

In the next post I’ll teach you the trick that helped me to draw all these monsters in a few hours.

I hope you enjoyed. I’d love you to comment and ask questions. What is your favorite monster?

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