skip to main |
skip to sidebar
See all my portfolio samples at stevensalerno.com
Posted above is one of the illustrated scenes from my latest children's book, PANTALOON, just released by Random publishing house in April of this year. (see earlier posts about this picture book by clicking here and here)
This is the full view of the actual gouache painting (Winsor & Newton designer gouache on Arches 260 lb hot press paper)... in the final printed book the image is cropped slightly as the image bleeds off the page spread on all sides. Pantaloon, the main character of the story, is an obsessed, antsy, quirky, poodle bent on becoming a baker's assistant just so he can get close to all the pastries and sweets he adores. In this scene he's in the tub, wearing all his favorite hats, lamenting on his failed attempts at becoming the baker's new assistant. Pantaloon is a Kathryn Jackson story, and first published in 1951 as a Simon & Schuster Little Golden Book classic, with wonderful illustrations by Leonard Weisgard.
The remake of the 2010 book called for all new illustrations, and I had the terrific honor of being able to give my stylistic visual spin on the story ... Look for it in the bookstores!
See all my portfolio samples at stevensalerno.com
A while ago (last year?) I worked on a fun annual report project with BCN Communications in Chicago, with art director Rob Mileham. It was a preliminary test stage for their client Pepsico's Annual Report. The agency was exploring different options for the visual images to be used... and I was chosen for the illustrative approach.
My task was creating still life graphics of some of the well known consumer products under the Pepsico umbrella of companies. The art images were taking the tact of a "hand-drawn" look with a bit of a purposeful naive feel to them (compared to the usual photographic approach). I created still life vignettes of Quaker Oats Oatmeal, Gatorade, Tropicana Orange Juice, Lays Potato Chips, and Pepsi Zero. Each image was created in Adobe Illustrator. The essence was to capture the recognizable container shape and product colors with a bit of flair...
I had fun with these images...I always do when drawing food images, but it's too bad that my illustration approach was ultimately not selected for the final stage use for the client's annual report. This happens many times in advertising... wherein the agency will present the client a photographic approach, and a couple different illustrative approaches before deciding on the final "look" to go with. Sure, you get paid for the preliminary stage work, but it's an empty exercise, because the satisfaction is having the work seen in print, which also brings new assignments your way. Hey, you can't win them all!
My favorite one?... the Gatorade bottle!
See full portfolio of illustration samples on my web site at stevensalerno.com
I recently completed a project with Larry Fredette, Creative Director of Fredette & Associates in Pittsburgh on the advertising and other print promotions for a new commercial real estate development project named BAKERY SQUARE, near the corner of Fifth and Penn Avenues, transforming the former Nabisco factory into a mixed-use center that is quickly filling up with retailers and big-name corporations and institutions. The developer is Walnut Capital of Pittsburgh.
Posted here is the magazine print ad I recently completed employing the character of a baker as the visual anchor and tie-in with the site name. The baker is mixing the four catchy theme words of the ad copy, WORK, SHOP, PLAY, STAY.
I also created a long horizontal graphic which was installed as a temporary "barrier art mural" at the site location... in fact this image was enlarged to a size of approximately 150 feet long by 20 feet high, the equivalent of about 2 stories high and nearly a city block long! See the architectural drawing depicting the side view of the massive renovated Nabisco factory and how my long outdoor graphic is positioned along the street level. The other images posted are details of this giant graphic image which has four themed panels engaging the four theme words: work, shop, play, stay.
I created the magazine ad image in Photoshop, but the long horizontal image was created in Adobe Illustrator (vector based imaging) at a proportional 20" tall x 150" wide, - which enabled it to then be scaled up by the design team to its final giant size without any loss of crisp edges and detail. At the bottom are the lamp post banners which were created pulling elements from the barrier mural art, and re-formatting them to fit the vertical composition.
If you are in Pittsburgh, visit the site and send me some pix!
What does an artist do at the end of the day, after having already spent many hours creating images for assignments and projects? Pick up a pen and start drawing some more, of course.
Sure, I do other things besides draw: exercise, cook, maybe watch a film, etc... but at the end of the day I still find myself picking up a pen again, especially when on the phone or watching some TV. Inevitably I start doodling and sketching -anything that comes to mind. In fact, in my experience, I think doodling and watching TV at the same time makes your doodles less of a conscious activity and your creative instincts seep through onto the paper more readily. Sometimes I hit a streak of doodling one particular subject or theme for a while...
Posted here are some doodles of alien beings I created. The joy in being able to draw, is not only being able to depict what you see in front of you, but also to give life to whatever forms you imagine in your mind. It's fun to imagine what another kind of being might look like and realize it on paper. I created these images as if they were character thumbnails for a science fiction film project... I think they were all created with ball-point pen, or markers, on paper scraps. See another posting of my doodles here.
You can see all my illustration portfolio samples on stevensalerno.com
Anyone who knows me, knows I have been involved with and keenly interested in the great game of golf nearly all my life...
Just recently I (finally) launched a new web site named sasgolf.com (based on the initials of my full name, Steven Anthony Salerno) It is a showcase for my personal golf related art images and graphics... available on this new site as limited edition giclee prints. (on the site you can also read a brief bio/info of my involvement with golf and how my golf art has been used by the PGA Tour.)
During my rather lengthy professional illustration career I've developed a recognizable whimsical style, which has appeared in literally thousands of illustrations for advertising, magazines, product packaging and children's books.... but my golf art images on my new golf art site are a complete departure from my regular illustration career style. These golf images are more painterly and/or "reality" based in concept and execution... Posted above are a handful of my original golf images and graphics.
I love creating illustrations, but as anyone in the biz knows, many times there are compromises to be made (some big, some small) due to client needs and especially due to time & budget constraints. And many times you are having to align your illustration style with topics that do not necessarily line up with your style nor your own personal interests. Of course as a professional, the trick is to create a wonderful illustration despite any of these various obstacles... and for the most part I feel I have done it well. But after nearly thirty years of tight illustration deadlines and commercial demands, it is refreshing when doing these golf art images to not have client factors in the mix ... and to take as much time as I want. Compared to the all-too-often feeling of being pressed for time to complete my illustration projects, in contrast, when creating these golf art images I can relax and feel more in sync with what I am creating.
My motivation is to create the best golf images I can -to express in the images the thoughts and feelings I have about the game and its top players who become incons. I'm selling these images as fine reproductions prints... so, of course it will be terrific if the prints sell well, but ultimately my goal, as an artist, is to leave some lasting images on the subject. Hopefully the golfing world will enjoy them.
Visit my new site at sasgolf.com
To see all my illustration portfolio samples, visit my web site.
I guess the Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz was the first city to officially go "green." What most people don't know is that the giant flaming vision of the Wizard's face that scared the Lion enough to jump out the window, was actually solar powered. Glinda,The Good Witch of the North's flying bubble and The Wicked Witch of West's flying broom? ...yup, both were zero-emission transportation. (well, except when the Wicked Witch wrote Dorothy's name in the sky!) And not to mention all the walking, hot air ballooning, and horse-carriage riding everyone did to get where they wanted to go.
Posted here is an illustration I recently completed for Pittsburgh Magazine, to appear on the cover and also with the feature article inside their next issue about the city going "green"... The illustration depicts a stylized skyline of Pittsburgh as the Emerald City (taken from the article's title). The illustration to be used with the inside article will also contain some additional icons and a rolling green carpet. The illustration was created by using some of my painted textures that I scanned into Photoshop, then merely made specific shapes of them with the lasso tool. I also used the airbrush tool and erase tool to complete the final image... oh, and certain shapes had their opacity levels altered and the "noise" filter effect was used as well.
Now get out there and follow the green brick road to work tomorrow!
To see all my illustration portfolio samples, visit my web site.
I had the opportunity to work with O'Connor Design in the Chicago area (James O'Connor/Creative Director), on a project for The Options Clearing Corporation 2009 Annual Report. (The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC), founded in 1973, is the world's largest equity derivatives clearing organization)
The images were to reflect a handful of themes used to create the thrust of the report: Strength, Growth, Development, and "Behind the Scenes." Since the process of clearing options is very detailed and high-tech driven, I chose to go low-tech and monolithic with the nature of my images allowing the readers to immediately understand what the core themes were, at a glance. I came up with the idea of using a monolithic financial-esque building as the visual handle throughout all the images, and a repeating the same male character who adds the action and human value.
Several variations ensued in the sketch stages... first a simple approach, then exploring a more textural background and even trying composing the building shapes out of just financial data, but ultimately we went back to the basic approach as I initially envisioned.
Usually, most of the illustrations I do these days all have layered digital Photoshop enhancements, but all these final illustrations for OCC were done the "old fashioned" way, with just brush and paints, without benefit of the computer, in part because the client also wanted to purchase the originals to display in their Chicago offices. The final artwork was created with gouache, watercolor, and pastels on Arches 260 lb hot press watercolor paper.
The sketches posted here show one image from sketch through to the finished art (man lifting building over his head) -and I also have shown one of the other final images, too. (building as hot air balloon)
See all my portfolio samples at stevensalerno.com 
