To show my Commercial Art I illustrations, I think that they have improved in the second assignment since the first. My shading techniques alone improved and I felt that I was able to convey more of a story than I had in the first assignment.

In the first assignment, we were supposed to create a story with two 10" x 15" panels, one panel portraying an outside scene and the other portraying an inside scene, each with at least four people. My outside scene at best was mediocre. The people in it were not anatomically correct, and the whole piece in my opinion was just a disaster. The inside scene was a bit better. It had better shading, better facial features, and was more anatomically correct. I felt that I conveyed that the children were smaller than the woman. But my issue with my shading is that you can see my lines. The shades and tones don't just blend together, and that's something that I need to improve upon.

Assignment #1
Outside panel
10" x 15"
Pencil on Bristol

Assignment #1
Inside panel
10" x 15"
Pencil on Bristol

In the second assignment, we were told to pick a historical event and create two panels with depicting that event. Each panel had to have four people in them, and I chose to portray the sinking of the Steamboat Arabia, near northern Kansas City, Kansas in 1856 in the Missouri River.

A bit of the back story: the steamboat hit what was thought to be a snag, but turned out to be an entire dead log that was submerged under water. The log ripped out the bottom of the steamboat and within 10 minutes, the steamboat had sunk to the bottom of the river with only the smokestacks visible above the water. All the passengers survived except for the one mule chained to the boat. Decades later, the river had moved and changed course. One farmer decided to check his field and began to transect the area. He eventually found the sunken boat, and an excavation was begun. Although covered in mud, the entire contents of the boat had been preserved. There is a museum that shows all the artifacts that have been preserved, including clothing and fabric.

The outside panel depicted the actual sinking of the Arabia. This was a harder piece to create, because there was not actual photos for references of the sinking of the steamboat. I had to come up with a fairly original piece and guess what the sinking boat actually looked like, which was an interesting concept. Some art that I looked at for reference photos included:

My design that I came up with was more detailed than I thought it would originally be. I used my eraser to smear the marks to make it appear like water was pouring off of the wheel and the hull of the steamboat. During the class critique, it was mentioned that the smoke coming out of the smokestacks should be more adjusted to the level of shading that the rest of the illustration was. It appeared "sketchy" and not the same as the rest. 

Assignment #2
Outside panel
10" x 15"
Pencil on Bristol

The inside panel depicted the paddle wheel of the steamboat inside the museum. I thought that it would be an interesting element to tie the two illustrations together. The reference photo that I used was taken inside of the museum.

I liked the idea of adding two people as if they were looking up at the wheel as they were touring the museum. To show depth, I drew an adult figure with two smaller figures to show levels on the second floor. I felt that the shading I complete on the paddle wheel was better than I have done in previous pieces, and was a better accomplishment to show my skills.