Free Comic Book Day

Free Comic Book Day is nearly upon us! I’ll be joining Rodney Fyke, Tina McElhinney Chris Charlton and more fun folks to ring in the day this Saturday at Rockin’ Rooster Comics on Glenway Avenue in Western Hills. Stop by, say hi and get a highly collectable Zombie Marge trading card. See you there!

Flaming Medusa Studios Interviewed on WVXU Today at 1PM

Darcy Vorhees Van Horn will be discussing  their animation series Queen City Chronicles on WVXU (91.7 FM) today at 1PM EST, the "Cincinnati Edition" show.

http://wvxu.org/post/telling-tales-local-icons-animation

Jodorowsky's Dune Movie Night Tuesday April 29th

A bunch of us are seeing the new documentary of the Dune film that never was at the Esquire Theater next Tuesday ($6 day) at 7 PM. Hope to see you there!

HR Giger Dune Concept Art. From the NPR review: http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2014/03/20/12_wide-20dbe9d859f41dedca838947dcee81a391085bb5-s40-c85.jpg

Great review by NPR: http://www.npr.org/2014/03/20/291132685/jodorowskys-dune-the-greatest-film-that-never-was

For fun, here is one of the cards I illustrated for the Dune CCG in the 90s:

Baliset Illustration by Christina Wald

Making It • CCAD workshop • Spectrum

Making It

So here is a trailer for the film we just wrapped called Making It. This film has been a labor of love for all those involved for the last year and a half. It's nice to finally be in the home stretch and be able to share it.

Making It Trailer

Making It Website

Making It Facebook

“Making It” is a documentary film that explores the daily struggles of making a living, staying creative, and making it all up as we go along. The film focuses primarily on Eric Fortune, Andrew Bawidamann, and Brian Ewing discussing education, their business model, and the future of Illustration but ultimately asks what does “Making It” mean to each artist?

The documentary also features additional interviews with artists and industry giants such as: Adam Hughes, Tara McPherson , Becky Cloonan, Jon Foster, Greg Manchess, C.F. Payne, Olivia, Michael Whelan, Irene Gallo, Iain McCaig, William Stout, Sam Weber, Dave McKean, Mike Mignola.

CCAD workshop

Every year I have an annual illustration workshop at CCAD for anyone who wishes to attend.
This year we will have a small private screening of the film Making It to start off the workshop for those intersested and for those who can't be with us for the Official May Premiere next month in Kansas City.

Poster Designed by Hannah Ross
http://www.hannahrossillustrates.com

Spectrum

Please join us for the opening Premiere of Making It at Spectrum Fantastic Art Live 2014 and stick around afterward for a short Q&A session with the guys from Sidebar and the featured artists and filmmakers.

Happy Easter!

I've been trying to sharpen my competence with vector-based art. This Easter greeting was created start-to-finish in Illustrator —something I rarely do.

Not ready to throw out my pencils though.

Happy Easter everyone!

David Hartz

Nice article in the Eastern Hills Journal today about Dave Hartz...burning it up in Eastern Europe!

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/local/cincinnati/2014/02/13/uc-blue-ash-professor-represents-us-in-olympics-of-fire-sculpture/5448611/

Drink and Draw Thursday April 17th

Drink. Draw. FOR FREE. at Tacocracy!

Get some tacos and drinks from the fine folks of Tacocracy, drink, and draw!

We'll provide some used art supplies and we'll have a few for sale at 20%-70% off, but please feel free to BYO art supplies! 

8PM until 11PM


https://www.facebook.com/events/528322537289367/

Sketch Outing to Spring Grove Cemetery

Sketch by Vanessa Sorensen

Amy, Vanessa and I managed to get out and sketch the cherry blossoms at Spring Grove Cemetery while they were peak. It was a beautiful day. There was also a plein air group out, so a lot of painting was going on.

Blossoms by Amy Bogard

Here is a vine on location: https://vine.co/v/M5T7vuYrIz5

If anyone ever wants to join us, drop me a line! The more the merrier!

Sketch by Amy Bogard

Lovely trees by Vanessa Sorensen

Sphinx by Amy Bogard

Tree by Vanessa Sorensen

Sketch by Christina Wald

Tonight: Cincy Illustrator Gallery Opening

"Cincinnati Illustrators" is the theme of tonight's opening at the Red Tree Art Gallery and Coffee Shop. The opening is for everyone and will be from 6-9 p.m.

Artists represented from our group include Christina Wald, Jerry Dowling, Tim Fuller, Bearman, Dawna Boehmer, myself and several others. (If your work is in the show and I've neglected to mention you, tell me and I'll correct my mistake!)  

I know that Jerry and I are planning on attending the opening, while Christina is madly preparing her new comic for S.P.A.C.E. this weekend in Columbus. 

The Red Tree Gallery is located at 3210 Madison Rd., just off the I-71 and the Norwood Lateral.

New Zombie Marge

Gloryoskie! There's a brand, spankin' new episode up. 'Bout time, too!

http://zombiemarge.blogspot.com/2014/04/episode-50.html

Sketch Outing to Newport Aquarium

Spider Tortoise by Linda Bittner

Linda, Julie, Christina, Amy

Linda and Julie Bittner, Amy Bogard and I went to Newport Aquarium March 28th to sketch and check out the new turtle exhibit.

The new enclosure is really cool!

We are going on another sketch outing this week. Drop a line if you want to join us!

Bravo, the new Galapagos turtle by Amy Bogard

Amy sketching

Pancake tortoise by Linda Bittner

Bravo in his ideal home setting by Julie Bittner

Bravo in the new turtle environment by Christina Wald

The super cool crabs by Christina Wald

Article about Flaming Medusa Studios in Soapbox

Darcy Vorhees Van Horn and Tom Beuerlein

 Great write up on Flaming Medusa Studios about their animated series on Cincinnati iconic companies:

25 most iconic Cincy companies captured in video

www.soapboxmedia.com/features/040814-queen-city-chronicles.aspx

FMS also just did a really cool animation for WCPO celebrating the Reds Opening Day:

http://www.wcpo.com/news/cintagious/video-knock-it-out-of-the-park-reds-hope-springs-eternal-for-opening-day-and-beyond

New Reditorial Cartoon

Here's my latest Reditorial Cartoon for WCPO.com. It's based on Cardinal's Matt Adams's run-in with a Reds fan last week.

Finally ... the World Fire Sculpture Championship Video

My video from the World Fire Sculpture Championship in Riga, Latvia is finally finished. It is all video that was taken by myself and edited by myself in Premiere Pro. It took awhile to learn the software and work out all the bugs. The video is a bit longer than I would like. It is about 30 minutes long. I could have cut out alot of footage and made this shorter and more exciting but I wanted this video to be more of a document of the event for myself. I wanted to include all of the fire sculptures and the way they looked before being burnt as well as while they were burning. I also wanted to include some footage of Gunnar the Artistic Curator and Reinis the Producer and to give a feel of what it was like to participate in this international event.
So here is the link to the video on Vimeo. Please let me know what you think of this video.


http://vimeo.com/90363463

WFSC 2014 from Artist David Hartz on Vimeo.

Get an ArtWorks Grant for $15,000 for your Art Business

ArtWorks Big Pitch

Deliver a 5-minute pitch. Win cash. Take your business to the next level.

ArtWorks Big Pitch is a biannual competition where creatives pitch for cash prizes and professional services. 8 finalists will be chosen to give their 5-minute pitches for the chance to win a grand prize of $15,000 cash, $5,000 cash by audience vote, or professional services to apply toward their business’ long-term growth. Presented by U.S. Bank.

August 2014: Growing Creative Businesses

Connecting established businesses with cash for long-term growth.

March 2015: Launching Creative Businesses
Helping new businesses get off the ground

Basically, what they are offering a grant. The big plus is that they offer a free mentor to help you focus your art business and hone your pitch.

Anyway, get more information here. They sincerely want to help fund Cincinnati artists to enhance the arts business community.

http://www.artworkscincinnati.org/creative-enterprise/artworksbigpitch/

Summer Fair Poster Reveal: News and New Work

Hello fellow illustrators!


I just wanted to remind everyone that my Summer Fair 2014 poster reveal will be taking place April, 27th from 1pm-3pm at  Malton Gallery!
This info is also on the Summer Fair website -http://www.summerfair.org/node/3803
You can also see a little sneak peak of my Bio on the Summer Fair website as well-http://www.summerfair.org/SummerFair%202014/Poster%20Competition

I would love to meet some fellow Cincinnati-an artists and Illustrators!

I have also been informed that I will be doing a five minute TV interview on Channel 5 on the 27th of April before the reveal. So tune in at 9:00AM on Sunday to see the interview!


And now for some new work!

All of these works and more can be found on my website-http://hannahgraffillustrations.com/

Also dont forget to check out my society6 website!http://society6.com/HannahGraff
You can buy prints as well as many other fun items like these-

Thanks so much everyone! :)

Library Program: Behind the Mask: Superheroes and Intellectual Property

Behind the Mask: Superheroes and Intellectual Property

Event Type: Genealogy & History Age Group(s): Adults Date: 4/12/2014 Start Time: 12:00 PM End Time: 1:30 PM Description:  Dive into the history of comic books and see how these cultural icons have evolved into a lucrative output of popular entertainment. Resources are presented with tips on how to draw or write superhero stories. Attendees also learn which intellectual properties may apply to one's own creative artwork. This program is a part of the Cincinnati Library Comic Con Series. Library: Main Library    Link Location: Main Library - Room 3B

volunteers needed to review student portfolios

The Cincinnati chapter of AIGA is looking for volunteers to review portfolios at their Annual AIGA Cincinnati Senior Portfolio Day, which takes place Saturday April 12, 2014, at the Art Academy of Cincinnati.  It's a great opportunity to offer some appreciative college students feedback about their work before they go out there in the big scary world.  Plus, if you're an illustrator, it's also a great opportunity for you to network with design professionals in Cincinnati--you know...people who buy illustrations ;)



If you're interested, please contact Jessica Wollcot at jessica@creativesoncall.com

The first Reditorial Cartoon

This is the first of my "Reditorial Cartoons," which will be featured Mondays throughout baseball season on WCPO.com. Here's looking to many more in the weeks to come.

C is for Camello

Are there really 26 letters in the alphabet? This could take forever. (The image came through darker than it is.)