One Busy Dude

It has been very busy in the life of Elgin Smith with the teaching, and commission work never the less I have made time to do some fun side drawings. Check it out!!

This is a new logo design for my buddy Ryan Keesling who is a electronic artist. He's an amazing Dj if you wanna check out his stuff go to his web site -http://www.searchl1te.com/v1/


Speaking of Logo's I have recently changed mine as well. The more I draw myself as the bunny the more it evolves. In this design I look more like the cartoon rabbit then human. I plan to use the big image for my business cards.




I went home twice in the last few months and each time I found a lot of my old drawings ( my mom keeps everything). Being home brought up a lot of great memories, and I noticed I had a lot of characters I haven't Drawn in ages. So I was curious what they would look like if I drew them today.

here's one: This guys name is frozon



here is the updated look



Over the Weekend I met a lot of great black comic artist and it inspired me to resurface one my old black heroes. I believe every artist has at least one hero thats loosely based off themselves, Thotmes is mine. For those of you that don't know I have a very strong martial arts background and actually a first degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do. So one of my first characters I created as a kid was a black Martial Arts expert by the name of Thotmes. Thotmes is my middle name and the name of a famous pharaohs of Egypt. The word Thot comes from the egyptian God of thinking. Thus my character is highly intelligent and reads peoples moves before they make them, the only downfall is he has Photophobia, which is sun light sensitivity. So my character his to constantly operate in the dark and if he walks around in the day he has to keep his eyes close, or squint.


Heres an old picture of him from my freshmen year of high school. (he's the black guy)


This sketch was a few years later I believe my second year in College.



Here's the new drawing I wanted to do a few color choices.





While Strolling down memory lane I wanted to pay homage to my favorite comic hero Nightwing. As a youth I loved the art style of Scott McDaniel. The way he infused movement into his drawing made me want to do animation. So in a way this drawing is a homage to him. -http://www.scottmcdaniel.net/-



This last drawing shows the most important characters I've created through out the years; Electro Kid, Revel, The Shmo, and Choi.

The BOok is Finally Here

The First Copies of the Juvenile Law book Featuring Yours truly as head illustrator. This booklet will be distributed through out Illinois.

If anyone wants to get involved and knows any youth who would need this information please let me know and I will give you copies. I want as many Youth to understand theirs rights. Lets Fight to keep Our Youth OUt of the System.

Juvie Book Update

For the last few months I have been doing a commission for a company called Youth Voices. They commissioned me to do illustrations for a juvenile booklet that's geared to help new inmates get through their experience. I finished all the illustrations before the holiday break and just got a first look from the graphic designer.

I like how the youth will have a page to put their information in.

New Comission stuff

So I haven't posted in awhile and that's mostly because I've been so busy with all the commission work and teaching the jobs. Even though everything has been super busy I've made a lot of really cool work. So here is a bit of an update on my last few months.

So the first commission came from a new rapper name Lee How who just finished his first mixtape entitled Art Project. Lee produces his own music through garage band and writes his own lyrics and tap dances. Yours truly was put in charge of doing the album cover and Lp. CHeck it out!!


You can download the Art Project at-http://leehowfasho.bandcamp.com/


The biggest Project thats been taking over most of my time has been this commission I've been doing for Juvenile justice. I was hired to draw all the illustrations for a booklet to help the new inmates with the proper process after being arrested. I cant put up the main drawings but here are a few that were not selected for use. Don't worry I still got paid for them lol.






Besides the crazy commission stuff I've had time to do a few fun things. I'm working on a new comic strip with my friend Maurice "Flash" Meaway. We realized though out time If there is a cool black person in an anime cartoon there either going to look like Me, Maurice, or raciest. As we further talked about this issue I wondered what would happen if they were to show up to the same auditions. Thus STAB-D was born, STAB-D stands for Stereotypical Black Anime Black Dudes. Were still writing the stories but here are the first two shorts.

Flash-Black dude with the Dreadlocks
Gino-DAt black dude with the Glasses

Flash and Gino finds out Dragon Ball Z is making a new series called DBZ Kai. Flash thinks it might be some room for some brothers.


Also made a little time to draw my favorite chain smoker CHoi.


Now that most of my commission stuff is done for a while I hope I get time to work on the next issue of Shmo. I started this cover awhile back and just finished it.


This last drawing is a present I did for my sister and little niece. As most of you would know a lot of new disney princess movies have been coming out and my sister thought it would be a great idea if for a christmas gift If I drew my little niece as a princess.

Fun Times with Ninja Girls

IM BACK WASS GOOOD

Sorry I haven't posted in forever in a day I've been getting my working black man on. OK SO TO UPDATE YOU ON ELGIN SMITHS Life. I'm still working both jobs at the Gary Comer Youth Center teaching art to the 3rd to 8th graders, and the Cook County Juvenile Center teaching ceramic sculpture. Both Jobs have been going great. My students have really stepped up there game in the juvenile. We had an art show for their ceramic work they've been creating. The work had great reviews. It’s also landed me another Job at the Juvenile. Starting in August I'll be commissioned to instruct the kids on how to create a zine about the history of the Juvenile. I went to my first meeting last week and everyone seems to be excited about the development of this project. I was also approached by some of the guards about putting more art work in the visiting room so my coworkers and I have been getting student work together to display.

As for the youth center we had our end of the year art show/award ceremony. I was very pleased with the turn out, I felt so proud to see all of the work my students created throughout the year. I also gave out awards to the top two students in my Toon Studio class, Jade L(age 7), and Miracle B(age 8). Giving out awards and seeing all of my kids work made me feel proud to be a teacher.

Besides trying to be the best teacher I can be I’ve been working a few commissions for possible comic/TV shows, also been trying to keep My Shmos up. So I'm going to try to show you guys the drawings you have missed.

I saw the Movie Kick-ASS and Loved it. I made a new Shmo for my kids coloring book collection so I kept the logo PG.


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Me and my art/dance crew buddy Vicky Kao decided to draw each others main characters. She drew Choi and I drew her comic hero Scruballz. If you wanna learn more about this crazy dude you can check out her Deviant page.-http://scruballz.deviantart.com/ OR http://portfolio.colum.edu/vickykao/home


Vicky's Choi


Robert and I were at it again this time going for a commission for this new tv/comic series. I can't tell too much about this project just that I was asked to submit a suit design and comic layout based on a few descriptions the producers gave me. In the end they didn't choose my design but they still want me to be apart of the team So that's great news for me. I'll keep everyone updated once I find out more.






Vector work



I was drawing some random Ninja dude ended up looking like Adult Gohan from DBZ



I call these little shorts granny Tales. This one is an old story my Grandma use to tell me about her and brother Prinis. One day they were walking home from a days work and my Unk stopped in mid stride just to tell my grandma her knees were cracking and shaking so much he thought they broke.....


NEW CHOI Drawing.. I don't know if Ive ever let people see the real Choi the person my comic hero is based off of but I saw an out fit he was wearing and I was like I HAVE TO USE this for reference.



Well Thats all for now...

SANTA SHMO

Happy Holidays EVERYONE!!!