About Me

My photo
Santa Clarita, California, United States
Jonathan Payne is a freelance artist residing in Santa Clarita, California. His sculptures and paintings focus primarily on creature and character design . He has studied under Jordu Schell (Men In Black, Edward Scissorhands, Avatar), concept sculptor Simon Lee and fine art sculptor John Brown. He prefers to sculpt in oil, polymer and WED clays. Recently he has become consumed with creating an original line of tumorous balls of flesh known as the Fleshlettes. In addition to his macabre "babies" he also enjoys composing fine art sculptures depicting both wildlife and the human form. Jonathan is available for hire as a freelance artist and for individual commissions.

Sunday, December 23, 2007

Hugo Sculpture in Stereo!



nuff said

Hugo






A sculpture of Hugo that I made for Lacie as a Christmas present. It's about 4 inches tall on the base and made out of aluminum foil, Super Scupey Firm and acrylic paints. Critiques welcome!

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Jr Nightforce cover!


This is the last picture for Gary Vitello's Jr. Nightforce pitch and it's one of my favorites. This is meant to depict an old stone tablet laying next to some old scrolls on a wooden table which is no doubt, very old.

Click for a bigger version.

Monday, November 05, 2007

Alien WIP


Here is a quick dirty pic of my 'work in progress' alien warrior. This alien is not authentic to the films but instead It's my tweak on the recent designs and is meant to be a personal exercise.

Friday, October 19, 2007

Darpia


Darpia, the original master of the Nightforce, now centuries old and living in exile.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

New Nightforce Pics - The Good Guys!






The Team of Four kids and their leader. All done in photoshop.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Group Photo from "No Fright Nite-Lite Co."


Here is the big group painting with all of the bad guy characters from Nightforce. I spent over 7 hours on this painting reworking and fidgeting different aspects of both the environment and the characters. I'm fairly happy with what I got but I do think i would have been happier if I had got this result in half the time. I feel like this was too slow for so much time against the grindstone. I think that metaphor makes sense...it's late as I write/post this.

Click on the thumbnail for a larger view!

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

More Nightforce Artwork



The first is Fritter's (Evil Scientist) helmet device that connects to the nightmare machine. The Second is the Big Bad Boss's Big Bad Bulldog.

Monday, September 24, 2007

Night Force Concept Art

These are two final character paintings. The first one is the evil boss of the evil corporation and the second is the mad scientist cohort. Both of these are designs from my co-worker's next cartoon pitch. There should be plenty more where this comes from in the next week.
Blogger is having technical problems so I've hosted these images. Below is a thumbnail and then click the link below it for the larger version.

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Sunday, August 12, 2007

Mythic Rider




Out of nowhere comes a guy with a thick helmet for doing battle and a mane of horse hair to impress the ladies!

Monday, August 06, 2007

A Happy Robot



Psychologically speaking, this picture just appeared out of nowhere. It's just a simple painting of a robot traipsing through the forest as it comes upon a monarch butterfly in mid skip.

Like the last picture, this one is big so please click on it to see the more detailed version.

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Birthday Present + Portrait = Explosions


This is a quasi-family portrait of Lacie,Hugo and I that started as a joking sketch (link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacierunolfson/634475786/ ) but was requested by Lacie's mom to be turned into a fully painted portrait for her birthday present.

It's meant to printed out at 11"x17"

Critiques/Comments welcome!

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Accidentally looks like the Silver Surfer




This is my new head that sort of unintentionally looks like a certain someone from a recent super-hero movie. Presented here are a few examples which help to show how it actually has it's own eyes that are physically separate from the rest of the head (something that should be compulsory but is a first for me). Also I'm having fun with the different metallic shader/materials in Zbrush.

Friday, June 01, 2007

Colonel Zbrush 3!!!





Here is my first sculpture in Zbrush 3. This new version of Zbrush is a big improvement that allows the user to sculpt with more control, more response, and greater finesse.

This is a European gentlemen, that would sit around smoking with his fellow hunters, amidst taxidermy, tucked away in a war room somewhere. I called him colonel mustard to poke fun at the stereotypical "great white hunter" characterization.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Emaciated Man




Here's my initial crack at one I've been having a lot of fun with. This is also the first sculpture I've done with my own copy of Zbrush so I can save it and come back later.

I see this guy as a facial reconstruction patient who has suffered multiple fractures all over his jaw, nose and cheek bones. His x-ray reveals a bunch of fragments of bone screwed together with metal plates.

Monday, May 07, 2007

Stereo Success



Here is my favorite of a series of stereo photos I took depicting statues of old Television stars. This one is of Johnny Carson and is presented in cross-eye stereo and Anaglyph (Red/Blue) glasses versions.

Click on the thumbnails for larger pictures.

Monday, April 16, 2007

New in Zbrush: Hired Thug





Here is my new zbrush creation. I see this guy as a hired thug, someone who can always stoop to a new low for the right price.

Notables for me is the fact that I was was able to do this on an old hand-me-down PC, with demo of Zbrush 2. With the new computer I was able to get wrinkles under the eyes. Also he's got an asymmetrical face and an actual expression of sorts.

Monday, April 02, 2007

New Pics


Here is a new shot.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Orangutan is A-OK!






He's pretty much done. Here are some pics I took today on my lunch break. Basically all that's left to do from here on out are some paint touch ups and making the eyes glossy (to appear wet). Click on pics for large images!

Thursday, March 08, 2007

Sculpture Update!

I'm excited beyond belief! I'm almost finished with my sculpture and I'm really happy with where it's going. Click on the image to enlarge. Comments, critiques welcome.

Friday, February 23, 2007

GOOD OLD FASHIONED DRAWINGS





It's been a while but now i'm pleased to say that I'm really enjoying my recent experiences drawing the way I always used to - on paper - no color - no tonal range. That said these are obviously scanned so I'm going to take them into photoshop and look at them with my current aesthetic. These are my take on a style inspired heavily by Kent Williams.






Wednesday, February 07, 2007

New Sculpture: "Old Man of the Forest"



We went to the zoo instead of watching the Superbowl and I was touched by the big old male orangutan that lives there. He inspired a new appreciation for the apes and I wanted to sculpt one. Zbrushing hasn't been so hot lately on my aging mac so I broke out the super sculpey and tools and went to work. This is about halfway to completion. Comments/criticism always welcome.

Monday, January 22, 2007

New Zbrush head...in 3 - D!!!






Here is an anaglyph image from my late-night zbrushing. This thing is nowhere near done but it's still coming along alright. I'm troubled though as I'm beginning to think that my computer is just not powerful enough to push fine details in zbrush (which is bad because zbrush runs quite fast).

(UPDATE) The non-anaglyph (2D) version is slightly newer with new surface details and a higher polygon count.