New Products! New Art! New!

I love phone cases and skins. For as long as it’s been possible to decorate a mobile phone or a laptop I have done. I have a variety of hard cases available on RedBubble but I was hugely excited when GelaSkins rebranded as Nuvango and announced that their amazing range of skins were available for print-on-demand artists. There are literally skins for every bit of electronics you can think of, not just iPhones and Blackberrys, there are Playstation skins! DS skins! Nook and Kindle skins! Wii skins! They do hard cases for the major phones too, but these skins are ideal for anything you want to protect, without adding extra weight or bulk. I’ve used this brand of skin for years (I have a 7 year old iPod classic in one of these skins and its still perfect) so I’m very excited to finally be able to offer them with my art on them!

It’s currently 15% off all hoodies and sweatshirts over at RedBubble! Use code HOODIE15

There are also new products available on RedBubble- tote bags, throw pillows and bedding!

Last bit of news for today- the latest novella in Nico Murray’s excellent vampire series “Winterblood” is out now, and the next full length novel “Stealing Sunlight” will be available in November!

CoffeeMania Design Project

It’s been a long time since I last updated this blog. But now I’m back, and I hope that the project I’m going to show you will help you to forgive my absence. 

In New York State (on the other side of the Atlantic to me) there’s a marvellous coffee company called CoffeeMania. They have drive-throughs and cafes as well as selling their delicious coffee online (I can testify to it’s deliciousness cos I’ve tried all their blends, you should try them too). I was commissioned to design a series of steampunk labels for their ten special coffee blends, and here they are-

There are two decaf blends and eight blends to suit any taste from mellow and soothing to deep, rich and dark, including a special holiday blend that’s perfect for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

If you’re in the area you can buy the whole beans in various sized jars directly from the stores, as well as the bags that are also available online.

 

Please visit www.cnycoffee.com to find out about each blend and how to order them.

Steampunk Star Trek

here are a couple of steampunk Star Trek portraits I was commissioned to draw a while ago, the main aim was to show off the models amazing costumes. These were a huge amount of fun to do!

 

Please note commissions are still closed for the time being.

The Lyrics of Abney Park

For more then twenty years “Captain” Robert of Abney Park has been creating a world. Each song he’s written is like a tiny window revealing a new detail or character in this lush UNIVERSE. This book is a collection of all the lyrics to all the songs that shape the World of Abney Park. It also contains hundreds of full color illustrations by –

Artists: Juan Pablo Valdecantos Anfuso
Rachel Esmeralda Schwarting
MANDEM
Delucienne Maekerr
Desiree Kern
Miles Graves
Alex Thomas
Myke Amend
Bethalynn Bajema
Phantoms Siren
Model Maker: Matthew Slater
Photographer: Jonathan Happs

Copies are available for purchase in the Abney Park Marketplace.

Steampunk & Victoriana Exhibition in Leek, Staffordshire

-Poster by Phantoms Siren-

The Steampunk & Victoriana Exhibition will be running at the Foxlowe Arts Centre in Leek, Staffordshire (England) from 20th October to 18th November. The artists on display include – Miss Emilly Ladybird, Dr Geof, Justin Rasbridge, Neil Watkins, Liz Yates, Stefany Maden, Emma Brackenbury, Timesmiths and myself.

New Steampunk Piece

Bring Light Into Dark Places by =phantoms-siren

RedBubble

Wordless Warrior Wednesday

Going To War by =phantoms-siren on deviantART

Couple of Newish Things

First off, here’s some steampunk for you. I actually started this back in June 2010, it was one of the first things I tried to create when I upgraded from my beloved (but clunky) G4. Because I also upgraded from Photoshop CS2 to CS5 at the same time, I found myself totally overwhelmed. The program was too different and the screen too much better. Seriously going from a  tiny cheap plasma screen to a wide screen beast makes any kind of graphics work look and feel totally different. Well, having abandoned this mostly uncoloured, I finally dragged it out again just before Christmas and got it finished.

I’ve never been terribly happy with the focus on pirates and other ne’er-do-wells in the steampunk subculture, I think it might be time to start representing the other side of the argument. Airship pirates are all glamourous and that, but in reality I think I’d probably have more fun on the side of justice and not having all your stuff nicked 😀 Plus I wanted an opportunity to portray a slightly more realistic female fighting outfit 🙂

Prints available at DeviantArt : Folksy : Etsy

One of the major changes with Photoshop CS5 was the paint-effect brushes. I haven’t had many opportunities to play with them, other than when I was first learning my way around the program. I’ve been feeling a bit restless with the Art Nouveau style recently, so when a friend asked for fan art of the modern BBC Sherlock adaptation it seemed like the perfect opportunity.

on DeviantArt

At 4am this morning I randomly decided to change my Facebook timeline cover. This is from a REALLY old piece, but it’s the only thing I have that suits the horizontal format. I’ll get around to making something specific eventually. If you’d like to use this as your cover just click on the image to download it 🙂

Hope you all have a good weekend 😀

New OctoSquidy Fabrics At Spoonflower

Yup. I’m still obsessed with Spoonflower. Oh how I love that site! This week’s contest was to make 4 coordinating fabrics to be printed together so they fit onto a yard of fabric. I’ve been meaning to make some coordinating fabrics for Tale of Three Squids for a while now so I though this would be a good time to do so. The requirement was for a stripe and a dot fabric, so I paired those with the Squid-de-Lis and a smaller version of the ToTS designs. The fabrics will also be available separately. Click on the image to see a larger (and clear) version of the image.

 

A Steampunk New Years Gift From Me To You

2011 is almost over, 2012 is just around the corner and I wanted to make you all a little freebie gift for being so good to me this year. So here’s a little desk calendar featuring the Airship Pirates city mascots.

Click on the image above to get the full size image. (It’s set to A4, the standard international printer size, if you’re using another size just scale to fit when you print.)

Cut off the white areas and cut the slits on the left hand side to put the tabs through.

Then just fold along the lines between the images.

You’ll end up a three sided calendar that stands on its own.

Please note that whilst it works with paper it’ll look better and last longer on thin card.

You can purchase photo quality prints of this, in various sizes, from DeviantArt if your printer won’t cooperate 😀