Growing up, I didn't know it, but Ed Emberley was one of my favorite artists. As a kid I had several of his books, and I have to say he was one of my first artistic inspirations. I used to love to draw from his books, follow the steps, use all the fun shapes, and adding all the detail at the end was my favorite part. One of the things I love about Ed Emberley's work is the way he designed his characters off such simple shapes. It's one of the first things that I think we all learn and do as designers when we are working on a character design, or thinking about structuring a layout drawing for a background. Start simple, and play with simple shapes to help vary your design, then go from there. Anyways, even though I haven't thought of Ed Emberely's work for a little while, his whimsical design principles thankfully are permanently burned into my brain and it wasn't until I saw this post on Cartoon Brew today about a gallery showcasing some work as a tribute to him, that I stopped to take a look back at his work, and reflect on the influence his style and artwork had on me as a young artist.
I'm not part of the gallery opening, but I felt compelled today to illustrate a Sasquatch inspired by Emberley's style ( shown above ) and in true Emberley fashion, I illustrated the steps on how to draw this particular Sasquatch. For anyone who either wants to follow the steps bellow, or has kids who would like to create this Sasquatch from the steps below, go for it! and email me a scan of your piece and I'll post it here on my blog. My only request for those interested would be to follow the steps on real paper with marker, pencil or preferably crayon!
Two great artisists in Trip Park and Amy Mebberson showed their love for Mr. Emberley's work by contributing to this post with their awesome work below.
Here are a few images of Embereley's amazing work I grabbed off the internet. To read more about him click HERE , or head over HERE to buy his books online.
