June 28th Macleans illustration

Here's the final for the Macleans illustration. The subject of the piece was a Thai welder who came to Edmonton to make a living and to support his family back home. He was a devout Buddhist, so I wanted to make the design resemble temple decorations and use Buddhist motifs. Hope you like it!

Julia Minamata site/blog

Macleans illustration, coming to a newsstand near you!

Here's a little sample of one of my latest jobs, the obituary illustration on the back page of Macleans magazine. It's published in their June 28th, 2010 issue. I've done about half a dozen of these, but this is the first one in a while. I get a particular kick out of doing them because my mom get a subscription and there's nothing cooler than getting your artwork published in a magazine that your mom reads!

I also love the stories of people's lives. Creating images to accompany and augment amazing stories is one of the reasons I love editorial illustration. For me, the more information and details I get to work off of, the happier I am.

New work on t-shirt @Rogue Monk: Please vote!

Here's something new and fun! I submitted my work to Rogue Monk, if it gets voted up enough they stick it on a t-shirt. Please visit the site and vote me if you like it! You have to sign in, but that means you can also vote for a bunch of other cool designs. Try it! -- Julia

Casino Royale

Here's an image I did based on the Vesper-Lind-Drowns-in-Venice-in-an-Elevator scene from Casino Royale. This is more of an interpretive take on the event, not a straight-up narrative representation.

I was flipping through one of my Toulouse-Lautrec books and I love his use of coloured line to define figures, so that's what I'm playing with here. Daniel Craig is a brooding Bond, so I've got him in Thinker pose. His nakedness indicates his psychological vulnerability. He's holding the Algerian love knot necklace that Vesper wore during the film. Vesper is blue because she is full of water. Oops, I guess that's a spoiler! Also, they were on Earth all along. And he's actually a dude.

Julia Minamata