2024 Grad Show

Mouse Brown

AUArts Grad Show mouse_portrait crop

VCD – Character Design & Illustration

WWiS- Transportation The purpose of this illustration was to demonstrate the potential transportation available in my western alien world. The two humanoids in the piece are farmers, so I imagined they would travel to town on some form of beast of burden. Inspiration for the creature design came from the rhinoceros. rhinoceros beetles, and pangolins.
WWiS- Transportation An overhead 3/4 view of the farmstead that our alien farmers own and live on. I took inspiration from beekeeping hives and an image of a repurposed water tower that I found on Pinterest to create their house. The crop layout is based off of real world desert agriculture.
WWiS- Map General overview of the desert colony that our bee farmers find themselves living in/near. Taking inspiration from medieval city planning, the centre of the walled hexagon is where the hive queen lives, with all of the drones/workers residing around her. Our farmers live outside of the walled city; not pictured, but implied, are different zones surrounding the city where various farms would be.
WWiS- Ezrah the "Hero" The humanoid figures in the first piece come from a project completed in 2021 exploring character archetypes. The taller bee humanoid, Ezrah, is designed to be the "hero" of the theoretical story that all of these pieces combine to create. He is the elder brother of Tilly.
WWiS- Tilly the "Innocent" The humanoid figures in the first piece come from a project completed in 2021 exploring character archetypes. The smaller bee humanoid, Tilly, is designed to be the "innocent" of the theoretical story that all of these pieces combine to create. She's clumsy, but means well.

Wild West in Space

Project where we took two disparate genres and combined them to create an interesting world or environment. My project combined sci-fi and western, with insects as the inspiration for the alien designs.

Wild West in Space AUArts Grad Show transportation
WWiS- Transportation The purpose of this illustration was to demonstrate the potential transportation available in my western alien world. The two humanoids in the piece are farmers, so I imagined they would travel to town on some form of beast of burden. Inspiration for the creature design came from the rhinoceros. rhinoceros beetles, and pangolins.
Wild West in Space AUArts Grad Show exterior
WWiS- Transportation An overhead 3/4 view of the farmstead that our alien farmers own and live on. I took inspiration from beekeeping hives and an image of a repurposed water tower that I found on Pinterest to create their house. The crop layout is based off of real world desert agriculture.
Wild West in Space AUArts Grad Show map
WWiS- Map General overview of the desert colony that our bee farmers find themselves living in/near. Taking inspiration from medieval city planning, the centre of the walled hexagon is where the hive queen lives, with all of the drones/workers residing around her. Our farmers live outside of the walled city; not pictured, but implied, are different zones surrounding the city where various farms would be.
Wild West in Space AUArts Grad Show HERO archetype colour
WWiS- Ezrah the "Hero" The humanoid figures in the first piece come from a project completed in 2021 exploring character archetypes. The taller bee humanoid, Ezrah, is designed to be the "hero" of the theoretical story that all of these pieces combine to create. He is the elder brother of Tilly.
Wild West in Space AUArts Grad Show INNOCENT archetype colour
WWiS- Tilly the "Innocent" The humanoid figures in the first piece come from a project completed in 2021 exploring character archetypes. The smaller bee humanoid, Tilly, is designed to be the "innocent" of the theoretical story that all of these pieces combine to create. She's clumsy, but means well.
Serket Nassyr Final design, including colour palette and pattern elements.
Serket Nassyr- Scar Exploration Serket has severe scarring from an explosion of melted glass. When coming up with her scars it was important for me to keep in mind things like splash pattern, covered areas of skin at the time of the accident, and how scarring affects scales differently than fleshy skin.
Serket Nassyr- Hairstyle Exploration Process of determining a hairstyle suitable for a fantasy character, keeping in mind her job, her culture, and what would make an interesting silhouette for the character. I looked at a variety of hairstyles at differing lengths, with different hair textures, to see what would work best for the design that I was building. The final hairstyle combined elements that I liked from multiple hairstyles, so the exploration proved to be very useful.
Serket Nassyr- Outfit Exploration This one is a looser exploration, combining a series of designs explored in a sketchbook and compiled digitally for comparison. Once again I needed to keep in mind her class (in this case, a paladin), her culture, and an interesting, unique silhouette that would make the character distinct. Taking inspiration from real world cultures helped keep the design focused and gave me a jumping off point for my research.

Serket Nassyr

Steps of exploration in the character design process. The character in question is a fantasy character created for Dungeons & Dragons, Serket Nassyr the Yuan-Ti (serpent humanoid) Paladin.

Serket Nassyr AUArts Grad Show Serket Nassyr base
Serket Nassyr Final design, including colour palette and pattern elements.
Serket Nassyr AUArts Grad Show Serket scar exploration
Serket Nassyr- Scar Exploration Serket has severe scarring from an explosion of melted glass. When coming up with her scars it was important for me to keep in mind things like splash pattern, covered areas of skin at the time of the accident, and how scarring affects scales differently than fleshy skin.
Serket Nassyr AUArts Grad Show Serket hair exploration
Serket Nassyr- Hairstyle Exploration Process of determining a hairstyle suitable for a fantasy character, keeping in mind her job, her culture, and what would make an interesting silhouette for the character. I looked at a variety of hairstyles at differing lengths, with different hair textures, to see what would work best for the design that I was building. The final hairstyle combined elements that I liked from multiple hairstyles, so the exploration proved to be very useful.
Serket Nassyr AUArts Grad Show Serket outfit concepts
Serket Nassyr- Outfit Exploration This one is a looser exploration, combining a series of designs explored in a sketchbook and compiled digitally for comparison. Once again I needed to keep in mind her class (in this case, a paladin), her culture, and an interesting, unique silhouette that would make the character distinct. Taking inspiration from real world cultures helped keep the design focused and gave me a jumping off point for my research.
Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn (Final Project) Illustration Concept: Iconography
Ordinary Wonder Tales by Emily Urquhart Illustration Concept: Environment/Setting
Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu Illustration Concept: Character/Figure Design
sleep by Mouse Brown (this book is not real) Illustration Concept: Hand Lettering as Environmental Component

Book Cover Concepts

Various book cover concepts, with each cover exploring a different aspect of symbolism utilized to inform and entice readers with the contents of the books (literally, judging the book by it's cover).

Book Cover Concepts AUArts Grad Show Mouse Brown- Book Cover
Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn (Final Project) Illustration Concept: Iconography
Book Cover Concepts AUArts Grad Show Mouse Brown- Environment Cover
Ordinary Wonder Tales by Emily Urquhart Illustration Concept: Environment/Setting
Book Cover Concepts AUArts Grad Show Mouse Brown- Discussion rough
Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu Illustration Concept: Character/Figure Design
Book Cover Concepts AUArts Grad Show colour rough 2
sleep by Mouse Brown (this book is not real) Illustration Concept: Hand Lettering as Environmental Component
HMC- Exterior Watercolour piece of the iconic castle roaming the countryside. I gave the castle four legs, as I really like the idea of the castle looking like a traditional castle except for this one unsettling element.
HMC- Interior In this scene I've chosen to illustrate the hearth of the castle, as quite a few crucial story beats take place in front of it. While these pieces are not character focused, I did include the fire demon Calcifer in the piece as without him the castle wouldn't be able to function.
HMC- Exterior 2 What is a space ship if not the sci-fi equivalent of a castle? Since the book was published in the 80s I took inspiration from tv shows from that time period for my design, complete with the noise and colour grading of a fake screenshot.
HMC- Interior 2 Calcifer is the heart of the castle, using his magic to keep everything running. To translate him to a sci-fi equivalent I imagine he would need to be a computer program of some kind (or at least, appear to be a computer program). Since Howl is the captain of the ship I left the console in disarray, with elements illustrating his magical prowess (coding) and his love of guitar (sheet music).

Genre Swap- Howl's Moving Castle

The purpose of this assignment was to take a book in a specific genre, illustrate an interior and exterior for the setting focusing on environmental storytelling, and then switch the genre. I chose to reinterpret Howl's Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones as I love her whimsical fantasy settings and wanted to attempt to bring her world to life.

Genre Swap- Howl's Moving Castle AUArts Grad Show HMC ext 1
HMC- Exterior Watercolour piece of the iconic castle roaming the countryside. I gave the castle four legs, as I really like the idea of the castle looking like a traditional castle except for this one unsettling element.
Genre Swap- Howl's Moving Castle AUArts Grad Show HMC int 1
HMC- Interior In this scene I've chosen to illustrate the hearth of the castle, as quite a few crucial story beats take place in front of it. While these pieces are not character focused, I did include the fire demon Calcifer in the piece as without him the castle wouldn't be able to function.
Genre Swap- Howl's Moving Castle AUArts Grad Show hmc ext 2 render
HMC- Exterior 2 What is a space ship if not the sci-fi equivalent of a castle? Since the book was published in the 80s I took inspiration from tv shows from that time period for my design, complete with the noise and colour grading of a fake screenshot.
Genre Swap- Howl's Moving Castle AUArts Grad Show hmc int 2.2 screenshot
HMC- Interior 2 Calcifer is the heart of the castle, using his magic to keep everything running. To translate him to a sci-fi equivalent I imagine he would need to be a computer program of some kind (or at least, appear to be a computer program). Since Howl is the captain of the ship I left the console in disarray, with elements illustrating his magical prowess (coding) and his love of guitar (sheet music).
Untitled v.1 Speedball ink on Maidstone watercolour paper, ~7”x11”. 2024.
Untitled v.2 Speedball ink on Maidstone watercolour paper, ~7”x11”. 2024.
Untitled Stencil/Colour Plan Digital stencil, coloured to plan out a palette for when I printed it.

untitled

untitled AUArts Grad Show untitled v 1
Untitled v.1 Speedball ink on Maidstone watercolour paper, ~7”x11”. 2024.
untitled AUArts Grad Show untitled v 2
Untitled v.2 Speedball ink on Maidstone watercolour paper, ~7”x11”. 2024.
untitled AUArts Grad Show smoking kills stencil process 5
Untitled Stencil/Colour Plan Digital stencil, coloured to plan out a palette for when I printed it.
Agoraphobia, Scene 1 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia, Scene 2 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia, Scene 3 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia, Scene 4 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.

Agoraphobia

Series of 4 ink paintings with digital text overlayed to create a story emphasizing the everyday horror of agoraphobia. The scenery depicted is from areas in Prince's Island Park.

Agoraphobia AUArts Grad Show agoraphobia scene 1
Agoraphobia, Scene 1 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia AUArts Grad Show agoraphobia scene 3
Agoraphobia, Scene 2 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia AUArts Grad Show agoraphobia scene 4
Agoraphobia, Scene 3 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.
Agoraphobia AUArts Grad Show agoraphobia scene 6
Agoraphobia, Scene 4 Ink on watercolour paper, 4"x6". 2021.

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