An update on some artwork

I thought I'd put up some sketches of pics I'm working on at the moment. I've had to postpone my `Jungle goddess' pic till October as my model is going on a World Discovery Tour till then. But here's a preview.

Rihanna will be photographed in my lil garage studio against a green screen and then composited into the image. I'm hoping to work on it so that although she's been photographed, she'll still look illustrated enough not to stand out as a photo within the illustration. So just imagine a gorgeous, dark and sultry, petite Indian/Malaysian girl reclining naked on the lilly pad in front of the waterfall, one leg dangling in the water. She should have a `come hither' look but also shy and demure. (de muuuuuuurrrrrrrrr)

So until then, I'm steaming ahead with some other pics I've got in my pipeline (ewww).

Frinstance... Here's one I've had in my scone for several years now. I've had this thing about doing to the Australian Outback what the Warner Bros Artist's did to the American landscape. Stylising it down to it's essence but making it unmistakably the Australian Outback. Part of why I went on my trek last year to Alice Springs with my parents was to research and take lots of reference pics. Below is a series of pics showing some roughs of some trees called Desert Oaks. I love these tree's, they reminded me of the Truffler Tree's in Dr Seus.

Here's some landscape designs. I've a bit more work to go refining the shapes.
And below are a couple of sketches detailing the idea for the final picture.

I call it `Encounter at Red River'. I originally thought of it as a scene from an imaginary Western movie that was never made. Indian braves look down on a Preacher riding a tired old horse and a young Indian girl on the saddle in front of him. Behind them, a young Indian brave (teen) tethered with rope around his wrists to the horse's saddle.

But I had a think and decided to change the location to Australia. A young Aborigine girl sits on the saddle in front of the old priest. There is a young Aborigine boy still tethered to the horse but between them there could be someone else. We can see a shadow but there is a rocky outcrop blocking our view of whether there is someone else between the boy and the horse.

And up above them, three Aborigine hunters look on. The one closest to us will look directly at the viewer. When I was a kid, I remember an old illustration of some Aborigine's looking at some settler's or something. I always remember this black fella in the front who was looking at the viewer with his eyes wide open and staring. It used to freak me out, so I'm going to have a go at putting him in this pic. I'm also having a muck around with perspectives in it. The first image below has three different perspectives going on. Looking straight down onto the preacher, off into the distance and left, down into a gorge. But I thought that was a bit much so I've knocked the gorge out on the second one.

But is it a positive or a negative image? What I like most about the concept is that, to me at least, it's really ambiguous. Is the old priest good or evil? Are the Aborigines in the foreground up to no good? Are they coming across children being stolen or returned? Why does Allbran have such an impact on my internal thingies?