Paul Brown, aka Roctopus is an graphic artist that is based in London and he has been one of my favorite illustrationist ever since I am on flickr. His self-identity art piece (above) is the first image that catches my attention. Whenever I look at his works, his drawings will always remind me of 2 things: Beatles and Dr Seuss.
Today, I am lucky enough to have the opportunity to ask him some questions and let you know more about this great artist! Trust me, once you look at his works, you will be addicted to them (they are like drugs!).
Evolution of Man
I got a lucky break 13 years ago when I recommended by a friend and began working in a small design studio. I got the job off the back of my graffiti work and sketches, I only had a little DTP experience from stuff I had done at college - on Early black and white macs using Aldus Pagemaker!!
I am self taught and first started seriously illustrating around 20 years ago when I was into the Hip-Hop scene. My passion for characters and lettering stems from there, and even though I am not involved in that scene anymore, it gave me a great appreciation of line structure and form.
Some of my early graffiti inspired works can be seen on my FLICKR stream. I first started working on a Mac around 13 years ago and I found it really easy to pick up using Photoshop, Illustrator, Dimensions, Quark and Raydreamstudio. I was using a Macintosh Quadra with 4mb of RAM - state of the art!!
Since then I have worked for a few design houses and more recently done a bit of freelancing in London.
I have been lucky in my commercial work and have work on some big projects and for some major brands including:
Electronic Arts, Universal Pictures, Universal Music, Dreamworks, Peroni, AOL, BBC, KOEI, and Mattel.
Having said that my real passion is for illustration, initially sketching then vectorising using Adobe Illustrator. This is a real break from the commercial world where I am not constrained by client briefs, requirements and deadlines. I find it really therapeutic and a great release to be free to do exactly what I want and take as long as I like to do things, virtually the opposite from real working life!
A little help from my friend
Your vector arts are just full of creativity and I really like your style. Do you have any artist(s) that influence(s) your drawing style?
I am influenced by so many people and things, I will just list a few:-
When I was growing up I loved the graffiti work of Mode2, Daim, Loomit, Dondi and the Cheech Wizard comics by Vaughn Bodé. In the traditional medium I love the work of Jenny Saville I saw one of her obese women paintings at the Tate liverpool it was so beautifully conceived and painted. Paul Wright the way he forms shape and light using bold, thick brush strokes is great. Matt Small and Connor Harrington, I suppose these both appeal to me as their art to me is an evolution from graffiti and stencil art. Moving to more graphic style art I like Richt, Guy McKinley, Hylton Warburton and Theory one to name but a few. Vector artists I always look out for new work by are Mr. Chompins, Meomi, Jasper Goodall, Zutto, Mark Verhaagen, Lab Partners and Malota.
Our date with destiny...
I suppose creating my Roctopus identity was a real turning point in my illustration career and shortly after I got approached by Getty Images. They loved the little fella but I didn't want to licence him for public use as this is my personal identity. Luckily they like my other works so I sell a lot of my work exclusively through them. The other turning point for me was my collaboration with LA based artist Mr. Chompins he suggested a collab and I jumped at the chance. It was a no brainer for me to try and bend my style to fit into the surreal world of Mr. Chompins and I started the ball rolling with the stripey, furry, trunked monster pedaling on top of a zeppelin. I then put the file on FTP for Mr. Chompins to add to over in L.A. I think the file went back and forth across the atlantic about 6 times, it was really exciting for both of us each time we saw what the other had done and we were both amazed how well the piece came together in the end, it looked like we had planned it!
ChompxRocto
I am working on a brilliant project I am super excited about. Its a 15ft (4.6 meter) long mural which I am getting printed onto wallpaper for a client in Pittsburg! I am so stoked about this and spending ages on each character to make sure it is my best piece of super shiny hyper realistic vector work to date.
I have not been able to resist posting a few work in progress characters to my Flickr and Behance accounts. It is a scene set in a forest with loads of weird and wonderful characters set in the trees, sky on the ground and buried beneath. I am contemplating treating myself to a copy of 'Phantasm CS' to play around with colours and lighting within the scene , I am undecided whether to go for daytime lighting or Moonlight as the main light source casting a blue/turquoise light.
Sponge
Tough question! I really enjoyed my collab with Mr. Chompins and it taught me loads. I am at a point where I am really enjoying setting myself challenges and refining my techniques and styles.
As I said before I find it a great release not to have deadlines or constraints from clients - free reign is the best!
Having said all that I would never say never and I would like to explore more interactive flash type work.
Teaming up with someone who does Action Scripting and coding for games, animations or an animated illustration site is something I hope comes along in the near future.
Montgomery the Monocled Monkey
This is something I really want to know, is there any meaning with your name "roctopus"? If so, how did you come up with this name?
I love to think of all things British mostly fun and quirky things and did a small series of these type of illustrations. Around the same time I also produced a number of illustrations with a squid theme -
Montgomery the monocled Monkey - featuring a Giant Squid Tentacle
The Pirates and the Kraken - Featuring Kraken Tentacles
Humboldt Squid
I was thinking of an eccentric British busker - one man band and having an obsession with all things tentacle I just combined the two and Roctopus seemed a natural play on words. After sketching the character out i liked it so much I decided to assume the identity. I was really happy to get the URL www.roctopus.net too! Initially it was just a vector illustration but I had it in the back of my mind it would be great to animate, I suppose that was one of the things which lead me to start using Flash. That was only my 3rd flash animation. I took a while to choose the music I used with a couple of tracks in the running in the end:-
Instant Whip - The Tremeloes
Woo Hoo - 5,6,7,8's
I went for Woo Hoo - the with lip and instrument syncing was quite a challenge.
Roctopus - Yeah!
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There are so many different things that will influence an artist to build his/her unique style and now you are lucky to get a glimpse of what he likes!
Rain or Snow?
Rain
Shortbread or Scone?
Shortbread
Skittles or M&Ms?
Skittles Sours
London Bridge or London Eye?
London Bridge (old skull!)
Rabbit or Octopus?
Roctopus of course!
Mr. Bernard Crabbins esq
Modern or Retro graphic style?
Both
Red or Blue?
Blue
Mickey or Mario Brothers?
Mario all day long :D
Rolls Royce or Aston Martin?
Aston Martin
Coldplay or the Beatles?
Beatles
Are you amazed by his works yet? If not, make sure you check both his official website and also his flickr stream. If you have a twitter account, come follow him as well! I have to say, his works make me happy all the time when I look at them! Thanks Paul for letting me to have a Q&A session with him! If you want to use any of the images on your blog, make sure you ask him for permission first!
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