The Monster Engine is a project born from the imagination of Dave Devries. The project originally started when he asked the simple question, "What would a child's drawing look like if it were painted realistically?"
In 1998 he started the project because of doodles his young niece would leave in his sketchbooks or on scraps of paper around his home. From there he started transforming some of her drawings into 3D concepts and "bringing them to life". From there it expanded into a book, demonstration, lecture and gallery exhibition.
Devires is an illustrator and painter for Marvel and DC comics he applied his learned techniques to create truly unique pieces of art, all originally derived from simplistic children's drawings.
How he creates these works is by projecting a child's drawing with an opaque projector, then tracing all the lines. After getting the base outline and simple lines complete, he then renders the image as realistically as he can using acrylic, airbrush, and colored pencil.
I think this project is really awesome and creates for some very interesting characters. Sometimes the best view is through the eyes of a child.
For more images check out the site www.themonsterengine.com.
I've seen this idea be done before in the past, and it is pretty brilliant I agree. This recreation you showed is really creepy,but surely can see how he came up with it from the art of a child. Been times where I thought of doing this from art I did as a child my mother saved. Anyways thanks for sharing, really enjoy looking at their work even if it is freaky, hehe.
ReplyDeletecoool! this is such a great idea ive never thot of before tht i might hav to try. looks nd sounds like fun.
ReplyDeletenow this is actually awesome.
ReplyDeleteits funny because its so well done but it still really looks exactly like his reference material.
fun project
I love this project! Very inspired, and well executed. I wonder what the kids think of the finished pieces. Nightmares!
ReplyDeleteThis is such a great idea! There's no better idea in finding inspiration-kids have great imaginations. However, it also takes some imagination on his part since he has to fill in the details.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of my top three because it has such an interesting concept behind the piece, which itself is beautiful. I like that he basically completely removes the monster from any semblance of being kid-friendly. In fact, it's kind of creepy, and I wonder what the kid who drew it thought when she saw the finished painting. The colors are lovely; the background especially also has great texture. The fact that I can't tell whether the monster is bursting out in the middle of a city or a landscape or in front of a wall doesn't bother me, I like the abstractness there.
ReplyDelete