personal work

Illustration / character design

Who is Quincy?

I’ve had a passion for animation since I was a kid. And I started expressing this passion and love through drawing fan art of my favorite childhood cartoons, this quickly evolved into creating my own characters with their own stories. I can’t express how much I love seeing my creations come to life when I make them.


My goal is to pursue this passion by working in animation/illustration, ideally in character design/development. Whether working in movies or for a television series I have no preference. But I want to not only create a character's look but also their personality; I want viewers to understand why they walk and talk a certain way. I want to make and create the little details that makes these characters real—and really brings them to life.

COLLEGE APPLICATION ESSAY


When I was ten, I loved The PowerPuff Girls, an absurdly violent cartoon about three super-powered kindergarteners from 1998 that I had found on Netflix and defended with a passion. I completely engrossed myself in every shred of media I could get my grubby little hands on. I watched fan-made music videos and read comics and people's own self-made characters. And I wanted to be a part of this creative expression, so I started to draw, doodle and sketch. Everything I made, without a doubt, would have a bobblehead, bug eyes, and stubby arms and legs. Eventually filling several sketchbooks full of these creatures.

While still being fixated on The Powerpuff Girls, I began to branch off into my own original creations. I gave them their own relationships, stories, and worlds to live in. They weren’t great but, creative I’d say for a fifth grader. One world allowed friends to travel through each other's dreams, another where a girl had a shape-shifting sister, and another where a girl spoke to a ghost living in her backyard's pond, and I loved all of it. I adored making my own worlds and participating in pre-made ones. I had vivid imaginations and daydreams about not only The Powerpuff Girls but countless other animated series. Now while most would debate that kids grow out of cartoons eventually, I haven’t and probably never will. Because it's my passion and my escape. For me, it’s always been hard to have a full grip on reality and I've always needed to make sense of it through a mix of cartoons and my imagination. Putting myself in to these worlds and interpreting my friends and family as mixtures of preexisting characters.

Ironically, cartoons have helped me make sense of reality. And my goal is to share this love with others; not only kids, but teenagers and adults who share this passion of mine.

Halloween Invitation

Client: START Design Co.

— PROJECT NAME

Halloween Dance Invite


— ROLE

Illustration & Character Design


— DATE

06.10.2022

PROJECT BRIEF:


We'd like to have a main character like a witch or vampire, something that quickly represents Halloween. Also could you add jack-o-lanterns, bats, cats, etc? No background needed, but shouldn't be blank white. Include "Halloween Dance" as the main title—all other text should be visible, but smaller.

Size is standard postcard (4.5 x 6.5 inches)



QUINCY:

Here’s the working sketch I have for the Halloween character for the posters.I was just thinking of a little pumpkin ghost with a fun shall and maybe a little cat ghost companion.


START DESIGN CO.:

Hi Quincy, this is a great start. I love the originality of the characters, let's keep the cat ghost too. I think the pose in the top left will work well (fun and dynamic) and the glow effect will be a nice touch. The legs and arms can be a size of your choosing. I don't think we need a pattern on the shall. It could get too busy. When working on the final, can we ground them somehow? Perhaps with a tombstone or another jack-o-lantern at the feet. No need for a background image, but the background could have a gradation of dark to light in a complimentary color to the characters. Something to make them pop. A hand-written/illustrated title of "Halloween Dance" would be nice. The rest of the text can be in a smaller, legible font.




QUINCY:

Here’s the layout plus most of the drawing done; I still have to do some shading and add in the words. I can get that done tomorrow but I wanted to show you what I have so far.


START DESIGN CO.:

This is looking really great. You might already be working on this for the final, but can you tone down the candles a bit? The pink wax part isa bit bright and draws my eye there. I like the pink because it matches her eyes, but some shading, as you've mentioned, will probably do it.

The green flames are perfect.

The rest of the colours are working really well together.

One other thing, can you incorporate the school logo in somewhere? It doesn't have to be big, it just needs to be there. I've attached a copy of what it looks like.





QUINCY:

Here’s the final illustration of the invite. Please let me know if there’s any issues with the file.


START DESIGN CO.:

Thanks, I've lighten it up a bit. It could be the difference between your screen and mine, but we were losing some of the detail at the bottom. And great placement of the logo. I was really hoping you were going to carve it into the pumpkin or tombstone.

You have some really good instincts as far as composition, colors, and original ideas – ghost cat, floating pumpkin head, all the different jack-o-lanterns, and the addition of candles. The glow from the candles

on the pumpkins is a nice touch too. Your characters have a lot of character with their expressions and body positions. I purposefully left a lot of it up to you to see how you would interpret the illustration brief and I think you did a really great job.






Theater Posters

CLIENT: Westerville North Theater Boosters

— PROJECT NAME

Murder Can be Habit-Forming


— ROLE

Illustration & Design


— DATE

12.09.2022

PROJECT BRIEF:


Create a poster to promote the WNHS theater production of “Murder Can be Habit-Forming”, a murder mystery/who done it. I partnered with another classmate on the overall look and design of the poster, she would later build the final poster for printing. We also needed to get the approval of the Westerville Theater Boosters, since they were the ones putting on the performance.

My creative process is pretty simple. First I would work up a couple sketches and then share them with my design partner to discuss what's working and what's not. After some back and forth we decided on the image of a nun with a "ominous presence" standing behind her. I then continued to refine the design, the layout and color palette, until we were both happy with the final piece.

Unfortunately, when we shared our final poster concept to the Westerville Theater Boosters, they felt that it was a little too scary for a high school production. They wanted to make sure we highlighted the comedy aspect of the play a little more, in order to drawn in wider audience. So I went back to the drawing board and came up with the idea of featuring a question mark to highlight the "mystery" instead of the "murder". I also softened the colors to make it feel a little more inviting.

The theater boosters were very happy with the new illustration, especially how it now felt more like a fun, who-done it—instead of a scary play about murder.

Final approved version of the poster.

Senior One Acts

CLIENT: Westerville Theater Boosters

— PROJECT NAME

Senior One Acts


— ROLE

Illustration & Design


— DATE

23.01.2023

PROJECT BRIEF:


Create a poster to promote the WNHS theater production of senior one-acts—a series of senior directed one act plays.


We also needed to get the approval of the Westerville Theater Boosters, since they were the ones putting on the performance.

This poster was a little different than the last. The ask was to create four individual images—one to represent each of the one act plays—while making sure they all work together as a whole. So I worked up a few ideas and sent them to my design partner to discuss.

The next step was to find a way to combine all these individual images into one poster. We knew that keeping the color palette simple would help, but we needed something else. We landed on making them feel like they were pictures on a film strip. After a little back and forth tweaking we were able to land on a design.

Final approved version of the poster.

Theater Social Posts

CLIENT: Westerville Theater Boosters

— PROJECT NAME

Social Posts


— ROLE

Illustration, Layout & Design


— DATE

2022/2023

As a part of my position as the social marketing manager on the Theater council, I am in charge of creating and managing the theater social channels (Instagram, Facebook, etc.)


PRODUCT BRIEF:

Promote and advertise upcoming shows and events for the Westerville North theater program.

Octoberfest Poster

CLIENT: START Design Co.

— PROJECT NAME

Brewery Octoberfest Poster


— ROLE

Illustration & Design


— DATE

17.02.2023

PRODUCT BRIEF:


We need a design for this year’s Bobbing Bobber Brewing Company Octoberfest t-shirt. Each year the brewery celebrates Octoberfest by creating a unique design to sell during its Octoberfest events. Please create 3 different designs we can choose from. We will then finish one design for the final print.


Design should be 15 x 15 inches, no more than 4 colors and include Bobbing Brewery Brewing Company, Octoberfest 2023, Hutchinson Minnesota and a waitress in a Dirndle dress.

QUINCY:

I’ve made a few rough sketches with different ideas and slightly different tones with them. I haven’t worked with the full composition of the ideal shirt designs nor colored them yet because I wanted to see how you felt about them first. Have a good night!


START DESIGN CO.:

Hi Quincy, these are a great start. I've been trying to get them to agree to a mermaid for 4 years. If you could develop that one, plus your favourite out of the other two, that should get us closer. For the woman fishing, could you place her on the end of a dock or change the stump to a free standing dock post in the water, perhaps something left over from an old dock? They really like to play up the "lake life" aspect of their brewery.

I know they are going to ask to see a beer mug or two, or even a beer stein in the design – if you are comfortable drawing those. You can stay in the sketch phase, but take them to that full composition you mentioned.





QUINCY:

So sorry for the late message I’ve been super busy catching up on schoolwork because I was sick last week. I got the composition done for these two, plus added the beer mugs. If you need me to do some colors let me know.


START DESIGN CO.:

No problem on the delay. Hope you are feeling better.

We still have a good amount of time. If you can take the mermaid one and add colour to it I think it will be in a good place to submit it to the brewery for consideration. So no rush on it, but probably no later than the end of March.Thanks!


QUINCY:

I cleaned up the lines and laid down some color, I like the palette but I'm not 100% about the placement. I kept three colors plus white to keep it minimal. If you want me to play with the colors more just me know. Have a great rest of your day!



START DESIGN CO.:

Thanks Quincy, I think this is great for an initial pitch. I'll send this in to the client early summer. closer to their deadline, and let you know what they say. Thanks again.






St.Elizabeth TV

CLIENT: GSW Advertising

— PROJECT NAME

St. Elizabeth TV


— ROLE

Storyboards / Illustration


— DATE

07.03.2023

PROJECT BRIEF:


St. Elizabeth Healthcare (located in Northern Kentucky) is creating a series of television commercials and we are need of some of the scripts visualized as storyboards before shooting to help with planning of the overall production.

Original sketch from GSW

QUINCY:

Attached are 2 rough sketches to see if this is the style you are looking for. Once we agree on a style I will finish all the frames you have requested.


GSW ADVERTISING:

Thanks for sending some work in progress sketches. Overall they are looking good, but I'd like to dial back the "cartoonness" of the faces (no big anime eyes), and for the next pass let's tighten up the lines, add a little more detail to the background and send them on a white background.


QUINCY:

Attached are a couple refined images for the storyboard.


GSW ADVERTISING:

Quincy this is the right amount of finish and detail. Let's go ahead and finish out the rest of the frames. Thanks.


GSW ADVERTISING:

Thank you very much Quincy, the frames look great. I attached a copy of the completed storyboard so you could see how it all came together. Thanks again.