Form Drawing Class

These images are from my form drawing class with Vanessa Lemen. Starting from the first week to the third week, you can see a major difference in skill. I just wish I could be around to take the other five weeks.

2nd to go...

Ok so now that Eddie's picture is done, I can move on to this experiment. I decided to make this more of a supernatural/halloweeny theme and turn the space ship into the moon. I added a mummy in the foreground to give it some compositional structure as well as better intensity.

Before

After

Now I'm having problems with the left arm at it's insertion at the shoulder. the bicep is crooked and I'm not really sure how to fix this... I still need to add a face and render out the details but once all the problems are solved I can kick this one out the door in no time. I think I'm going to take a break from it for a little bit though to work on the third illustration, just to have fresh eyes later.

One Down...

And I'm calling it finished.... 2 more to go.

Madness

Ok... So after a long day of video games and movies, I jumped onto Photoshop CS4 for the first time to start working on Eddie a bit more. Here's the current progress.... I'm deeply amazed with the outcome so far, and the way I'm seeing the strokes stack upon one another. This has been a huge problem solving challenge.

Before

After

Notice the corrections to proportion and relationships. Thanks to Ron and Vanessa, I'm starting to see these relationships and patterns better, and it's making it easier to see the process from stage to stage.

Painting Breakthrough

I was working on this image and started playing around with my brushes. I realized with great glee that the brush I had created for hair worked better as an oil painting brush. Here is the result of just using it to paint the forms.

The Old Getting Newer

So, thanks to the Studio 2nd Street After Hours group and my continued instruction from Ron Lemen, I'm glad to say that my work is improving immeasurably. However, every time I turn over a new stone, I find several more to be explored. Here are 3 illustrations I want to have done in the coming few weeks before I break for the summer.

This started the other day as a speed painting. I've only worked about 30 minutes into it, however I see great potential in its design. I'm hoping to add in atmospheric effects, movement blurs and tie in a background spaceship or two to complete the image.

I had started this back in December but never really worked on it since then. I decided that the linear and blotchy background just wouldn't do, so I threw in this new one. I plan on completing this very quickly over the next few days. I'm going to add more contrasting light patterns with rim lighting and try and bring that gun into a more close and personal view.

This image started a long time ago in an old sketchbook. I'd say it's been over a year now. The image itself is very flat and linear, however I still see this as a challenge due to the incredible contrast in light patterns. The throne she is knee deep in, is composed of liquid crystal and will give off it's own glow. With that in mind, I have to greatly engineer the proper lighting effects on her body, as well as the hands coming out of the darkness to grab her. The hands will be a great challenge, hopefully getting me to see perspective and foreshortening in a new way.

Leaps In Improvement

As I mentioned before; my experience with the Studio 2nd Street after hours group has greatly improved my skills in drawing and digital painting. Here is the first project we worked on, a shamanistic character built for the cold:


Here is a sketch done after the last sketch critique. As you can see, I took better care in analyzing her proportions and tried to tone using a smudge stick this time instead of my finger:

Improving Upon Ideas

After my meetings with Andy, Mike and Dave, my ability to draw has improved as well as my ability to paint in photoshop. Here is a piece I had wanted to work on, of which I had a thumbnail, for several months. It's amost finished, I just need to detail the armor and figure out how I want the bottom of the page to look.

Preliminary Outline

Mid-Production Underpainting

Near Finalized Piece