Paint Sketch

I just got a new tablet, to replace the one that fried. So, here's a warm-up painting to get back into practice.

Ne shiteru... ?

8-04 Sketch

For something a little different, this week, I came up with a sketch prompt for myself. Today's been packed, so I've only finished Part 1, so far. I'll finish the rest of it over the weekend, though.

For anyone following this blog, feel free to follow along and do this prompt yourself (and share your sketches, too, if you do) or suggest prompts for the future.

1. Pick the animal that you find most difficult to draw, and sketch it.
2. Now, pick the animal that is easiest for you to draw. Sketch this one the same as you did for the first animal.
3. Pick a random animal that you find interesting. Sketch it, as you did with the others.
4. ???
5. Profit! Combine all three animals into a chimera-type creature. Try to blend the features of all three into something that looks like it could exist in nature.

Step 1 - Horse

• I'd recommend drawing from life, where possible. Of course, there aren't any horses near where I live, so I used this photo as reference. Try to keep your drawing fairly realistic. Heavily stylized looks exaggerate or cut out visual information, and thus won't help you improve on drawing the real thing.
• Don't re-use existing sketches. Make a new drawing for each step.
• For a little extra challenge, don't erase (or if working digitally, undo) any of your lines. Just put 'em down, and try to live with it.

7-28 Sketch

I've started doing something unusual, lately: namely, playing an MMORTS. Games I enjoy rarely fall into the category of "MMO" or "RTS," much less both at the same time. Last week, though, Hellcat invited me to play League of Legends with him. I was skeptical at first (and also not very good at it), but the game has won me over. I like the art style quite a bit, and the gameplay turned out to be pretty fun once I figured out what I was supposed to be doing.

One of my favorite champions, in terms of design is Anivia. She just looks awesome. She's one of Hellcat's preferred champions, too, so I thought she might be a good subject for a paint-sketch, today. [Insert obligatory Articuno joke here.]

I promise I'll post some non-bird art, soon.

7-21 Sketch

I'm working on commissions again, so a lot of what I've been drawing won't be posted for awhile. I do have something new, today, though. Here's a quick 30-min sketch, 30-min color of Seket that I did as a warm-up.

Birthday Birds

Two of my friends and classmates had birthdays this week, so I did some gift art for them. The first is for Cara. It's a sort-of fanart for her series "Pesedjet," featuring Thoth, god of writing and other scholarly pursuits. The second image is for Christine, and depicts her personal charge, the cockatoo with a bit of an in-joke.

I feel that these turned out pretty well, and both were very enjoyable to draw. Funnily enough, I used to hate drawing birds, because I never felt I was very good at them. After doing this commission, though, that's changed and I actually like birds quite a bit more.

Weekly Sketches

Here's a little bit of what I've been working on, over the past week. After finishing up Sobel, I did a character sketch of Myron.

I spent a lot more time on this one, playing around with a larger scene. Ultimately, though, I scrapped the idea and went back to the simpler spot illustration style I used with Sobel. It was a little frustrating at first. I felt as though I'd wasted a lot of time fiddling around with something that didn't make it into the piece. Then I remembered how Tom Jech advised us, when he visited BGSU this past semester, that the difference between student and professional work is often what you don't include. It's good advice that I think I'm starting to internalize.

The next sketch that I worked on is a few months older: the clothing design for the High Priestess of the Syäloä, län-Eyloeiwä I started this one at the same time as the others, but felt unsure about how to finalize the design. I spent a few minutes on it again this week, and feel quite confident about the design. She shares some elements of dress with the temple guardians. This also shows, when compared with the other outfits, a cultural element of hierarchy through dress--the higher an individual's status, the more clothing they wear. This is a common practice in many real-world societies.

You can see the previous clothing concepts here; the Temple Guardian here; and the High Priestess here.

Critters!

It's been awhile since I last posted. I've been busy with commissions, that I'll hopefully be able to post later. In the mean time, here's some personal sketches I've been working on. Alien critters!

I always enjoy having a few "rules" to play by when I create new creatures and characters. It helps keep me focused on important aspects of the design and the opportunity to find creative solutions on how to work within my rules.

One of the rules for this set of xeno-animals is that none of them could have true teeth (the predators' fangs are part of the skull), and they must have scaly, avian/reptilian feet. With just those two rules, I've made five different creatures, each with its own niche. Hopefully, their roles will be clear from their designs. (Click the image for a bigger view.)

• The nova-frill is a small arboreal creature that eats fruits and nuts. Its brightly colored frill changes color and fans out to frighten predators.
• The poiga is an herbivore that lives in lowland jungles and marshes.
• The firetail is a pack predator and scavenger that inhabits grasslands. Males have a brightly-colored tail to attract mates.
• The terror-bear is an apex predator that prefers temperate and taiga forests.
• The skaptopus is a small jungle insectivore, and a good swimmer.

These have been a lot of fun, and I've also enjoyed getting critique from and bouncing ideas off of  Leah. I'll probably do another set of creatures like this in the near-ish future.

Concepts

Continuing the concept work I've been doing lately, I moved on to fleshing out character designs for some of the Syäloä characters. Because my initial focus this time was clothing design, I simply re-used my temple guardian sketch as a base. It saves time and the pose--frontal, fairly open--works well for quick sketches.

The first design is for the High General of the Autocracy, Seket. This one was particularly challenging, because I needed to incorporate armor. What I finally decided upon was a modular design. The partial armor Seket has on is her everyday wear, which augments her strength without being cumbersome. More pieces can be added for combat.

The second design is for the Empress of the Autocracy, Nileshta, which developed much more easily. I got a lot of great feedback from Leah and Christine, which really helped the process. Christine even contributed a few touches to Nileshta's headdress.

Sketches - "Chandra"

Now that I finally have an opportunity to work on personal art, I've decided to start doing more exercises. I really want to spend some time on technique, and try to examine where I need work. I decided to begin with some character work, and picked Chandra as my subject.

I hadn't done much with the character since I designed her a couple months ago, so I wanted to try to explore her personality with some studies. Her clothes, jewelry, and makeup reflect the culture she's grown up in, and I felt her movements should, as well. Unlike her mother who's usually standing straight, I chose a lot of crouching poses. Mom is also used to chairs, while Chandra just sits on the ground.

The original photo references come from some super-cool folks on deviantART: SenshiStock,  Kirilee, Gesastock, Reference-Poses, and DrunkHobo-Stock.