FACEPOCALYPSE

Another portrait for Media class; one of my housemates this time. I’m trying to push my mark making and explore other stylistic approaches. It’s kind of based on one of Nicolai Fechin’s techniques, with a bit of improvised scratchy pencil over the top.

Tools used: graphite block, smudge stick, kneadable eraser, 2H and 4B pencils.

I also found that if I use a sharp 2H pencil to draw it digs the line into the page so when you go over with the graphite block those lines remain light. This could be useful! I must experiment further.

A few more figures!

A 10-15min drawing people seem to like. I was playing more with softening edges for this one, also keeping in mind the idea of ‘sensitivity’. Paying attention to the marks you’re making and not being really heavy handed. This ties in with the rendering form in general; blending the pastels where the shadow softens and turns the form.

Plus an untimed drawing. I intended on using this for a poster but did a painting instead.

The aforementioned painting. Oil painting on canvas + digital wizardry. It was a bit of a rush; kept it very simple, reliant on implied detail. The poster design is in the works and due Monday!

Following on from my original sketch I did some thumbnails of the girl on the bus, sticking to 3 values to make sure everything reads.

After my critique the decision was between the top left and bottom right thumbnails.

I chose the bottom right, and didn’t completely stick to the value structure (which I should’ve), but kept in mind the principles of composition. Most importantly, putting a light shape on a dark shape or vice versa. This assures the silhouette of everything reads and will help direct your focus.

Andrew Android Jones, the man of a thousand faces. Literally. This is one of the reasons Conceptart.org garnered attention and grew as it did. It was started so there’d be something which kept people coming back to the forum regularly, and 1000 daily portraits later CA.org had grown immensely. Ofcourse, not all of its successes are attributed to this but perhaps this is one that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Anyway, Andrew is one of the best known digital artists, and virtually the face of Corel Painter, as well as the inspiration for Alchemy. This week he dropped by the Kansas City workshop and spread some inspiration. Read the rest of this entry →

After an intense day of (awesome) presentations by George Pratt (about 5 hours worth) I spent last night doing refining the composition of my thumbnail and then tweaking colours. I was originally working with cool colours but John English’s very apt critique was that he’d like to see a warm palette which really accentuates the heat. It needs to look like this guy is out in the burning sun. I didn’t even think to take that approach! Brilliant! And after another round of critiques and some live colour tweaks this morning here’s where I ended up:

Most of the day was then spent doing a gouache painting, with only a little time lost trying to get the laser printer to print my linework on tracing paper. After about 5 attempts to pioneer a new method of linework to canvas progression (I would’ve projected the tracing paper printout instead of tracing the whole thing then projecting) I gave up on it. However, I did manage to coerce it to print straight onto watercolour paper! Even better! That’s the kind of efficiency that makes me want punch through a wall and be like, “YEAAA!” But in actuality if I tried to pull a stunt like that the wall would probably punch through me, and thus I must stick to minor feats like skipping the tracing paper phase. Anyway, due to this my project was no longer going to be on illustration board.

I learnt a fair amount about colour mixing in this assignment. I’ve never really tried to precisely mix certain colours, and given that the photo above is a bit inaccurate (little digital camera) I think it turned out pretty close to the plan. At least I’m pleased with it!

Also, along the way I was reminded that gouache dries darker than it looks when wet so my hot tip to you is to test it on paper before applying.

All in all it was a good exercise in composition, and really forced us to simplify an image. It makes me think I was actually onto something with my more minimal paintings, like this one.

That’s what I’m here to do. This is what’s getting drilled into us. We’re here to make good pictures, but it’s not that simple.

I’m just going to write about some lessons I’ve learnt thus far, in no particular order. I don’t even really know where to start so maybe I’ll start with what we’re doing now. Our first assignment.

The aim is to focus on shapes and composition to make a nice looking picture (without narrative). It has to be a square and we’re only allowed to use 1 or 2 values (max 30% diff) for each ‘object’. It’s a slice of life project, based on something here in Kansas City.

And here are my 2 best thumbnails thus far (chosen by John English), although the guy with the wheelbarrow was a distinct favourite; and when I drew it I knew I was onto something:

One thing I’ve realised while doing thumbnails is that to make things pop (really emphasise a silhouette – it’s all about silhouette) you can define shapes with other shapes, but they need to have different values. For example, you put a light figure in front of a shadowed wall, or dark figure against a light sky etc. This is seen throughout master painters’ work, and it’s probably something you’ve even heard before.

It also involves simplifying. A great deal of simplification. You need to eliminate unnecessary elements from a picture to really focus on the point, or the important subject matter.

There are 2 ways to make pictures; having no light source and using pattern/shapes to define everything, or using light to draw form. Defining all your shapes by how they interact with the light.

Anyway, I’m crazybusy with this project but will attempt to keep posting.

This morning Brent Watkinson, Gary Kelly and George Pratt gathered the Illustration Academy workshop students for an impromptu discussion on various things arty. I’m just going to relay some points in no particular order. Some things I knew were reaffirmed and others completely opened my eyes to what I should be doing. There are things that art schools/universities just don’t teach you. The overall standard of art education worldwide is pretty appalling, with a few stand-out institutions that tell students everything they need to know about working and learning as an artist. Read the rest of this entry →

My head is spinning, and I don’t mean metaphorically. I hope this is just the jetlag because I’m pretty phased at the moment, I certainly hit the ground running!

After arriving in LA on a delayed plane I was promptly whisked aside at customs due to my desire for a 6 month visa. I was shuffled into a waiting room and sat there for quite awhile as I waited for my more “in-depth” review on my visit to America. What ended up being a very brief discussion with the official there kind of made me think I was just palmed off by the guy at the first checkpoint. Anyway, in short I was granted my 6 month visa, but by the time I made it through the baggage check area (thankfully I wasn’t picked for further examination there) I’d just missed the check-in for my next flight (3hrs after my original scheduled arrival time).

Read the rest of this entry →

At the start of the year I was invited to do a digital painting demonstration by the Alfred Cove Art Society, who meet at the Atwell Art Gallery on the last Thursday of every month. I was slotted in for this week passed, and went along to share what I could with a room full of fine artists. When it comes to demonstrations I typically don’t have enough time to do anything really ‘finished’, so focus on showing different techniques. In this case I tried to liken it to painting equivalents. eg. Overlay mode is like glazing, painting in selections is like using masking fluid, and ‘undo’ is like travelling back in time. Something I do on a regular basis here in Perth.

There were an abundance of questions throughout my 1 hour painting, which was great! It’s nice to have an engaged audience, they all seemed really eager and interested.

I received a little traditional vs digital effectiveness and timeliness questioning along the way, which can be hard to field since I haven’t spent nearly as much time with traditional mediums as digital. Anyway, after I’d mostly been focussing on painting the boats one lady challenged me to paint a tree. As you might imagine I had a sly grin when responding “Sure, I’ll draw a tree.” and opened my brush list to select an appropriate tree. Then with a single swoosh a forest appeared and the room cried out “That’s cheating!”

I was amused.

But really it requires more manipulation than just slapping a line of tree clones in, and it was a nice segue into showing them brush creation.

Anyway, I worked the demo image into the painting shown below after painting into a lot of it.

It was mostly referenced from a photo I took at the Amazon River in Peru which I’d always wanted to paint. I loved the mass of boats sitting unattended as we approached the canoe we were boarding. It was almost like a dumping ground, all looking a bit abandoned like raw husks of their former glory. It’s almost haunting. I also added the bird, an escort of sorts. Your guide across the waters, like you need some protection from what lurks beneath. The Amazon is built up as a dangerous place with lots of animals quite capable of eating you and your new safari outfi; yet it looks so placid…

I’ve just watched the free TAD on demand streaming workshop. It’s available for anyone to watch if other artists are interested. I enjoyed the process insights but think the best content is probably in the Q&A section at the end.  A lot of common problems artists face are brought up. Things like what to focus on to be a better artist, when perfectionism helps vs hinders, the question of ‘style’, and so on. However, I thought I’d write a post on ‘critiquing’ since  it extends beyond artists.

Constructive critique can be a great tool for improvement, but I’ve received a lot of horribly unproductive crits in my time and it’s generally due to a lack of awareness. There’s a lot more to critiquing than people realise, and little comments can have more impact than people realise. One of my old art directors had a “No driveby critiques” rule in the studio, which should be implemented in any studio. A lot of it comes down to communication skills and problem solving, which are both distinct from technical skills.

Anyway, I’ve compiled artists’ pointers from the video as a series of notes: Read the rest of this entry →