eilidh: sketches, WIPs, and the abandoned

#38

And if you don’t do it like that, how will you do it? :slight_smile:

Traditional doesn’t exclude using various means – on the contrary. You get to use large bristly brushes, palette knives, sponges and cloth or wrinkled paper to make patterns, your own fingers – all sorts of things, in order to produced a desired effect. And the same happens in digital; only it’s easier, handier, and definitely more controllable.

I think it’s far from cheating: it’s plainly trying to do things in an efficient way. I don’t think it requires less skill to do something with specialized brushes like these than it would to paint them individually; I still had to think about composition, balance, flow, texture and feel. Customizing these brushes was part of the process, and it required attention as well.

I think I’ll have to refer you to your own signature as a conclusion, Renee. :slight_smile:

#39

wow. thanks for the brushes and tips eilidh. it’s great help. :slight_smile:

runecaster: i agree with everything eilidh said. i think that i was proceeding with the same frame of mind as yours until i did my forest piece. normaly the leaves would have been done by dabing etc… but how do i do that in digital media and still have the same effect? the solution was to make custom brushes. i just couldn’t do it otherwise. maybe think of each medium as a whole new game with it’s own sets of rules. some techniques you can import and some you can’t. :wink:

#40

Very well said, I think people have to be a little more open when painting digitally. If you were going to paind all those leafs individually, not only would it be a very daunting task, but the results might not even be as good than taking the ‘faster’ way.

Having said that, I’m looking forward to more progress, your artwork is great.

#41

Thanks, Giwrgo :slight_smile:

I’m afraid I might be updating much less frequently now. We had some strikes at uni in June, which means our exam period has transfered to July; I’m starting on Monday, and I have a ton of studying to catch up with. But I’m trying not to drop this altogether.

#42

How did I miss all those great replies!

My brain is warped apparently :eek:

I’m sorry to hear about the strikes - that’s a bummer about the moved test dates :frowning:

#43

Runecaster: pretty much, yes – but I can’t complain, I had all June at my disposal. Hopefully I’ll be able to steal some time in between papers to paint some more. :slight_smile:

These are from last week, for the Anatomy Lesson Series: The Head. I seriously doubt I’ll get all 50 of them done till the 26th, with the exams and all, just like I missed the deadline for the OFDW 018 – my poor Pope picture! Still, I can make a try. Every head is a bonus in terms of learning, after all.

The first, along with the original and progress:

See how warped the initial stages are? :stuck_out_tongue: It took me 2,5 hours to complete this.

And a few more in pencil (and one in pen):

#44

For the record, I’ve now uploaded some (older) works in my CGPortfolio. You can check it out if you’re interested. :slight_smile:

#45

neat! heheh, nice work once again.

#46

Great work on the head, nicely done.

#47

I happen to have a fixation with imagining cities and structures on top of / in between clouds, so this DSG topic was too, too hard to resist.


Photoshop, Painter, I guess something like 2.5-3 hours – it was done during breaks… erh… okay, during long breaks from studying. I had trouble getting the colours and textures right.

#48

Quick one, not sure exactly how long it took. Mainly done for the mood.

Photoshop – and ArtRage for some of the textures.

#49

I like the last one very much.
I like the characters you draw, like this one above, and the first one with the gunshot.
They all have a stylistic stature somehow.

#50

Thank you – and come to that, you’ve got a point about the figures. I guess Stalker would fit in that category, too.

This is an older one from June that I completely forgot about; it was an exercise in making stars following a tutorial, and on top of that I wanted to figure out how to paint aurora borealis (based on some 40 photos I searched for and downloaded).

The clouds aren’t that good looking, I know. I painted them even more hastily than the rest.

#51

Phototshop, 55 minutes.

#52

Wow, I’m in love with the one with the silhouette, it would be amazing on a large canevas!
Great sketches, some colour variations on the aurora borealis would be nice IMO :wink:

#53

Thank you, Diane. You’re quite right about the colours in the aurora borealis picture. If I retouch the picture, I’ll go for it.
Heh, the sillhouette picture is so small – this is the actual size! I really made it as an idle sketch. Fortunately, it wouldn’t be difficult to reproduce it in a larger scale.

#54

i haven’t noticed how things have been progressing in here. these are very nice ones eilidh. i love the city in the clouds.

i’ll tag you so i don’t loose track of how things are in here. :thumbsup:

#55

Thanks Ryan! It had been quite slow this past month, exams and all, and some post-exam fatigue as well. I hope I’ll be picking up again now.

Right… nothing substantial to show at this point. So here’s some quick nose studies for a character concept. Please disregard the marble texture underneath: I had it open for another WIP, and it just seemed convenient as a base colour to sketch these on.

#56

Nice nose sketches! Some cold colours on them would be nice but they are really great, noses are hard to paint! Well done :slight_smile:

#57

I know, I know. It’s almost been a year since the last post. And it’s been almost a year since I last actually painted! But uni caught up with me, and so did art school (my BA research project – no painting involved there), and all this time Photoshop and Painter seemed like alien environments. And my PC is very, very old. Well, not really that old, but it’s pretty much convinced me it feels that way. It’s practically wheezing when I open large files – really can’t bear them at all. As for inspiration? Straight out of the window.

A few days ago was my friend’s birthday, however, and I put it in my mind to paint something for him as a birthday present. One should put whatever talent they have to good use, after all. So I came up with this, overnight, because I had to squeeze it between studying and exam papers. It is essentially an illustration for one of his stories. Happy with the atmosphere and mood; not so happy with the shape of the tower (the left side). Want to include a city (also from the story) somewhere in the distance. Will I do it, or will I add this image to the long list of neverending WIPs? :stuck_out_tongue: