Swindesr's Sketchbook

[swindesr]

Hey I'm Sam. I've been drawing and painting like crazy for 4 months trying to go from design to illustration. Here's a few highlights of the last few months. Will keep it updated as often as possible.

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/T0qll4j

Highlights

[DESQUOLOR]

welcome welcome!! I can't wait to see more. Nice work so far!

[John]

Hey Sam. Very diverse array of pieces! Welcome to the Crimson Daggers.

[swindesr]

Thanks for the welcome. Happy to be around. Here's some more studies from the week.

[Fedodika]

You've been drawing 4 months? very solid for that amount of time, post moarr

[swindesr]

Fedo: I should probably elaborate. I have a degree in Graphic Design, so I have a decent background of drawing experience from that. But, until recently I never really pushed drawing. Mostly just did it to pass the class and get to my Graphic Design core stuff.

Here's a study from this morning.
And here's a piece I started last night. 1.5 hours in to get value/color set up. It's a remake of a painting I did in December. Trying to see how much I've progressed.

[Fedodika]

try to recreate the arm in an application so it sticks, or whatever youre studying so the study is more meaningful than just a hand exercise

[darktiste]

The minimum mentality can get you a degre but it won't get you a job that will last.I don't say that to be harsh i think it a reality.

[swindesr]

Ya lol definitely agree with that Darktiste. I put all my eggs in design and did good and got a job then realized I wanted to do the drawing thing. Long past are the days of me slacking with drawing.

fedo: good point. Will have to think up something to work on. Lot of the time arms are weird for me because on most people their arm muscles are so small and subtle.

[darktiste]

You mean illustration rather than design?

[swindesr]

Yah like I went to school for graphic design, and then worked as a designer for a few years before now switching over to illustration. Used to put all my effort in school to typography/grid/etc. not drawing. Not sure why though, I like drawing more haha

[swindesr]

A life drawing from the other night and some asaro head studies to better understand reflected lights. Now to work on my bigger piece using that new knowledge!

[swindesr]

Further work on this piece. Trying to figure out how to give his skin a good texture. A bit too smooth for my liking in most areas.

[Fedodika]

i think the issue isnt the texture, color, lighting or values its the drawing, maybe seek a reference of that pose or take one yourself and see how it measures up; You can also try DAZ3D studio, its free and you get a poseable model to play around with ;)

[swindesr]

Drapery study and the final for the alien zombie piece I was working on this weekend.

[Fedodika]

soo i wanted to drop these, to give you some ideas about pushing this monster piece. definitely watch the critters streams and learn the general idea of pushing a concept further and making it more interesting. This comes from good drawing and shape design, not rendering

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWDyzRxtCjQ

I did essentially the same kinda thing, which is push the shape, you know, if its a horrifying alien, make his silhouette itself horrifying. When i see this character you drew, he has big eyes, a small mouth, tiny body, he's actually kinda cute. 

For making a crazy alien, combine two things that dont make sense together, what i went for was like a crocodile and a birdlike thing. Pick some animals like that and draw them from reference, then make your design, it'll be more informed by reality and have a much better design. Also reference is key for the back, find or create the best reference you can so you can see all those muscles, it adds 1000% quality to a piece. again, proper indication, not rendering. 

and if his heads in shadow, why? so you can obscure the forms, which is useful for horror. But i can guess exactly what this guy looks like, so if he has a more unusual form, that adds to the horror, and also some secondary light thats dim on the edge of the forms can help a lot ;)

[swindesr]

Hey! I appreciate the response and paintover. All good points to think about. In this case, I just don't really like the crazy monster approach.

It would be interesting to think of ways to push his shape further while keeping it rather humanoid.

[Fedodika]

in that case, you could model it after humanoid like creatures like chimps or bonobos and combine it with a reptile like skin or something closer to human. You just gotta still push the design and make the silhouette more engaging, its all in the drawing ;)