Bjulvar's Sketchbook

[Archreux]

Hey man, good to hear you're feeling some stronger love for the craft. I really get what you're saying when you talk about jumping right into stuff as opposed to doing something totally unrelated to whatever it is you'll be doing for the rest of the day. For me, personally, sometimes it's so hard to just get to work straight from waking up, it takes forever to wake up fully. Haha. That's cool, though.

It looks like you're making good progress on that spellsword, that comp is really selling it. Getting rid of lines can be a pain in the ass if you don't make them small enough, I've got the same problem too. It just takes time to get used to the process, much like everything else. If I could make a small suggestion, it'd be to take the building out from behind his head, and leave the area open how you have it in the previous WIP, his silhouette stands out way more in the earlier version. More buildings in the background would be nice, though. So try experimenting with some different placement and see how that works. :]

[Bjulvar]

Archreux
Thank you, it feels good! Yeah it's not easy to do it. But it's mostly because I find myself distracted throughout the day if the first thing on my mind is games! Might be like how breakfast is the most important meal :P
Haha yeah, just drink some coffe and do bad doodles for a while then! :D

Thanks a bunch for the suggestion man. I went with it and put some more buildings behind him. More problems arose though, but I think that I like it more. Just a matter of rendering and moving stuff around! But that's true about it being a process as everything else. Just do it enough times and a technique will surely stick.


Spitpaintinging Tribal earing. just playing around



Two masterstudies one for value and one for color.




A sketch I lost interest in, some things that I wanted to apply.



New sketchbook+ finger!



Diablo 3 fan art compositions, going with the fourth one.

[Adzerak]

Mmm the face of that knight sketch is really nice, how the shadow falls and the look of the helmet. Even though you tired of it xD
So. Many. Barbarians! That is awesome you know. If you fancy a good read for inspiration, have you heard of The first law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie? Dark fantasy with sweet characters and some great barbarians among 'em!

[Bjulvar]

Adzerak
Thanks a bunch man, yeah it started out kind of interesting. Felt that it didn't progress though! :P
Barbarians for the win! I've never heard of that book series, but I read the synopsis of it and now I'm going to order it, obviously! Thanks for the tip mate!

Not much to show now, been working on finishing the spellsword piece!
Here's a another masterstudy, it's fun to do these every day.



A wise one spitpainting



Some sketches from the moleskin archiiives

[Bjulvar]

Finished the spellsword dude! This was pretty difficult for me to finish since it looked like crap for like 3 weeks. Just couldn't get it right! Started looking good the last few days, thank moses. Pretty happy with it overall because I felt that I challenged myself with some architecture and a more dynamic pose. All in the same piece, woah!



Todays spitpainting, went with Island castle. But it doesn't look like a castle :O Blasphemy!



Another one of those masterstudies. Played around with mixing brushes, though it didn't end up very visible.



Diablo fan art progress. Just started painting a bit in the silhouettes, still figuring out direction of light and colors. I think that I'm going to go with the colorpalette that the new expansion will be set in. From the look of the screenshots atleast. We'll see if I can make it.



Now off to bed! Nighty night!

[crackedskull]

Spellsword looks friggin amazing, good job dude, keep it up.

[Bjulvar]

Thanks Cracked, I'm glad that you like it! :D

Todays masterstudy, played some more with the mixer brush. Made my head hurt I think.



Value gesture



Some more progress on that diablo piece. I can feel that this is going to be a difficult one. Both with time and with quality :P



Pimped this one out a bit, it's an older sketch I posted here. I'm going to try and have it in an art exhibition here in my home town. Don't know if they like digital work or not, but we'll see. I'll update ya!

[will123will]

Love that last piece, the design of his head is really cool.

[Bjulvar]

Thanks Will, appreciate it! Love me some portraits!

Spitpainting medusa's shield



Mastursturdy in da values



Afterwork sketch



Damnit, feels like I'm getting sick. Catching a cold or some cool shit. I've been without energy today.

[Warburton]

Arrrgh you big show off! Pumpin all this work out and making us all look bad :D I kid of course but it is always cool dropping by here and seeing a ton of updates, makes me feel lazy, which I like. Gotta step up my game! :p

That latest spell sword piece came out great man, it's awesome that you stuck with it and saw it through to the end too. I especially like all the buildings and stuff around him, it looks cool. Always a bit of a fan boy when it comes to your designs too. That dude with the book and the blue effects is awesome, you did a great job of selling his attitude and personality.

[Bjulvar]

Warburton
Haha yeah damnit! Flexing those art-muscles too muuch. Sounds like a good exchange then, since I feel the same way when dropping by your sketchbook :D Inspirational!

Thank you man, really happy that I did too. Real struggle towards the end haha. Never do buildings or have much going on in the backgrounds otherwise so that was fun! Ooh really flattering to hear dude. Now I feel like I have something to prove haha :P
One of my favorites to! Planning to do something larger with him, maybe a project or two!


Been kind of beat down this week. Started off by being feverish and sick, so couldn't work with anything for some days. Then I found out that I wouldn't get a job during the summer from my internship and after that I got rejected at an exhibition, thought that I had shot!

Pretty disappointed that I didn't finish the diablo fanart piece either. I never really like the composition that much, so it felt more like turd-polishing all the way through. One lesson learned I suppose. Don't stick with what you don't like!

So I have to take some new and deep breaths and get going again.

Here's the failed diablo piece. Don't know if it's bad for real, or if it's me that's having high standards. Anyway, really felt that I had to perform and that crippled me in a sense. So next step is trying to have fun while still doing something that's important. But I guess that's going to be hard.



Sky Demon spitpainting



Armorstudy, kind of a quick one. Haven't done a long study for soo long.



A flexible gesture study



Quick gestures



Gnoll Warlord Spitpainting



Hoppin Hood



Sketch thing, trying out some new paper



Going to apply for another school this year. It's called informative illustration. One of the assignments for the portfolio is a piece with two active people, one being carried. Full body shot with the heads visible. I like what I'm doing, but with this one I want the carried guy to be leaned against the other dude. Hopefully it still fits the rules. Might have to do another one.



Anyways have a nice day/night guys. Take care of your beautiful selves.

[Bjulvar]

Dear diary, pretty crappy day today. But it's better now, so all is good.
Went ahead and tried out an intuos on a laptop. Colors didn't turn out great now when I've switched monitors. So here's some fun things!





landscape sketch



Mushroom king spitpainting



Cloaks and cloths



And a dude that flies without wings, kind of!

[Bjulvar]

Sketchbook thingies! Fixed a tooth and it felt so good that I had to eternalize it on paper!



Stonedude, I like drawing stone



Red Hunter with a crappy mech.



Helmet study for some textures, pushed this one a bit further than usual.



Changed the portfolio piece around a bit so it matched the brief more. I guess it wasn't worth risking it! Going to find a more suitable pose for the guy being carried though. A bit stiff right now.



And something fun that I'm working on. Pretty early stage though.

[Archreux]

Heyyyyy, that spellsword turned out really nice. Man, sorry to hear about the stuff that's been going on, it's hard sometimes to not let it all get you ya, especially being sick and all. It's all just more of a reason to feed the fire and stay even hungrier. We'll all make it, and I'm confident that you've got what it takes to do it. :]

That Diablo piece isn't half bad either, it does suck you didn't finish it in time, however, you've got something to show for it. I'd even say you should keep working on it. If you extended the canvas out to give it more breathing room it could be something quite nice.

Great colors on all these other quickies, you've really got a solid grasp on those I've noticed, a lot of your stuff reminds me of Mike Azevedo's work and how he uses color/light.

Going to avoid long wall of text here. Keep killing it! :D

[Jaik]

Man, I really love looking through your sketchbook. Its really eye opening to see the amount of sketches and imaginative work you do. Really need to follow your lead. With the guy carrying another guy, dont forget about centre of gravity, he would be leaning over a lot more with his feet basically under the guy he is carrying.

Keep up the good work! :D

[Bjulvar]

Archreux
Yoooh thanks dude! Yeah it sucked for a period of time there, but it's getting better! I think that I'm in a situation now where it's going up and down :P Trying my best to feed the fire! Thank you man, that's motivating to hear. You're too cool! We'll make it if we fight for it :D

Might try and do that. Wouldn't hurt to see if there's room to continue. Got too caught up with thinking about being so original and all. Now I can be a bit more bold!

Ah that's a nice compliment dude! :D I was kind of inspired by him a while back. Cool that something stuck!

THanks a bunch for the words of encouragement man, I appreciate it :D


Jaik

Hah I'm happy that you love it, making me blush man! Yeah just go for it dude, nothing holding ya back! I have been neglecting doing proper studies for a while though, so don't fall into that trap either :P
Thank you Jaik! Fixed a bunch of stuff after you pointed that out, probably wouldn't have figured it out otherwise! Good thing there's girlfriends to lift so you can check for reference! :P

You too man!

Still focusing on cloaks and fabric. Want to nail down some of it's feeling. So here's another study and an application of it. I think that it's really hard to imagine how cloth flows and falls, so it's a bit of a challenge.





A skeleton King sketch, didn't feel it that much, but continued on for a while anyway.



Cloud Archdemon spitpainting. Played around with colored lineart to get some style to it. Liked it!



A sketchie-doodle I call Finding home, dunno why. Might continue when I have more time.



Beetle study for that piece with a guy riding on an insect. Helped out a bunch.



Here's the Active human piece with changes done to it. Still early in it's process but I'm polishing it to look as good as the other pieces that I do. Don't want the quality to be bad right now :O



And here's some anime inspired stuff. Watched a bunch of Miyazaki movies lately and I can't believe that I've missed them. All of them are freaking awesome, so had to draw something in that nature (obviously not near it :P)
Really refreshing to move away from realistic stuff once in a while!

[Bjulvar]

Portraitstudy, gotta get more real with my faces. They've started to look more cartoony!



A guy that means business. Little sketchy sketch as an application of various things



Ancient warlord speedy

[Rosolino]

ooh boy, how many studies did i missed!! nice to know that you continue doing awesome stuff Bjulvar! good to see you buddy, keep pushing forward!!

[Adzerak]

Hail to ye!
Those spitpaints of yours, do you use some sort of random generator or just draw the first thing that pops up in your head? Seems like a sweet warm-up regardless, just pushing imagination and ideas around and all that good stuff.

As for the piece with the guy-carrier. Maybe you could ad some threatening background element, like soldiers or monsters chasing after, and he has to hurry to carry the wounded man away from there. Ads a bit of drama. BUT, maybe that's not what you want to go for xD Right now it has more of a calm, brothers in arms feel about it.

[Bjulvar]

Rosolino
Hey dude! Thank you man, glad you like it! You'll have to post more, since you're an awesome beast :D

Adzerak
Haail brothah!
They're mostly done based on words that are posted in the various spitpainting/sketch groups on facebook! I try to come up with my own themes, but that can easily lead to just repeating the same things over and over! But it's supersweet, it has definitely helped with speed and confidence. Try it out man!

Link to one cool group if you're not already a member:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/29066624...1/?fref=ts

Thanks a buuuunch man, that's exactly what I did, just subtely though! It wasn't the goal at first, just as you said, blood brothers type of thing. But drama doesn't hurt. I couldn't make the poses dynamic either because I feared that I would go against the brief that the school wanted.

Here it is done as a matter of fact! I struggled quite a bit with everything here. So I'm not very satisfied. A lot of limb-moving and pixelpushing. Must've gone through about five different faces too.
But I'm happy that I did something where two characters interacted more closely than usual. That was the biggest challenge.




A study of a torso, gotta level up those anatomy skills



Some quick sculpture studies for fun



Tried out that Cartoon screen paintover, twas fun!



Two sketchies from da book of sketches. Added supercool real shadow effects from reality, totally a new genre. Planning on taking the dude with the turtle further!