What ImSkeptical learnt this week (Sketchbook)

[ImSkeptical]

Sydney workshop was great, learned alot, met lots of great people. Even got to drink with Kekai. Sleeping on my friends couch, and also making the decision to not bring my tablet, i got to hone my traditional skills to the point i can get a clean drawing as opposed to a scribble. Also last week of work tomorrow so i can go back to mad study mode. Here's the stuff i did at the workshop and some stuff this week.

[JerryActric]

woah, awesome sketches man ! :) I like the jets in perspective alot !

[stace]

Great art man! Keep pushing with your drawings. You need a good drawing to make a good painting. :D

[ImSkeptical]

Thanks Jerry and Stace!

This week i worked on a project from the instructors at the Sydney workshop. I did John Park's one (if you haven't seen his stuff do it, nice guy, spectacular design work). Brief was to design a vehicle and character looking for lost treasure. I ran it close to the deadline, I feel I could've done more, like drawn more drones and made the character less simple, but here it is.










I also started doing one hour studies of Albert Bierstadt to get a feel for landscapes. One hour is so little time :(






Also, finally finished work, so pure study 12-14 hours a day except once a week when i hang out with friends because its totally necessary xD.

[Wolkenfels]

Great studies, man. i am curiuos what will happen if you invest all your time now... :)
Love the environment studies - really great for one hour studies.

[FOERVRAENGD]

those one-hour studies look very neat!

[ImSkeptical]

Thanks Wolken and Forev, environments are hard xD

This week I started attempting to model an eroche, i might do a longer writeup when its done. I took some pictures, but it looks like ass right now :(.





Also started studying cinema/storytelling in greater depth. Guess the movie :D



Anyone interested in learning a bit more about screenwriting/directing should look to this guy, some very insightful articles
http://filmcrithulk.wordpress.com/2012/0...k-archive/

Also started some idea of redesigning quake 3 arena to fit how its played competitively.



Anyone interested should watch/listen to this video of a in-depth analysis of a match.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdkDjsBiO58

Not sure i like where the designs are heading though. I really need someone to force me on a project to get me to use my imagination :(.

The environment studies are getting me frustrated, as it has forced me to realize my complete inability to deal with texture. I did a long study of one of the Bierstadt's and found its very hard to get the right amount of hard and soft edges that make up leaves and grass. So i might focus more on brush making and applying texture on separate layers. I have 2 versions as well, one with noise added, because i don't know if it makes it look better or worse xD. I wish i could look at the painting in real life. Hopefully next week is better.

[ImSkeptical]

Feels like i didn't do that much this week, but then I realized it's probably because i spent so much time figuring out 3d programs. In the end, it feels like i could do more with z-brush, but I still can't figure out how to quickly create shapes or scale and move things in the direction i want, so sketchup is probably better for now. Both is probably the answer. I don't feel like its a waste of time because it seems a pretty logical process if you can build a design quickly, because it allows for easier experimentation with stuff like modules and scale of parts, especially if you already build a personal library of shapes. At least in my mind, maybe i am just wasting time :(. I mostly just want to be this guy http://karanak.deviantart.com/. Anyway i also learned from this guy if people want to follow me into this challenging realm.
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread....her/page49

Still working on the eroche, my camera's out of batteries, so hopefully i finish and show you guys next week? If you can guess the ref of my rotate the gesture study at the top you get 10 points xD.







Also was convinced by a Greg Manchess article to give tracing a try, and it does seem like it is a better way to study certain things. You do run the risk of turning you brain off though, i don't think its wise to listen to an audiobook while doing it.




Read some notes by Craig Mullins
http://theillustratorsnotebook.com/wp-co...inting.pdf
Made me try alter my approach to painting. Before I had this love hate relationship with painterly/chalk brushes, because edge control is entirely dependent on you pressing hard to get hard edges. I loved the painterly look and the textures you could get, but I like pressing as lightly as possible, a habit from starcraft and streetfighter, so you can see on the first page of my sketchbook there is no nice sharp edges, everything is too soft. For the past month, i discovered just using my sketch brush, which had no flow control on it, i could get those edges, and thus became aware of the problem, and also how to fix it. Furthermore from the workshop i learn't from keikai how to love the smudge brush to easily lose and gain those edges. However, after reading Craig's notes, and some articles by Manchess, I'm trying a new approach of reintroducing those brushes and just learning to press down hard to get those strokes. This is to also to follow their philosophy of directly picking the correct values and colors as opposed to blending to them, to get the painterly look that i want. Wish me luck in this new method!



Out of my studies, i think I learned a lot from this detail master study of Bierstadt ( http://www.googleartproject.com/collecti...dt/544137/ ) as I think i finally got my head around leaves. The answer was not expecting a brush to do all the work for me, and just spending more time than i thought it would. For some reason i thought a brush with the right shape and scatter, and picking the right values would magically give me leaves in 2 strokes. The answer is no.




I need to do more sketches for personal work and more drawing next week? Hopefully i didn't miss the revise timing on learning birds and cats.

[DK]

At first glance I thought that turn around was Ibuki from streetfighter, haha probably wrong. Very nice studies man, hope to see some more finished personal work though. Continue doing both studies and personal work and eventually everything will start to mesh. Keep up the good work.

[ramalooke]

Really great stuff. You are working hard for sure and I can see improvement on this single page. Really inspiring. Keep pushing it!

[iCi]

Looking good, improvement is so visible. Especially hard surface stuff! Keep it up!
Imho, you need more 'brave' lines when drawing figures and animals. Do not stop the line when you are doing curves, let it flow, free your hand a bit more, like in those quick movement drawings you did. *But still keep the concentration up and running :)

[JerryActric]

drooooooollll'n at the swat guy ! and the landscape, also man i have something that may help you with your model !

3d anatomy model
https://www.biodigitalhuman.com/

this has helped me no end to understand muscles, except they are rather flat compared to real life. So check where they insert and end, but then check them again from a real life photo !

Keep on kicking buuuuuut !

---

"The answer was not expecting a brush to do all the work for me, and just spending more time than i thought it would. For some reason i thought a brush with the right shape and scatter, and picking the right values would magically give me leaves in 2 strokes."

also i suffered this issue aswell hahaha

[ImSkeptical]

So close Dennis, you get 5 points xD. It was SF, but it was Cammy, stand jab, stand strong, crouching fierce then crouching strong (just incase someone wanted to know :D). I took your advice and really pushed myself to not just do studies, but i didn't get to finish the piece i worked on. Oh well, i have a problem it that i need people to help with though.

Thanks ramalooke, i checked out your stuff too, you're getting it done to xD. So many people leveling up at crimson daggers :D.

Thanks for the encouragement ici!. I actually took a break from doing so much hard surface because i was doing it in 3d xD. I need to get around to showing the little i've learnt in that. But yeah, i'm taking your advice of fluid figures by going back to studying loomis and vilppu.

Hey Jerry, man you always have great reference! Your google-fu is so much better than mine xD. Keep on working at it you're getting there!


So this week was me trying to not just do a study a do a personal piece, which i always have trouble with xD. I think its because i think and plan too much, as opposed to just being willing to get something out. I managed to get sketches of 2 ideas i managed to not think myself out of, so hopefully i get both done in 2 weeks! Other than that, studies were targeted at really nailing a process for learning using minimal brushstrokes (greg manchess style), keeping in mind that it will probably be distinct to the process when doing concept work or creating a personal piece. I'll write about it next week if i still like it.










And here's my personal work. It's not finished yet, and i need help in deciding which drawing looks better/ less incorrect. In future, im probably going to setup a clay diorama or something to figure out the perspective/foreshortening better, because its horrible how much time i spent just switching between the two every now and then xD.






I'll post it in the critique/paintover thread too. Cya next week, work less hard so i can catch up to you all xD.

[ramalooke]

It's really early in the morning for me. So my brain cells are not awake yet. But I'll try to share with you some of my thoughts. I like your composition and the mood of the piece. However the narrative is a bit unclear for me. I have no idea what's going on. If this chick killed those guys? Or someone else killed them and she's running away. What's with the cat? The cat killed those knights and now it's after her? I saw your post in critique thread and I understand you have the biggest problem with foreshortening. But to be honest I really thing this hand have to go. It's distracting and have broken anatomy. Foreshortening is the smallest of your problems here. Side of that you also want to fix your perspective and adjust the values. Hope that makes sens. I like the piece. Once you fix it I think it can become really strong image. And again, those are only my thoughts. And it's really early xD Cheers

[kidult]

i'd say at the very least she needs to be running towards something.

[ImSkeptical]

Thanks ramalooke and kidult for the help! I tried to clarify the storytelling by making the knife more obvious. Also in the end I went with the smaller hand, because you said it was distracting and smaller is better for that? It's still all wrong, and next time ill be sure to at minimum just strongly define a horizon with a guide or something and project out a ground plane and boxes or something. I only spent one extra day on it this week, then gave up :(. I need help choosing between whether these color changes made it better though.




Some movie shot comp analysis, I kinda want to go through the entire of no country for old men. We will see if I bother. Maybe I can do a full writeup analyzing the movie scene by scene?




Trying to refocus on drawing, cause that's where its got to happen! Also analyzing some face characteristics. This was after I learned that a lot of the time, actors are cast for their eyes, and a sort of eye-typecasting goes on where you can get certain categories like, the wide innocent type, the slightly off kilter may turn psycho, and the imminent tragedy pain and suffering type.







3d, going to do more of these. I don't know how detailed i should bother to go though, ill probably end up trying to do full detail 3d at least once.



Also I have been more prone to going outside and sketching for a bit traditionally, because I realized that not seeing the sun in 2 months was depriving me of vitamin D and making me tired. See yall next week, be sure to crit my thing, i would be ever so grateful xD.

[DK]

Nice studies man, and I'm glad you're doing that illustration piece, it's turning out great. I actually really like it, even though I don't really see her killing off those knights with a knife, haha.

For the color changes I would personally go with the first one in your last post; the one with the more warmer yellow tint; that one just feels more right to me, can't explain other than that :(.

You're doin awesome by the way, tons of work. Keep this up.

[Ursula Dorada]

Nice sketchbook man :D

[ImSkeptical]

Thanks as always Dennis. My excuse for the narrative is magic xD, which is also why she gets to wear skimpy clothes in the snow.

Thanks Ursula, but yours is much better than mine, I'm envious of you people and your pencil rendering skills.

So this week pretty much more of the same. I pretty much took a day off though because I realized tea had way more caffeine than i thought, so i thought 6 cups a day might be abit counter productive. So i went cold turkey and got these crazy caffeine headaches, but now I'm all good. Only hot chocolate for me! :D

Studies from "cabin in the woods", great film, some quick studies some slower.


Taking notes from Hannes, i'm going to make more of an effort to do pure imaginative/memory stuff. I have mixed feelings about it, but I feel that there probably is significant gains from pushing how far you can get without looking at anything. My memory's trash anyway and needs some training. So here's some no ref faces and a rendering that came out way better than I thought i could do from no ref.


Learning about guns




Rotating is getting better?


More 3d. I really need to experiment on whether 3d or 2d would be faster to detail


Thanks for looking. Also these two tumblers
http://eyecager.tumblr.com/
http://amberblade.tumblr.com/
are amazing. I'm not sure but I think one of the artists on Skullgirls (a good fighting game) runs them. Anyone able to tell me if that's correct? Or where the dudes art/portfolio is?

Cya next week

[DK]

Oh oh, skeptical, you gotta finish up that imagination piece you started with the girl holding the gun, it's lookin sick! Good studies too man!