Mat Kaminski Sketchybewk

[matkaminski]

Lap Painting

Title: Lap Painting
Date: December 31, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Same as Above.

Notes: Looking down, I noticed that my mouse in the distance and was being all reflective and whatnot, so to paint? I THINK SO!

Master Swordsman - Thus Far

Title: Master Swordsman - Thus Far
Date: December 23 - ?, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3

Notes: First few frames all animated out... many many more to come!

[ramalooke]

Hey, great update ;) Love the animation =D Try to pay more attention to your edges. Your images will seem more finished. Keep working hard, Cheers.

[matkaminski]

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ramalooke:

Hey, great update ;) Love the animation =D Try to pay more attention to your edges. Your images will seem more finished. Keep working hard, Cheers.

Totally agree. It's something that I'm still struggling with. I'm honestly just glad of the leap that I've made finally into the digital realm. Hilariously enough though, I still want to learn oil painting, but that's for a different time. But seriously though, watching oil painting demos is pretty much what got me where I am now with my digital painting. I'd suggest you give them a watch. I'll post some if you're interested... just let me know through a reply or something and I'll toss a ton of them up here that I find particularly useful.

Thanks a ton though! This semester will be insane, so hopefully no one will be disappointed for the next few months!

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Sass-a-Frass

Title: Sass-a-Frass
Date: January 7, 2014
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Same as Above

Notes: Little portrait study using what I learned from drawing all of those noses and mouths. Might do well to do some cloth studies as well as some hair studies for a bit methinks. On a side note though, all this painting is prepping me up good for this semester. Digi-paints GOOOO!!

Edit: Made a tutorial for this one...

Creepiness

Title: Creepiness
Date: January 5 - 7, 2014
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Varies

Notes: It's amazing what kind of weird stuff pop out when you listen to your fiancee read The Strain...

Anatomy Simplification Again

Title: Anatomy Simplification Again
Date: January 3 - 6, 2014
Medium: Pencil
Scale: Varies

Notes: Yet again, discovering more and more ways to simplify facial features. I'm sure more of this will keep coming up for some time to come.

[ramalooke]

Yeah sure I'm interested in those videos. Gonna be very gratefull if you share them ;) Keep those studies going. They'll serve you well in the future ;) Plus if you want to learn more about techniques try doing some master studies and try to replicate their way of painting. It does wonders. Trust me ;) Keep pushing!

[Nowio]

Cool sketchbook man! Love the animation but I would have to agree that you should pay more attention to your strokes and edges to make your works look more finished, right now they are a bit too suggestive.

Keep the good stuff coming! ;)

[matkaminski]

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Nowio:
Cool sketchbook man! Love the animation but I would have to agree that you should pay more attention to your strokes and edges to make your works look more finished, right now they are a bit too suggestive.

Keep the good stuff coming! ;)

This whole edges thing is something that I have been struggling with for awhile. I think maybe I should try and do just a bunch of cloth drape studies to really start to use that whole lost edge thing. Maybe there are some other things that I can use for good study material. One thing that is definitely fun to do is still lives, but they are hard to do because of the timing for them. The lighting has to be just right or it doesn't work very well.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Thanks for the kind words.

ramalooke:

Yeah sure I'm interested in those videos. Gonna be very gratefull if you share them ;) Keep those studies going. They'll serve you well in the future ;) Plus if you want to learn more about techniques try doing some master studies and try to replicate their way of painting. It does wonders. Trust me ;) Keep pushing!

Ah master studies... yeah, I need to do a ton of them. Even doing the small ones from Scott Burdick (he may not be an old master, but he's far better than I at the moment) that I've done recently have improved me leaps and bounds. I think just doing studies of any artist (so long as they are anatomically correct and what-not) will serve one well. Not just the old masters. But you can't go wrong either way. I plan on doing some studies of Sorolla and Dicksee soon so hopefully those will help even further.

Oh, here was one of those oil painting demos that I watched that was pretty kick ass...


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Storytime Sketching

Title: Storytime Sketching
Date: January 10-13, 2014
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Varies

Notes: More sketches from life and images while listening to my special lady friend read her stories.

[ramalooke]

Hey. Awesome update ;) Your painting stuff is getting noticable stronger, great job. Keep pushing ;) Oh and work on those edges a bit more. They're a bit mess ;) Cheers!

[matkaminski]

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ramalooke :

Hey. Awesome update ;) Your painting stuff is getting noticable stronger, great job. Keep pushing ;) Oh and work on those edges a bit more. They're a bit mess ;) Cheers!

Thanks! Haha, edge control. I think I'll suffer with that for awhile. Anything you would suggest to try and study to break the edges?

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Cora Turnaround

Title: Cora Turnaround
Medium: Pencil
Scale: Original is 9" x 12"

Notes: For our first 'official' comics assignment, we are to draw our first character in a turnaround (front, back 3/4, front 3/4) and then a few faces for studies, and any small notes that you have about the character. And then you are to fill out a fully fleshed out character bio for said character.
The bio is pretty long, so I'm not going to post it here, but let's just sum up... Cora is nuts.

Silhouette Challenge

Title: Silhouette Challenge
Medium: Pencil, Brush and Ink
Scale: Original is 9" x 12"

Notes: Just a small supplemental exercise to go along with our first character: shape design and silhouettes. Mine are pretty specific, but I tried to make my characters based simply off of the three core shapes: circles, triangles, and squares.
Either way these are actually really fun to do and I suggest that people do these really often!

Applied Studies

Title: Applied Studies
Date: January 19 & 20, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3

Notes: So... I was attempting something new: a master painting, and then immediately afterwards I would jump in and try to paint one using the techniques I just learned.
The portrait on the left is a Sorolla.
Using the strokes and brush work from the left, I tried jumping in and painting a portrait that was in a similar vein using the same brushes and strokes that I just used. This of course proved harder than expected. I think I will try more of this soon (as you can see from the half-started piece on the bottom left).

Environment Speeds

Title: Environment Speeds
Date: January 20, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3

Notes: Studying environments to +1 on them. Actually got this idea entirely from Lee Parks here (http://zephyrumblog.blogspot.com/2014/01...udies.html). His are quite a bit better, but then I can honestly say that he studies environments far more than I do. Something that I should try and play catch-up on sometime soon.
It might not only help my characters from just floating in a space, but will most likely help my colors get closer to a more realistic palette instead of being quite off.

Here's Pinky, where's the Brain?

Title: Here's Pinky, where's the Brain?
Date: January 19, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Original is 1200px x 2000px

Notes: Yet again, more of those photostudies while listening to my madam read books. She's already on the third book of The Strain, and I highly recommend that people read it. It's AWESOME! :)

Step 1: Render Background some, this will help you to define your 'character space'.
Step 2: Sketch out the character in it's entirety (or at least what you plan to paint in later.
Step 3: Wash layer. Basically throw a quick wash over what your want the basic backdrop colors to be.
Step 4 & 5: Render, render, and more rendering.
Step 6: Because I was a little unsure of all the crazy jewelry and add-on stuff this girl had, I made a new layer and just popped it up there.

Anatomy (from Imagination)

Title: Anatomy (from Imagination)
Medium: Pencil

Notes: So, from the last time you saw some pencils, I have tried that mouth technique using no reference at all and have discovered that I can draw a mouth in pretty much any way using that technique. So I tried continuing on with the full head and even some body, and discovered that I need to go back to the drawing board even more before I can just spit these things out from imagination. More studies of shape design for sure.

[/quote]

Title: Potential Logo Designs
Date: January 14, 2013
Medium: Pencil
Scale: Original is 9" x 12"

Notes: We are assigned to create a series of logos for a potential company that could exist.

Mission Statement: "We Bleed Inc. / Origin Entertainment is a full service studio serving up high quality creative endeavors on a client-by-client basis. We provide many outlets of creativity such as Illustration, Storyboarding, Animation Assets, Graphic Design, as well as Script Design, Screenwriting, Story Development and even Consulting to help get your project on it's way.
We Bleed Inc. / Origin Entertainment is located in the heart of Memphis, TN. As a result we are centrally located and have the ability to ship your project cross-country if need be.
Let us create for you so that you can be free of the burden that's been keeping you up at night."

Since there are two potentially companies, I have split between the two. Hopefully during feedback I will get a definite on one or the other.

[matkaminski]

Comics 2: Aunt Shirly's Garden Adventure

Title: Comics 2: Aunt Shirly's Garden Adventure
Date: January 24 - 26, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Each 'page' fits to 8.5" x 11"

Notes: This was an assignment for comics 2 in which we traded characters with one person, who wrote a script based on two separate characters and then that was handed off to another person to draw a comic based off of it. Confusing, I know!

When first approached with this concept, I really had no direction initially... All I was given was two character sketches (both radically different) and a quick write-up of a scene.

"Aunt Shirly is going to visit her "little" nephew, Geoffrey.
She and her cats are making their way to Geoffrey's house when something in the garden scares the cats.
Shirly can't see what it is and is determined to hunt it down!!!
---- End page 1 ----
She busts inside to alert Geoffrey that she is going skeet shooting.
She's certain that's what scared her cats, and she's going to bring back it's head.
Geoffrey really does not want her to destroy his garden by tromping through it.
He's just prepared some drinks and everything if she will please calm down and come inside.
---- End page 2 ----
Alas, Aunt Shirly goes outside in search of the skeet and decimates the garden, only to return with a horrified squirrel.
Geoffrey is very upset."

It was fun, but took me quite a minute to even come up with a rough outline of what this was to look like. Either way, there are definitely more comics to come in the future!

So, at school I’ve been getting asked how I’ve been able to get where I am now… I think the following can literally sum up everything pretty much.

Here’s literally the way I got to where I am now:

http://youtu.be/g4qZCTrBoIo start here so that you know what a gesture is (if you didn’t already)

http://www.posemaniacs.com/ apply the gesture idea here. I would suggest to start with the longest time you can (2-minutes I think?) and try and capture the essence of the figure as fast as possible.

From there I would try out the challenge modes here: http://quickposes.com/

Next you can do real models here: http://artists.pixelovely.com/

And finally, when you get comfortable being able to slap out gesture and even longer pose studies, I would suggest you do full-renders from here:

http://characterdesigns.com/
http://hel-looks.com/
http://www.scott-eaton.com/category/bodies-in-motion

Of course, these are just for character design by the way.

Here’s everything else I got for you guys:

https://www.youtube.com/user/ProkoTV
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NygkJEc3yu4
http://muddycolors.blogspot.com/
http://bluefley.blogspot.com/

Other than that do Master Studies. Look to old masters like these:

http://greatilluminators.blogspot.com/

and try your damndest to copy them.

OH and I almost forgot… the brushes.

http://matkaminski.blogspot.com/2013/10/...i-use.html

also… http://bluefley.blogspot.com/2013/11/how...brush.html
Hopefully this will help someone… Happy painting. If you have any questions or whichever, you can always ask. I’ll try to respond as timely as possible :)

OH! Lastly… I followed this for awhile. It’s a bit intense, but it has a supply list and all that if you want to follow it exactly but that’s up to you.

http://matkaminski.blogspot.com/2012/05/...edule.html

It is a little intense though…

But yeah... I can't update without art... so here you go!

Green-Haired Madam

Title: Green-Haired Madam
Date: January 23 & 24, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Original is 2048px x 1326px

Notes: So this was an experiment really in field of vision painting. I was trying to see if I could make focal areas based on the rendered / looseness of the area of the painting. I think it came out okay, but I really need to play with that smudge tool a bunch more. It doesn't look as purposeful as I would have liked. Either way, I think the girl rendered out decently though.
As usual with my painting, I try to keep with as big of a brush for as long as I can, so initially this was painted at 25% zoom, and then as I painted I would get closer and closer rendering the focal points as much as possible. For example, her face and hands were painted at 100%.

And yet again, a tutorial gif... I hope this helps someone. Any questions or if you need anything clarified, toss up a comment.

[matkaminski]

The Stars Come Out to Play

Title: The Stars Come Out to Play
Date: February 6, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Original image is 1600px x 1470px

Notes: Yet again, watching those oil painting videos is really helping out. Seriously in the next few days I'm going to bust out the oil paints for sure! I'm so damn anxious to get them to work right.
Anyway... feeling ill today so I just sat around working on homework (clay sculpture). I decided to take a break for a bit and cranked this thing out. Just a photostudy, but I feel like things are starting to get a little easier. I guess that's how it goes, the more you do it, the easier it gets?
Eh, whichever... here's a tutorial for anyone that wants it:

Comics 2: Cora's Wonderful Writing Day

Title: Comics 2: Cora's Wonderful Writing Day
Date: February 1 & 2, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Each page is 8.5" x 11"

Notes: Since posting the character design sheet we were tasked with creating a comic that was two-to-four pages in length using our main character as a driving force for an action.

Overall, I can personally say that I rushed this one too hard. I had the script hewn out pretty early, but for some reason I just wasn't feeling it. This will most likely be one project that I will have to rework because as of right now it looks more like it's at the like earlier stages. You can see that story there, but it still seems to have some work to go in my opinion.
Either way, Cora feels nice and inspired...

3D Illustration: Y.T. Character Turn-around

Title: 3D Illusttration: Y.T. Character Turn-around
Date: January 28 - 30, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Varies

Notes: For our first assignment in 3D illustration we are to make a character from a book in clay.
I decided to go with a secondary character from Snow Crash. Y.T.

Initially we were to do a bunch of sketchwork to try and search for what we wanted the character to look like and then take some sketches and render out (fully and professionally) the character into a full orthograph view. Complete with Front, Side, and Back as well as any detail shots.
In addition, the images below are part of the style exploration and questions I asked myself during creation.

[Othrandir]

Loving your stuff!! That animation on the top of the page is killer! Also that traditional painting is great! Give us some more to look aat :O
:D

[matkaminski]

Illustration 4: Levitt Shell Poster & T-Shirt

Title: Illustration 4: Levitt Shell Poster & T-Shirt
Date: February 8 - 10, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3

Notes: This is for the newest project we have on the burner for Illustration 4. We are working with the Levitt Shell for a competition to help design a poster and t-shirt for the summer concert series.

The thumbs above are different ideas that were rolling around my head while looking at a whole bunch of reference photos.

Head swirling hair back to make it look like the Levitt Shell. (Janis Joplin?)
Evolution chart from birth to rockstar.
Half-cut from neck down of a guitarist. Show the guitar leaning towards the audience.
Look at Mucha paintings. Maybe one with a rockstar would work?
Rudeone - Rock the Casbah. What if it were to an Elvis type figure butted up against a heavily tattoo'd person (back to back).

Were just a couple of ideas that immediately popped out. I'm sure there will be more, but this is where I'm at currently.
Also, the moodboard below reflects all of the applicable images that I could find that were related to those five themes above.

Mysterious Woman

Title: Mysterious Woman
Date: February 10, 2013
Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Original image is 1428px x 1800px

Notes: I've been watching more oil painting demos and then attempting to apply them to my photo studies that I do digitally. This is my newest attempt. Of course I think it helps a ton to get read to while working.

On a side note, I've finally braved it. I have more work to do on it, but I've started to officially oil paint!

I'll post that later when I'm satisfied with it...

Here's the tutorial for this one. As always, leave a comment if you need any clarification or if you want a better tutorial.

[Samszym]

Thanks for the sketchbook comment dude! Oil painting's definitely gonna help out your digital work, you're on the right track to improvement!

[matkaminski]

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Samszym:

Thanks for the sketchbook comment dude! Oil painting's definitely gonna help out your digital work, you're on the right track to improvement!

Thanks!
I have a long way to go and oil painting really is awesome. You should definitely try it out!

Othrandir:

Loving your stuff!! That animation on the top of the page is killer! Also that traditional painting is great! Give us some more to look aat :O
:D

Yeah, I try to do those animations whenever I do a series of something all in a row. I think it helps to see them actually move all in tandem (plus, let's face it, doing those kind of forces me to do anatomy study).
Thanks for the nice words! I'm trying to keep pace for things to look at, but it's tough posting a ton during classes. I'll try to keep up though! :)

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Black Magic Woman

Title: Black Magic Woman
Date: February 14, 2013Medium: Photoshop CS3
Scale: Original image is 1224px x 1632px

Notes: Continuing on attempting that oil painting style with my digitals.
I tried some new stuff in terms of using different brushes in different areas to see how that would change things. I don't know why I love portraits so much. I should break away from them for a bit maybe and do some animals or something... Unfortunately for the oil paintings that I'm working on, since I'm not comfortable with the materials, I'm working with comfortable subject matter.

Anyway... more soon!

[pnate]

Heyyy, nice studies going on here matkaminski! As a crit, I'd recommend watching some of the saturation in those skin tones, because they seem a little flat at the moment. It may be the sources you are pulling your refs from, in which case I'd suggest trying to get the most "natural" photos possible (that don't look super color-corrected or "professional"). For instance, in that oil paint video you posted, you can see how rich the artist's warms are and all of the interesting cools that are there as well. Something that may help is laying down the most saturated colors first as a base, then layering on top (or an extra color, soft light, or saturation layer on top may do the job).

[Ursula Dorada]

What pnate said :)
Not only saturation, but there is a lot of hue shifts on skin tones too! Try working on them, they will add a lot of richness to your paintings.

[NumberAlone]

i like it.. i would suggest you to use smooth brush to blend in tones

[ReneAigner]

Hey mat, I'm not a big one for general advice in sketchbooks, so I picked this quote from you because I think I might be more helpful in this regard:

This whole edges thing is something that I have been struggling with for awhile. I think maybe I should try and do just a bunch of cloth drape studies to really start to use that whole lost edge thing. Maybe there are some other things that I can use for good study material. One thing that is definitely fun to do is still lives, but they are hard to do because of the timing for them. The lighting has to be just right or it doesn't work very well.

Edge variation doesn't really exist in reality. There are no soft/lost edges, except in unusual situations (fog/mist etc.).Edges have to be designed. That's why you won't be able to really practice edge control with any specific subject, be it still life or portrait. They cannot be observed. Look to masters of edge control (Sargent, Zorn etc.) and analyze what they do with edges and why they do it. Stapleton Kearns has a nice series of blog-posts on edge control:
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.de/2010/...rgent.html

Also, about changing light in a still life, you might want to try building a shadow box. One simple artificial lightsource, eliminating most if not all indirect light affords you the opportunity to work on a still life whenever and as long as you want.

[matkaminski]

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ReneAigner:

Hey mat, I'm not a big one for general advice in sketchbooks, so I picked this quote from you because I think I might be more helpful in this regard:

(01-14-2014 12:05 PM)matkaminski Wrote:
This whole edges thing is something that I have been struggling with for awhile. I think maybe I should try and do just a bunch of cloth drape studies to really start to use that whole lost edge thing. Maybe there are some other things that I can use for good study material. One thing that is definitely fun to do is still lives, but they are hard to do because of the timing for them. The lighting has to be just right or it doesn't work very well.

Edge variation doesn't really exist in reality. There are no soft/lost edges, except in unusual situations (fog/mist etc.).Edges have to be designed. That's why you won't be able to really practice edge control with any specific subject, be it still life or portrait. They cannot be observed. Look to masters of edge control (Sargent, Zorn etc.) and analyze what they do with edges and why they do it. Stapleton Kearns has a nice series of blog-posts on edge control:
http://stapletonkearns.blogspot.de/2010/...rgent.html

Also, about changing light in a still life, you might want to try building a shadow box. One simple artificial lightsource, eliminating most if not all indirect light affords you the opportunity to work on a still life whenever and as long as you want.

Thanks for the advice!

Yeah, usually when I deal with lost edges, I'm just trying to make my digital work look more 'painterly'. I ideally want to make my digital work look more like oil painting in the long run, so I think it's really important to start dealing with smaller techniques like lost edges and blurred lines.

That Stapleton blog entry is really damn helpful! Couple that type of thing with continuing on doing master studies (which I have been neglecting lately) and I think I'll be on a new path. It's funny how the path of finding your voice in art has so many side-roads.

A shadow box could be really smart to make in the future, but as of right now, I don't exactly have the room for one mainly because I don't have much space. BUT that will be something that I do in the future!

NumberAlone:

i like it.. i would suggest you to use smooth brush to blend in tones

I think I prefer the chunkiness of the painters of yore when it comes to blending. Although... I am a fan of Bouguereau's work. But, his blending and smoothness makes no sense... :P

Ursula Dorada:

What pnate said :)
Not only saturation, but there is a lot of hue shifts on skin tones too! Try working on them, they will add a lot of richness to your paintings.

For sure! Skin tones are so dumb in the fact of how many tones there are inside of the skin. I'm trying to mimic how Larriva does his skin. But I think to do that, I would be better served to step out of the digital realm for a bit and try more oil painting.

pnate:

Heyyy, nice studies going on here matkaminski! As a crit, I'd recommend watching some of the saturation in those skin tones, because they seem a little flat at the moment. It may be the sources you are pulling your refs from, in which case I'd suggest trying to get the most "natural" photos possible (that don't look super color-corrected or "professional"). For instance, in that oil paint video you posted, you can see how rich the artist's warms are and all of the interesting cools that are there as well. Something that may help is laying down the most saturated colors first as a base, then layering on top (or an extra color, soft light, or saturation layer on top may do the job).

As of right now, I tend to work from dark to light. Meaning that I'll try to find the darkest tone to lay as a base, and then work upward from there to the lightest light. Is that the 'right way'? Or is there no right way...?
Usually right at the end though, I tend to make a new layer with a warming photo filter to really bring the skin tones back to that warmness instead of that dead color that I tend to paint them in. Hmmm maybe if I paint on top of that too perhaps? Stuff to think about...

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Flight

Title: Flight
Medium: Oils
Scale: Original image is around 4ft x 2ft

Notes: No joke... this is the biggest painting I've ever done.
For some reason I had this in my head early on. Before I even started painting it I kind of knew exactly what I wanted to paint. Not only that, but this was one of the first real attempts at doing anything in oil that was more than just black and white. Oh this was so exciting to me and I definitely DEFINITELY want to do more of this.

Dust Sprites

Title: Dust Sprites
Date: February 14, 2013
Medium: Gouache
Scale: Original image is 15" x 20"

Notes: This was a birthday present for my special lady friend. She loves these little guys! I wish I could be as happy as they are all the time! They are from Miyazaki films such as Spirited Away and My Neighbor Totoro.

Serious Face

Title: Serious Face
Medium: Oils
Scale: Original is 9" x 12"

Notes: This was my first attempt at oil paints ever. I think it turned out okay, but those eyes are still wonky. From what I hear you can just go right over oil paints with more oil paints. OOHHH I'm so excited about Oil painting!

Sketchin' the Night Away

Title: Sketchin' the Night Away
Medium: Graphite
Scale: Each 'page' is 9" x 12"

Notes: These are all just various things that pop into my head while relaxing as well as doing sketches for different assignments. Just a small sampling really, but I thought I would share.

Comics 2: Characters 1 - 5

Title: Comics 2: Characters 1 - 5
Medium: Graphite
Scale: Each 'page' is 9" x 12"

Notes: The characters that we've had to flesh out so far for comics 2. From the top: Cora, Aleksi, Cora (alternate), Mr. Johnson, and the Journal. I can't really talk much about the overall character descriptions at the moment, but each one has about 1000 words talking about their past, their attitudes, why they exist, etc.

Characters are so damn fun... makes me more and more want to study Wes Burt and Marko Djurdjevic's character design!

Comics 2: Cora's Awakening

Title: Comics 2: Cora's Awakening
Medium: Graphite
Scale: Each 'page' is 9" x 12"

Notes: The second comic for comics 2 was to create a comic in which your main character and two side character get into a heated argument.
Hopefully this actually makes sense to people... this has been an insane day so far!

False Starts

Title: False Starts
Medium: Photoshop CS3 & CS6
Scale: Varies

Notes: I think the most important thing to realize here, is that this happens to everyone. The sketching. I used to think this was a bad thing to not finish what you start. And I still think it sometimes. The point though, is to realize that sometimes the process is just as important as what you ultimately get out of the final piece.

John Lee goes on about this type of thing over and over here. I would honestly suggest that you read a bunch of this to really get some good advice!

More pretty sound advice from Jeff Simpson at the Collective here. (thanks Erica!)

All-in-all, the point I'm trying to make is two-fold:

1) Do whatever it takes to get your final piece out. I mean, WHATEVER it takes. The industry from what I understand has such a huge turnaround rate that I think it's important to note that you might have to make finalized pieces in a day. I once read an article (can't find it at the moment) that talked about if you have a week to finish a piece, it better be a damn good piece. If you have an hour, then you give them your very best in an hour. Point being, always try your damn best!

2) Sometimes just purely sketching is just as important as finalized pieces. Just make sure that all of your sketching is actively pushing you towards some goal or you are just sketching for the sake of sketching. While this may work for certain artists (mainly because they lack a specific end-goal) you should always be actively researching things, making them look representational (and I could start a whole rant about how stylized and abstraction should be first influenced by correct basics, such as proper anatomy, proper color theory, etc.), and overall, making them appealing. Not specifically to everyone else, make sure that YOU enjoy your output. If you can't love your own work, how do you expect anyone else to?

ANYWAY... just some thoughts I had while sketching.

Finally... more advice on exposure from Gregory Manchess.

Logo Final 1: Origin Entertainment

Title: Logo Final 1: Origin Entertainment
Medium: Illustrator CS3

Notes: The final logo that I came up with for Origin Entertainment. One day this will hopefully become a reality... one day.

Logo Final 2: Cannonball Cakes

Title: Logo Final 2: Cannonball Cakes
Medium: Photoshop CS3

Notes: As a continuation of the logo design project, we were to take someone else's logo in the class, and then redesign it to fit around our own personal style. Of course there was someone in the middle that served as our art director and they would hand off their sketch and then we were to finalize it.

[matkaminski]

3D Illustration: Snow Crash - Book Cover Mock-Up

Title: 3D Illusttration: Snow Crash - Book Cover Mock-Up
Medium: Clay, Mixed Media, Photoshop CS3

Notes: It's been a minute since anything related to this project has been shown, but this is the cover mock-up for a redesign on the Snow Crash cover.
I definitely feel like the sculpt and background could have been better. I'm still definitely learning clay. It's ALOT harder than I anticipated. But that's what we do as artists, try new things and then keep messing around until we - at least remotely - figure out what we're doing.
Anyway, this was fun regardless and the photographers that showed up to take pictures of our sculpts at the end, honestly, brought the magic! They were amazing!

Zoodles 1 - 4

Title: Zoodles 1 - 4
Medium: Brush and Ink, Pencil
Scale: Each 'page' is 9" x 12"

Notes: Every Wednesday during lunch the Illustration department at MCA takes a little trip over to the local zoo and we just wander about sketching different types of animals. It's actually ludicrously fun!
Here's a few weeks in... you have (in this order):

Animals of the Night, The Farm Animals, Tropical Bird House, and the Herpetarium.

I could sit and do these all day hahaha they are awesome. Sometimes really hard too, because the animals can be extremely fidgety.

Illustration 4: Levitt Shell Poster and T-Shirt Finals

Title: Illustration 4: Levitt Shell Poster & T-Shirt Finals
Medium: Photoshop CS3, Illustrator CS3

Notes: PHEW! Big 'ole mess, but this project is officially over. As always though, here comes the next one in the pipe...

This project was the Levitt Shell here in Memphis was holding a competition to promote their summer rock series for the upcoming year. We had to enter this piece into that competition and see how we fare. Hopefully I'll do alright.