More Sketches

 Some more Sketches from the TO Zoo among other places. I am working on more paintings but I'm doing sort of a design pack thing with multiple images, backgrounds, character and machine designs, so that will be a large update, and is also taking some time.

Assorted sketches

This is just an assortment of sketches from my sketchbook over the past month. Just as a disclaimer, they were collaged together from different pages just so I didn't have like 50 pages with one or two drawings each. Basically just content wise it's a random assortment of my cats, zoo animals from a trip to the TO zoo, and some Google image practice.

The Wombat was interesting because I was using a different pen which played out a lot differently than the one I normally use.

Hydroponic Garden

So one thing I really want to play with is the visual impact of the painting itself, as opposed to finicky details which seem to have a lot of diminishing returns (not that I don't like details). So this is the first in a series of 3 I want to do featuring this ruined hydroponic garden.

Primary goal: Visual impact!

In between these I need to start doing more studies too, so expect some of those, I need to increase my know how so once I do get the visual impact I want, then I can play with details again.

A Quick Musing

So just a quick musing while I work.

It's become increasingly obvious to me to what I need to do in this learning process, is not just tackle the base concepts again, but also play with something far more important, that truth be told I never really thought about.

I don't know what to call it, I'm sure there's a term, and I'm sure I'll come across it eventually, but I what my drawings lack more then technical ability is Oomph (yeah see, need a better word).

 With backgrounds it comes down to visual impact, I'm working on a sci fi style hydroponics garden/lab right now, and I want to get it right, but I hit a huge wall. And it has nothing to do with actual technical ability. It's boring, it lacks oomph, and regardless of how many valves and pipes I add, it will still be boring. And then I got thinking even more about it, and one theme came into my head (partially induced by playing Journey), Style and aesthetic, play a monumental role, and even though I have become a much better artist since I started training way back in 2002/3, my style never fundamentally changed. Its remained based on my interpretations of how I should approach drawing back from high school and before, not now. The thing is, I know better, and I think I need to play more.

So two huge things I want to play with:

1) ensuring I follow some of the basic idea's of good art, composition, story telling, personality etc, in the pieces I do

2) Ensuring the STYLE and Aesthetic I use also has personality, story telling etc.

So its not just what I draw, but how I should draw it. I still feel like I'm just barely grasping the fundamentals of good art, but I'm glad I started looking into this. Because how I choose to draw eyes, hands etc, can really affect how my arts going to look and whats more, give it my own spice. Its not just about anatomical accuracy or proper perspective, or even gesture. All important things, but only part of the whole.

Water brush

A quick experiment with a water brush, I think the ripples are probably too big, but was fun none the less. Something more dramatic coming soon.

Mole Dreams

As a joke this morning I did this on my break and set it up on my gf's computer as a wallpaper for when she got up.

This is the beginning of me finally getting around to proper experimentation with brushes. This one was generated using a picture of my cats fur.

Soldierific

Inspired a bit by the Deadspace artwork, I wanted to do a painting of one of my characters in a standard 3/4 front. Ideally in the future I would like to get a bit more realism in the painting work, so I'll be working on that in the coming paintings.

 The design of the character itself was a bit inspired by the Mass effect series, I wanted to do my own light armored Sci fi-y soldier.

More to come in the future!