Sketches

Visitation

While browsing through my directories, I realized I never posted this one up. I drew it maybe 9 months ago, (so it’s somewhat old) but it was gift art of a character created by one of my art directors at Vicious Cycle. His co-authored comic series, The Black Coat, follows a revolutionary war hero/spy and his adventures to thwart the British. The two characters portrayed in my drawing are The Black Coat and the girl, Robin, who lost her mother to a serial killer in the first volume of the graphic novel.

Sketches · Updates

Pencil life drawings

I upgraded my site to WordPress 2.5, and I’m really liking the UI overhaul for the admin. I haven’t tried out the gallery feature yet, but it seems really cool. I also fixed the problem with the Archives, so now, when you click on one of the categories or months, you will access all the posts from that category/month.

I didn’t want to make this another boring ‘Update’ post, so here’s some life drawings from a couple weeks ago. Decided to take a break from the brushpens and go back to using some pencils during my last life drawing session:

The middle sketch, the model folded over her legs so her right foot was tucked between her torso and her right arm. It amazed me she was able to hold that pose. 😮

The model, while posing, was reading one of the books from His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman, one of my most favorite book series. 😀

Updates

Still alive

Hey all, I apologize for the zero activity recently; I have been busy at work and with other things. I am currently in the process of updating my blog to the new WordPress v.2.5 along with re-organizing the content on my site. I noticed that the Archives and Categories don’t actually show their respective content. Anyway, personal project-wise, my 3d character is almost finished being skinned and soon will be ready to animate! 😀

Thanks for your patience!

Sketches

More Life Drawings

I had an idea for this week’s Illustration Friday topic, but I think I bit off more than I can chew and ended up rushing the whole thing. I was so disappointed in it that I chose not to post it…maybe one day it will appear on my blog.

Right now I’m torn between many things I want to do in my spare time. Between Illustration Friday, weekly life drawings, and working on my character for personal animations, I’m hard-pressed to drop one of them because I love working on all. However, my professional goal is to become a better character animator, so my focus is going to shift towards Asher and my personal animation practices.

Just because I’ll be working on 3d animations doesn’t mean I’ll avoid sketching, though. Drawing is the most liberating thing for me, creatively, and I certainly don’t want to lose that. 😉 There will definitely be weekly posts of sketches, but they may or may not pertain to Illustration Friday.

Anyway, since I didn’t have a new illustration this week, I decided to post more life drawing sketches from the past few weeks. A couple in brush pen and one set of short poses in sanguine:

The model was definitely a superhero.

Getting on the right path using the brush pen, but I’m definitely still an amateur. Look at those wobbly lines! (Not to mention the proportions…)

My heavy hand gets me every time when I lay lines down with the brush pen. I also blame my impatience when I first start drawing the contours of the figure.

Sketches

Life Drawings!

Been going to weekly life drawing sessions and decided to compile some of the sketches I’ve done over the past few weeks. I’ve started experimenting with markers and brushpens:

Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Multiple

As you can tell, I’ve missed the past couple Illo Fridays. My energies are currently being spent on my 3d character, Asher (which once skinned, I’ll post another WIP of him). Left on the to-do list for the li’l guy is to texture, skin, and do his facial set-up. I can’t wait to animate him!

Anyway, this comic above was inspired by a dream I had awhile back in college. The funniest part was that in my dream I consciously came to the conclusion that my dog was asexually reproducing. Apparently this is how chihuahuas spawn their offspring in my subconscious.

Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Tales and Legends

These sketches come from a project I did awhile back for World Mythology class, where we had to create a visual representation of any item from mythology. For my project, I referenced heavily from A Field Guide to Demons, Fairies, Fallen Angels, and Other Subversive Spirits. It’s a very excellent reference for all things creature in the mythological world, and is definitely a wonderful source of inspiration.

I chose to create a sketch journal of a traveler who encounters the Surem, small, peaceful folk who live in the Sonoran Desert. They originated from an ancient tribe that split in half after receiving a message from a Tree, warning them of major changes that will come to pass. The prophecy told the tribe that their life will change forever and things such as “good” and “evil”, “life” and “death” will happen to those who stay. (Essentially, I imagined the Surem to live in an environment and mindset similar to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.)

Those who stayed grew taller and became humans, specifically the ancestors of the Yaquis tribe. Those who continued to live as Surem, retained their 3ft. stature (and some grew even smaller!) and sought other natural places to hide in the world. Surem are nomads, living in deserts and caves. They’re a natural people, and are usually known to carry around a portable lake, rolled up like a carpet. Once unrolled, they can fish and drink water.

Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Plain

Recently received my new Cintiq 12wx and have been playing around with it. Unfortunately, the image didn’t turn out the way I wanted just because I spent so much time getting color profiles/calibration and monitor set-ups to work for me. While I love using the Cintiq, it has definitely been awhile since I have drawn directly onto the PC using Painter. My usual workflow is drawing a sketch on paper and scanning it in to do the values with Photoshop. I’m sure after some practice, though, I’ll get back into the swing of things.

Concerning the illustration, I wanted to portray someone who feels ‘plain’ and yearns to be someone else. I’m sure in a few years, she’ll realize it wasn’t worth the time or effort. 😉