Tuesday, October 30, 2012

and now some ladies...

This is going to be first of many ladies.

Trying out some new brushes, but I still end up using a hard and soft round.

Making some goals

Another screen cap from the movie Singing in the Rain.

A few things I take into consideration.
Speed
Flow % (I'm trying to keep this at 100%) I'm trying to do this for the sole purpose of increasing my painting speed. Although, there are times where I go in with a softbrush and a low flow % to just nudge it into the desired value, I try to keep it at 100% throughout the whole project.

Working with colors and unfamiliar lighting.
Using images with cast shadows.
and accessories!

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Steve Zissou

I asked my cousin Mike what should I draw. He chose Steve Zissou. And BOOM!

Friday, October 26, 2012

Moarrr


Awesome movie still shot from Brazil. I also included my process. I really wish I timed myself. :[

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

new work!

How is my friend so ridiculously photogenic!?


Here's a bird with a little understanding of how I get started.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Professional Photographer Interview for aspiring phtographers

I've have been a huge fan of photography ever since I was a child and my dad subscribed to those National Geographic magazines. Fast forward 10 years later and I'm still awestruck by pictures on the internet. So naturally when friends are involved in things I find interesting, it's awesome seeing the passion come out in their work.

So anyways, I asked a friend who is a professional photographer to do a Q and A and she said yes! And here it is!

Here's a mini bio of Jessica Van Pelt, she's a professional photographer in Southern California and here's a link to her site www.JayRaePhotography.com

Heyo Jessica! Thank you for this small Q & A for aspiring photographers! As one who enjoys art in all mediums, I find many similarities between a good photo and a good piece of art.


1.         I want to ask first, what was the allure of photography and what did you do to make it a part of your life and future career.

Well to be honest my first allure was that I was working with film. I actually loved the science behind film and capturing an image onto essentially a piece of paper! It intrigued me so much so I took my first photography class my sophmore year in high school. I love things that are very technical so the knowledge behind getting the "right" settings on a camera to get a certain look also caught my attention. You have so much control as an artist with a camera in the effects that you want it to produce! But of course the actual 'art' of it all also helps! When I started photographing people I literally knew that I wanted to do it for the rest of my life!

2.         Is there any recommended literature or websites which helped you hone your photography skills?

CreativeLive is an amazing place for people to learn! They host free live seminars with people that are huge in the industry. I also recommend just searching for blogs, some of my favorites are Sara France's blog, Jasmine Star, Marissa Rodriguez, and Ashley Goodwin. Those are just a few that got me started!

3.         For a starting photographer, can I still get crisp photos using a mediocre camera? Is a digital camera needed? Or for that matter, how important is equipment? Is it going to cost me an arm and a leg to get started?

As far as crispness goes, it really does depend on your equipment. For a long time I had just mid-line equipment and that did me a fine job, but if you really want to get the kind of image quality that the pros get, you really have to get the right gear. But, within that I also want to state that it all depends on the kind of images that you want. As artist, it's not always the "crispness" of the image that you want. But yes, if that's what you're searching for, then I would recommend getting the right gear.

4.         How important is the computer? Do you find yourself using it with every project? What software do you use? Is there anything else computer related you would like to add?

As far as computers go, I have actually been using a mac notebook for about 4 years now. As soon as I got into wedding I invested into an external hardrive of 2 TB. It's way more storage than I needed at the time but I was investing in my future! As of now I own my laptop, my external hardrive (which both lend me the capability to work on the go if I need to) but I also have a desktop computer with a 50 inch screen at home which makes editing a thousand times easier!

5.         Last question, what do you love most about photography? And do you have any favorite photographers?

The thing that I love most about photography mainly came from my grandparents. As a child I would have never really known about the people that they were without going through their albums. It allowed me to see them as they were, through all their adventures, experiences, and lessons without going through their photographs. I wish that my children can experience these things through my own photos and I truly want to capture these things for other people's families. My favorites photographers (who are mainly wedding photographers at this point) are those who really capture the emotion of the day and the true love that is surrounding the people they are photographing! (Sara France/ Jasmine Star).

P.S........Above all my favorite quote sums it all up

"We don't remember days, we remember moments." Cesare Pavese

Thank you for your time Jessica. You are very inspirational.

color/value study!


I'm loving movie stills. They really do have the best lighting/poses/scenes. Every time I do one of these I feel like I'm observing new techniques with lighting and rendering objects. Still iffy on textures with odd brushes.

Friday, October 12, 2012

Some more value practice with process explained.

So far digital painting for me involves 5 steps.

Step 1 Using a photo reference, I make a clean line drawing, focusing mainly on the large shapes with similar values (His hair/beard/skin/large sections of similar colored clothing. Note, ignore the small details and focusing mainly on the overall shape.

Step 2 I throw down the main colors using a hard round brush and I like to use the darker values and build up. Then I merge the line drawing and the main color values into one layer.

Step 3 I refine and shape the large sections using a soft brush. I try imagine the values the light casts on the shapes. For instance, her dimple on the right, how would light effect that area? I used a photo as a reference.

Step 4 The details. This is probably the best part. I shrink my brush down and zoom in very close to capture the small creases in the face and clothing.

Step 5 Looking for small errors I glanced over and cleaning them up.

An afterthought, I have some sloppiness in there which probably could have been avoided with some masks. =]

Tossing up some music...

I don't normally post music, but this is Reddit's top 1,00 songs (via Grooveshark) playlist. It contains a pleasant mixture of different genres. Although, I skip every other songs, there's plenty of gems in here.

Monday, October 8, 2012

Dog process

carving!

Carving!

I noticed this earlier on that when I worked my pencil skills my digital painting cleaned up. I've also noticed I approach digital painting differently. I focus more on the values and carving the image out; usually working with darker values and building up. Anywho, http://www.cinemasquid.com is a great site. Here's another snapshot from John Carter, it's my boy Mark Strong!

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

New splash art and some more doods



Felt it was time for a new splash piece and rather than Vectorizing the bob-omb or copying it from the internet I made my own. :D

Monday, October 1, 2012

sketchie sketches and a Dwarf Assassin




The top was a idea created by http://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/random/#npc
Frerain: Male Dwarf Assassin, Evil. Frerain has long copper hair and amber eyes. He wears leather armor and wields a dagger and darts. " I sorta ran with the idea loosely, and used a model of a Lineage 2 dwarf as a reference