@iruka unfortunately not. I have no mirrors in my house that I could set up to see myself in, so I tried to hold a hand mirror in my one hand and paint with the other - it didn't work out so I gave in and just did portrait studies and imagination portraits.
Abandoned the gouache, watercolour is at least portable. I can't manage the medium to save my life, so I'm just going to clumsily head out and try to learn a little every day. For what it's worth, a tricky medium really makes you appreciate what you have in digital, and reminds you to slow down and be deliberate.
He did the first critique thing today on livestream. I missed it because I don't check facebook all the time. He posted a link to the video on youtube I can message it to you guys if you want if it falls off the facebook front page.
He did the first critique thing today on livestream. I missed it because I don't check facebook all the time. He posted a link to the video on youtube I can message it to you guys if you want if it falls off the facebook front page.
We just got an email with a link to all the videos nicely listed on an HTML page (No posting that link either, since theres no other security on it), The critique video is included.
Like Frank, I also didn't do a single plein air. I sux.
But here are some self portraits I did today, before moving on to this week's assignment. Slowly, very slowly, honing in on getting likenesses, but I won't know for sure until I start doing faces that aren't mine.
I started off having a pretty solid idea where I wanted to go with it, but then I had to step out for a couple of hours and when I came back, I had no idea where I was or what I was doing.
Frank, try to "think less" and "observe more" in regards to the colors. As an example - the soldier's uniform isn't green like you've painted (though green is often what we go to when we think "soldier"). It's practically the exact same set of colors as the ground he's on, as it should be for proper camouflage. There's also no purple at all in the mountain, though in other photographs of mountains in the distance, it can be common to see them as blueish or purple.
Similarly, with the cityscape, the lights reflected in the water are a bright kind of brick-orange with a brighter/hotter pale "yellowy peach" color in the center, rather than the dark beige color that you have from the street.
You matched the other colors relatively well, but that might just be something to think about!
These are the exact kinds of studies I'm planning on doing soon.
Thanks ND! I struggle with color quite a bit, so I appreciate the feedback.
Also guys, a critique session will be starting soon!
Edit: Spent the morning on a fur study for this weeks assignment. I tried exaggerating the colors some and didn't use my soft brush once. It was really tough!
Edit2: Looking at this now, the colors are pretty off in most areas. : \
I definitely need think less and observe more!
aaaand a metal armor study! I think the colors came out closer here and I really like painting reflective things. I think it's much easier than furry things, in some ways. Lots of fun!
i actually went to school with Noah, and when I last spoke with him at Spectrum, he was very impressed with the level of work his students were turning out, and seeing it in person, I am too. Keep up the hard work guys!
It would probably look better without the big green Zelda but it was idea I wanted to execute a month ago, and the photoref happened to line up with the type of color palette I wanted so I decided to give it a shot.
Sky, those are pretty good - I think you could emphasise the edges more to get different materials to read better though (check the fur coat v skin on the lady - if you use noah's brush on both the edges on her skin wont be super soft, it can be tricky)
I only did a few material studies cause I hated it, but this is probably the only one that was seriously considered:
I didn't really understand the explanation for studying exclusively from dead people, how does that change your perception? I really like William Wray, Kazuo Oga and Dice Tsutsumi so I'm going for it.
I think artists tend to teach in absolutes a lot to dissuade people from damaging practices, with the expectation that once you're savvy enough to understand why that rule is there, you're savvy enough to know when and how to break it.
It's been a few weeks since I've seen the video, so I can't remember exactly what he said or how he said it
But I think the point he was mostly getting at is that it's easy to get caught up in what's trendy now, and let that overly influence your art, and that can mean you get caught up in fads and bad habits that don't necessarily make you better as an artist. There's a cultural filtering effect that happens with respect to older works, and doing master studies of those works means you end up learning methods that have withstood the test of time and be in a better position to iterate on those. You can still study contemporary artists - hell, some of my master studies came by way of an extremely girly anime - you just have to be careful, because if you do that too much you run the risk of becoming a copy-cat of someone already alive and working in the field. Or you might get tunnel vision and lock yourself into current trends that are burning hot, but extinguish in a couple years and everyone is kind of sick of them.
Imagine if you were doing these studies in the 70's, and you really liked fantasy art, so you studied the most popular fantasy art available to you at the time. Eventually you'll probably end up making the same generic velvety airbrushed 70's fantasy art that you find on discount blacklight posters at Spencer's Gifts. Or say you really liked anime in the 90's, so you modeled your education around learning to draw like this, then the 00's roll around and suddenly you kind of bored with melty-faced anime girls. So then you transition to studying how Jhonen Vasquez and Roman Dirge design their characters, and 5 years later your work has a distinct Hot Topic edge to it that even you yourself find kind of unappealing in retrospect.
At the moment, there are a lot of artists that draw like Pendleton Ward, who weren't drawing like Pendleton Ward a few years ago.
Not saying that you'll definitely fall into that trap if you don't study artists from before your time, and it's entirely possible that you can get along perfectly fine having never done a study of an artist who stopped making work before you were born. But even if their body of work doesn't quite excite you, there is probably a certain area in which they really excelled, be it color or composition or specific rendering techniques, and that can be extremely captivating. And those techniques are probably things that have aged incredibly gracefully, otherwise you wouldn't be looking at their work to begin with. That's probably worth studying.
the way he phrased it is "time has weeded out bad art" or something to that effect. It's the art that "stands the test of time" to prove its worth. Art that is in fact good (by that I mean) art that can teach you VS art that influences you that may not have as much substance. I'm influenced by a lot of artists that lack a lot of foundation in their style. Exaggerated anatomy, exaggerated perspective, and I can't learn real perspective and anatomy from them. I can absorb their habits and mannerisms that make me like them, but it isn't going to teach me foundational skills.
There are a lot of phenomenal concept artists whose works are incomplete that, in studying their work, would teach me less than I would get from an old master.
You can still study contemporary artists - hell, some of my master studies came by way of an extremely girly anime -
I'm such a huge fan if we're talking about You Yoshinari, this guy is practically a god among men who can do it all. Leaving Gainax and starting up his own studio was a serious gusty move and I'm super excited for their new anime which should be out in a couple months. Imaishi, Sushio, Yoneyama, they all make me cry inside something fierce.
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Abandoned the gouache, watercolour is at least portable. I can't manage the medium to save my life, so I'm just going to clumsily head out and try to learn a little every day. For what it's worth, a tricky medium really makes you appreciate what you have in digital, and reminds you to slow down and be deliberate.
Totally starting on some photo studies today though!
To be fair, these are basically still life studies, since I couldn't manage doing any environments in the medium - bummer.
But here are some self portraits I did today, before moving on to this week's assignment. Slowly, very slowly, honing in on getting likenesses, but I won't know for sure until I start doing faces that aren't mine.
Dishonored/HL2-inspired imagined thing
I started off having a pretty solid idea where I wanted to go with it, but then I had to step out for a couple of hours and when I came back, I had no idea where I was or what I was doing.
I did a few quick photo studies:
Similarly, with the cityscape, the lights reflected in the water are a bright kind of brick-orange with a brighter/hotter pale "yellowy peach" color in the center, rather than the dark beige color that you have from the street.
You matched the other colors relatively well, but that might just be something to think about!
These are the exact kinds of studies I'm planning on doing soon.
Also guys, a critique session will be starting soon!
Edit: Spent the morning on a fur study for this weeks assignment. I tried exaggerating the colors some and didn't use my soft brush once. It was really tough!
Edit2: Looking at this now, the colors are pretty off in most areas. : \
I definitely need think less and observe more!
aaaand a metal armor study! I think the colors came out closer here and I really like painting reflective things. I think it's much easier than furry things, in some ways. Lots of fun!
some photo studies from the previous week
Here is a material/edge imaginative sketch:
What is perspective even???:
30 minute en plain air (I carried my wacom & netbook around for these):
Color study of a painting by a certain Michael (said painting in spoiler):
Assorted imagined sketches:
And the landscape reference it came from.
It would probably look better without the big green Zelda but it was idea I wanted to execute a month ago, and the photoref happened to line up with the type of color palette I wanted so I decided to give it a shot.
above ref'd from Nick Sachos - Blush on deviant art
I only did a few material studies cause I hated it, but this is probably the only one that was seriously considered:
Figure studies this week! get hyped!
Edit to add: The download link is wrong in the facebook post but he corrected it in the comments.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=kQfF-P70V2Q
It's been a few weeks since I've seen the video, so I can't remember exactly what he said or how he said it
But I think the point he was mostly getting at is that it's easy to get caught up in what's trendy now, and let that overly influence your art, and that can mean you get caught up in fads and bad habits that don't necessarily make you better as an artist. There's a cultural filtering effect that happens with respect to older works, and doing master studies of those works means you end up learning methods that have withstood the test of time and be in a better position to iterate on those. You can still study contemporary artists - hell, some of my master studies came by way of an extremely girly anime - you just have to be careful, because if you do that too much you run the risk of becoming a copy-cat of someone already alive and working in the field. Or you might get tunnel vision and lock yourself into current trends that are burning hot, but extinguish in a couple years and everyone is kind of sick of them.
Imagine if you were doing these studies in the 70's, and you really liked fantasy art, so you studied the most popular fantasy art available to you at the time. Eventually you'll probably end up making the same generic velvety airbrushed 70's fantasy art that you find on discount blacklight posters at Spencer's Gifts. Or say you really liked anime in the 90's, so you modeled your education around learning to draw like this, then the 00's roll around and suddenly you kind of bored with melty-faced anime girls. So then you transition to studying how Jhonen Vasquez and Roman Dirge design their characters, and 5 years later your work has a distinct Hot Topic edge to it that even you yourself find kind of unappealing in retrospect.
At the moment, there are a lot of artists that draw like Pendleton Ward, who weren't drawing like Pendleton Ward a few years ago.
Not saying that you'll definitely fall into that trap if you don't study artists from before your time, and it's entirely possible that you can get along perfectly fine having never done a study of an artist who stopped making work before you were born. But even if their body of work doesn't quite excite you, there is probably a certain area in which they really excelled, be it color or composition or specific rendering techniques, and that can be extremely captivating. And those techniques are probably things that have aged incredibly gracefully, otherwise you wouldn't be looking at their work to begin with. That's probably worth studying.
There are a lot of phenomenal concept artists whose works are incomplete that, in studying their work, would teach me less than I would get from an old master.
:P
I'm such a huge fan if we're talking about You Yoshinari, this guy is practically a god among men who can do it all. Leaving Gainax and starting up his own studio was a serious gusty move and I'm super excited for their new anime which should be out in a couple months. Imaishi, Sushio, Yoneyama, they all make me cry inside something fierce.
I was hoping the link to the figure video would have been fixed / re-mailed. I never actually watched it because I couldn't find it. : \
Still, I did some figure gesture/sketches: