NB's SB (update: sketches and CHOW entries)

**kenjitsu** · April 21st, 2008, 07:42 PM

Hope I didn't discourrage you. Your perspective issues are very small and with very little exercise you will nail it, actually you only need to be more aware of the perspective when painting, and your work it out by matching parallel lines and by connecting with a vanishing point, or several points which ever your perspective is based on.
http://www.termespheres.com/perspective.html, <-- simple as that.

That Chow really is beautiful... that entry should win. By far the best picture in the contest. I love it, very powerful and really nice details. I saw it in the finals thread and had to come here to comment. I feel lazy not finishing my chow, only the eow...

Edit:

Your Eow I did already comment in the wip thread and as I said, the only thing I could mention was that you used one point perspective which in it's own is already a strong compositional decision and then you even used the arrows to lead the eye and point inwards to the castle far out, which sadly happens to be non detailed, however you did detail the foreground, but as the eye is lead to the point that is almost the least detailed confuses the viewer. This too is a very easy to understand kind of thing, just like with perspective, you only need to be focused and constantly question every decision. As for composition, ask your self what is the most important part of the image, how to lead the eye. There are serveral methods, the use of contrast, color and value and then there are direction, perspective and movement, all of these are powerful eye leaders. You only need one, but to really emphasize the importance of a part in an image you can combine several of these if not all (which might be a little overkill).

1. Check your perspective with your vanishing point/s.
2. Be aware of you compositional decisions and question them as you progress.
Thou I think you did a good composition with the Beast Chow. And you did say you didn't go all in on the Eow so I don't mean to step on your toes by telling you something you already know.

I'm also learning... I have just figured out the importance of these pats myself, now it's time to really practice them. These weekly activities are just heaven sent for people like us, to test and improve skill.

Hope you understand what I'm trying to tell, I'm not so good with English.

**Nightblue** · April 24th, 2008, 04:04 AM

Dragonsnail: Thank you for the kind words! You know, I held the same prejudice and believed that it was impossible to make a living as a game developer for the longest time. It took an undergraduate degree plus an internship I ended up disliking to make me realize that 1. people do make a living making games, and 2. you have to take risks sometimes and do what you really want to do. I knew both of these things in theory before, but to actually understand them I had to kind of bump my head into a wall.

William: Thanks much for dropping by! (omg it's the daily sketch guy!) Thanks for the kind comments. I have a lot to learn in everything still, and am still in a kind of zealous panic as to what to learn first. I'm really glad my environments came through as being suitable for games, because that's exactly what I was aiming for.

Kenjitsu: You were as far from discouraging me as you could get

People's comments and critiques work wonders in lighting my fire when I'm tired, frustrated, or feel burnt-out. I'll be sure to practice perspective. It's funny how you can understand the basis of something but still struggle so much when using it. The EOW was simply not well-thought out... more of a playing with silhouette and I could not make sense of it structualy and functionally. Thank you so much for taking your time to critique, and please do step on my toes... I have shameless thick skin, and am about sensitive as a piece of log

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Struggling with the last piece of my focused study project... I'm still not happy with the composition and gesture, but because of time constraints I have to move on. Will finish the first pass of this piece by tomorrow. Here are my struggles in the past couple of days, likely trying to do too much to get a dynamic shot.

end of the day wip:

**Nightblue** · April 24th, 2008, 05:29 PM

semi final for the action pose:

Project is almost over! It's only a 2-month project but sure felt like forever

A quick one-hour study of a photo.

Edit: apparently photobucket doesn't like nude studies

back to the good ole uploader.

**Maestro Andres** · April 25th, 2008, 01:06 AM

Hey nightblue, it's outstanding seeing your last batch of updates. It shows a lot of dedication for your project and seems to be paying off well. Looking at the quality of your painting compared to the previous ones done for the Headhunter's guild. You are really nailing how to render those materials and surfaces well!
Critique wise, not so sure about this but in the last character illustration, I feel that there seems to be a disconnection between the character and background because of the different perspective being used. The background has this type of distorted view while the character is in regular perspective which kinda don't push the effect to its entirity. Also, the hour study did come out great but the added purple light is jumping a bit much because of the saturation IMHO, just a thought. BTW, I also really like that guy's stock pictures

Keep up the great work.

hp · April 25th, 2008, 07:22 PM

use imgshack! it goes down less.

your study looks great, maybe make her expression more intense. i think it'll help add "motion" to the piece.

**Nightblue** · April 27th, 2008, 08:38 PM

Maestro: Thanks! I hope I'll be more comfortable with characters in perspective eventually. I came across the stock photo on deviant art - amazing amount of figures there, love a lot of them

HP: thanks! I'll look into image shack. Still kind of shocked they'd take my nude study down. I guess I'm just desensitized to naked people.

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This Saturday, some local artists held a mini workshop at Reel FX. It was probably the best 10 bucks I've ever spent. There were goodies like lectures and tours, but the part I made the most use of is the 2 3-hour life drawing sessions. I had not done a long pose since... come to think of it, I have never done a pose that's longer than 2 hours from life!

For the first drawing, I forgot that I had my entire drawing toolbox in my car and had to use a 0.5 mechanic pencil. I did a 30 minute study in photoshop also. The 2nd drawing was done in 4B pencil.

**Jamesy** · April 28th, 2008, 03:37 AM

Nice life studies! That's pretty cool that you got the opportunity to do a longer pose, where I go the longest we get is around 40 minutes. With pencil (I usually use a .3 or .5), I wish I had a longer amount of time so I could give more care to the hatchings. I think you handled it pretty well, although the right arm on the first image seems to be a little off. You have a great imagination as well, and I've noticed the composition of your pieces are getting better and better! Keep it up!

**kenjitsu** · April 30th, 2008, 11:46 AM

I really really like the actionpose... damn... that is really awesome... the first life studie have some minor issues, right shoulder is too wide and it messes up the whole arm... You are getting better... alot. I wish I could go to some art classes... or school.

**Tec** · May 3rd, 2008, 07:33 AM

very nice sketchbook....it's cool to see that you try to improve in any direction possible: characters, props, environments, modeling etc. and it comes together really nicely...especially love the action pose sketches on the last page

and i have also a small critique for you: after looking through your sketchbook i noticed that most of your digital paintings are painted in midtones. you should try to push your values more and set focus with some really black or white areas...i think this would improve the look/depth even more

**Nightblue** · May 3rd, 2008, 11:22 PM

Jamesy: Thanks a lot! Getting not one, but two long poses in a day is a rare chance indeed, and the models were so fantastic too! I see what you are saying about the shoulder. I think her hair got me pre-occupied.

Kenjisu: Thanks! look around and see if you have any local sketch groups. I heard almost every city has at least one. Community colleges are affordable and generally cater to working people also.

Tec: Thanks! I'm trying to get decent on everything, but I'm also trying to find a specialization I can narrow down to. Sadly, I'm 100% indecisive

I completely agree with the midtone critique. Funny thing is I used to do pure black and white ink drawings and had no problem with that. I'll try to bring that boldness into my paintings.

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Just survived the finals week. First day of my week-long break from school... was very lazy. At least I got a wip for IDW, which I've always meant to enter.

**Nightblue** · May 4th, 2008, 05:56 PM

Final for IDW#69- happiness dispenser:

Forget about the 18 hour work day, the lackluster economy, and the sky-rocketing bio fuel price! Step in the Salon of Joy. Sit down, close your eyes, feel the world shrink around you into a much more comforting size. Our harmless brain stimulator mask will bring you the best and only happiness you'll feel in this world

**Mat Kaminski** · May 5th, 2008, 12:24 PM

HAHAHAHA!!!

That happiness dispenser is awesome!

**Nightblue** · May 13th, 2008, 01:00 AM

Malakai: Thanks!

Took one week off when the school went into break... rested up, watched the entire season 1 of Heroes with boyfriend, and slacked off a lot!

I'll try to practice every day consistently from today on. Must get good before graduation.

One-hour self-portrait for today. I have some kind of disconnection between painting in photoshop and drawing in traditional media still. Hopefully painting in photoshop from life will help.

**Nightblue** · May 14th, 2008, 01:02 PM

Trying to learn to use digital airbrush.

**Mat Kaminski** · May 14th, 2008, 01:23 PM

Hmmm, that self-portrait looks pretty nice. Try using an even lower opacity brush to really get the colors to blend nicely

I don't know how you color, but I usually have this giant pallette off the "paper" that has all my colors and their many shades. Kind of like traditional I suppose. But it actually helps me to get the many blends. I actually almost never use a soft brush unless I need shines or things like that. You might have been painting really fast though... I dunno, I don't do enough paint, because like you, I share in that disconnection between traditional and digital. I draw traditionally all the time, and then scan and try to start painting, but for some reason my mind just refuses to color the picture. Something about the solidity of the lines or something... I don't know, it sucks sometimes.

Regardless though, the digital airbrush stuff is really really good. The best of the four is definitely the bottom right.

You're definitely getting better. But I suppose that would happen after a good while of drawing and working with the programs.

Well anyway, nice update, always glad to see more of your work

**Alex the Red** · May 14th, 2008, 02:01 PM

That happiness dispenser made me laugh . . . specifically the cleanable seat and the "safe space" curtains. I think the image would benefit from harder edges, but otherwise it looks nice.

**Nightblue** · May 18th, 2008, 06:59 PM

Malakai: Thanks for the tips! I totally need to try the digital palette thing. I don't often use soft brushes, but I've always been amazed by people who can do airbushes in a not squishy way. I hope that makes sense

Alex: Thanks! I think I should have painted cheesy happy flowers on the machine like I originally wanted to also. It would probably be even creepier

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Haven't updated for a long while. I swear that I've been drawing though!

A rat watercolor for a friend. It was done on really small size with a really crappy brush and everything... didn't do the character justice at all! And 2 collages of sketches I did today, studying boat and facial structure.

**Kfeeras** · May 18th, 2008, 07:43 PM

the little critter reminds me of the south park episode with lemmiwinks.

love the ship-thumbs. keep up mate

-cheers

**Nightblue** · May 20th, 2008, 04:34 PM

Keefras: Thanks a lot!

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Sketches for CHOW. Not happy with the design... I think I'll try to go more futuristic and fluid. Right now it's looking kind of like the last concept project I just did.

Also posted are renderings of my lighting exercises for school. We were given a scene with nothing but gray textures, and were asked to use light to create four different moods.

**Mat Kaminski** · May 21st, 2008, 01:37 PM

Man, those are just gray textures on all of them?
The mood and feel of number 2 is incredible!
It kind of looks very forboding, like there is something creepy in there...
Could have set the mood for a silent hill type thing or something for number three lol!

**BlightedArt** · May 21st, 2008, 05:14 PM

You almost got me in trouble at work when I scrolled down to a naked lady.

Just kidding. You have some excellent life studies (and don't worry, you're doing really well with those digital airbrush portraits).

I think you just need to practice a little more on high and low angle shots of the face, such as with the sketch of the person leaning back with their hands behind their head. 'Tis a tough angle but you're well on your way to accomplishing the means to pull it off rather nicely. ^_^

Also, how much would one of those happiness dispensers go for? ;P

**Nightblue** · May 22nd, 2008, 07:38 PM

Malakai: Thanks! It was quite a fun assignment, and took deceptively long too.

Blighted: Oops... I guess I should put a nudity warning on my sketchbook :-o I'll definitely work on different angled faces, or even body parts since I always have trouble with it. The happiness dispenser is still under development, and I'd like a first dib on it once it comes out

Thanks for stopping by!

===============

Flying boat for a game pitch for class. More sketches to come...

**Mat Kaminski** · May 23rd, 2008, 12:45 PM

Man, that boat looks like the best of the bunch !!!

**Giorge** · May 23rd, 2008, 01:12 PM

Nice sketches, some of them are really funny , watch your edges ( hard/soft edges) and do some material sketches, texture sketches, practice more on the skin ... in some of your sketches the skin looks like rubber ... don't worry that's a common mistake. Cheers

**cout<mecha** · May 24th, 2008, 12:48 PM

Nice updates! I see you attacking the problem from all sides and genres while staying relevant. I imagine you are in a gaming styled school. Your work with 3D and Z-brush turned out really well.

**Nightblue** · May 25th, 2008, 11:00 PM

malakai: Thanks!

flamable: Thanks! I'm definitely going to work more on the skin. It's one of the deceptively hard things.

cout<mecha: Thanks! I am going to a gaming styled school, and enjoy it a lot so far. My goal is to become decent well-rounded before finding something I really want to focus on.

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So I'm trying to model again... my 2nd original character model will be Aura the treasure hunter from last term's directed focus study (her action shot is on top of this page and her character concept is one page before.)

Roughly 10 hours into modeling. I need to do more and get faster. The geometry is far from done - many accessories to come, and Aura also doesn't have ears yet because I forgot

**cout<mecha** · May 26th, 2008, 01:18 PM

This is an awesome character and ten hours is excellent especially with the face. I can tell you have a talent in 3D. Ears are hard, what about an ear shaped poly with a relief map. Doesn't z-brush make it easy to dig out those types of details?

**Mat Kaminski** · May 27th, 2008, 01:24 AM

I think I agree with cout<mecha, you definitely have a knack for 3D modelling as well as regular 'ole painting...

You'll have to let me know what game company you end up at lol!!

**Nightblue** · May 27th, 2008, 11:37 PM

cout: Thanks for the encouragement! I haven't used z-brush before, but having used mudbox it is a good idea to do the ear like you talked about.

Malakai: Thanks for the kind words! I would totally keep you updated. Still about half a year to go, this is exciting and nerve-wrecking in a way.

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Today's update: sketch for game pitch for class - it's a gnome!

I also messed more with the 3D model, especially on the face. I'll post more of her when I'm nearing done with geometry.

**Flaskpost** · May 28th, 2008, 11:35 AM

Nice gnome! The "sparkling" effect at the end of the screw drivers are bother me a bit tho, not as good as the rest of the painting. Maybe clean em up some?