The Mad Violinist

[The Violinist]

Hey

So I finally got the finger out of my donkey, and decided to make a sketchbook. My greatest passion lies in music, but I also love to draw (especially during math lessons...).

Most of my drawings are of people, although I'd love to learn how to draw landscapes as well. I like to put odd details in my art; hoping that watching them will be worth while.

My main weaknesses, when it comes to art, are drawing with pen (although I will submit pen illustrations as well), getting the eyes to look the same direction, shadowing (especially with pen) not making the nose to long...

I'm here to get better, and will be very happy if you give me constructive criticism. I know there are some extraordinary artists here, and that I have a lot to learn.

Thanks a lot



The Dead Eyes picture has been moved to another post. I wanted to change the gallery picture

[Mokinzi]

That is a gorgeous portrait up there! Beautiful face, interesting concept and a lovely play with textures. Nice shading as well!

I have a deep understanding for your struggle with the scanner

Like you say you have, I've earlier on had a big problem with always drawing the noses too long compared to the distance between nose and lips. You can have fun with it when drawing stylized people, but it's not usually wanted when going for something realistic.
You should try doing a simple practice where you quickly draw down a series of different faces, but all with rather way too short noses than too long, with a big area between nose and lips. Don't focuse too much on realism, but let them be more caricature-like. I think this could give you a better feel for balanced nose lengths


Well, I'd certainly like to see more from you!

[The Violinist]

Mokinzi: Hahaha thanks a lot^^ Don't think I have ever heard that sort of practice before ought to have a try at it. Thanks for the compliments and suggestions.

I have a lot of sketches lying about... Have redrawn some of them now. I wasn't sure how to render them though. I took away the "papery" background grit, and altered the colour slightly. Made a bit clearer.

If anyone has a good suggestion on how to edit pencil drawings in PS, please share .

Without further ado:


"Well rumour has it... That he once killed a dragon barehanded!"
A character concept of Waldemar Haagen, for a story I'm writing.


Another character concept for my story. Leapers are creatures that dwell in the deepest parts of the city. They can control the mind of rats, through which they locate their enemy. They can jump up to ten meters, and eats human flesh.


Yet another story concept. James Heart, the retired rock star. He had that one popular song, but didn't really make it as an artist. Despite this he still believes that he is the king of rock. He has an ego with the size of a zeppelin, and loves his guitar more than anything else in the world (except himself of course)



My violin The way only I perceive her.


I just had to make this after I'd made the first one Needless to say this one was made as a joke She plays an E by the way.


Last but not least: Rodogaar (pronounced Rodogore in English). Another story concept. An author who thinks that modern stories are nothing but cliches. He wants to make his own stories, and sets out on an adventure to get inspired. Later on he becomes one of the best selling author in the world.

[The Violinist]

Here is the Dead Eyes picture, I moved it here, because I wanted to change the gallery image.



Dead Eyes - Pencile on paper, rendered in Photoshop
I know there is something wrong at the bottom part... Dunno what happened there, the picture was edited in a rush, might re-upload it later on.
Also, the weird lights on her neck came when we printed it in.

[Mokinzi]

Hey, that's some lovely updates! I'm so glad you decided to update here


The first one with the man fighting the dragon is really cool. Very nice style of shading, and I'm fascinated by the way you drew the man's face and muscles.

The leaper is very nice, but I don't think I'd ever like to meet him...

And James Heart - what a funky character! I'd definitly like to read a story about him.

The violin drawings... I just love that concept. Very original and very beautiful Are you good at playing the violin, by the way?

Rodogaar is cool. I like his expression and his mustache! And his frustrations are very understandable... The bed design there is very neat!


All in all a great update! I really like your style. Please keep posting!

[Pixie Trick]

I like that violin character! Very cool. Keep on working at it.

[The Violinist]

Mokinzi: Thanks for those kind words . Now:
Waldemar and the dragon - The shading technique sort of faded away in the rendering... (Papersketch is a lot better ) but it's a technique I learned from watching a video by Stephen Platt at the Gnomon Workshop... But now that I looked it up I realized that I haven't gotten it quite right haha^^ Oh well.

I'm glad you liked the violingirl . I have have played violin for 9 or 10 years... Don't know for sure. So I'm starting to get the hang of it now yeah . Although I do live in a very rural place, and it's quite difficult to find a proper... Muse would be the most correct word I presume. Therefore I have traveled with train to Stavanger and Haugesund and played in an orchestra there(7 hour trip); gonna play in the Grieg Hall in Bergen next week

Pixie Trick: Thanks a bunch I'm actually making a third contribution to the violingirl "series", but I don't know where I've put it.

Anyhow:


Elizabeth Kaiser; the main character of my story. Her dear friend is brutally killed, but as the ship of souls travels towards Æther, (heaven) it falls down. Her friend is lost in the void between life and death; an odd dimension called Irrita. Liz travels after through her dreams, and tries everything to get back her lost friend.



Ducan Carravair; another character from my story. He might not be as strong as Waldemar hand to hand, but would without a doubt win in a combat between those two. His only weakness is, that he has problems determining the scale of a situation. This is why he wants to take on an entire army alone, so that his friends can get into safety.

He loves animals and has a horse names Carrot (because a carrot attached to the end of a fishing rod, held in front of the horse is the only way to make him move...), a chicken named Eggs (because... Well, you probably get the point), and a HUGE St. Bernard dog named Bernard (... He'd never been the creative one when it comes to names...).



Elijah Storm; the male protagonist in my story. He's The leader of a crew of skypirates. With wind constantly blowing through his hair, his flying bagship (a mobile flying ship which grows out from a backpack) takes him wherever the adventures might be.



The Cloakbird. A character from one of my DND (pen and paper roleplaying game) sessions. During the Weeping Masquerade, monsters blend in with the rest of the world, and capture innocent people! This big one was a guardian by a bridge in the woods.

They are really thin by the way, so their physique is kinda like that of a card man from Alice in Wonderland .

By the way, forgot to mention: I use a mechanical pencil on A4 paper. Do some rendering in Photoshop as well, but I'm not very skilled :/ (tips and tricks are more than welcome )

Thats it for now. Thanks for the kind words , hope you like this new addition.

Vio

[HAJiME]

I really like that first dragon thing. It's quite original looking. It's very fish like. Reminds me of a gar.

It would be FANTASTIC to see work you've done with media other than pencil.

[coreym1988]

I really like the picture with the man fighting the dragon. The white outline between him and the dragon really helps to draw your eye to him.

The leaper looks really cool. I can definately see them stalking their prey through the city staying just inside the darkness.

The violin girl is an excellent character idea. I like how you managed to incorporate many of the parts of a violin into her design. Just be careful not to break the g-string

My favorite is definately rodogaar. The text and the drawing have a very uniform style that is very neat looking. Very cool design

The faces of Ducan and Elijah look fairly similar to me. At first I thought that they were two ideas of the same character. Maybe changing the hair length or style would help differentiate them a little bit more? (I'm not trying to nitpick, just trying to find something to offer some constructive criticism on...

[Mokinzi]

You're playing in the Grieg hall? How cool!

All the drawings here are really nice. You have such a good sense of details! Like on Elisabeth's book and on Ducan's and Elijah's equipment. I love to read your little notes about the characters as well Ducan sounds awesome.
The shading on Elijah is very good!
And the cloakbird - it's brilliant! Hehe, I love anything strange and birdy.

My best advice for improving your skills in Photoshop is simply to practice hard and often and to experiment a lot! Portraits are nice to work with in order to get used to the functions of digital drawing.
I'd also like to see you experiment more with nose shapes

[The Violinist]

So long since I´ve been here . This contribution is a bunch of illustrations for the school year book. Sketched with pencil and later drawn with pen on a light table (a 300 year old light table with heat producing light bulbs I might add(nearly burned my fingers off...)).

Hajime: Thanks, hope you like the pen drawings . I never thought of the dragon as a fishlike creature but your quite right about that.

Coreym: Thanks a lot I´m glad you liked them. Luckily the G-string is the hardest one to break on a violin . Rodogaar is a strange character how seems to follow me wherever I go. My brother has actually adopted him and is currently making a comic about him. I really appreciate constructive criticism, although I can´t say I find Duncan and Elijah to be very similar. The hair looks a bit the same though. Even though Elijah has a pony tail . Perhaps it´s just the drawing style

Mokinzi: Thanks a lot for your kind words. I´m glad you liked them . I´ve made a few things in PS this year. Two posters for some students. One for an advent concert, the other for a ping pong tournament. I´ll post them another time. I´ll see if I can make more varied, and experimental nose shapes

I haven´t had a lot time to draw this year, but I´ve started making a comic. The story is not that important, I just wanted to practice comic drawing. Anyways. There is this girl, with a sun shaped sheath on her back, with many swords in it. And there´s a troll. And she´s gonna kill it. Yup. That´s it so far. Will be posting sketches as soon as I can.

Without further ado:


Spring


Summer


Autumn


Winter


Messages and greetings


House illustration. The number of the house, as well as the detail in the window, is unique on each of the 22 pages in which this drawing appears. Another fun fact: This drawing was actually drawn inverted. So the notes on the left side of the drawing was drawn opposite of the way they looked . The melody is the opening of Knut Nystedt´s (Norwegian composer) choir masterpiece "For a Small Planet", which we´ve performed several times (also in Oslo Cathedral).


Violin and cornet


Song and bass guitar


Trombone and percussion


"Tonebåten på nye eventyr" (Name of my school is Toneheim, and båt is Norwegian for boat).


"Tonebussen på nye eventyr" (Buss - Bus... You probably guessed that ).