Craig Paton Illustration

[Craig Paton]

Having finally built up the confidence to post my work on ConceptArt.org without fear of horrifying humiliation, I have began my own sketchbook.

Tired of being a less than averagely skilled artist, I have decided to dedicate most of this year to improving my work to a proper professional standard. Already I am growing frustrated with my slow and limited progress, hopefully posting work in this sketchbook will present me with the feedback and crits I need to properly set me on the right course to improvement.

I'll post some of my recent finished work, some of my recent practice sketches and studies, and then endeavour to post some work on, at least, a weekly basis.

Latest work on the newest post/page.

[Craig Paton]

This past week I've been doing daily speed paints on a canvas split into quadrants (Fang Zhu style), with a different topic or subject each day. Times for each quadrant range from 20-90 minutes.

[Craig Paton]

Some recent finished work.

[element1988]

Great sketchbook really diggin that last post.. tng was a great show.

[Kambei Shimada]

Craig, your splendid sketchbook is indeed splendid.


Would be nice to see some drawings/sketches from life also.

[Craig Paton]

Thanks you, sirs.

I shall get get some sketchbook scans and life drawings up here this week.

[Craig Paton]

My first attempt at a CHOW challenge, from a few weeks back.

[Craig Paton]

A few sketches from my weekly sketch jam group, DOJ-City Sketch Jam.

[JakehC]

Having finally built up the confidence to post my work on ConceptArt.org without fear of horrifying humiliation, I have began my own sketchbook.

Tired of being a less than averagely skilled artist, I have decided to dedicate most of this year to improving my work to a proper professional standard. Already I am growing frustrated with my slow and limited progress, hopefully posting work in this sketchbook will present me with the feedback and crits I need to properly set me on the right course to improvement.

I'll post some of my recent finished work, some of my recent practice sketches and studies, and then endeavour to post some work on, at least, a weekly basis. (You'll be able to see more of my work on the sites in my signature.)

I understand your sentiments in this but i hope i can give a few words of advice.

The best way to improve is to make a lifestyle adjustment and to make a daily motion towards sticking to a routine. I know it can be discouraging looking foward into a journey from the beginning onwards, and trust me ive seen my fare share of people quit half way through.

Just keep your head above the water, dont judge yourself to critically, and learn to not only enjoy the idea of art, but also the process of discovery.

People who become good usually do so because they love the technical aspect of creating and the problem solving.

Dont worry about whether things look good or if they meet the standard of beauty that you appreciate on the forum. Just do work that is true to your creative vision. And stay away from judging yourself by other people's standards.

Focus on expanding your visual vocabulary and literacy. Think about how ideas are formed from abstract to representative. Focus on studies of not only realistic things, but also try to understand things like animation (specifically how design restrictions influence the creative process of concept art).

Career wise, try to pin point exactly what it is you want to do with your work and put most of your time into that. A big mistake a lot of people make is confusing general fantasy illustration with concept art. Both require some similar things, but in some ways both require a lot of different things. If you are wanting to do concept art then i think its worth delving more into the process you use to make your design decisions like clothing, weapons, ornamentation, environment, ect. Try to think not so much about how you draw, but what you do with those drawings. And how they communicate ideas. Because in the end thats what it is mostly about in concept art.


Hope to continue to see your work around here. It looks like you are pretty talented and have a lot of potential.

KEEP IT UP!

[Craig Paton]

Good and encouraging advice Aryeh, much appreciated.

I keep a page of motivating notes beside my work station, on it I have a quote that says 'little steps, little goals, productive everyday', which I was put in mind of while reading your advice.

Blurring the line between what is required for concept art and what is required for general fantasy illustration is something I'm certainly guilty of, I shall take note of that in future.

[Craig Paton]

A couple of short life drawing studies. I often create my drawings from life really small, a confidence thing, I guess.

Some of these are a few months old. I shall have to scan in some more recent drawings.

I try to attend life a life drawing class in Glasgow every Tuesday, but often laziness gets the better of me.

[Craig Paton]

A Warhammer 40k Space Marine character design, created as part of an art test.

[Craig Paton]

Some fan art of characters from Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash, YT and Hiro Protagonist.

[Craig Paton]

Some more sketch jam stuff.

[Craig Paton]

A drawing of Kvothe from Kingkiller Chronicle.

[Craig Paton]

Some more speed paint picture studies and a sketch of Christopher Lee.

[Craig Paton]

Working on improving my basic drawing. Making an attempt at 100 hands, feet and faces.

30 hands thus far.

[Craig Paton]

Some recent work. I've been trying making attempts to introduce a much more painterly and loose style to my work.

[Craig Paton]

I made my first attempt at filming myself painting this past week, and posted the results to YouTube, in order to attempt to get some feedback and direction on how I'm working.

Had little but neckbeard ire from Reddit and YouTube thus far, perhaps those where not the best places to look for insightful comment.

[Craig Paton]

My entry for this week's CHOW.

[Craig Paton]

Took me a while, but, I have finally completed my 100 hand study project.

[Craig Paton]

A new illustration, cover art for Feylander.

[stan-c]

Craig,

Fantastic hand collection! I really like different drawing styles and variety of poses. Can't wait another hundreds! I will be dropping by so keep posting.
Try to post photos you use as references - viewers will be able to compare them with your paintings.

Cheers,
Stan

[lionheartGFX]

wow you truly stepped up keep on improving always strive for better and more awesome artwork, i saw your chow i liked the rendering alot, do you have more than that one video of you painting? how did you learn?

[Craig Paton]

Thanks for the feedback chaps.

I've only uploaded the one video so far, will need to make a new one soon, before my Camtasia trial runs out.

Here's my Chow for this week; Goblin Assassin.

[Craig Paton]

Some ref detail and wips for the Goblin Assassin.

[Seraph Fawkes]

Nice progress, especially over recent work I see how you've improved your understanding of values. However keep in mind anatomy, cause that goblin really unbalanced and skewed in lower part - his shoulders almost on the same horizontal level, which suggest small perspective distortion, but his feet are placed in a manner, that suggests strong distortion, but with upper half it looks like his right leg is short. Also the left foot position doesn't really supports his weight. But keep doing what you're doing!

[ChinaCadet]

very good progress

[Setherial]

nice work man, love those studies.

[Craig Paton]

Thanks for the feedback guys, always appreciated.

Here's a few 10-20 minute landscape studies, as I get to grips with my new Intuos 5.




I've decided to dedicate at least the next month solely to focusing on strengthening my core fundamental art skills. Doing excessive in perspective, figure drawing, anatomy, value & colour studies.

I'm hoping that this coming year will be the one where I see the largest improvement in the quality of my work.

Here are some basic 1st, 2nd and 3rd point perspective exercises, inspired by the Perspective 101 thread.



I'd welcome any suggestions of recommended studies or art exercises.

After this month of study my goal will be to bring a focus and sense of direction to my work and folio. Perhaps concentrating more on creating an appropriate folio for a fantasy & scifi book illustrator.