Akil Dawkins - Sketchbook Updated 5-17-2013

[akildee]

Hey all,

My name is Akil and I work professionally as 3D game artist. However more recently I'm starting to wish that I had gone to school for industrial design instead of 3D. I've never been happy with the consistency of my drawing and I think studying I.D. would have greatly helped with that. Anyway, at my current job I do 80 percent 3D and only 20 percent design. As we hire new artists I'm going to spend a year working on my design drawing at home, then eventually I'll move on to interiors and exterior concept painting and beyond. So that hopefully I will be able to easily transition into primarily a design roll. My goal for this sketchbook is to see dramatic overall improvement, in one year.

All of these drawings and paintings are done after work at home. I'll be drawing in the evening at least 3 times a week(wow that sounds tiring already). I'm also taking a basic trans design class next month so we'll see how this year goes! Any crits or comments are welcome!

[NickyBeats]

i think thats a great goal to set, and being from a 3D background, you actually have a solid leg up on a lot of artists that struggle to imagine things in 3 dimensions, and translate that image to 2d, or paper. i have only recently gotten into 3D, within the past few years, but i have already noticed a big improvement in how i perceive volume and forms in a 2D space. being able to spin around a sculpt on all axis has been very helpful in trying to better understand contours, and overlapping lines. i think it is a very good base to work off of, im not sure what type of modeling you were doing, but if your doing it professionally id say your gonna be just fine.

one thing to stress is that drawing and painting, like 3D modeling, requires you to work from the ground up. too many people try to jump ahead and skip to the fun stuff. a solid understanding of fundamentals will only strengthen your skills as they develop, and youll be less likely to lapse into one of those zones where your creativity seems to fade out because your technical skill is not up to what your mind is envisioning. the most basic principles can produce the most astonishing results, if your imagination is able to conceive it.

so, i wish you luck, remember to really concentrate on things like understanding of lines (what they represent at least), shapes (overall) - try not to sip into a pitfall of repeating shapes too often, it can mislead you into substituting shapes for real forms, with depth. also focus on lighting (shadows). perspective, line-weight, values... if you can really progress with these things youll be miles ahead of where you were, and then your ideas will be much easier to create once you better understand how to create them.

anyways, welcome to CA! your drawings look good, but theres still plenty of room to improve, so keep at it, and ill be keeping an eye out for more posts!

[akildee]

Thanks for the kind words Nicky. I checked out your sketchbook, but I didn't comment because you have about million images! But I will keep an eye out and will be sure to comment on your new stuff. I'll be posting whatever sketches I do after dinner tonight. Stay tunned...

Edit: These pics are actually from my first post. Was having a bit of difficulty with the forum tools. Not too savvy with them lol.

[akildee]

Here are the sketches from a couple nights ago. Feeling the blue indigo prismacolor recently. Reference for the helms is from the "Warrior" book. I'm gonna try to get through the whole book doing my own designs based off old armor and weapons. The woman is just a doodle. Later!

[akildee]

More nightly sketches. Exercises, "warrior" book redesigns, and random transport.

[akildee]

No problem at all. Just finished week four. Eleven more months to go! Will post more tonight after work.

[akildee]

Working on some transport. Its a weak spot for me so you'll be seeing a lot more of these. The pen thumbnails are a challenge cause they are loose with no erasing so I'm gonna try stick with it. Later guys.

[akildee]

Testing out some markers. Not very good with them. But I'm gonna stick with them. More sketches tomorrow.

[akildee]

Just some ship thumbnails today. Pretty tired. More tomorrow.

[asa]

hey man, good first effort, it's very good that you do lots of sketches
just as a personal thought, design is something independent of the medium you work in, if you are a 3d artist the 3d medium is an excellent design medium, a lot of people use it and a lot of people use a mix of the 2d and 3d in the design process
drawing fundamentals are great, I wish also I had some strong fundamental skills, but having excellent drawing or painting abilities don't automatically make you a designer
why I am saying all this, because if it is design you are after, not illustration, than you already have some pretty strong skills that can help you achieve great designs ant that ,if you ask me, you shouldn't dis consider
so if I were you I would definitively learn the 2d fundamentals but I would also use the 3d medium to flesh out ideas
keep up the good work

[akildee]

Asa: Thanks for the advice man. I wish I had half of your 2D skills! Its something I go back and fourth with a lot, and I see that you do a lot of 2D and 3D as well. The reason why I'm doing this year long test is because the people at my studio can design so much faster. Conveying ideas in a few minutes that would take me much longer in 3D. But you may be right, coming up with a hybrid solution may be the best idea in the long run :/

As for these sketches they are from Friday last week. Sorry I didn't up date daily like I said I would. I started my Transport class and it a LOT of work. So I only have time for trans homework. But for the next six weeks, I'll take a pic of my assignment and post it so you guys can see my progress. We are drawing huge so its too big to scan. Later guys.

[akildee]

OK, finally had a chance to update. Here are the class drawings from last week. Had to pick an animal and do some side view sketches based off that. I took some quick pics with my digital camera. Sorry for the distortion. will post more next week.

[phatbuddha]

Love the bug and costume studies.

[akildee]

Thanks for taking a look man. I made some comments in your sketchbook as well. Trying to become as active on these forums as time permits.

[Fess1001]

Cool sketchbook!~ The designs are easy to read, the ones in perspective seem pretty accurate and I like the line confidence that you're getting in your latest sketches. Keep it up!

[Rhoshone]

I like the bug studies and the thumb-nails are also cool. Would be nice to see them mocked up in CS.

Also nice to know your cars are 5 tires long

I shall stick around.

[xxshadowedsoulxx]

I'm digging those rough vehicle thumbs!

[akildee]

Thanks for all the replies guys! I've decided to only update every few days now until this trans class is over. Still struggling with that sketchy feel with quality draftsmanship. Very tough. Here's a selection of sketches from the week. Most are from class, and some are from me on the couch while watching Alias on Netflix. Later all.

[akildee]

Trans class finally over! I will be posting my stuff from the class this week. Here's some random sketches in the meantime.

[Joakim Olofsson]

Cool stuff

[akildee]

Thanks Joakim.

Here's some stuff from the Trans class. Really tough for me since cars are my achilles heel, but I learned a ton!
Note: The tiny drawing of the buggy in the bottom left of the first pic was done by the instructor in about 3 minutes. As you can see, he's pro.

[akildee]

Just some mech sketches I did while watching netflix. I'm on vacation till after the first of the year!

[Mr-Joe]

Hi, thanks for the post in my sketchbook, I appreciate your observation and suggestions, I'm sure I'll be thinking about it for quite a bit, I don't understand why you suggest that someone drawing on your art work is "pro",(post #21) to me i see nothing that makes it different than what you have posted, other than you stated he did it in 3mintues, which can even be seen as slow to someone who could sketch something so simple in 15 seconds, so why give that person that kind of praise, other than he has a job title that pays him a salary or money. I don't mean to undermine or belittle someone in place of an instructor, I think your drawings show growth, and that you might have miss represented what your instructor was trying to teach you if he is deemed to be of qualified degree, but beside my ignorance, great progress.

[akildee]

Hey thanks for posting Mr Joe! Your question is kind of a tough one to answer but I figure I'll give a shot at explaining what I mean. When you look at his buggy compared to mine, every line has a certain sureness and visual weight. Not like line work weight, but weight in its believability. For instance if you look at just the antenna, he nailed that antenna with one stroke because of the knowledge and coordination necessary to put that antenna exactly where it needs to be to make it read. If you look at my sports car side views from a few weeks ago as compared to the renderings I'm doing now, I definitely feel that I have improved. But my goal is to have enough knowledge and coordination to draw everything with the ease that my instructor is able to draw. In that picture I spent 20 minutes just on the base drawing before I started to add marker. Right after that he came and drew that one underneath to show me a bit of a demo. He showed me where the darks and reflections should be, how the mudflaps and antenna should look on a vehicle in motion, and the minimum level of line quality needed to get the vehicle to "read" within the shortest amount of time. When I draw my lines half the time I am guessing where to put them to see if I get something i like. He doesn't guess. If wants a bigger hood, he knows exactly what a big hood on a buggy looks like and draws it. Thats my goal. Maybe if you saw me struggling then saw him draw that small sketch with ease it would be more obvious. However, I still feel like if you look closely the difference in expertise and quality is still there, even in that simple drawing. Sketches from transportation designers are always so solid in their fundamentals! Hopefully that kind of makes sense.

I'll keep an eye on your sketchbook as well!

[akildee]

sorry, some type of double post error.

[akildee]

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. It just takes too long to scan all this stuff in after drawing each night. Plus I've been looking for a new place to live, gotta leave in month. But I'm still sketching and my goal hasn't changed! Here's some stuff from this week. Not sure if I'm going to go through the stuff from weeks past. May just do random posts until things calm down. Later all.

[Mr-Joe]

In response to your last reply to my post, it does make a lot of sense, he has an understanding of the functionality or mechanics of vehicles, or of whats unseen in the drawing to be able to simplify what you do see in a drawing on the exterior.

I suppose what I observed is your drawing "could" be functional, and appears very believable, so much so that it appears no different in believability than your instructors drawing, but what you were implying is that you drew it not knowing exactly why.

[Skuttling]

Have you tried working in photoshop at all? I find sometimes the way that you can construct an image in an application like photoshop can be more similar to 3D modeling and can be a good transition. Things like using layers to build up pieces and then clipping masks for shading.

[akildee]

Hey all, sorry for the late response, but I just moved into a condo! But we've got everything unpacked and I have still been drawing, so I throw some stuff up when I get home tonight.

To Mr-Joe:
Yes that's exactly what I was trying to say! I think my drawing looks believable, but one day I would love to have the ability to add all those subtleties that he adds with such ease.

To Skuttling:
Yeah, as I texture artist I use Photoshop all the time at work, but for drawing I like to stick with paper at least for now. In fact I've been sticking with marker and pen recently so that there is no way I can erase. When I start working on my painting though, I'm going skip traditional paints and go straight to Photoshop. Buying and using paints would be a bit too annoying to use in the condo!

[MrFrenik]

It's great that you've set your goal to be a solid 2D artist to help with your designs. It's also great that for now you're sticking to traditional pencil/paper. For me the number one thing that helped my drawing along in all aspects was fully understanding solid perspective. Scott Robertson has a dvd series that is killer and something that I usually suggest to all beginning artists that I see on here. Keep up the good work and I'll be back to check out more.