scribbles 'n things (traditional & digital)

[dierat]

Looove the leopard, keep it up!

[Harmageddon]

dierat: thank you!
I hope I can finish it with power, so to speak.
Sometimes I'm afraid to kind of paint and detail on until the painting lost it's "spark" it had in the beginning.
Only one way to find out, though.
...What am I saying, I will finish it, to the best of my abilities!
I'm on a rocket!

Could not help myself, started another one.
Acrylics on canvas, 60x80cm. Leopard.

[Lumens]

ah this awesome!
Yeah keeping that intial spark from the sketchfase into the rendering part without killing it is one of the hardest things.

Seeing your acrylic preditors makes me want to bust out my oil paints :o

[Harmageddon]

Lumens: I really want to keep the spark, though.
Therefore, I have decided I shall do 100 paintings this year, all of them finished.
Starting stuff is not hard; I've already got 16 paintings underway.
None of them are finished however, lol
Still, I figured if I just start finishing them, I'll practice 100 times how to finish a painting - I'm bound to learn something from this, no?
Oh, and thanks man, to say I inspired you to bust out your oils. I will be smiling all day now

Update - nothing finished ... yet
But I did start some new stuff. And I did some work on the woodpecker.
All acrylics on canvases, 60x80cm.

[Harmageddon]

small update

some more work on the grey bird, and the first setup of a new one.
Both are acrylics on canvas, 60x80cm...familiar recipe.

Lol, really got to finish 2 pieces this week, because they've been sold!
I just can't seem to stop making new ones

[Harmageddon]

Damn it's hard to actually finish paintings!

I will do it however. No matter the struggles ahead, no matter all the demons in my head that are telling me I can't do it, I can't paint worth shit, I ain't original, I will fail, this is mediocre, etc. I will go down into the valley of darkness in my own head and I will put them to the sword. I will make these demons wish they'd stayed in hell where they belong.

Conceptart will follow later. For now I'm struggling for a career as a wildlife artist.

update. Been working on some things.
All are acrylics on canvases, 60x80cm

[Harmageddon]

Wow.. it's been a week already. Gotta get back into the groove...
Also I've got to get back to practicing my digital skills.. argh!
So much to do, so little time! Still great though. Enjoying every minute of it.
For now, I'm just going to be me. And pretend I'm an artist

I've taken a break on the big ones (60x80cm) to just do something different, so now I've started 3 smalle ones (10x15cm).

Acrylics on mini-canvas, referenced (obviously)







Ok and did some work on the last big painting.
acrylics on canvas, 60x80cm, reffed, wip.

[CarstenJ]

Hi,

very cool animal portraits, and the "mini" elephant is adorable. Keep on painting.

[Satu]

Heyy many awesome new paintings here! Career as a wildlife artist sounds very good. Also I love the baby elephant. Keep working and having fun as you are doing!

[Harmageddon]

CarstenJ & satupeikko: thank you for your comments.
Much appreciated.
The baby elephant is happy to be adored

I've been sketching some stuff; centaur and a page of weird shit from mind.The bulls are all reffed, apart from the bottom right one.
I'm getting stiff with a pencil. Must draw more often.

And some more work on the mini paintings.
Thanks for watching. And keep making that art you want to make.
The world could use some of that. Off you go!

[Harmageddon]

flurp

[Harmageddon]

update on the book cover
I'm making this for a friend of mine; he's got his 1st book to be published!
He wants a pencilled cover; no ink; no colours.
I'm kind of going overboard with the detailing maybe.. dunno.
Any thougths? This is supposed to be a wraparound with the guy on the front of the book.





And I started another painting. Reffed. Wip.

[dierat]

He wants an all-pencil drawn cover? I don't think that's going to attract many buyers.. is he self-publishing by any chance?

In any case, I know you've already got it planned out and started detailing it out and everything, but the best advice I have for you is to stop what you're doing and do some thumbnails. It feels like you sketched out the image and then just started going to town on it without play-testing the composition. Make sure the shapes are creating the movement that you want and bringing the viewer's eye to the important areas of the piece, then do a quick value mock-up to help you keep your value range in check. With a piece like this where you have a very long view distance, you have to be careful that you don't throw too many dark darks and light lights into the far background - that will draw attention away from the foreground and create a distorted sense of perspective. And that's an issue with the details as well. Objects get fuzzy and simplified further away, but we artists have a tendency to render out all the texture and details which will work against us if we're not careful.

Okay, about the composition you have right now, to be quite frank, it's a bit stiff. You have some crazy nice stuff happening in the sky back there, and that's exciting, but then you have this guy in the front that might as well be a cardboard box for all the movement happening there. I marked up your image to simplify it down and show you how you have to analyze your piece in order to determine how effective the movement will be. As a general rule, diagonal lines are king for compositional movement. Straight-up vertical and horizontal lines are movement killers that create flat images. The white box and red lines illustrate why your composition isn't eye-catching. The green lines demonstrate organic, beautiful movement that should be pushing us to enjoy the rest of your image. You might notice a kind of kidney bean shape happening in the center of the image created by the clouds on the right and his robe on the bottom. That's what we're looking for - lines that point to the focus of the image like traffic signs guiding the viewer in the right direction and tying the various elements together.

Okay that's enough for now.. I'm gonna go eat a sandwich.

[Harmageddon]

Dierat: thanks for your exquisite and eloquent critique!

As my friend is the customer and customer = king, it will be a pencilled cover.
Whether it will sell or not; maybe just because it is different it will. Maybe it won’t. I don’t know.

I agree with your observations regarding depth to be conveyed by a
a) more details in the foreground and less in the background and
b) more black/white contrast in the front and less in the back.
I could put less detail in the background, but could not help myself while autopiloting.

Then again, the night sky is dark and the stars are bright, yet they are in the background.
The sky in itself is weird of course, but he wants a bigbang/stars and galaxies on 1 side and a sun on the other, and something in between.

As for the composition.
I'll keep it this way. (minor changes maybe)

The front of the book will only be visible to potential buyers, which is the right half of the drawing.
Composition wise this is the weakest part maybe. Lol.

You are right that I kind of rushed into it: I started off chopping it all up in thirds, then took it from there.
I filled in the sky, also in thirds. Kind of. Interesting enough shapes. Done.
Background with the fields would have a road in them (as he is a traveller, or prophet) and I figured only grasslands would be bland.
So I threw in a forest and a lake (that kind of sucks).
In all, not too many distracting things, as it’s about the prophet, not the background.

I'm still struggling with the foreground atm.
Putting some interesting things in there, to kind of draw the eye forward.

In all, I think you pointed out some valuable things
(some of which I notice in your own work as well, but that's how it goes with critiques
and I really appreciate your thoughts.
Next time, I'll do more thumbs, and think out main elements a bit further.

This was a rush job so it'll have to do.
Besides my friend is happy so that is what counts for now.

PS: you're up late? Lol.

[Harmageddon]

YES! Finally! After 2 days; it is done. Feels...energizing.

That is to say, I need to take a better picture and tweak that a little in Photoshop, but it's just past midnight here and it's too dark to take a decent picture.

I'm just surging with energy and thought I'd post it anyway.

*pours a glass of wine* peace. Out.

[dierat]

Looks really nice dude, I think it turned out really well. Most of what I was saying was more of a 'to keep in mind for the future' tips; I understand that sometimes you just have to finish what you started, and I think you did a great job with it. The prophet is really well rendered, particularly the face and robe. I do think he could handle a few more dark touches though. His feet are demanding a lot of attention because those sandals have the darkest tones of the whole right half of the image (ie the front cover). Going in with a sharp, soft pencil and enhancing the shadows a touch, around his face and hair in particular to emphasize the focal point, would really help I think.

Another thing to consider in the future is that when you create an image to be printed is you want to leave a bleed margin around the outside where nothing important is happening because it might get cut off in the printing process. His right (our left) foot and the bottom of his staff are really close to the edge right now.

In all, I think you pointed out some valuable things
(some of which I notice in your own work as well, but that's how it goes with critiques

Oh no that crit totally boomeranged on me! But yeah I know what you mean; it's definitely something I need to work on as well.

PS: you're up late? Lol.

12:30's not late; I got to bed at 3am

[Harmageddon]

dierat: thanks again,
I realize your were handing out tips, I will keep them in mind.
Personally, I think that sometimes it is good to do loads of thumbs and pick strong compositions from them,
but other times it is good to just do what feels right and take it in 1 go only.

Oh no that crit totally boomeranged on me! But yeah I know what you mean; it's definitely something I need to work on as well.

Both are paths on the road to become a better artist, and both paths are well worth the walk.

You are right about the edge - I just cut it off to post just the image here.
The actual picture does have an extra edge; although I think 1cm might be too small an edge. We'll see.

Good crits always boomerang.
It's the mirror of life.
You learn by reflection.

12:30's not late; I got to bed at 3am

Haha I thought it was way later than that, my bad.

[ThomasM]

Hi, wow great start to a sketchbook. All these acrylics are looking great. I like your style of using extremely saturated colours, but I think occassionally the brightness of the background might detract slightly from the subject, but then perhaps not, its just something to think about.

Also, with the grass in the last piece I would recommend trying to "clump" it a little more, and group it into a mass rather than a collection of blades. For a little more of an idea of what I mean, I would recommend ferdinand petrie´s book on "drawing landscapes in pencil". There is also a little on composition in that book, and value structure which could help.

I hope that helps, keep up the hard work!

[AlexTooth]

Cool I love animals too! Especially birds. I like the great tit painting, we have some which nest outside the kitchen every year

[Harmageddon]

ThomasM: thanks man! Glad you like them!
As for saturated background: I'm still kind of playing with colors to see what works.
I like the extremely saturated colours, but maybe I go overboard with them sometimes.
I did a test in Photoshop on the lion's background after your comment.
The desaturated background may even be better. Dunno.
Thanks for pointing this out - you've incorporated this into my thinking now
Oh and about the grass; yeah you're right. I rushed it too much.

AlexTooth: yeah animals are just .. awesome!
Those little fuzzy featherballs called great tits (what a name) are just cute.
I'm going to do loads more of these paintings this year, so hopefully there's some that you like even more

Some more stuff I'm working on atm...
The horse is 50x70cm, water based oils, the other 2 are 60x80cm, acrylics.
All on canvas.

The horse's tail currently looks like a giant spray of stuff from it's ass, so I need to fix that.
The bird of prey is proving to be quite a struggle, getting the likeness of all colours and shapes right.
The tiger ...
Well, I brought it along to some folks that wanted to see some of my works,
and although the adults were all like "ooh" and "aah", the best reaction came from a 6yrs old girl.
She said "I'm a tiger, too!" and started dancing in front of the painting.
The whole evening she kept playing, drawing with crayons and whatnot in front of the tiger.
To see her so captivated by it, made me feel great.
That is exactly the kind of stuff I hope to give to the world.
That's the stuff I try to put into these paintings.
And somehow it was there, for this girl anyway. Awesome

[Harmageddon]

I'm still struggling to finish my paintings, but starting them is no problem at all.

So, some new works, all paintings, works in progress.
The blues paintings are for an uncle who throws a blues party in april,
I thought they'd make nice decoration/atmosphere (he doesn't know I'm making them)
and these are 30x40cm, acrylics on canvas.
Can you guess who they are?

The panther is a new one, 60x80cm, acrylics on canvas.

[Harmageddon]

whew it's been a while..

First off, I joined some COW challenges, why don't you?
You can find them here: Challenges

I suck at drawing people, or industrial stuff so I didn't join those challenges yet. Besides, I need to seriously step it up with my paintings.
I'm trying to make a living off of them, so that means I need to sell them. All of them.

Anyway, some cow attempts (I really need to learn a lot still)
An eow attempt and some acrylics painting (wip) and some sketches.

[Harmageddon]

some work on eow, some paintings...

[Satu]

Man you are getting better and better, awesome! I really like the book cover, I think you did a very nice job with it.
Also the hawk's eyes on post # 170 (and of course the whole bird itself too) I also like your cow challenge works too. Been meaning to do something for that too but I feel like I'm so bad in making creatures from imagination. Wish I would be better though so maybe participating would make my skills better. Cool digital enviro too!

I also admire your enthusiasm (I don't know if this is the word I'm looking for) and the amount of works you create and yet they are all still so beautiful. How do you find the time and inspiration to all of these?

[Harmageddon]

Finally, I finished a painting!
So much to change, improve, redraw... but not now.
For now, I'm calling this one done.

Acrylics on canvas, 60x80cm

Satupeikko: Thanks my lady! How do I find the time?
Well, for one, I quit my job so now I'm drawing and painting full-time.
I have to push harder and harder, because my savings have all but gone
and I really want to make this work. That is, to make a living with my art.
Basically, everything I am painting right now is for sale and meanwhile I'm trying
to improve my photoshop skills to maybe some day break into a concept art job someplace.
.. a man can dream, eh?

[Harmageddon]

So, I've tried to finish a painting each day..but that didn't work.
I will keep pushing myself to get it done however.

So some updates on 3 paintings (some from a while back)
All 3 are acrylics on canvas, 60x80cm.

Actually, the horse painting stood still for quite a while, as I didn't like the background and didn't have a clue what to do with it. And because the background stopped, I couldn't finish the horse either. Ah well. I've got a new plan now. Let's see if this works.

Also, ChOW that I did not finish on time and an EOW that did make it to the poll. Not really finished yet, but concept wise, finished enough.
Zero votes btw.
Either I suck worse than I thought, or these other guys are just so much better than I thought. Either way, I need to improve!

Thanks for watching, now I will enjoy the sun!

[yenee]

Lovely sketchbook, your animal portraits are truly stunning!

[Harmageddon]

yenee: thanks! glad you like them.

I'm calling these 2 done.

Both are acrylics on canvas, 40x50cm

Made them for a bluesparty that will be held at an uncle&aunt of mine.
They're supposed to help add atmosphere to the party.
It's a surprise; I hope they like them

[carakhan]

I really like your animal portraits! It could be the reflection of the canvas but it seems like sometimes you lose some of your contrast, the eagle eye doesn't pop and I feel like it should pierce through me.
For your EOW - I think you needed to spend more time in the thinking phase on that one. There were some entries that were really fleshed out, full concepts that weren't just "glowy river". The character in the woods almost completely disappeared, and didn't add anything to the piece. Why is he there, what do the glowing balls do? maybe he's trying to steal one or maybe theyre chasing him away or... something. I can tell right away when you're into a painting, they just come out better. Your chows are nice and detailed.

Thanks for stopping by as always

[Harmageddon]

carakhan: thanks! Glad you like the animal portraits! And I agree with everything you said.
The eagle is still wip, so getting there. The eye is supposed to win any stare-down, so yeah, I'll try and make it seem to be in the room.
About the EoW; didnt think that one through at all. Just started, played a lot with layers, quick color scheme and pushed for speed.
The guy was kind of an afterthought, although I did want a centaur or something first at the far riverbank.
But then figured it didn't really look like a river to begin with, and... well, just screwed it up really. Glad I pushed it into the finals though.
FInishing stuff is a big issue for me. So practicing on that recently.

Some updates on paintings.
The baby elephant is finished, oil on canvas, 10x15cm

The others are wips; mostly acrylics on canvas, darth maul (from several posts back, prolly previous page, is getting an overhaul: trying to finish him this time)

Thanks for watching, H.