Oden's Sketchybook *Update May 27th*

[Oden]

Hey all -- a brief bio;
I'm 20 years old, attending UVIC and majoring in Biology....but reaaally wanting to be going to art school. I'm thinking about trying even just a year or two at a decent art school before finishing my "real" degree.

I'm from Nelson B.C., which is a beautiful mountain town in the kootenays and a constant source of inspiration.
I started fooling around with acrylics (and now oils) on canvas about a year ago, although I've always liked to doodle and sketch.


werd,

Owen

[Oden]

here are a few random studies and sketches I've done in the past couple of months...



p.s. is there any way to adjust the layout of attachments? like make them go linear instead of side-by-side?

anyways, the bottom two are Bridgeman studies. The top right is a sketch of the Kokanee glacier visible down the valley, and some studies of clouds. Clouds are cool.
The top left is random sketches, and the center head is a copy from a very useful CA post..I forget the poster now.

[Soft_Hands]

Damn good for a Biology student. I would love to wear the fourth page as a T-shirt. Perhaps you have a page just filled with doodles you would like to show?

[Jeff Bartzis]

Really good start. Keep it up, I'll be watching! hah.(not like that)
I know nelson, I used to live in Castlegar, like 30 minutes away.. Nelson really is beautiful town. Small world eh?

[RandAlThor]

Nice pencils so far... to make them vertically aligned, just add a carriage return in between the [img] tags before you submit your post.. keep sharing ;-)

[Oden]

uggghhh, sorry guys. I'm seriously questioning if it's worth having a sketchbook if I'm gonna be this unproductive. It just makes me feel guilty for not posting...
...I guess that's a good thing.

@everybody: thanks for the comments!
Jeff: cool mang, small world indeed. Were you born there, or did you go to Selkirk?

Here's a small art dump...paintings from the last half-year, minus a few I still have to get pictures of. I have a bunch more sketchbook pages and bridgman studies that I'll try to get up here within a reasonable timeframe as well (ie. 1 month )

the majority are water-soluble oil on canvas (love this stuff), although Red Cloud is pure acrylic.

and yeah, the shaman's neck is super-way too long. He's been dancing too much for the giraffe spirits, obviously.

[Oden]

a couple of slightly older ones...
both acrylic

[Nubb]

Man I love that style. Your technique needs polishing ( but whose doesn't? ) but You actually rock now. I'm scared of what You may become

[andrea w]

Awwh man your work is too cool, I love your paintings! Really, really hope you'll keep posting because I wanna see moooore.

[tor]

cool styling - these remind me of a very early greg staples from 2000AD - he did a particular series called 'Slaine - Jealousy of Niamh'- Pretty cool
I like the darker undertones and the blocky styling...with the swirly bits-
And the guy leaning on the tree has a nice feel too - What is the general size of your works?

[Oden]

thanks all...I appreciate the wordz. I'll try to keep pluggin away. School makes it tough, though.

@thanks Tor, the general size is probably ~18x24 inches...some are flipped everywhichaways, some are slightly different dimensions, but it's a decent approximation.
the reclining elf dude is around 20x24, but don't quote me on it.
...they're getting bigger...

[shamandalie]

Whoa, you are a bio student? I was a design student and i cant paint half as well as you. @_@
Love the grayscale painting by the way.
POST MORE PLEASE!

[Jasper_]

wow dude these are really good. much better than i expected from a bio student...better than a lot of stuff i've seen from art students as well lol. love the style, definately try and get to art school if its something you would llike to take seriously.

[Jeff Bartzis]

Cool updates so far dude, they are looking really good.

Jeff: cool mang, small world indeed. Were you born there, or did you go to Selkirk?

Nah, i moved there when i was younger a couple years back. Im going to shool in vancouver atm.

[kidult]

Some very nice didgital work - awesome colours. I feel a lot of the work is very flat though. You have a great style but lots of stuff dont seem to have any form maybe try a more deicated light source.

Keep it up!

[Nadiamoon]

very-very nice pieces. Love them. Keep it up and I am looking forward to your sketchbook stuff

[SQuiP]

These are really great! I see you enjoy rendering arms, you do it really well, just keep an eye on the hands, they're all good except the guy's left hand in buddharoots seems a tad small. Nitpicky me ...love your clouds!
Keep posting man

[Coinpurse]

Biology? and your pumping out this kind of work? ggahhuuughhh, you may want to reconsider that. With a strong foundational background and self motivation you'd easily become one of the pro's. Your illustrations tell a story, nice rendering style. Really thick brushstrokes, and the way you applied your light sources give your art this smooth rubbery texture. Your line work has a lot of potential, but currently not near the quality of your finished illustrations. I'd work on pencils first, nice stuff~

[Oden]

Sorry for the late replies, guys; I should really subscribe to this thread. hahah

Thanks Shamandalie, Pyroclasm, Nadiamoon--I appreciate yer kindness...

I'll try to post more soon, although school is keeping me busy.
I don't have time to do much, but I try to fit some art in. I'm going to a weekly drop-in life drawing class at the university, so I'll post up some drawings from that in the next couple of weeks.

Kidult; thanks for the input!--although these are all traditional.
I totally agree with you about the flatness. I'm really having trouble getting depth in my pictures, so my figures don't just look like they're pasted onto a flat landscape..and like you said, my forms are kinda flat too.

Aside from a more dedicated light source, are there other things that pop out in terms of a solution?

Squip; I do like to do arms, haha. I think it's because they're the only body part I feel comfortable doing. The next chance I get to do a painting with a humanoid in it, I'm going to make myself show some leg.

Coinpurse; thanks a lot for the comment, I'm aimin' for a year of art foundation sometime/somewhere in the next few years.
Pencils are definitely my weak point..pretty much everything is aside from rendering. I'm trying to focus more on drawing and less on painting, to start correcting that weakness. it also takes less time,which works for me now.

[crabbyclem]

DUDE! Those paintings are sweet. Keep it up.

[SixPrism]

Would love to see some more of those acrylics man. Keep posting!

[Farvus]

That's great. I like your style. I especially like the character painting you got as sketchbook thumbnail right now.
Keep posting .

[Mischeviouslittleelf]

Nice beginning here mate, like the style, it is quite unique, and still it plays at the dynamics of grafiti and that sort of illustrative works.

Keep at it!

-E

[Oden]

thanks for your comments everybody!

sooo I've been working on my pencils and life drawing work lately.
I'm going to a weekly drop-in life drawing class right now...not able to put a lot of time into art at the moment, but the weekly drawing sesh at least keeps me from slipping back.
I think one of my biggest issues with life-drawing is that I'm SLOW. I lack confidence in it, so I usually just end up with "bits of a body" after 30 minutes instead of a full figure like most people in the session. Yarrrrr

anyways, this is a couple of sessions worth of figure drawing...enjoy...at your own peril.

please excuse the wildly varying colour balance and crappy pictures. some of them are on different colours of toned paper...others I have no excuse for, hahah. figure no. 6 is actually a full-body drawing, but the lower half of the pencil got some insane glare from the lighting so I cropped that shit. A few other pics got washed out a bit as well...

[Clochette]

Wo! Impressive! You never studied art before?? I have only respect for people like you. Really great style, your stylization choice work so far, beautiful rendering, strong anatomy skills, and all that as a self taught! 5 stars !!!

[serhc]

wowza. it's hard to believe these are all traditional...you've got a great hand at that. love your stylization. i'm in the same boat as you, 3rd year college student, working on a separate degree, but desperately wants to try a year or two at an art school. stupid money, huh? i can see you getting a pretty hefty scholarship though :]

[johnnytran]

i digg the style
biology was my favorite subject when i was in school



http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=142144

[Opilione]

Fucking A man. Love your stuff, especially the colour works.

[donalfall]

Crisp, lovely life drawings. You have a great command of your lines. Keep posting!

[Oden]

Thanks johnny, opilione, and donalfall! I appreciate your thought(s)!

Tiny update:
a few little people bits from life drawing today. I missed most of the class, so I only have a couple that I'm happy with.
Having life drawing classes at 10 o'clock on Saturday morning means I usually go hungover, late, and with 4 hours of sleep under my belt...if it was for anything other than art, I would be sleeping in.

As per usual, I only managed to draw about 1/5 of the body. I gotta get faster.

I'm not noticing much improvement with my pencils, unfortunately. I'm so busy during the week that I don't even manage much random sketching...not enough practice. My hatching and line quality in general feel really weak (aside from anatomy of course )

And no new paintings done, I'm sorry!
They take a serious investment of space and time (and space is actually fairly limited at the place I'm living in for school). Hopefully during christmas break I'll be able to crank one out.

PICS: the guys arm in the first one (green) is kinda messed up proportions wise. Also, the line weight isn't quite so uniform in real life. This pic got leveled in photoshop, so the darker pencil got SUPER dark. I also tried a softer darker pencil this time. ME no like.
the head one made me realise I haven't put nearly enough time into studying the head. I fudged the ear, nose, mouth area, etc. I got Loomis's "Heads and Hands" out of the UVIC library, though!
as usual, critiques are always appreciated! any tips for "going faster" would be awesome.