◘♦◘ Art Of Choob ◘♦◘ Fantastic Five

[Choob]

Edit: New Page! One more to go before I hit my target. I want to hit page 10 by my birthday, on the 19th of July.

Started a new Bridgeman book today, this one has a great section on proportions and skeleton construction at the beginning, so did some studies of those. Things like this:



Did some Burne Hogarth studies too, but they never end up looking good. His construction knowledge is very useful, but his proportions are often way off. On the topic of useful art books though, Jim Gurney's made a list of some of his favourite books, click here to see it.

[Choob]

Calling this finished so I can move on to other work. This is the statue study I've been saying was almost done for the past couple of weeks, it's been a lot of fun, and I've spent a lot longer on this piece than I have on anything else so far. There are some parts needing tweaked, but overall it's a good likeness, and I learned so much. I've uploaded it full size so you can see it how I did, and I'll upload a process .gif soon.

[Black Spot]

Finally managed to get through your SB without CA crashing on me. Like the sigs. Figure drawing is improving. On that last study, you did the grapes really well but didn't continue in the same vein on the hair. The grapes show us what you're capable of, now push it more.

[Choob]

Black Spot - Glad you could finally get through my sketchbook without it crashing. Thanks for the advice, I'll try push things as far as I can.

Couple of thumbs for this week's Teen Challenge, theme is Cowboy. Think I prefer the enviro idea, do some of those weird rock pillar formations.



More to come soon, plus I need to do some horse studies, since they always look like blobs with stick legs.

[frankfrank]

I really like the 3dness of most of your work. Looking great ^^

[Choob]

frankfrank - Thanks man. I dropped by your sketchbook and left you a comment too.

Not feeling too happy today, got a letter out of the blue telling me there was problems with some of my uni portfolio, which I believe to be a mistake, since it's happened before where tutors have ignored the notes to go to my blog, and so they haven't added that into the final mark. Still, either way it's some added stress, I was sure I was finished with uni.

Some Halo helmet studies, might do an illustration of a bunch of them later.

[Choob]

Quick enviro study today, the stock had such great colours I had to give it a go.

[Choob]

So remember I said something about getting an unexpected letter about some of my module's not being happy with my uni work this year? I've got in touch with the people involved, turns out I failed a couple of things by like a single mark, so they want me to do some touch-ups here and there and then resubmit.

One of these modules is my 3D work. He wants me to fix it up a bit to get that one more mark, but while I'm at it I'll redo a bunch of stuff, try get an even higher mark. Here's a mockup sketch on top of the 3D rendered model to try out some ideas. Going to add rubble, more lighting work, and some texture.

[Choob]

Did some studies of dwarven architecture, and so updated the mockup to make it more accurate to their design.

[Choob]

Sunday today, and as such, I don't do much artwork, but stick to relaxing, watching some tutorials, finding inspiration, reading some books on art techniques and so on. One such book I just got yesterday; the book Fantasy Art Workshop by John Howe, an artist well known for his work on Lord of the Rings, both the book illustrations and the concept art for the films. The book is a great read so far, and I'm enjoying how it's not a typical how-to-draw-like-me type book with easy steps, but how it's more about teaching you to draw like you, and how to find an artistic process that works for you.

You can find the book here, and on various other places to download, and John's site here. I'd check him out on Facebook too, he posts some great updates and sketches you don't see elsewhere, like this one, my favourite so far.



Actual art coming tomorrow, as I said, Sundays are mainly for inspiration, learning, and mindless enjoyable doodling.

[Choob]

Did some Bridgemann studies to try out a new way of holding the pencil from the John Howe book. Basically, any way of holding it is fine, providing it's not the same way you use it for writing. The one I'm trying is basically the same as the standard writing grip, but with the pencil between the forefinger and middle finger, instead of between the forefinger and thumb. Doesn't change too much, but I find it means I don't use my fingers and wrist so much, and draw from the shoulder more. I also take my time, and feel a lot more comfortable doing long, curving lines.



Also trying out some nice 4B pencils someone got me at some point, which work better with this grip than my usual .5mm mechanical pencils.

[Choob]

Quick screencap sketch of Lord of the Rings. I want to try out doing some studies in Painter, Photoshop just feels like the same old thing every time at the moment.

[Choob]

Spent most of today fixing my laptop, which for those of you fortunate to have never done such a thing, means taking it all apart, cleaning and such, and then putting it all back together again. And in my case, drilling some holes for the fan, since there was something wrong with the manufacturing which meant the holes were actually just dents, they didn't go all the way through.

Also, it was mainly my Dad who did the taking apart and putting together, and my older brother Ben who did the drilling. Thanks for the help.

Here's a couple of brush experiments, trying to find a new way of working, or just something fun to try.

[Choob]

Colour study from a LOTR screencap, to get an idea of the lighting and colouring for my 3D work. Going to do some texture experiments as well.

[Choob]

Also, the amazing Bjorn Hurri is getting interviewed on the Crimson Daggers stream on Monday. For full information click here. Found this video of him talking about concept art on YouTube, his bit starts at about 4:10.

[Choob]

Been doing storyboarding today, for Time Based Narrative. That's the subject where I did the Pirates of the Caribbean video editing. For that, the tutor just wants me to do some more storyboards, do a treatment (short sentences describing storyboards/simple plan), and touch up the essay.



The 3D work is pretty much planned out now, I'm just reinstalling Maya since it's decided it's not installed properly, and then I can get to work on that too.

[Izene]

Hey!Great sketchbook!Really awesome improvements
I think Post #256 has alot of potential for depthness...maybe add more darker values in the front?
Good luck!!

[Choob]

Izene - Thanks man.

Some gestures today, a couple of minutes on each one. Trying to get back into time limit stuff, since I'm far too slow on everything.

[Choob]

Sketch for the CHOW this week, since the theme sounded pretty cool; "Spaceship Pinup".



Don't feel like going any further with this, but I'm getting into the habit of doing sketches for the challenges even if I'm not going to enter them, or don't have time to. Get the ideas flowing, you know.

[Choob]

Quick reminder, it's now an hour until Bjorn Hurri's getting interviewed by Dave and Dan. Click here to go to the stream. I'll be unable to come until about an hour in, but if you see me in the chat say hi, name there is Chooby.

[Choob]

There's a discussion going on in my OHG sketchbook regarding the mythology of Atlas. Apparently, Atlas doesn't hold up the world, but actually holds up the sky. But as someone pointed out, you don't see anyone painting a vast, muscular titan holding up clouds.



3D stuff coming tomorrow I think, today was getting most of the written work out of the way.

[Clur]

Pretty cool in here.

It's a joy to see your improvement through this sketchbook, I especially noticed it in the quality of your pencils! You've also got great design sense that lends itself really well to composition.

Your figures are kind of your weak point, though you've improved a lot in that area too! I see you've been studying the skeleton, that'll definitely help with the structure of your figures.

Keep it up!

[Choob]

Clur - Thanks man. Yeah, I've not spent time on character and figure work until recently, have a lot of catching up to do.

It's my last chance to enter the Teen Challenge this week, as I turn 20 next Thursday. I'm not sure if I'll have enough time to finish this, since I'm working on my 3D coursework this week too, which is way more important, but it's worth a go. Did some doodling, some thumbnails and head designs. Think I might go with the second thumbnail, I like the armoured head look.

[Shahan]

Hey thanks for stopping by my SB and good luck on the challenge.
Nice! LOADS of studies and they're all really accurate and its affecting your art positively.
This painting is lovely
Happy early birthday dude! keep posting! (can't wait til i have 10 pages)

Also any advice on the TC? I can see you've already won one . What was your process? I'm stuck.. too many ideas. any general advice?
---
PS - also lol just realised i replied to you on my own SB and on here... heh i'll link my reply on my sb, here.

[Choob]

Sporus - Thanks man. As for advice on Teen Challenge, the time I won it, I saw the competition the day before the deadline and so just painted into the night for a few hours. No thumbs or plans or anything, just doodled out an environment. For IDW I planned a bit more, then did a sketch, and then did a polished sketch on a layer above it, and finally just added some colours and such. Just do whatever works for you, I'm struggling a bit on this challenge because I've never done dragons or serpents before, and that's the look I'm going for with my Wurm. Good luck.

Mindless thumbs done to Fetsch's Livestream. Love all the livestreams I join, there was a new one I found last week, had a swedish girl doing art. I'm not that into manga and such, but dude, that accent. See the Livestream list here.

[Choob]

Quick update on what I'm doing. This is why I've just been posting sketches and doodles this week, I've been working on coursework. Have all the written work for Time Based Narrative out the way, and have been trundling along in Maya. I've decided to make the archway a rugged, random, rocky shape instead of the simple square arch in my paintover plan. This is just to change things a bit, give me the opportunity to do it out of a different material and texture, as well as keeping the dwarven theme, since they carve their architecture out of the rock.



That's the modelling done I think, now for textures and lighting. Still not sure if I'll have time to finish the Teen Challenge Wurm piece, but I'm going to try finish off 3D tomorrow morning, and can then have some time for painting in the afternoon and Saturday.

[Choob]

Texture and lighting experiments today.

[Choob]

Here's the other 3 shots that are needed. That should be that done, aside from the short essay, just going to email these to my tutor and see if they're OK to submit.







I'll be so glad if that's this finished with, I still have a couple of weeks until the deadline but I want to get everything handed in the start of next week, so I can relax and enjoy my birthday. Also means I can get back to doing what I want to, namely studies, challenges, and personal work. Had so many ideas piling up the past couple of weeks, and no time to do them.

[Choob]

Spent today working on my essay, which means I'm now done. Just waiting for feedback from tutors, and can then go up and submit on Tuesday or Wednesday. Didn't do much art other than sketching from imagination today, but I found another video you kids might be interested in.



I've always wanted to watch Min Yum (aka Bumskee) work. This is the first of a 3 part video, and they have links to some of his brushes and his explanation of his process too. You can also find Min's CA sketchbook by clicking here, and website by clicking here. Doesn't work for me at the moment, but worth posting anyway.

Back to personal work tomorrow, think I'd like to do some environment work.

[Choob]

Study of a Paul Lasaine painting; Edoras from Lord of the Rings.



Did it in Painter using a smeary flat oil brush, which was a bit weird to use at first, but I stuck with it since that's what he recommends as his favourite brush. The trick is to play with the opacity and bleed a lot I find. Also, you should listen to this music while looking.