Ultarant's Fantasty Sketchbook

[Ultarant]

Greetings everyone,

Well, after looking at everyone's awesome work in the medium I finally decided to take the plunge into digital art myself. Thanks to reading a lot of good advice here (I'm a big lurker) and some tutorials, I have learned a lot in only a few months. Please check out my work and,as always, criticism is greatly appreciated.

[Ultarant]

here is some fantasty themed line art. I may colour these in time:

[ladyknowles]

Great ideas and concepts! Do you draw them first?

[Ultarant]

Thank you for replying! I generally like to draw with a ball point pen on paper when concepting something, as I think pen can actually define things a bit better than a pencil sketch. When I scan the art I usually just paint over it in Photoshop using multiply.

[ladyknowles]

Hmm that's a good way of doing things!

It might help you to not use a scanned image, instead have it infront of you and draw the general shape first. This is what they tell us to do in my class as it encourages concept art looking outcomes

[JIEZHOU]

HI nice to meet you . you draw looking good . i like the dragon first one keep it and you well be great !

[Ultarant]

Thank you very much guys! I do feel as though I have more control with hand drawn art, but that might change as I continue to get used to doing digital work. I have used a tablet and a mouse to create concept art before:

[ladyknowles]

That looks great!!

Everyones the same at first. It takes an age to get used to it (Apparantly, I'm still not used to it entirely!)
I do this akward head tilt thing, looking at the screen, cos I can't get used to not looking down while I'm drawing!

[Ultarant]

lol! I do the same thing! Some of my earliest CG work came out extremely awkward. I actually revisted my first attempt at a human face and attempted to 'modernize' it with what I know now. The result is still somewhat awkward thanks to my attempt to preserve the features.

[Ultarant]

One thing I do pretty much constantly is 'doodle' in some of the notebooks I carry around with me. The concept art is of course hit or miss, but it allows me to quickly recall any concept that interested me, especially when it comes to creature designs.

Here are a few pages:

[smael]

your draws are cool, i like dragon, you should do illustrations with your monster, you will improve very quickly^^

[Ultarant]

Thank you! I'm trying to break into professional art at the moment.

[alamed]

I wish I could draw dragons. Keep drawing , its the only way to fully learn this.
Have you seen "How to train your dragon"? its a great movie, and you might get some great shots to practice drawing.

[JIEZHOU]

hi ! nice work just keep it

[Ultarant]

Thanks! I haven't actually seen How to Train your Dragon, but I keep hearing it's great. I should check it out one of these days.

More sketches coming soon!

[karmiclychee]

Dude, thanks for the comments in my SB! Your pencils are awesome! I can tell, you've got some serious energy behind those lines and a sweet sense of motion going on in your compositions. As for your digital, you could benefit from a tutorial or two - check out some stuff on color and edges - I've got a few in my sig that you might look at.

Keep up the good work!

[Ultarant]

Thank you, and thank you for the tutorial suggestions! I've been experimenting with a few recently, and came up with this study/album cover, which is an experiment with a number of new techniques for me. Comments are of course appreciated!

[libellchen]

I like the last one, there's a color-concept and the focused and unfocused areas make it more interesting. I can already see an improvement in your work. Keep it up!

[angela3636]

Thank you, and thank you for the tutorial suggestions! I've been experimenting with a few recently, and came up with this study/album cover, which is an experiment with a number of new techniques for me. Comments are of course appreciated!

wow! its really nice!! i love the color palette!!

[Ultarant]

Thanks guys! Stephanie Valentin's tutorials have been a big help:

http://www.stval.fr/

[karmiclychee]

Couple issues I'm seeing here in the most recent post...

first, and it's a big one that can be solved instantly is what looks like the use of dodge and burn brushes. Don't do it - it's just not good and ends up making your shadows, highlights, and midtone gradients look REALLY tacky.

What size are you working at? You should definitely be painting in at least 300 DPI (I think, that's what I paint at, at least). My most recent painting (that you commented on) was... I think 1500 x 1000 px.

You're thinking in terms of lines, rather than value. You kind of have to do one or the other. For instance, on the girls face, you're using lines when what those lines should be are hard shadows. Noses, for instance, are usually constructed entirely of value and shadows and rarely any lines.

Try painting with ONLY a 100% hardness brush for a while, use fuzzier brushes at the end when you're blending your value areas.

Also, use the LARGEST brush you can at any given point. And try pushing your work in the direction that it already wants to go it, rather than trying to push it in the way that you want it to go in, if that makes any sense. I think, at this stage, you'll learn more that way, especially if you've stumbled on some new technique.

[Ultarant]

Thanks for the feedback. I actually didn't use dodge or burn brushes in this last pic (the overlays did create a burn-like effect however), but I have used them in the past and, while they are useful for providing some definition of objects, I agree that they just don't look good on skin.

I recently started working in 300 DPI thanks to my new computer. I have learned that working on a larger scale makes a HUGE difference.

I think you're right about the line business, since prior to jumping into digital art most of my work was comic line art. Approaching it from the way you suggested seems like it would improve the overall composition, so I'm going to do my next pic the way you suggested and post the results here.

Wish me luck!

[karmiclychee]

Oh, and do more painting from life! Get a lightbulb and some random crap you have lying around the house, stick it next to your monitor and just do studies.

[Ultarant]

Well, taking karmiclychee's advice I took one of my existing scanned sketches and turned it into a painting...and considering it took me over a week to complete, I'd say I blended the 'hard' way. I unfortunately had to lower the image quality to fit it on the forums.

I experimented with a number of different textures, and I'd love feedback from you guys.

[Ultarant]

I debated whether or not to show this, but we're all friends here and don't judge each other, right?

Over the last year, when I really started working hard at my art, I did a side fan project for a mock anime starring the monster characters from Jonathan Wojcik's Mortasheen universe. If you don't know what that is I recommend checking out his website, Bogleech, for all kinds of creepy goodness:

http://www.bogleech.com/

Anyway the story itself contained 37 episodes done in a semi-review format, with 'screencaps' of the fictitious show. The artwork is awfully hit or miss, but it too serves as a kind of progress book, so if you are curious about seeing some strange and interesting stuff, please check it out here:

http://www.lucidstillness.com/mortasheenanime.html

No this isn't a cop out for my sketchbook homework! I promise I'll post some new stuff soon.

[Ultarant]

Here is some more work experimenting with painting in shades:

[Myszt]

Ohh nice, shading practice with that last one! I'm digging the subtle texturing. One thing that could be something to pursue would be practicing focal points - I have to work on that myself :] Your earlier picture with the girl and the dragon could be experimented with contrast guided focal points for some really cool results!

[Ultarant]

Ah, good idea. I will definitely give that a try in my next painting.

Now it is time for faces! These were mostly done from magazines, as well as a few statue studies.

[Ultarant]

Here is a page of sketches that may be familiar to Bond fans. I really liked the graceful poses the heavily shadowed anonymous women make in the new DVD menus for the classic bond films, so I attempted to capture the feel of that on paper.

[Ultarant]

Now for some perspective!