Ville's Sketchbook: C&C greatly apreciated

[Ville_S]

Psychobuddy: Thanks. Actually I hadn't think of it that way at all. Now that I have finally thought about it it does make sense,
as the bright rim light indicates that viewer is seeing the shadow side of the object and thus that gives justification for the low contrast.
Interesting

CONtra: Will try though life tries to slow me down.

Joe777k7: Thanks for checking out my sketchbook bro.
Glad you enjoyed my stuff.


So...I was out of the game for few days. Reason? Well, I catched a cold so I needed another set of antibiotics to fight the damn sinusitis. So I visited a doctor, got my antibiotics...all good all good...
but then as I was stepping out of the god damn building my ankle flipped, I lost my balance and fell forward. My galaxy note, that was on my left hand, went flying and hit the concrete while my right arm took the full brunt of the impact.
No broken bones but my forearm/elbow got a shock of the lifetime. It's hurting (not terribly but still plenty enough) and doesn't take rotaing movement of the forearm too kindly, but it is getting better.

in any case I read some Andrew loomis books and had to do this small value experiment. Possibly not the smartest move, but atleast I can say I'm literally suffering for my art.

[Satu]

Oh man sorry to hear about the arm :/ Hope it gets better soon!
Also you have a galaxy note too? Have you painted with it a lot? Did it got smashed now? :o

By the way I love that Craig Mullins study!

[Ville_S]

Satu: yes and yes. The screen got smashed. I got the screen replaced already and my beloved note is fully functional again.
I have painted with it little bit but I have yet to find a satisfactory skech/painting app.
I wish there was a Android version of the alchemy.

Speaking of which, Alchemy sketches.

[Ville_S]

derpy meltyface creature.

Sorry. I'm sure these random alien creature portraits arent very interesting, but these experiments have really helped me to understand few new things about values and forms.

[Lyraina]

Oh no, I hope you/your arm are getting well soon!
The alchemy sketches are beautiful. So dynamic

The alien portraits are interesting, nice to see what you come up with!

[Tofa]

good stuff, reminding me I should probably get to doing some value studies of my own

[Ville_S]

Lyraina: Thanks and thanks for the well wishes.

Tofa: Thankyou! It's good to go to basics once in a while. Usually I find that I'm not as well versed in them as I had thought.

Sargent study.

Conserve values and you keep planes clear.

[Orkimede]

Your study work is so cool,

Love this one =>
http://conceptart.org/forums/attachm...1&d=1348077148

The style is cool ! dont hesitate to do more like that

[Ville_S]

Orkimede: Thanks.
Yeah, that one turned out quite nicely. One of those rare occasions.

Another sargent.

[Ville_S]

Experimenting with conserving values: Tapir skull from photoref.

[ceddo]

Hey Ville,

These last updates are beautiful studies, I love the portraits! You used few brushstrokes but they are all very efficiently placed. Very elegant way of working. I also like your perspective studies, are you planning on using 3D renders to aid you at all? Keep up the good work man

Kindly,

Cedric

[Ville_S]

Ceddo: Thanks dude. I have thought about using 3d renders as aids but haven't yet done that.
I certainly wouldn't rule it out as viable method.

Lunchbreak sketches from photos.

Back to work...

[Saran09]

very inspiring!

[chevy28360]

Loving your value studies. That's something I really need to work on. Whenever I get the hankering to do some grey scale stuff, I always go directly to my pencil and paper. Got to break that habit and do some in photoshop or corel.

[Ville_S]

Saran09: Thanks. Glad to hear it.

Chevy: Cheers! The medium doesn't really matter...unless your trying to practise to get better at that particular medium that is. I ususally just tend to exhaust one, then get bored of that medium and move on to next one.

Tools of the trade: quick still life.

Edit. added two late night things. Both are from imagination.

[Ville_S]

Richard Schmidt master study.

[smuli]

I really like the still life and the colors on the waterfall sketch before it! The values and brushing on the tapir skull look awesome, I like the way you did the teeth as blobs of paint. The second and last Alchemy sketch have a nice silhouette and energy in the brushing.

[aks9]

really cool alchemy sketches

[Ville_S]

Smuli: Cheers man.

aks: thankyou!


Another Schmid study and two B&W thumbs.

[kingkostas]

Whats up mate . Love the alien portrait value studies. Great values there, keep up the good work

[Ville_S]

Kingkostas: Doing good.
Thanks man, will do.


Another Schmid.
I'm disliking how my works look. Theyr messy and look like they lack confidence. Something needs to change...but what.

[Gpozzo]

Great updates man, i'm digging these last you've been posting... so, on your take about your work...they might look messy, but i think that's just because they are studies, maybe is just me, but i dont see how they lack confidence, on the contrary... but that's not an answer, i think a more define brushwork? and therefore more defined shapes? i really like it as it is, but i think that might be the answer to a less ''messy'' work (obviously taking it from the aesthetics view...) but again these are studies, you should do a more elaborated piece to see what you come up with... keep posting man, i'm enjoying this, keep it up

[Satu]

I love these latest studies. I agree with Gpozzo, I don't see the lack of confidence.
I love the "messyness" in them and the brushtrokes. I would love to be able to make something like those.
And even though they look messy to you, to me it seems like every brushstroke has its meaning in them and it feels like you have planned every one of them carefully.
Even though you propably haven't I think it comes naturally from you

And like Gpozzo said, they are studies and I think they are not supposed to look that finished so to say. Maybe if you do longer studies you will get them to look more refined.
But please do these too I really like them

[Ville_S]

Gpozzo & Satu: Thanks for the kind words! Messy/ loose look is good as long as it's intentional. Craig Mullins is brilliant example of this.
I certainly try to go with that loose look, but I feel that there's unintentional brush artifacts here and there all over the image that lowers the quality of the image.
small overlaps of low opacity strokes. They create small patches with hard etches which creates additional annoying noice to the image.
Hard edges where there should be none.

I feel like i need to change tactics a bit.

A) start with brushes that lack hard edges and add hard edges where they should be later on on the painting progress

and/or

B) as you both pointed out, spend more time to polish the image.

I think that should do the trick...maybe. Need to experiment.

Thanks again for your comments! And thanks for making me think!


Here's another Schmid. This looks slightly better than the previous ones I think.

[kevin_]

sick updates, really digging your rendering!

[Ville_S]

Kevin: thanks! Glad to hear it.

Repin study + Leyendecker study.

[Ville_S]

Sargent study:

[marcoferrigno]

Your knowledge of lighting is incredible, they way you capture the volume and texture of your subjects without going into laboured detail through the use of light is really great to see. The aliens portraits are nice, the humanoid looks interesting.

[Ville_S]

marcoferrigno: Cheers man.

Sargent followed by another Sargent:

[Tofa]

lovely updates, are you using photoshop or Painter? Really can't tell lol