Philipopotamus'' Sketchbook

[Philipopotamus]

Today I was working on the Illustration of the week secret tower and it didn't turn into anything so I wont be posting it anytime soon.
Ima gonna go back and do more thumbnails and go about it in a more orderly manner. but for today here's a WIP of a parrot caricature I stated today.



BjorkT; Thank you very much I am glad you like it!

I just realised though that I have been getting lazy on the anatomy side, better get back to it.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I did some anatomy studies! 2nd pic are some sketches I did in the train, some are people and the others are just made up.

[Philipopotamus]

Yesterday i did a few more anatomy studies and some poses without ref and a few portraits on the train but i didn't have time to post them. Here they are now.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I sketched on the train and stylized two passengers the old lady and the afro guy, I also finished the parrot caricature which I got the pic original pic from Dev WijeWardane. I created the light pirecing through the banches overhead onto the parrot and I also added reflections to the eyes.

[Philipopotamus]

Toady I was working on Maya modelling some stuff for 3D class and it did not go well.
If I dedicated as much time to that as I do to drawing stuff maybe I'd fare better. time time time management what an art that is.
That's enough moping for today. Here is a Subsurface scattering study (butt ugly Character) I did without reference. I was inspired by Olijosman he's awesome!

[Philipopotamus]

Today I did a few sketches in the train, I did not do any portraits of peeps there though. so everything there is just made up.

[Philipopotamus]

This is what I tried posting yesterday but couldn't because of the server issues. I did a few sketches to try and make up the look of a few characters that are in a story I am writing. I am writing my first animation script and have to develop a few characters.
I also rendered one of the characters faces, she is one of the supporting characters (in the sketches she is on the page with the monkeys).
I will have to do a detailed character sheet of the main character so ill post that later. I might just design all of the other ones too If i have the time.

[Philipopotamus]

Today my Genius Mousepen 8x6 started to give in, after all these years. When I move it slightly the computer stops detecting it. I hope it doesn't break completely because I don't know if I will be able to get a new one anytime soon. As for some good old fashioned pencil work here's what I've done so far; a few sketches just to pass time by, 30 second facial expressions and a few more just for fun.

[Philipopotamus]

I am an extremely slow writer right now, this fantasy script I'm writing is taking too long. It took me the whole day just to finish up the story so I did not have much time for drawing. I did about 40 min of gesture drawing today its been a while since I did gestures.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I was designing my main character when suddenly....my tablet stopped working! I'll open it up tomorrow to check whats wrong.
I think that there is a disconnected wire or something on the part where the usb cable connects to the tablet.
So I'll break these pictures down into the process I'm using for this character.
First I draw some silhouettes.
Then i chose one then i tried to see which other combinations of shapes i could make with that silhouette.
Then i chose one and started painting before the tablet went on holidays.

[Philipopotamus]

I did some sketches, I drew a quick portrait of a lady in the train and yeah the rest is just from my imagination. Still need a graphics tablet...

[Philipopotamus]

Today I finally got to some anatomy studies.
I did the upper back, then I did some rough drawings of gestures from my head to see how much I've got down.
I also did some sketches of peeps in the train.
I am thinking of getting a Huion H610 to replace my genius, does anybody know if its up to standard?

[Azsha]

Hi Philipopotamus, your lines are so clean and accurate! I can see a solid work as usual, its awesome to see you serious about all of your artistic studies. Keep posting!

[Papu]

Great sketchbook! You're colors are pretty good especially in your environment paintings. Keep studying that anatomy and do a lot of studies.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I moved on to the legs. I did a bit of the anatomy of the front part of the legs.

[Philipopotamus]

Hi Everybody, I've had very limited internet the past few days with the SEACOM cable being cut and internet services for some South Africans becoming really lame.
Well I continued with my Studies on the leg and I also did a few sketches for fun on the train. Here they are.

Nika: Thank you very much I'll try and keep doing them!
Papu: Thank you! I dont have a tablet right noe so the study thing will have to wait for a bit. But when i get my hands on one... I can feel the urge building up. need to paint
Sorry for not replying earlier.

[I STRaY I]

Hey man, really good studies. Always like to see anatomy studies, I get to learn something without doing it myself, oh wait I should really do that too! Good job, keep it up!

[Philipopotamus]

Today I got very handy and started with the hands (pun intended). Does anybody know Of any good books on hand construction besides Andrew Loomis' Drawing the Head and Hands?

I STRaY I Thank you. Yeah anatomy studies can kind of feel like a chore but they're sooooo necessary. After a while you sort of begin to like it.

[Philipopotamus]

Today i did a few gestures, mostly 30 seconds. I tried to use lines sparingly to illustrate the pose with a s little detail as possible.

[Philipopotamus]

I've been Busy with my animation projects since yesterday , but I managed to do some stuff. some poses from my head and some faces for fun. I saw a portrait taken by gacher on deviant art and I just had to draw. The title is "She's on fire", very beautiful.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I was animating again and wow i had to delete a few walks before i got something that resembles one.
I went and redid my main character for my story. It's really hard to keep the face looking like the character when you have to do facial expressions with it. Does anyone have any tips for that? I also did a few poses from my head.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I was animating again and then I did some writing too so there was almost no time for drawing. I managed to get some concepts for the bad guy in the tragedy I am writing. Here she is.

[DefiledVisions]

Nice sketches! really liking what I see here.. tons of variety. Even saw good ol' Bridgman in there keep it up like this and you'll see progress before you know it. As for your animation.. are you a self-learner or are you going to some school? If in school your teachers should be able to give you good directions of what you need to study and where to improve.

If you're on your own though.. I haven't done animation myself, but something that I've seen animators stress A LOT is understanding construction. You need to be able to turn your characters in space and draw all kinds of angles of them and still retain likeness. Doing Bridgman studies will help you with that. Another name you might want to check out is Glenn Vilppu. He focuses specifically on constructive anatomy for animation (taught anatomy at Disney for many years) and is much more focused on getting gesture and movement into his figures (immensely important to understand and be able to do when doing animation).

You said something about having trouble with facial expressions.. To sum it up, learn how to draw your characters in a simplified way from any angle and practice a lot of facial expressions! Now to the important question - HOW to do that? keep doing your anatomy studies and figure studies. Learn how to emphasize form (Vilppu and Michael Hampton teach this really well, and they are more focused on gesture where as bridgman is more focused on simplified anatomy) and grab a mirror and start to make faces. Learn which muscles in the face are important and learn how to draw the main human emotions such as joy, sadness, fear, anger etc. And when studying yourself, don't just copy your face, exaggerate it. Blow it out of proportion to really understand what makes a facial expression.

lastly.. I think you should check this sketchbook out - http://www.conceptart.org/showthread.php?t=65824 Kaktuzlime is really good at drawing different facial expressions and characters. Stuff like this:
I think what he does can help and inspire you!

Oh, and some critique on your latest character. You said she's the badguy in your tragedy, but to me she looks a bit more like a misunderstood side-character, or even one of the good buys (but with a bad attitude). Try to really bring out the badness of the character. We should understand it immediately.

keep it up!!

[Philipopotamus]

Hello, today i worked a bit more on my character I tried to make her more evil like DefiledVisions said. I also did few sketches for fun. Tomorrow I will apparently receive my graphics tablet! This is my final week of the first term so i have a couple of projects to had in so i wont have much time to digi paint.

DefiledVisions: Thank You so much! I am at an animation school but my teachers aren't really character designers, as a matter of fact we don't even have a proper course for that. I'm swimming in the dark here. There is so much ref online though that I've managed to learn a few things. as for the facial expressions yeah I'll definitely practice them with a mirror. The Michael Hampton book is not available for sale here in South Africa from what I've searched on online bookstores. But I've been looking for that book for a while now. I guess I'll stick to all of those free resources for now.
Thank you again so much for the crit and the help!
Oh and Kaktuzlime is really awesome! You do get tons of inspiration just by looking at his stuff!

[Philipopotamus]

Today I quickly painted my characters for my scripts. It has been a long week and now I finally have time for trying out the huion table! So far its awesome the 2048 pressure sensitivity level is amazing. If anybody wants a cheaper alternative to the wacom bamboo and intuos this is a great one. Anyway enough propaganda, here's my stuff.

[Philipopotamus]

a WIP for today. Looking through some Finding Nemo concept art and just got inspired.

[Philipopotamus]

Hey everybody,I wasn't able to upload yesterday, something crazy was going on in this website. Well here's my WIP finished for now.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I tried something new, I did a digital version of a Chinese watercolor. I tried to follow some of the
techniques I still remember. It is a highly technical painting style but very beautiful too.
They are always accompanied by a poem or some type of writing
because traditionally a painting is not finished or complete without one. I probably did not
do my teachers proud but at least it was fun! I also did a few
hand studies.

[Philipopotamus]

Today I did a master study based on a painting by Vladimir Orlovsky. I also did a few more hand studies, hands have been my enemy for too long, I have to put an end to this.

[Kambei Shimada]

Enviroments are looking good.

Just keep up with the sketching.