Wm.B.Hand • SHARPIE CREATURES!! -- (Apr.16th)

[William b. Hand]

I'm sorta bailing yet again on my comment duties, but I'll be back. Just some more fineline Sharpie™ drowings... See wotchya tink.

Thumbnail Enviros:


Some industrial machinery efforts:



A few sharkish musings:


And a rookie exercise at a simple animation (wait for it):

[Velocity Kendall]

Damn William, your machines are just as neat as your creatures!
I love the truck with the hyab arm on the front, maybe for picking up loads and dumping them in its back. I want my bins collected by one of those!

[AustenFM]

Whoa dude! Neat update as always~ Those sharpie thumbnails are neat, interesting hodgepodge or organic & mechanical. Speaking of mechanix, those vehicle and gear concepts are outa sight! You really excel at anything you put your mind to it seems, love your grungy futuristic take on things.

Anyway, thanks for the eyecandy, i got a note i need to shoot your way sometime. I shall be in touch! Keep it up~

[Vulgar`]

"Is it Whale Week? Is it Shark Week? Is it Bizarrely Fantastic Anatomy Week?
Nah, it's just William week."

Irresistable updates, naturally.

[William b. Hand]

Velocity Kendall - Thanks, I'm glad you like the trucks! I sure do got a lot to learn vehicular-wise.

AustenFM - Thanx! I dunno about excelling in the machinery-realm, but I'm glad you are liking something in these -- "hodgepodge" and "grungy" are pretty apt descriptors, hehe.

Vulgar` - Cheers!




I realize that there may be a number of sketches that I've posted on fb that I haven't posted here (for shame), so I'll try to rectify that oversight.

To begin with, here're a few watercolour-pencil noodles that I think may be new to you... A bit of a mish-mash.

critters...


thumbs...


some figure oddness...


more watercolour-pencil thumbs...


fake dinos


further thumb nonsense


A sprintly runner


...and a giant stone kitty type

[shyamshriram]

WOW so much awesomeness !
Thanks for sharing

[maxswinton]

Amazing stuff, I love it all.

[William b. Hand]

shyamshriram - Thank you -- Happy to oblige!

maxswinton - Thanks!

So, here're some more things that I never got around to posting here, I don't think. This stuff is all fineline Sharpie™ with some colored pencil practice, a bit of marker (or maybe it was watercolour) wash, and the odd white gel pen. This is really something of a dumping, I guess.

[AustenFM]

Holy canole! Really blowin' my mind into chunks with these last 2 posts Hr.Hand. I'm glad there's some glue at my desk cause im gonna need it to piece myself back together after looking at all this great stuff! Really loving how you're making that fine tip sharpie work for you. I always get fed up with how it bleeds immediately when you stop a line, or make a corner, but like i said you really make the best of it, gives little shadow and depth areas that make the drawings pop! The organic intricacies of your 'creatures' always has me drawn close to the screen. If you compiled a book of these things with random liner notes i'm sure it could pass for a genuine scientific study of alien morphology.

Really blown away by your colored pencil experiments in the last post, especially that menagerie of twisted forms against the green BG, as well as the girl with the red and blue underlighting hidden behind the tangled branches of 'arms'. Incredible, you're making me want to dust off my neglected box of prismacolors again! May i ask how you achieved the small spot whites on the colored pencil pieces? Is it just simple acrylic or do you have a neat pen or somethin'?

Anway, i've got a mess to clean up no thanks to you. Again, blowin' my mind man, keep it up!

P.S.
Diggin' your simply animated prairie girl icon update, took me off guard cause i wasnt sure if it was moving or not. o:

[wilkerson]

Wow, what a discovery with each new drawing.
This is brilliant
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/att...2&d=1342676146

You are a very skilled monster maker, among other things.

[Carnifex]

some of those fine liner things remind me of moebius, only freakier all in all it's too much for me to wrap my brain around for the moment, so you'll have to make do with my brain-fried attempt at a compliment

[NickyBeats]

amazing updates William!! really love your design aesthetic! your gravitation towards the mutated, freakishly created is always a bonus in my book!! i love the (color pencil?) sketches on pastel paper! very very cool!!!

[ThomasM]

excellent work hand yet again! keep on doing what you're doing sir

[Kambei Shimada]

Holy Shit, these studies are RAWESOME!!

Never used a fineline sharpy to draw with, will give it a go. Has a nice 'graphical' quality to it.(if that's even a word)

Very inventive and very inspiring.

[Jonesoda]

These are awesome! the colors look great. Can't really describe the mutated awesomeness I'm seeing haha.

[TheGnoll]

incredible updates Will! so good to see so much traditional goodness in here!!

the sharks, the trucks, the organic swirling of deformed things-- you manage to strike a balance between creepy and cute that makes your work really unique.

Your output has been especially generous lately, and that is really cool too.
One thing (take it as a provocation) that came to my mind is that you seem to have incredible fun with technique and concept (so much experimentation in every possible direction!), but rarely "wrangle it" and put it in service of one higher concept/idea.
You're capable of doing enviroments, creatures, mechanical thinghs, why not try and put a couple of things all from the same "world", and show you can put thee wonderful concepts in line as part of a bigger picture (ex: wayne barlowe's alien planet/hell).Obviously a full book might be a very big task (one can dream, thought), but getting started with a couple might get the ball rolling.

Can't wait to see whatever else you'll be willing to share Will!

[William b. Hand]

AustenFM - Ha ha! Thanks, man -- I'm really glad you're liking this stuff. The very reason I like to use the fineline Sharpie™ is because of the bleed. I like the quality that it provides, and I love the urgency that it forces upon my lines -- sortuv a do-or-die situation. I can get far greater control and subtlety from other pens, but there have been lessons I wanted to learn from the Sharpie™ and that's why I've been using them almost exclusively. I have a very long history of forsaking techniques and tools that I feel too at ease with, which does keep me from sitting on my perceived laurels, but possibly masks my other powers. Perhaps I should begin to tap into the greater firepower of those other pens? Hmm... Those white specular highlights were achieved using a simple white gel pen, nothing fancy. I'm very pleased to hear you had that reaction to my prairie girl avatar -- it's exactly the effect I was hoping for. Cheers, buddy.

wilkerson - Thank you! I'm glad you dig that page... it's a pic that reveals some profound limitations concerning my understanding of human anatomy, but also represents me having some real fun attempting to learn about those limitations.

Carnifex - Thanks! I'm happy to have the Moebius reference, for sure... Although I've been dimly aware of him for decades, I had barely seen his work until recently. I'm still in the dark about most of it, but am filled with respect for what I've seen so far... I have much to learn.

NickyBeats - Thank you! I'm pretty stubborn about my mutations and freakish creations, to be sure. I'm hoping that I can get to a place where I'm incorporating some less freakish denizens to contrast with (and thereby better present) the lovingly mutated.

ThomasM - Thanks! k!

Kambei Shimada - Thanks, man!

Jonesoda - Thank you!

TheGnoll - Thanks, buddy! I am happy to take your provocation as just that. You're right, of course... There are probably many ways that creating a contextual continuum will be of benefit both to my imaginings as well as my presentings to possible employings. It's not immediately now, but it's been bouncing about in my brainwavery and the ripples're friggin everywhere. This is where I've been heading with all these studies, so mebbe I'll be dabbling soon, but I'm also still trying to come up with a workflow that I'm happy with. I feel all of these things: enviros, humans, critters, sharpie and pencil drawings, paintings, photorealistic digitals... I feel them all collecting closer and closer together. Thanks for the continuing encouragements!


Okay, this is not a finished thing, but I like him so here he is in wip form. See whatchya think:

"SQUIRREL" • PS CS4


detail:

[The Electric Ant]

Well.. No offence, but that doesn't exactly look like a squirrel... maybe u should have done some sketches from photo refs first? ;D hahah great sketchbook anyway

[Orkimede]

still awesome here !
This shark

And some of your work made me think of moebius work in some ways, a little bit more creepier. Love it.

[PaulGanguly]

You're making this stuff like 40 feet away from me. How's life? I'm trying to get my groove back. Doing this week's CHOW.

[William b. Hand]

The Electric Ant - Thanks!

Orkimede - Thank you! Yeah, since I began posting the fineline Sharpie™ stuff, I've been hearing about this Moebius fellow. Not there yet.

PaulGanguly - Hey neighbor! You probably alternate between hearing the skritchings of my pen tool or the cursings of my MW failings. Except I'm not as cranky or loud about it as the guys downstairs, maybe?

So, here're some more critter drawings, and also some calligraphic decoratifs...
All fineline Sharpie™, of course. See whatchya tink:





A bit messy looking, maybe... I moved around and consolidated elements on the page, and couldn't clean it up without taking something away.

[AustenFM]

More funky-cool work man! The guy with the earwig-pincer face + dingdong gave me a chuckle~ Do you make a marker sketch foundation drawing before you let that permanent ink flow, or is all of that post process shading? Those calligraphic brackets are mysteriously beautiful as well, some alien art-nouveau movement type of work from planet 41-B would look similar i imagine!

Thanks for sharing bud!

[William b. Hand]

AustenFM - Thanks fall onto you friend for so attentive and distinct the particulars you do the bestowing of, and such, and then furthermore (despite lack of appropriately timely tat on the part of me) the more that is anticipated, etcetera, etcetera, and with whatever due so ons. In general I haven't used marker to scope out possible Sharpie® lines, but that's certainly what I was doing with these recent pics. Indeed, previous posts sported post-line shading. Thank you for liking my brackets!


Alright, well I only meant for this picture to be a sketch but it expanded into something more finished. Unfortunately, but predictably for me, that means it's got some real rough edges. Oh well. I was just trying to reacquaint myself with some of the lessons I was learning last time I attempted bug type imagery. I like it okay, but I also am irritated by many aspects of it. No refs for this, so it was merely review, but next one will be from some serious ref study for sure. See whatchya think:

[William b. Hand]

After wandering off and then coming back to the computer, I realize that this fly looks much better when scaled down. The ham-handed way I wrangled those compound eyes on there doesn't make me cringe quite as much:

[William b. Hand]

I was cleaning up my desktop and stumbled upon a coupluv Photoshop® sketches I made a few months ago... I was trying to come up with a technique for creating tech stuff quickly and it had this kinda comic look to it. I forgot all about it, but I felt rather excited about the possibilities for super fast results with a clean stylized look, so I'll be picking up where I left off soon.





If I have further positive results and figure out an explainable workflow, I might work up a tutorial of the process. The core of it is astonishingly simple. Well... it surprised the hell outta me, at least.

[EDIT: Again, these are pure Photoshop. Simply put, I'm using the airbrush tool (basic round brush squashed flat, and using the color White) on a few separate layers that have the layer effect "stroke" turned on. I've found that this allows one to quickly create flat planes and blobby volumes that have a cel shader look. Then you can go in and add detailing lines in the normal way. It's one of those techniques that forces you to think a bit differently than if you were actually drawing... Things remain malleable whilst instantly appearing rather finished. ]



Anyways, instead of simply posting the pics, I was compelled to create a little animated gif with one of them because that's what I have to do now that I can:



Recap of previous simple animations:










So, these aren't meant to be finished works, just part of a process that I hope to develop.

[AustenFM]

Neat tech work, I'm lookin' forward to seeing your animated development technique! You're awesome for sharing things like this from time to time, i'll be keepin' my eyes peeled (augh!) for an update!

[William b. Hand]

AustenFM - Thanks! My sense is that learning to animate will have to take a bit of a backseat to other (static) imagery, but my curiosity is certainly piqued. Here was a gif that I didn't post but that I was using to explore how I might utilize the gif format to show creative process. Nothing stunning -- there are some real perspective issues and it doesn't really represent how I generally work -- but I sorta like his big round belly, so I'll show you:

[William b. Hand]

I did a number of airbrushed acrylic paintings back in December/January area for a local show, but never got around to posting anything, so I'll be putting up a few of them over the course of the next day or two. Scanning & level adjusting drives me crazy.

Here's a Small Dragon • Airbrushed Acrylic on Paper

[LisaAnnGreen]

kickass!! love the sharpie drawings and calligraphy. fantastic sense of both presence and fun.

[Psychobuddy]

Wow...everything in here is so amazing, but that dragon is just beautiful.