Oh hai there.

Yeah it's been awhile since last update, sorry.

I'm starting on a drawing course in October and it's like that's been my excuse lately.

I picked up the pencil and convinced myself to not use the tablet before I started the course, stupid idea tbh. Using the pencil again is really challenging and I don't have enough “ideas” to keep me busy. I'm trying to follow some different books, but it's a slow process and I think I should pick up the tablet again really, since it's just so easy to use and it steps up the productivity in my case.
It's the whole balancing act thing, I'm very much all or nothing, in this case, it's either tablet or pencil, which is fucking moronic and I'm gonna try and vary it now - It's weird how you can realize things when you write shit down lol.

I haven't been completely lazy though, there's not a lot to upload, but at least there's a few things lying around.

I've been playing some old school, Maniac Mansion and Day of the Tentacle, so obviously I tried to draw some of those characters using the basic shapes approach. I might have been a bit influenced by watching The Big Lebowski as well...

*(yeah I did "cheat" a bit with using the tablet to try and add some color... ssshh)

Drawing those small characters, made me think about putting up the title to Day of the Tentacle on my wall here, which took me into some weird drawing letters direction, a bit like graffiti I suppose, so I ended up trying to do my own wild style letters as well, though I only got to four “T, U, E, L” but that whole thing is like a mystery to me, I would love to learn more about that since the style looks efing cool when done right (mine are.... not done right, baby steps!).

They are kinda silly, basically I no fucking clue what I'm doing here, started out with just very "block" like letters and then into something... weirdish, but one thing I really enjoyed was to just color them... I love the tablet ><!

And then I've been working on some Riven Phoenix and Vilppu studies again, getting mad as fuck one more time :)

Not a lot going on here

Yes I'm still here. Been struggling with motivation and which direction to pursue etc. I have gone back to pencils lately, I just wanted to refresh some of the basics again and not relying 100% on pure digital work.
I'm shocked though, it's so hard for me to work with just pencils again, everything seems slightly off and unnatural, which fucks with my motivation.

I started on some Kimon Nicolaides again, but it felt weird and I started to question the value of it, at least for someone at my starter level. Feeling the gesture and weight etc. is great ofc, but to me it seems like something that should come after a general drawing foundation, like right now I just want to draw a person with somewhat correct proportions etc. In my mind knowing how to feel a gesture doesn't really help you all that much if you don't have a clue about basic anatomy for example, sure I can feel the action of someone throwing a fast ball, but if I don't know where the elbow should sit, or how you actually draw an arm with some basic muscle ideas, I don't want to draw some old black and white Mickey Mouse clone where the arms are just waving around. It's not the style I'm looking for at least.

Anyway, picked up ”Loomis – Fun with a pencil” book again, this time drawing the circles and actually using some of the ideas came a lot easier. I remember I tried it when I first started this journey and understanding how a circle worked in 3D space was just too big a leap for me, as well as drawing using basic shapes just made me angry. Now though it was just a matter of practice and patience... mainly patience for goddamn copying drawings from a book etc. is a drag.

Don't really have a lot to upload, but there are the Loomis copies, so I suppose it's better than nothing. In the end I tried the techniques to de-construct a still frame from Despicable Me, dunno... some of it made sense, but... meah, wanted to render it afterwards though, which was a mistake, because fuck I can't control the valuing with a pencil -.-

Blah Blah Blah more SAI stuff

Was away for a couple of days and getting back into the grind is a slow process for me. :)

Butts, I’ve been looking into “painting” with SAI some more and done a few pieces, nothing big though.
I’m starting to get frustrated with it, in an attempt to get as close to a painting sensation or work process – how I imagine it to be at least – I kept it to one layer, no fancy effect or tricks, just one brush setting and that was it. This is how it looks if anyone would be interested in that stuff…

Anywho, the first one is Jeff Bridges in True Grit, I did it in pretty much one go, I got a bit lost tbh it was fun and new… blah blah. I didn’t measure a single thing it was all done “gefühl” or wtf too call it… sense? It was major annoying not being able to do details, I really fucked myself over trying to keep it “realistic” when you have to paint over the same spot 10 times before the color really sets, then doing details like correct eyelids, nose and well general features, becomes a bit of a “meh cba”. Still fuck it, it was sorta fun :)

 

I started on a painting with the same premise as the True Grit, but of Queen Anne’s Revenge from Pirates of the Caribbean. Initially I thought I had start something I couldn’t possible finish, the shit was just too complex, but this “lolol paint shit” sorta defeats the whole getting the whole detail shit right, so I was slightly surprised I managed to finish it and not just throw it away after a couple of minutes. This time I did make sure to save the steps though, so yeah gg… Half-way through I felt I made the sky too bright, so I wanted to correct that, but omfg that shit is impossible when u got a ship in the middle of everything and it’s all on one layer… fml! But again it’s the same story as the girl in the jeans; I gotta get the background shit correct first and then move on, going back and do an entire rework of the background in the middle of things is just a huge ass time sink, so hopefully I’ll learn that someday.
In the end I did a brightness/contrast adjustment, because I’m weak…

Also I put some colors on the Aliens in Photoshop, just for giggles, it’s… I don’t know, not correct, the glow from the finger should be reflected more, but what can you do… you live and learn :)

 Oh and last one. I wanted to try something with Plato's cave allegory, but I never got past the idea really... maybe another day.

"Me, your momma, and someother whore..."

I hate how I handled the drawing of the little girl and her genie, it was done from the genie head to his body and then adding the girl and boy for some… sense? But never going back and really changing anything in the sketch in the process, which shows imho, it’s way to flat and boring, plus the characters are… well I’m certainly not satisfied.

So I wanted to do another run or attempt, again I started without a real idea of wtf I was going for, but well maybe third time?! 

I didn’t finish any of the drawings ofc… :P I got the attention span of a coked up reality star, so I started sketching a bit in SAI without really noticing the transition – autopilot much? I really like the sketching part of the program compared to PS, but when I tried to do a more paintish thing it turned weird, I can’t control the brush at all >< I have too paint over the same part 10 times before the bloody value shifts, major frustrating! But I managed to do some quickies before it got too unbearable to work with… -.-

And yeah sketching to Jello Biafra and Mojo Nixon might have influenced me a tiny bit… :)

Went into photoshop with the second Alien picture, since I know how the goddamn brushes work there! Did a quick fix to some of the details I couldn't do in SAI and well yeah "Fuck it dude, let's go bowling"

"Never compromise. Not even in the face of Armageddon."... and stuff

 I tried some imagination sketching, in the start I couldn’t even come up with a basic idea of wtf I wanted to draw. A friend told me to just start with a head and then build on that, so I did… It’s extremely weird for me to go around things like that.
I finished the head and thought it looked a bit like that bomb guy from Super Mario, so I added a bowler and a cigar to downplay that a bit, then I didn’t know what the fuck I would do with the body… so he got some generic thing, which didn’t really do all that much, I wanted to force myself to try and do a bit more feel of dimension instead of a flat 2D feel, which turned into a palm in the foreground and a bat in the background – baby steps okay! – adding those got me thinking of some cartoon schoolyard bully asking for lunch money. I got into some problems with the legs, I couldn’t come up with anything other than a flat and boring stance, so yeah… removing them and just giving him some djinn form was easier – don’t judge.
I didn’t have any room to add anything else on the paper and it needed some more to make any sense, I thought about what scenario I could use the djinn and came up with the little girl who lost her rabbit teddy or what you call it, added the boy and called it quits.

Looking back, it was stupid of me to stop there. I should have started over, using my sketch as a concept of wtf it was I was trying to do.
If I had an idea what I was going to draw from the start then this is not how I would have choose to do it, I would have made the Djinn a lot more gaseous and demon like, no solid features just some glowing eyes maybe and have it take up a lot more space, like it looking directly down on the boy instead of this, this is to flat and action less.
Still it’s not too late for doing it over! So who knows :)

 

I got persuaded into trying to draw a Harpy Girl, I thought it would be pretty much impossible since it would require some sorta anatomy knowledge which I don’t have… AT ALL!
Still what’s the worst that could happen…? Instead of going about it as the other cartoon drawing, I did loads of ideas this time, just quick scribbles trying out different things and poses. I ended up on a mix and tried to sketch something rough in SAI and then color it quickly in PS, I didn’t want to overdo things, since I knew I would get into trouble if I went overboard on details, then you suddenly need to know a bit more exact where the elbow joint is located instead of just “uhmmm on the arm somewhere”… It’s a stupid notion, but again… baby steps!
After I did a very quick coloring and a bare minimum of detail, I called it done and tbh was pleasantly surprised, it’s not very innovative or complex, but coming from a stickman background it’s reassuring to see that even if I don’t know it, I must be learning something at least :)

It got to rest a few hours, but I felt I had to come back and at least attempt to finish the coloring, so I did and after a while I got aware I was going with a very one color tone theme which I wanted to break or at least upset slightly, so I did the glowing eyes… it wasn’t really my Harpy anymore, but more some evil fairy or demon in my opinion.

So what have I learned?
I learned I need to lose the idea that the first sketch has to be the final and I should still attempt to do the things I want, instead of just doing compromises without even attempting new things – fuck it man you learn from mistakes, the best is when you can see the mistakes and NOT knowing how on earth you correct them, it may sound stupid, but in my experience I will keep ruminating over the problem and if I’m lucky the solution will come while I’m doing the dishes or something.
I don’t draw nearly as much as I would like – I’m like a level 31 procrastinator – but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m thinking about drawing constantly :)

Oh yeah also did a quick environment study, but haha yeah... nvm.