First Man on the Moon

This was a school project for my Digital Painting class. The project was to combine two (or more) mediums together and make them seem like they all fit together. So, in this picture I painted the background (the earth, moon, and space) using acrylic paints on Illustration Board. I then scanned that image into PhotoShop and digitally painted the ladder and the Astronaut.

The entire image, from start to finish was about 15 hours, if you include all the time I spent locating reference images, thumbnails, roughs, and the final painting. I think the most difficult part was finding good space suit pictures from multiple angles.

Anyway, I think that it worked out and everything came together nicely in the end.

Gamer's Widow

This was done as gift art for a person who plays City of Heroes. This is their character, Gamer's Widow.

Freddy and Amphora

This is one of the projects that I was working on that I mentioned in one of my other posts. I finally finished it, yippee!!!

This project took me a while longer to complete than most of my other pieces because I ended up having to do quite a bit of research for it. I ended up studying lots of underwater images of people and animals, trying to get a feel for how the water affected the colors and how light refracted and broke apart. I am not certain I got everything correct, but overall I think the illusion worked well enough.

The image is dark because the scene is taking place at night, underwater, during a storm. I tried to include enough light so that it was easy to see what is happening, but still trying to leave enough in darkness to complete the feel I was going for.

This painting was inspired by a short story that was written for me. The main character is Freddy Sunshine (a Hero from the City of Heroes game that I created). He was on a boat out in the water when a huge storm hit and he was capsized. Amphora is a priestess of some underwater goddes who saves Freddy and grants some of her powers to him. Anyway, the full story explains it all in more detail. My short descriptions does not give it justice. Anyway, while reading the story I had this image come to mind and so I just had to paint it.

PhotoShop CS2 and Wacom Tablet. Not including any of the research, this took about 16 or 17 hours. With research, it was closer to 20.

I am now working on some other projects. I am going to try and finish a piece based on the Legend of Sleepy Hollow before Halloween. And my firend wants me to do a painting of one of his CoH characters after he hits level 50. Then I have a person that I am going to do a Volleyball painting for, and finally I was commissioned to do an Acrylic painting of a dog (that needs to be completed before Christmas). So, I am pretty dang busy with stuff, and this doesn't even include any of my school projects.

Sassy and Rad

Well, I think this image will just about end my ramp up to commissions. I think this has shown me that I can accomplish what I need to in an amount of time that will be both convinient and allow me to keep my costs low enough to hopefully get people to commission me.

This image was done in about 2.5 to 3 hours. I used no referrence during the actual design and placement, but I had seen an image previously that I was trying to emulate (but I could never find the actual image to use for reference). I know that there are some flaws with the anatomy, and that I need to clean up my colors a bit more around the edges, but overall I think this is a pretty good piece. Also, since this was a freebie and that I wanted to finish it in one evening, I had to cut some corners to get it posted before it got too late.

Now to decide on pricing...

Nurse White

This is a digital painting I did of another City of Heroes Character. The person specifically asked for a similar pose and wanted it to be playful and sexy. Anyway, I tried to capture those qualities in the image.

The painting was done in PhotoShop CS2 using a Wacom tablet. It took about 2.5 hours to complete.

This image, like the one below, was done mainly for the pupose of trying to decide how long an average piece will take to complete. I am trying to get a feel for time so I can start devising a payment schedule for doing commissions. I don't want to charge so much that people will not want to commission me, but I don't want to charge so little that I don't feel the price is worth my time. And so, by knowing what I can do given a certain amount of time I am better able to compile a price list for different projects.

Anyway, I think I my style lends it's self nicely to comic characters since I seem to have a more cartoonish style when I am working fast and from memory. Anyway, here is to hoping that I am able to make some extra cash on the side doing commissions...

Demon on a Rock

Well, I got bored the other night and decided to have some fun with my Wacom tablet and this was the result. A lot of it is based heavily on options available for characters in the City of Heroes game. Like many of my drawings, this idea (the one of a demon type character standing on a rock with flames behind him) has been running through my head just waiting for me to draw or paint it.

This piece took me about two hours to complete. I spent about 30 minutes on the actual sketch and then about an hour and a hlaf painting it. I was not trying for perfection with this, but rather I was trying to gague what I was able to do in a limited amount of time. This had it's roots in my 30 minute sketches, but trying to take it up a notch. I wanted to work fast, have fun, and get a decent, semi completed look to it. I think it was successful on all accounts and I am very happy with the results.

I did not use any referrences for this, but rather tried to just make it up as I went along.

PhotoShop CS2 and a Wacom tablet.

30 Minute Quick Sketches

In an attempt to try and work on my figure structure and gesture drawing I decided to try a new approach. This is what I call the "30 Minute Quick Sketch". The five drawings above were all drawn and colored in about 30 minutes.

My goal with this exercide was to visualize a pose for thses characters and then draw it quickly and with very little care for fine detail or extras. I was specifically looking for dynamic poses that worked well with the individual character. I felt that this would help me visualize the pose and be better able to draw it.

So far I have really like the results. I have made some glaring errors in some of the anatomy, but overall I feel that it helping me to better understand the character's structure. As I get time, here and there, I figure that I will continue to do these. They are fun for me, and it seems that people always like to get free drawings of their characters.

All the characters above are from the game City of Heroes, and so I do not own any rights to them. All rights belong their respective owners. All the drawings were done using Adobe PhotoShop CS2 and a Wacom Intuos3 Tablet.

Tundara - Art Trade

I did an art trade with a person on the City of Heroes forums. I offered to draw a picture of their character and they offered to write a short story about one of mine. Anyway, the image above was my half of the art trade. This is her character, Tundara.

This was done entierly in Adobe Illustrator CS2. It was drawn with only a mouse. I have trouble using Illustrator and a tablet. My goal here was to create an image that had no gradiants but still had a sort of cell shaded look. I am actually very happy with this piece.

Self Portrait - School Project

Well, school is back in and I have decided to take a Digital Painting class. I felt that this would help me round out my abilities and help me improve in some areas I need help in. As the first project we were asked to do a self portrait. Part of the assignment was to somehow mix our image with something that we really like, enjoy, or that makes us, us. I chose the beach as my subject, since I love the beach, and tried to add my face into the clouds.

I think the attempt so far works pretty well. I still want to make some changes based on feedback received from my teacher, and so this piece is still a work in progress.

So far I have spent around 8 hours working on it. It was done using PhotoShop CS2 and a Wacom Tablet. The reference photo was taken by myself using a Olympus Digital camera, but there was no tracing of the photo. I only used the photo as a referrence and painted the image while looking at it.

I have also been working on some other stuff that I may be posting pretty soon. I have a digital painting that I am working on (not school related) that is based off a story that a person wrote for me. As I get closer to completing it I will post it. I have also been drawing people's characetrs from the game City of Heroes because it is good practice for my figure structure class. One of my new ideas to help me get better is what I call a 30 minute sketch. I will post more on this later, with images that I have done.

So, even though I have not been posting much recently I have been busy with projects, probably not as many as I would like, but I keep letting other stuff get in the way...

Jenny - looks like I need more practice

So, this is my attempt at painting my sister, Jenny. Or, at least it is *supposed* to be my sister... I guess this just means that I still need more practice. While it is possible to identify who it is, the likeness is not quite as close as I would have liked.

There are just so many things that are wrong with this painting, that I have identified. I will need to work on improving those things in future paintings. But it is progress.

Other than the likeness not being quite right, I do like the painting as it relates to my progress in digital painting. While there are many things I dislike, there are also many things that I do like.

This was simply good practice.

Ashly

This is a painting of my niece, Ashly. She is my brother's daughter.

Overall I am very pleased with this one. Although, I may have to go back and do some additional clean up on the hair because parts of it still bother me. I was very happy with the skin tones, and I think the eyes work pretty good.

I am still working on improving my abilities with a Wacom Tablet, but I also think that I am getting a lot better. I must say that I really like to work digitally because it is so forgiving and much, much easier to make correction and fix stuff that is not quite the way I want it.

My next goal is to start working on backgrounds and sceanery. I have been looking through old photographs that I have and trying to decide what would make a good painting. So, I am hoping to have some landscape or, as I am thinking of them, "background" type paintings in the near future.

Larissa Rasputin

Another City of Heroes character. This character belongs to person from the game forums that has been very supportive of my artwork and so this piece was made as a thank you. This was actually a pretty fast sketch, with that in mind, I am pretty happy with the smothness of the skin and the overall feel.

Sir Bronco

This is another City of Heroes character. This character belongs to a friend of mine.

The character's name is Sir Bronco because my friend is a huge Denver Bronco's fan. The pose was inspired by a picture of John Elway throwing a football, and since this character's special powers in the game is throwing fireballs it worked out very well.

Girl with Red Hair

This is a digital painting of a picture I found over on the DeviantArt web site. The original photo can be found Here.

This painting was done using PhotoShop CS2 and an Intuos3 Wacom tablet. Around 7 hours of work.

I have two monitors on my computer, and when I paint digitally I load PhotoShop up on one monitor and use the other monitor to display my reference picture. This painting was done while looking at the picture. There was no tracing or grids used, and if you look at the original picture you will see that there are a lot of little things that are off. I may go back and rework some of the parts because I am not completely happy with everything. But for all intents and purposes I am very happy with the way this piece turned out.

I am really liking digital painting.

City of Heroes and Digital Painting

This painting is of a City of Heroes character. Her name is Absinthium. This piece was done as a Birthday gift for graver13. Graver13 is a great artist, you can find his stuff here: graver13's DeviantART page

This piece was actually done before my All Hollows Eve painting. It took about 6.5 hours using only PhotoShop and a Wacom tablet.

For those of you that don't know, City of Heroes if a MMO game like World of Warcraft. MMO means Massively Multiplayer Online. It is a game that is played entirely online with other people from around the world. You can team up and play together or just solo. City of Heroes is a very fun game where you get to play a super powered hero fighting the forces of evil in Parogon City.

And since CoH is based in comic book lore it is only natural that people would want comic book type images of their characters, and while I do not offer much in the way of pure comic book style people still enjoy seeing a painting or drawing of them. I have been trying to practice up on my digital painting skills because I would really like to do this for comissions.

...Painting for money, who would have thought?!?

Digital Painting is fun!

Well, I am back again. Nothing too exciting has been going on other than I have been enjoying my summer break so far. As of today I have not done any traditional painting, but I have been doing quite a bit of digital painting.

The piece you see above is one that I did just recently. The painting of of a character from the video game City of Heroes. His name is All Hollows Eve. I felt that he fit the mood perfectly that I was trying to capture and so I used him. I think that the final piece turned out pretty well considering I am still trying to learn the ins-and-out of using a Wacom Tablet.

A short break

Well, school is finally out for the summer! Yeah, I am finally free... woot!

I have set some goals that I want to achieve over the summer in the world of art. My goals include finishing a few paintings that were started during the school semester that were never finished due to time and other projects. Both of these were for my Illustration Media Techniques class. Up to this point I am very excited about these two pieces because I feel that they have a lot of potential to be very good. I really want to post them, but I will refrain from doing so until I think they are done and presentable.

One of my other goals is that I want to work on portraits. I went and bought some canvases to work on. I want to get about 6 or 7 done over the summer. I even have the subjects all picked out, but I will not say who they will be at this point for fear of ruining the surprise. In case you didn't guess, I will be working from photo reference on these, but I think that will actually be a benefit to me because I can spend the time necessary to make sure they are good without the need to have someone sit for hours on end while I paint them.

And finally, I bought a new 6x8 Intuos3 Wacom Tablet. This has to do with my final goal. I want to learn to use it effectively and try my hand at digital painting. So far I am not very good at it and need to work on my control. The pen feels a little odd at first and I need to get used to the way it feels on the tablet surface. I am trying the different pen tabs to see if they make a difference, and I may even try taping a piece of paper over the tablet area to try and simulate the feel of actually drawing on paper. I have also started tweaking the setting to make it respond better to how I use it. Anyway, this will be fun and I am looking forward to playing with it more. So, in the future you may start seeing digital paintings here as well as all the other stuff I have been posting.

Anyway, that is all for right now. I have been taking a break for a few days, but I will be getting back to work on painting/drawing tomorrow.

Lady Walking Dog in Crosswalk

Acrylic. 9" x 12" on Canvas. 2007.

I really ended up liking this piece. It has some problems, but overall I like the composition, the colors and the feel. The picture didn't quite capture the true colors, and so it this peview isn't as nice as the real piece.

This was one of the two final pieces for my Illustration class. This project was to make a composition with multiple figures in an urban environment.

What Is Your Time Worth?

Acrylic. 9" x 14" on Illustration Board. 2007.

This is one of the final two illustrations that I did for my Illustration class this semester. I am not completely happy with this piece, but it was fun trying a new style. I think a lot of things worked, but not enough to make it feel like it is complete. But oh well, I had quite a bit of painting that I had to squeeze into a short amount of time and so it was only natural that something would suffer, and this one is the one.

Not my best work, but definitly not my worst.

Ladyhawk

Adobe Illustrator. 1997.

This piece was done for a friend of mine. She asked me to illustrate a character from a story she was writing. So, I got all the information about her character and this was the final piece. The only complaint I had was the character actually had red hair... oh well, that is what you get for free.

I was actually quite happy with the final results. I did quite a few sketches for it, and after deciding on the final piece I simply drew it in Illustrator. I did not scan the image to get the lines into the program, I just created it from looking at the sketches. I have since found that I like to do the sketches in a book and then scan them in. It really helps with speed and accuracy. Now, If I can just get around to buying a scanner so I don't have to always use the one at school...

Sunset in Watercolor

School is finally coming to an end, and as a result I have been pretty busy trying to get all my final projects done and ready to be turned in. But, since none of them are in any sort of finished state I thought I would share another of my paintings that I did a few years ago.

This painting is watercolor on Strathmore, 18"x24", 1998. I actually painted this at school, not as a project, but because I had an idea and wanted to see if I could portray it. Anyway, the idea had to do more with the trees, and how they are a silhouet for the most part. I wanted to see if I could reproduce that in watercolors. This was the result. I actually like this painting, the water could use some work, but overall I think it is very pleasing.

In the future I think I will just start adding paintings that I have done whenever I am inbetween current pieces. This allows me to keep up to date on my postings, and allows me to continue to showcase my work (since that is the real purpose of this blog).

"Diagnosis: ID Theft" final piece

This is the final of the "Diagnosis: ID Theft" piece. I am very happy with this piece because I think everything works together well. Anyway, this is what I am submitting for the grade. I will keep my fingers crossed that the teacher feels the same way about it as I do. Acrylic on cold press Illustration Board. 9 x 14 inches.

Dinosaur Final and Painting of my Mom

So, here is the final image of the Dinosaur chasing the kid. I think that it turned out pretty good. In case you can't tell, there is a car that is upsidedown and spewing smoke just to the right of the T-rex's leg. I also added some people, not that you can see them very well. This piece was done using Acrylic Paint on Cold Press Illustration Board. The final size is 5" x 7".

This is a painting I did of my mom. It isn't perfect, but I was playing around with a slightly different style. I was trying to use a lot of dry brushing. I think the results look like it is not quite finished, but other people seem to like the way it turned out. I may go back and do so some additional work on this one, but we will have to see how much time I have. This was done with Acrylic on Cold Press Illustration Board.

3D Chess Set

This is a chess set that I modeled using Maya 8. Not too much to it other that the wood grain for the table top is incredibly ugly looking. But I feel that I did a pretty good job with all of the pieces.

I found that I really like using Maya, it is a fun 3D program. I currently have a class right now that is covering the texturing and lighting. It isn't too advanced, but it is pretty cool to learn how to make things look almost real.

Partials and one Final

This picture is for my illustration class. Our project was to paint a human in an urban setting with either an animal or a monster/hybrid. I chose a T-Rex for my monster because I liked the idea of how it could interact in a modern setting. My idea has the T-Rex chasing a person (who is hiding behind a van). As you can see this is a very preliminary painting. I have essentially added a wash and began work on the building in the background and on the van. My goal up to this point was to establish a color harmony and to begin blocking in shapes.

This painting was finished and submitted for critique, and so I am currently working on the corrections and updates to it so I can turn it in for a grade. After I finish with the additions I will get a picture to post so everyone can see the final in addition to the partial piece above.

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This Painting was also for my Illustration Class. I am currently doing conceptual illustrations, and this one was an illustration for a Magazine article called "Diagnosis: Identity Theft". As you can see the image is not complete, but a few of the parts in it are. As with the piece above it was completed and submitted for review and I am currently working on the updates for it. When it is done I will post the final.
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This piece was also for the conceptual side of my class. It was an illustration for an article called, "Consciousness in a Cockroach". The article was talking about how studying insect brains help us to understand how the brain works and how it evolved. This was a play on th evolution theme. This was the final piece in it's completed stage. Acrylic on cold press Illustration Board. 9 x 14 inches.

Busy week

Well, this week has been busy, even more busy than usual and it is supposed to be spring break! I work at Novell and next week is their big technology conference in Salt Lake City. I have been working overtime trying to get things finalized for our booth. I am just glad that all the prep is now done, but I still have to go and stand at a booth and answer the same three questions over and over and over again next week. Should be fun.

I am still trying to decide the best way to show my work. I think I may just start posting it and then put a link to my web page in my biography section. It is easier to add it here than it is to create an entire web site, and my time is pretty limited at the moment.

Anyway, here is a picture I did a few years ago. This was done using Adobe Illustrator. I really like Illustrator and so I was trying to see how far I could push it and was going for a more detailed picture. Some things worked while others things need some tweaking, but overall I am pretty happy with the final results.

Just another day

Well, I am working on some different project for my school classes.

I have three paintings due next week, and so I will be taking pictures of them and posting them here. Hopefully I will be able to post some progress pictures of at least one of them to show how it evolves, but that may be more work than it is worth.

I am also planning on posting pictures of some of my other work. But I am still deciding if I want to just link to them here, or put a link to static web page. If I do the web page then I will need to revamp the whole thing to make it more presentable. My current page is so out dated that it isn't even funny. I guess I will have to think about this some more and see how much time I have to devote to updating the web site.

The Beginning

This blog is going to start out as a class project for extra credit, but depending on how things go it may turn into something more... but, we will have to wait and see.

I will be spending some time in the next week updating this blog with artwork that I have created either by hand or digitally. So, stop on by later and see what is going on.