Sunday, June 30, 2013 at 03:37AM Finalized my lineart and started filling in my background coloring and shading. I have some definite persepective/anatomy/etc. issues buuuttt...I'm letting them go and just finishing this.
Thursday, June 27, 2013 at 08:03AM work in progress -- getting my background lineart in:
Upon contemplation, I think I ended up going in a different direction than my original plan, making the characters more defined and clear, rather than soft-edged suggestions, but...I think I like it? We'll see when I get to colors and everything falls apart.
Roughing in my foreground:
I'm once again in a rather frustrating spot, where I'm not totally sure what direction I want to go with the face --there are various levels of pensiveness I could go with, and I'm still not really solid on my stylized representation of this character, so I'm still deciding just how to do his hair, just how pointy his face should be, whether I want him almost stylized to a Disney character level (I've seen some really gorgeous interpretations of the show in that style) or based more strongly off of the character reference photographs I'm working from.
More soon, I hope.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013 at 11:46AM So, after the thumbnails I made yesterday, I decided that, of COURSE my favorite composition was the one that was going to give me the most trouble -- the high angle shot looking down at the street.
So this morning, I made two more thumbnails, with some hopefully better perspective.
However.
After thinking about it and looking the images over, I have decided that, though I really like that composition, the focus isn't as much in the right place. This is a story about a character that is leaving someone they cared about behind to live a new life and the story is told from a first-person perspective. So, despite the fact that the new images are very emotionally effective, I feel that the image that actually fits what I'm trying to say best is the first one, which puts the narrator way up in the foreground, larger and more present than the two in their brightly lit cocoon, unaware of his presence.
And this is how an illustrator makes decisions. By hemming and hawing and crossing her fingers that she isn't choosing totally the wrong thing.
Monday, June 24, 2013 at 01:04PM So, I've started on another little something -- just a personal project for a monthly fan art challenge -- and I started some thumbnails today.
And I decided to actually do that thing I do now and then where I document my process.
With this I am dealing with the mild frustration of knowing that I am going to have some steep perspective one way or another and some serious foreground/background stuff that needs to be properly dealt with in order for the characters to be properly distinguishable and also agreeing with the laws of physics and such, and although I know pretty well in my mind how the layout should go, as soon as I start sketching, my brain forgets how perspective works.
With these I also threw in a little color because, after looking at some style references, I decided that predominantly dark grey/blue tones counterpointed by the warm golden light of the window would be the most effective for this piece. This month's challenge is to base the piece on a song, and I am going with 'Someone Like You' by Adele, which is about hunting down an old flame/friend and hoping they want to return to the crazy life you once shared, only to realize that they really have moved on, and letting them go. I wanted to really play up the feel of the story told in the song through the complementary colors and the strong contrast between light and dark, warm and cold.
And that's enough of me nattering on, pretending that I know what I'm talking about.
Sunday, June 23, 2013 at 03:00AM Finished the present I was making for BFF -- it was supposed to be a quicky but most of my art time this weekend has consisted of me erasing the head and going back and drawing it again and again and again until it actually looks a bit like Misha Collins. Anyway, far from perfect but completed.
Whatever, it's hot and I'm tired. Hopefully more (better) art soon.
