Current WIP: Valkyrie

  

  What's up everyone?  Won't keep you for long, however I figured it upon myself to put up a quickie for the current painting I am working on for a dear loyal client of mine.  It's the character Valkyrie from Namco's series of games, and don't blame yourself if you don't know her...I didn't know of her much either until I got hit up for this picture.

   I won't be talking much about this one, but I will post up WIPs for when most of coloring is done, and then a final piece when the picture is done.  I'll just say I had to restart this one four times before getting this particular rendition, but it was more than worth it.  Also been merging my coloring, painting, and drawing theories and tests into working btwn this and a couple other pieces, but this will be the first one to test how much has been gained in such a short amount of time.

   Funny enough, the client doesn't know this is the version I'm going w/...I think I'll keep this ver. as a surprise until it's done.  Compared to what they THINK they're getting, though, this one's much better and more focused (although, it's nowhere near finished yet).

  Keeping w/ the art themed topics, I'm going to be purchasing some more tubes of paint from Dickblick over the next few days.  I've been very tempted to at least try picking up some oil pastels, but the results I've been getting w/ acrylics is enough for me.  My studies on color theory and mixing are what are pushing me to get these paints, but w/ them I should be set for anything.  Also, since the art process is becoming much more streamlined, I can probably do away w/ other things I felt I needed before.  Feels good to finally be back on track, w/ a fully clear head :)

  That's it for now; I'll jump back sometime l8r in the week to chat about Beserk and Outlaw Star, two very good examples of their respective genres, and muse over some classics I've been playing.  Stay awesome everyone; l8r.

Runs in the family?!?

  Hey everyone; today's feeling almost too good to stay cooped up inside, so I might go see a buddy of mine and just relax w/ 'em.  However, while sitting around on the computer inbetween looking at various nothings and cooking lunch, my eldest niece bought to me a very cute little drawing she did w/ markers (Crayolas, I'm assuming; hell if I ever could get this level of clarity out of them) on writing paper.  I think it merits some exposure, and so I present The Sunshine's Geisha..

 

  Just goes to show you that a passion for art and creative endeavors can begin at any age; she's just eight years old and already experimenting w/ color in a fashion most of us probably didn't start doing until we were teenagers or later.  It's interesting in seeing how a child interprets color, b/c I think they have a natural affinity and raw eagerness in them that we naturally lose grasp on as we become adults.  Sure, we can learn all we want about color theory, temperature, harmony and concord--and I'm certainly not saying an adult's understanding of advanced color properties is never utilized to stunning effect (or that studying those concepts is hurtful; in the end it's a more beneficial route of knowledge)-but sometimes all the theories and studying, all the formulating,..it can rob us of our ambition to just "let go" and be childish in using color to accidentally stumble on some fantastic mistakes.

   In any case, at least children don't become so pretentious and serious w/ their works as to seem cold, uninviting and overtly analytical of others and grossly overestimating in their own abilities.  As adults we unfortunately take on those qualities (even in miniscule doses) naturally as we understand the concepts behind the talent more concretely.  I think there's a saying in "too much knowledge can be destructive"...I'll just probably leave it there.

   Okay, off for lunch and enjoying the rest of the day.  Hope to post a WIP of a current painting or two over the next several days.  Everyone just enjoy the weekend and kick it mad stylin' like (oh the horror in the infidel's meager attempts for teh "coolnez" x3).  L8r.

  

  Right...so a little while ago I took the initiative to begin cleaning up my deviantART gallery, being somewhat frustrated w/ the direction it seemed to reflect and hinted I was going in.  As-is, the gallery size stands at almost half of what was there before, and to be honest, most of what was there were WIPs.  I don't want to be known as the WIPping boy on the site, especially if I want a professional appearance, so they just had to go.

  Some time after that I wrote a journal there announcing a small departure, if only for a couple of days to get my username changed.  Unfortunately, dA is completely backwards on that subject so I deactivated the account for absolutely nothing when all was said and done.  I also expressed some frustration in my process and the need to relax down there some and focus on my own pursuits (i.e admit I want to be more selfish), which seems to be understood from most of my closest pals around there.

  The truth is, even the Mai picture is nowhere near definitive of the direction I want to reach, but it was definitely a step in the right direction.  It has gotten me thinking about painting in a whole different mindset and methodology, interpreting concepts in a whole new light.  I just wasn't THINKING enough w/ my paints and painting techniques, but now I am.  Now I'm exploring the full use of the materials in my possession and am not being cheap about it anymore, all in an effort to bring out the best results.  Those best results won't be evident in the next piece I get to, or even the next several, but certainly, new concepts and clarity will begin to emerge itself in what is put out from here on forth.

   To that effect, I've decided to make The Bristle's Law my main WIP dumping ground, since this is a much more personal space where the pressure to upload one's best (e.g 'finished) work isn't a priority.  However, I'll try and keep it down to just a couple of WIPs for w/e picture is being worked on, don't wanna spam the hell out of it like the Mai one.  That also takes into account if I can even scan the image (canvas boards are looking like a very viable ground now more than ever ;).  And yes, there's just a megaton of other little things I'd like to garb down on while here, but that's (obviously) more random and not as frequent.

  So, I hope this was an informative post if any, and I'll be back sometime to wax on some wholly different subject.  U all enjoy the weekend, see 'ya l8r :)

Mai Fin (ish)

  Welp, it took little more than a week off and on, serious and semi-serious (in terms of time investment) sessions and a whole lotta of testing and other shit, but she is done, at last.  Here may I present the finished Mai Shiranui picture...

 "Sure to give Chun-Li some food for thought x3"
(Ed. Note:  Please visit my deviantArt page here for the full version.  I'll post it there tomorrow)

   I said it before and I'll say it again:  she was a fun one to paint.  It's technically marred in more than a few spots for sure--and there's nothing saying what was done here will stick in the future--but it felt like an overall step forward to do.  Now that I've learned how to use mediums for dilution of the paint, I hardly think I'll ever be stepping back to the dark ages of using water alone, or perhaps water period outside of the thin initial underpaintings.  There, it seems like it can be very useful, but for final work I doubt it will make a comeback.  But hey, u never quite know.

   I also picked up some interesting use of mediums in ways I'm not sure they were intended for..on THAT front, there's much more testing to be done, but I do feel confident in that w/ them, I can get a greater range out of the limited set of tubes I got.  Even w/ that said tho there's no time to rest on laurels:  there's another picture I'm doing for a friend that I have to start from scratch again tomorrow (well, not really scratch, but I'm not using the line drawing sheet I had before, even if the pose will remain about the same), and in between working on that (and posting some bits of it here), I'll try experimenting some more w/ creating color swatches and getting a better handle of the mediums.

   Reminds me, too, that a new brush or two is in order.  These brushes are wearing down, and new ones are always more than welcome...

   That'll do it for this time; I hope u all dig my Mai piece.  Maybe sometime in the future I can go over the process, but as this process is ever-changing, all the future seems like an immature moment to pick for that topic.  Tomorrow I'll prop back up w/ some pictures and underpaintings for the new picture.  Hint:  we're taking it back to olden Norse times for this one ;).  Catch 'ya l8r...

She's Almost (Sorta) Ready

  What up peeps?  The days have been good and this is a little two-part bloggity-blog where I'll feature that Mai picture one last time before it's, well, actually done, and gloss over a bit on something I'm apt to wanting to do as soon as tomorrow night, if all things go over well.

   First off, Mai.  The current progress on her is pretty good, and yes I understand there's some anatomy issues.  @ the same time, w/ absolutely no preplanning or prepardness going into this one, I guess it ain't half-bad.  W/ more practice in this technique I'm sure to steadily improve.  Right now I have one final glaze to do on the skin, and from there I need to go back and add some more detail to the red bit of the gown before doing the background and the final glazes to set a mood.  All of that aughta get done tomorrow, as I promised, all things considered, so..yeah...what's next?

  Moving on, last night I kinda had a really rad thought pop up while outside:  why not try doing a painting at midnight?  A lot of artist do what they call "midnight jams", staying up the whole night in their studio working on some piece.  Welp, my studio ain't nothin' special, and the temperatures are very warm outdoors so, barring any wet weather, I don't see why it's a big issue to set stuff up outside some night, maybe get the music going, and paint my ass off (of course, there are those stray animals,...creepy sonsabitches!).  It's not like me going off on some deep tangent of thinking the best art is done in the after-hours, but it'd be interesting to see how the night sky influences my thought process (plus, during the day it's too much a hassle to set things up outside and it truly is HOT around here during that time).

  So, uhm,...tomorrow night I'll be starting on my first midnight painting session, aiming to do a piece that only gets worked on during the afterhours, and maybe incorporate some of the scenery around if possible.  Should be interesting...welp, I'll mention it again tomorrow, in any case.

 
   Ah, before I jet, did u read this news story on Yahoo about a 4-year old Australian art-"prodigy"?  If 'ya didn't I got a link here.  Now, it's stuff like this why I somewhat choose not to associate w/ that particular sector of the art scene; we just don't see eye-to-eye on this stuff (literally, in this girl's case we don't, she's freakin' four years old).  Still, it's always neat to hear about young kids showing any sort of interest in art given that most girls her age are wanting to be the next sleazy pop-star whore, and I must admit, there is some strong talent in this kid, particularly in some of the pieces like The Leopard or The Luck Dragon, Cosmic Leap, Chinese New Year and Sunflares and Pegasus's Flight (very nice colors and composition).  Yeah, I probably don't know two shits about abstract art, and it's not actually something I'm interested in (in a "purists" POV), but I can at least say the kid has a couple of good pieces on her.  Let's hope she's not a fraud.

   That'll do it for tonight; hope this was of anything interesting and maybe even insightful, eh.  Damn, if I wanna stay up all night, I'd have to rework my sleeping schedule.  Awkward...

   Welp,...g'nite...

Stuff For Mid-Week

  Heyzapeeps...Wednesdays are SO slow, aren't they?  Dead-center of the week, u know u have energy but the fact Wednesday's, well, Wednesday kinda drags it down some.  What a sucky day Wednesday can be, it aughta be banned imho (shorter weeks aren't as bad as others make them out to be ;).

  Anyhow, I have some more art to post, one's the Mai WIP which I'll poof up l8r, but in the meantime I have a special little tree here, done for my eldest sis in regards to her science class project for her college course.  I'm really proud she's attending school again (something I would love to do, if just for the purpose of having a degree), and I wish her all the best.  I know it's just a tree an' all, but hey, if it helps her get a smoking good grade on her project, I'm all for it.

  I had some fun w/ this one.  A long time back I bought some Prismacolor watercolor pencils decidedly on a whim.  There they sat for some odd months, only used for a now-subpar Hellsing picture I would rather not upload here (in fact I'm still struggling w/ the thought of deleting much of those older pictures b/c they might do more bad than good on reflecting where I'm at, but that's something for another time).  Sad indeed, b/c they were about thirty bucks and barely getting used (I should note by now:  I'm advocate the "get all for yer money" mentality.).  Seeing that I didn't want to break out the acrylics for a subject matter as simple as a tree--and having thrown out the pastels and color pencils and feeling a pen drawing was too boring (as well as aside from me)--I opened the tin and gave them another shot.

   Boy oh boy, when u start learning how to use these suckers, they can produce some phenomenal stuff.  Granted, I'm sure this tree is anything but the pinnacle of what these pencils can do, but I'm very inclined to explore them more as a side-media to my focus on acrylics.  In fact, they could eventually be useful for certain details and effects my acrylics can't pull off, but that's shit for another time and space well off in the distance.  It's still always intriguing to ponder on the thought, however, and I should consider investing in these more and using them on lower-scale/smaller-sized artwork.

  Oh, btw, despite kinda trouncing on the tree's "specialness", it is special in the sense my sis is using it for a family tree project.  So there's names and all that shit to add, but really ain't much more to be done.  For the sake of some internet-unsavvy fam, though, I won't be posting that final bit (which, again, won't be much of anything).

   Okay, so that's one.  Now here comes (slightly more tan than intended) Mai...ready, set....go!!

   Yes, I notice she's a bit more tan than most people consider her to be.  Granted, there's older spritework about in this range and I could lie and say that's what I was aiming for, but in reality I was looking to harmonize the skin more.  That was achieved, but due to an error in the initial laydown of the skin (relying on an old technique from older pictures that was proven to be insufficient for the methods being employed everywhere else in this one), I had to try and reduce down on the cracking and make the skin seem more alive.  Then again, I could've lightened the glaze some (but got carried away w/ having fun w/ the Extender...actually a lot more to that I'd like to go into sometime).  Ah well,..the rest of the picture will be shifting tone some to compromise, and it's still got a good ways to go so who knows what could go down.

    A side note:  working on this Mai picture has made me realize what I really want to do w/ my art.  This is the direction I want to go in full-term, and there are a lot of other pictures sitting around I wanted to finish, but wouldn't look right employing what's done here to them.  So I'm getting ready to batter down the hatches and re-envision a lot of WIPs (some of which are already fairly along) to try them in this newer technique.  Tough, but ultimately for the best.

   Another side note:  the Cresent illustration board finally came through, WOOT!!.  This motha's pretty big in person, and I'm already dreaming up what to do w/ it.  It'll be my first ever attempt on a ground this large, and I'm pulling out all the stops...once I get to it.  It'll likely be a few weeks out before doing anything, but that gives a long time for conceptualization.  Does outer space, spaceships and neo-futuristic jazz sound any good x?

Dead Samurai...An Early Beginning

  Been a few days since I posted anything up so far..I'd upload the current progress on my Mai painting but actually figured to take a break from that and switch to something else.  This is a quick post of my very early-in-the-rough WIPs for a Ronin Warriors and Resident Evil character, combined here for convenience.  I'm gonna get cracking on them (and another pic) tonight in just a few...no stream tho sorry (lolz, who would watch anyway?).

  I would try to finish these up but I have another painting to get started on first for a 1Up friend of mine, and a simple drawing/painting for my eldest sis's science class project (which was fun in it's own right to try, since it gave me a damn good excuse to use my Prismacolors once again).  And then there's the Mai picture, which will likely end up coming out btwn a few of the others, if time is on my side (it never is tho).

  In other news...welp E3's come and overall it was sorta a mute show.  Not that many big announcements.  I didn't bother to watch either Microsoft or Sony's shows, mainly b/c I wasn't captivated to do so.  Microsoft stuck mainly to Kinect and badly timed gaem reveals, while Sony actually did announce some cool stuff like Sly 4 and Vita, but it was pretty much Nintendo's for the taking.  Actually watched their press conference, and it was quite nice; always good to see Shiggy on the stage (but whatever happened to that woman who used to speak...u know, that very Sarah Palin-looking woman?).  Mario for 3DS looks good though a bit different than other Mario games (mainly to do w/ the camera, which reminds me so much of Saturn's Bug! games it's not even funny), but Wii 2...ouh I mean Wii "U"...nice. 

  Nice controller (they hit a home run w/ the golf game example in the reel) and acts almost like a handheld console of its own.  I don't like the Apple-like design philosophy they're continuing w/-and the console looks nothing like the SNES-inspired thing they mentioned earlier-but it seems like they've put a lot of thought into the controller and it could open some hard-locked doors in the Creativity Room. 

  So, uhm, that's it for now.  Dinner time and drawing time, basically, so I'll see u all sometime l8r.  Byez.

Mai Shiranui Step 2

  Back again peoples, after a few more hours of working on the Mai picture I started yesterday, and was supposed to be a single-sitting session.  However, my own process seems to keep elongating the time compared to what it could be, so even today she's not gettin' done.  In fact, it might be a few more days before she's completed.

   The reason why's simple:  if I spend six-seven hours a day on it (keeping in mind I'm still learning as I go along), at least a fourth or more of that time is me purely mixing my colors and making test swatches.  A digital program might have all the colors I need right then and there, but by hand it's a pretty laborious process and requires pinpoint balance.  Nevermind the fact diluting paint w/o water is a science in itself, so yeah, it's taking a while.  Leave it to me to underestimate my own working time x3.

   So for now, I'll take it a 'layer' at a time.  I consider multiple glazes of the same colors to count to a layer, until I end up needed to reduce the medium amount or deepen the color in the actual mix, which is where the next layer starts.  Ironically it's coming off a lot like an oil painting technique ("fat over lean")..I'm sure there are other ways to accomplish the same effects, but I'm not @ that point yet to know what they are or execute them in practice (which, really, is where it would matter).

   Still, at least the basic colors have been bought out some and some details are being worked in.  I'm deliberately leaving the skin for last b/c it'll require a wholly different approach than the rest of the picture, and the background should get a good spice-up sometime during all this shit.  The whole thing should get done in maybe another few days, since I have other pictures to attend to in the meanwhile.  That's just how it goes, I suppose.

   Sorry Mai, your face won't be in the mail until quite l8r this week, but as the old adage goes, "slow and steady wins the race".  Be back l8r everyone; take care and be awesome.  Bye.

Art Day Appreciation and New Direction

  Hey everyone; for the first real post to this blog, I decided to take a piece of artwork I wanted to do for the worldwide art appreciation effort and share it here.  I'm also featuring it on my dA account (naturally), but @ least here I can muse a bit more on what it means to me.

  The idea behind this piece was simple:  since it was for a one-day event, I wanted to try a much different direction than I normally do w/ my art.  More specifically, I wanted to try a piece that was not preplanned in any way, and not presketched in any way either.  And, keeping in mind the subject manner, the end aim goal and the use of a few techniques I have only started practicing on maybe two weeks ago @ most, it's coming along pretty damn well.

  First, a bit about the character; Mai Shiranui is, you could say, SNK's mascot champion girl.  She's the main reason so many people look to SNK w/ reverence, and/or a sly bit of perversion.  Make no mistake, she is a cute, quite sexy kunoichi, and sometimes it's a miracle she doesn't cave over w/ those quite massive breasts (granted, their size tends to change depending on the game and the artist, which does hint at good variety, if unintended on SNK's part).  She's essentially also SNK's answer to Chun-Li, who, I must admit, is my favorite video game female character (and also the one that got me started on my thigh fetish x3).

"Don't be scurred, my face should be in the mail tomorrow :)"

   The picture itself is being done on what was my very last piece of Canson Montval 400gsm acrylic paper (until the new pad came in this afternoon,..talk about timing) w/ Galeria Cadmium Yellow Hue, Cobalt/Ultramarine (again, new stuff arrived and I replaced the Cobalt w/ Ultramarine a bit later), Crimson, Titanium White, and Mixing White colors.  Mediums being used (interestingly enough none were going to at first) are water, Galeria Retarder fluid, Liquitex Glaze fluid and Galeria Extender.  Materials aside, I'm going back to something I haven't done in a long time w/ a painting...actually "painting".  Not content w/ doing a laborius sketch or mapping out every detail before even taking the first brush stroke, not content w/ using my trusty color pencils for laydown.  Certainly, @ this point it's pretty blocky but the freedom that's been opened up taking this approach again more seriously has given me a new fascination for art.

   That said, I've actually been considering taking this approach for a while now.  Some of the other pictures I had been doing were leaving me unsatisfied.  Always some issue w/ the lack of color density, the flatness of the lines, etc. etc.  So I took a step back and, while still doing some other pieces in techniques more comfortable, have been doing much reading on how to get the most out of my acrylics and brushing up on various theories of composition and design.  For now, this piece is the start of me putting that into practice w/ the medium I intend to main (not exclusively, but more or less) while maturing my craft.  A tough shit to do when it's basically yourself doing the teaching and learning (save the tutorials online and some people's art you find here and there), but if you want results, it's just gotta be done.

  For this picture in particular, I'm focusing mainly on glazing technique and proper dilution of the paint.  I'm also focusing on emphasizing for and shape using brushstrokes and color, rather than relying on any thick pen/marker outlines like I usually do.  It's a whole different ballgame, not to mention this piece is heavily opaque (I'm much more used to thin transparent washes using mostly water for dilution), but I plan to make it work regardless.  The progress here is just the initial opaque glaze following a few layers of transparent underpainting washes for harmony.  At first I thought I messed up w/ the skin by making it's top glaze seen here too thick (and, well, I might actually have done so xD), but I'm hoping using a variation of a wash-glaze technique used in some of my watercolor pictures will bring it together..keeping very subtle and sensible on the skin from here on.

  That's about all I have on this one piece for now; I was hoping to finish it by midnight but it's probably better to take a bit of a break (i.e not rush shit when the hand is getting cranky) and resume tomorrow, which should have it done.  I *really* want this one to be a noticeable step up from my previous painting, rough edges notwithstanding.  So I hope everyone watching and reading is wishing for the best and together we turn Mai's magic on like she's getting out on the runway.  Thanx for stoppin' by, peace out and see 'ya l8r.

Welcome :)

  Hello visistors...hopefully returning visitors if everything works out as I'm hoping.  This blogspot will be a hub of sorts wherein I can regularly update and post my various artwork in a manner that is completely free-form, and also submit work that doesn't have a fit in other places I tend to dwell.  It's also a spot where I can just muse on any topic I feel like.

  This is, for all intents and purposes, my official ground of dwelling until I can manage to concoct up my own website.  So for now I leave you with that, and the promise of oh so much more, in the world of The Bristle's Law.  Peace :)