Sunday 31 August 2014

I'm learning!

So this week I came down with a really bad bug. Got time off work to recover but I was too ill to go near a computer and do much work. I did create some quick character sketches when I was getting better so I'd have something to show. Plus a friend of mine requested characters that resembled myself and two other friends. Not the best drawings I've done but the proportions are at least better than my older ones. Shows I'm learning. Plus the colours are much better than previous attempts.


My friend is a big "yes" supporter (for the scottish independence vote) so he wanted some artwork that showed this. Since he's not a big fan of drawing he asked me to do this for him and then I decided to experiment with myself and my friend Lilia, along with our favourite "Pokemon".

I do have two other sketches that I'm planning on colouring. Hopefully at least one will be finished by next week - if not then I'll do some more experimentation until they're ready. They're completely my own design (no copying artwork to learn) as I feel I'm ready to start experimenting. Perhaps these won't be great, but at least I'm trying and not getting too comfortable with using someone else's artwork as a platform to learn. 

Also, before I forget. I did promise to show the character design I did a few weeks ago. Dun dun DUUUUUUN!


Here he is. I won't disclose too much about the company - been asked to do some more freelance work for them so hopefully this'll go well and I'll have more to show. This isn't the final character so I'm able to show this as it belongs to myself. The aim was to create a character that kids could like. I'm quite pleased with this as it's not too kiddy. Plus everyone I've shown seem to fall in love with the character so I must have done something right.

Thursday 21 August 2014

Tah dah, pictures!

So I have some good news. I've not only finished that underwater background but completed another one! I'm actually quite enjoying this. Still using concept art as a reference but I started to mess around with the plants and colours in this first picture. Starting to feel confident enough to start messing around. I'm surprised at how quickly I'm picking this up. I know it's difficult adapting to colouring in graphics programs. Must be because I'm experimenting so much!

Also, a friend recently told me about downloading brushes in photoshop. I'm ashamed to say it's taken me this long to start using more than one brush! It's making the drawing so much easier and looks a lot smoother than it did before. Really glad I was told about this. You should check out her stuff. It's amazing! You can find it at liliacheung.com!


I wasn't too sure of this second picture at first. Originally I was starting to make backgrounds that could scroll but I wanted to try something a bit more detailed. I found this concept art online and fell in love with it. Thought I should redo it in my own style so I could learn more about underwater colours and sea life. I'm now really happy with it. Took me slightly longer than I expected (maybe 6-8 hours?) but it was well worth it. I've been told this is quick for a background but it still feels really slow to me.


Anyway that's it for this week. Might try and do some character work for next week and show the character design I did not long ago. I'll wait and see what I feel like first. Also depends on what Zapcoder want from me next week.

Sunday 17 August 2014

Quick update

Just a quick update this time. Been pretty busy with work so not got much to show this week. I'm currently in the middle of a new background - being adventurous and going for an underwater theme. Hopefully that'll be done within the next day or two so it should be ready for the next update.

Also, I've been having a bit of artist's block lately. I get it every now and then and usually I can get over it by just looking at other people's amazing artwork. Not a good thing to have though when you've got to draw for work experience. I thought I'd do a quick character drawing to try and get myself out of this slump - plus it feels like it's been ages since I've done a character drawing. Don't want to get out of practice!


Still got a lot of things to work on, mainly colour and proportions. I'm quite happy with how this turned out considering it was supposed to be a quick drawing. Plus I'd seen a colour palette I wanted to try out and this gave me an excuse. Better get back to that underwater background so I have something for next time!

Tuesday 5 August 2014

Such a busy bee!

So between work and work experience I've got hardly any time to myself. Good thing the work experience is an excuse to draw! Gives me a chance to keep experimenting and keep learning. I'm now proud to say that I've started experimenting with my colouring so I'm now picking my own colours. Must mean I'm learning something!

I thought I'd try a more dark background that lacks colour. This way I can work on my tones and even lighting. I'm quite pleased with the end result, especially since I wanted a more cartoony style than my usual drawings. I think this works well and I'm glad I tried it. Definitely found that it's helping with my tones for other drawings.


I was asked to make some general assets for work experience. As I usually draw human characters, I thought I'd go for a change and draw an animal and see what I came up with. After some doodling I came up with this bee. I'm very pleased to say that's it's completely my own design, colours and all. That's something that doesn't happen often. Usually I use some sort of image as reference.


Today, although I was working on general assets, I did a LOT of backgrounds. I've been asked if I can try out Illustrator so I thought I'd try out a vector style in photoshop before I learn the new program. I've got to say I quite like the style. It's a lot different from what I'm used to but it's fun messing about with gradients and shapes. Plus it takes a lot less time than I'm used to!


This isn't something I usually do but I was reading manga the other day and came across one called "Bokura no Kiseki". It's all about people remembering their past lives and being friends in more than one lifetime. Also, it explores the idea of people being reborn to forgive past mistakes. I thought this was a pretty neat idea. I'm not just randomly saying this, I actually got really inspired by this! I think that it's a really sweet thing to imagine so why not play around with this topic. It's gave me an idea for a short animation, although it won't be started for a while. Since a blog post's supposed to outline development and thoughts I thought I'd stick this in here. Plus it means when I reread this I'll remember about this idea.