Flying Monkeys

This is a digital, 1-hour speed-painting I put together recently to demo the brush sets I have been shamelessly plugging. It is Photoshop CS5 over traditional pencil.  

I'm Selling Brush Sets Again!

So I am selling Brush Sets again for Photoshop.  And to kick things off, I am releasing the undead.  

Er, I mean the undead brushes.  When I started working on Resistance 3 I knew that I needed to create a completely new set of brushes to tackle this kind of work.  As you all know, most of my previous work had to do with pastel bunnies frolicking in magical fields of clover. I hadn't done as much of this super gritty work before, and this called for something new.  Something serious, something that could handle brains-on-the-wall mayhem and carnage.  


So I created the Zombie Brush Set.  It solved all my problems with how to deal with the undead, leaving me free to tend to my cactus garden and get back to painting adorable kittens.    

Visit the Store

To see these brushes in action, check out the demo:

How To Paint a Zombie

Resistance 3: My Year with Zombies

Some of you may recall this little post I put up a little while back:

I mentioned then that its purpose was to reclaim some balance in my life. I had been spending a lot of time in zombieland, and I needed some fresh air. The project (that I couldn't speak of or Sony would burn my farm) was Resistance 3, which was released September 6 for the PS3.

I'm excited to see it is doing really well so far and getting really good reviews. It was a fun project. I don't usually go in for zombies or slashers in general, and this was a complete departure from my usual style and manner of work. But it was fun to switch things up and jump into something really gritty for a while. It was also a great learning experience and I got to work with some super talented guys from Edgeworx.

My primary job on this project was to provide art for the opening cinematic sequence for the story.  This explained in brief how things got to be such a mess and why you were about to go out into that mess and shoot everything in site.

I was really excited to finally get to see the work in motion and with sound.  The guys we worked with at Edgeworx did some really amazing stuff with it.  However, there was one thing that did strike me as odd when I saw the first videos after it hit youtube.

Resistance 3: Opening Sequence

At 1:25 in the video my friends Zach and Alissa get married.

Zach helped me out on this project, getting reference together and setting everything up for me. And when there was no reference, he would improvise. So in much of my reference, I find Zach being both the hero and the villain, and occasionally even the innocent bystander who gets eaten by zombies.

Here Zach posed for the priest and for the groom and Alissa posed for the bride. Strangely enough, Zach and Alissa actually did get married in real life shortly after this scene.

I was actually in the wedding too and so all of this kind of blends together.

When I watch this video, what I see is Zach and Alissa taking their vows, walking down the aisle together, and then Zach running out into the parking lot with a machine gun and mowing down the wedding guests who have inexplicably turned into mutant zombies.

Like I said, it all gets kind of fuzzy now that I'm thinking back to it...

Also, for those of you who have picked up my brushes in the past, check back in later this week.  I will be selling the brushes I used for this project.  They are zombie killing machines!


Note: This post is a re-post from Muddy Colors. To check out the original post and comments visit:Muddycolors.blogspot.com.

Reference Hunting: The Narrows

In 2004 some friends and I hiked the Narrows at Zion National Park in Utah.  Of all the hikes I have ever been on, this was perhaps the greatest.

During much of the hike, the 100 foot vertical sandstone walls of the canyon close in so tightly that you must hike in the water itself, which is murky, and full of bowling balls, making each step a perilous lesson in jujitsu.

When I was working on the St. George illustrations, I kept coming back to this place in my mind, and in the end, I used it very closely for the images of the last showdown with the dragon.  Part of this, is that amidst all the natural splendor of the Narrows, there is an element of danger, depending on which time of the year you are hiking.

When we got into the park we were told that it would be very dangerous to hike the canyon because if it rained then there would be a good chance that it would flash flood in the canyon. This would result in either severe injury or death or both.  But only if it rained. And it was suppose to rain.

Also, there were cougars.

After looking at the forecast, my friends were justifiably alarmed that we might get rained on half way out in the gorge and then be overtaken by a chocolate mud-slide of bowling balls and angry cougars. I was only able to convince everyone to go by showing them pamphlets for the hike, which offered glowing, happy pictures of elderly couples and very young children hiking in the stream, unmolested by mud-slides or cougars. If they can brave it, being elderly and infirm, surely we can.

(Confession: The pamphlets were actually not for the hike we would be taking, but a separate, safer one with guided trails. I lied and I am sorry.)

But in the end it never rained, and we weren't caught up in a flash flood or eaten by the indigenous fauna.  Instead we witnessed one of the most amazing places I have ever seen on planet Earth and the most memorable hike I have ever been on.

If you ever get the chance, go to Utah, stop by Zion National Park and hike the Narrows.  You will not regret it.

(But check the forecast first…)

                                                                          Image: Jon Sullivan

Note: This post is a re-post from Muddy Colors. To check out the original post and comments visit: Muddycolors.blogspot.com.

St. George Final

As some of you may recall, I planned to tackle one of these two final St. George pieces in oil.  This was the piece I chose. 

Oil Underpainting

Things started off really well. But after finishing the underpainting, I ran into some minor health issues... 

Side effects may include...

And I turned into a monster and ate my neighbors.

  

Apparently my problem is that I cannot seem to manage to paint what I want without solvents and solvents just don't agree with me. 

So, while I sit here filing down my fangs and waiting for the manufacturers to solve this problem,  I tackled this piece digitally, in the same manner as the previous St. George painting.  

Digital Underpainting

St. George #10

12 x 16

Pencil and Digital

Note: This post is a re-post from Muddy Colors.  To check out the original post and comments visit Muddycolors.blogspot.com

St. George Process Articles on Muddy Colors

Recently, along with a few secret projects that I am not allowed to discuss even under pain of death, I have been working on a small show for Gallery Nucleus.  It is based on St. George and the Dragon and it goes up on August 6th.  

To see some of the methods used in the creation of these pieces, check out the Muddy Colors links below.  

Article 1 Link: Traditional Approach

Article 2 Link: Digital Approach

St. George Drawings

This is some recent development work on the St. George project. I'm still not sure how I want to tackle these two pieces. Oil, watercolor, or all digital. Decisions, decisions....

Harry Potter Show at Gallery Nucleus

For those of you who keep up with the comings and goings at Hogwart's, the Gallery Nucleus is having a Harry Potter Tribute Show July 9th - August 1. I was asked to contribute a painting to the show, and having thoroughly enjoyed the novels myself (via the fantastic audiobook performance by Jim Dale) I was eager to work on one.

When I started thinking, which scene should I choose? I realized that there were far too many great ones and couldn't make up my mind. In the end I wanted to focus more on a specific character.

I landed on the misanthropic house-elf Kreacher. His story of Master Regulus and the locket is one of my favorite moments in the latter parts of the series.

Drawing on Bristol

Inkwash over pencil

(I did not end up spray-fixing this one, and you can see the pencil has all but vanished.)

"Kreacher"

9x12

Watercolor and Ink on Bristol

Recent Project: St. George

I have recently been working on series of paintings for a show at Gallery Nucleus in L.A. They are based loosely around the St. George and the Dragon legend. It's a project I have wanted to work on for a long time and it's been great fun so far.

The following is some of the early rough work for the first painting for the project.

Character Development work

Pencil on Vellum

Character Development work

Digital

Early Watercolor Stages

Strathmore Bristol

Thumbnail/Color Comp

Digital

Illustration Process: Digital Trickery

Original Watercolor

In the last post, I focused on the traditional aspects of my process for watercolor and digital. This week, we focus on the digital hocus pocus used to complete these pieces.

My digital process is mainly derived from the Dutch-Flemish indirect manner of working.  If I travelled back in time and gave the Dutch-Flemish painters an Imac with Adobe Photoshop CS5 on it and a Intuos 4, they might have promptly thrown it all in the lake and then painted an unflattering picture of me as a fruit basket. But then again, they might decide that their methods work well regardless of what medium they are executed in and they would go on to make some awesome work with the new tools.

The process I follow mainly involves first laying in the shadows transparently, and then working in the highlights opaquely on top of them. This is then followed by adjusting the colors and details.

Color Adjustment

I have an ancient Epson flatbed scanner, one that primitive man invented sometime after fire, but before the wheel. Like most stone-age equipment, it is quite reliable, but it does tend to get its colors off just slightly. The image always seems lifeless and dead to me after it has been scanned.

This first stage is just to get the image back to what it looks like to the naked eye in soft light.

Shadows

I work purely in multiply layers to establish the dark areas and shadow details. I work this up to slowly to kind of explore the nuances of the lighting in the image. This chance to explore the lighting is one of my favorite aspects of working digitally.

I use multiply (set to zero black) to add the color. You can use any of the other modes to achieve color, (color, soft light, hard light etc.) I just prefer multiply because it behaves a little more predictably and because it tends to look a little more natural over a traditionally painted image.

Highlights

After working up the shadows to a satisfactory level of darkness, I work highlights in to slowly refine the shapes and give them more dimension. As in the Dutch-Flemish manner, I tend to work opaquely at this point, and generally stick to the areas that are being lit.

Color Adjustments & Final Details

For the final details I work with normal layers to sharpen up details and focal points. I try not to overwork the whole image at this point though. This is both a blessing and a curse with digital. Since you can essentially zoom in forever, you could feasibly spend the rest of your existence refining every little hair. At some point you need to make decisions about what needs to be refined and what can be left a little vague.

Original post on Muddy Colors

Illustration Process: Traditional Work

For this post and the next I will take a break from shameless self-promotions to share some process work.  

Over the years, my process has mutated from the clear and straightforward approach of my early childhood:

Step 1: Tear page from coloring book.

Step 2: Turn page over and apply crayon directly to back of paper.

..And turned into an overly-complex and technically absurd mess that it involves hundreds of extra steps and expensive, new-fangled products.

So, I will break this into 2 parts to keep things more manageable.

Today's post is the traditional side, the place where I begin most of my work, and my next post will focus on the digital side, the place where I end most of my work.

Thumbnail

Ink on napkin

The conceptual stages are generally just exploring ideas to help find a compositional arrangement that seems pleasing. The tools used for this change from image to image. For concept-work I go with whatever works.

Rough Drawing

#7 pencil on copy paper

Once I establish a rough drawing that I like I do studies of most of the faces and figures. I will try to really nail the expressions that I am after. I always consider this one of the most important elements of the image. As Rockwell pointed out, "if you get the face and hands right, they'll forgive you for the rest." So if I have a face in the image, I try to make sure I have it established in a study somewhere.

And if it hasn't already been determined, these studies will help me to decide which lighting arrangement will be the most advantageous for the characters.

Study

General's HB Pencil on Strathmore Vellum

Tight Drawing

Pencil on Strathmore Bristol

For the watercolor stage I stick very close a process laid out by Peter De Seve in his excellent Step-by-Step Graphics article (Vol.10, no. 6) about his technique. (I highly recommend it if you can find it.)

De Seve's overall method in the article carries a great emphasis on preserving the drawing, which is one of the most alluring aspects of it for me. You can see from his work how well it allows him to play up his characters expressions and designs.

I will sometimes (and this is one of those times) apply workable fixative to the drawing before starting the watercolor. Fixative will leave the surface a little less workable for the watercolor, (the surface tends to be less absorbent) but will keep the drawing much more intact. Since I weep bitter tears to see the drawing slowly disintegrate, I am generally willing to risk it.

Watercolor over Pencil

The watercolor process begins with washes of earth colors to tone the paper, applied wet into wet. Then after this has dried color and value are slowly worked up with about ten thousand tiny washes applied wet into wet or wet into damp.

One of the nice things about this approach is that it allows folks like me, who have a foggy command of color at best, to experiment a lot as they work. If a color doesn't look right it is really easy to adjust.

After this I panic and then throw all the old illustrator tricks at the piece in a last desperate effort to save it.

These tricks include, but are not necessarily limited to: Ink, pencil, acrylic, markers, badgers, lawsuits, incantations, harsh language, oaths, gouache, threats and even blows.

Final Traditional Painting

Next Post: Digital Trickery