I’m still playing around with Manga Studio 5 as a digital coloring tool. I did this study of a few panels from Jason Latour’s art in the comic “Southern Bastards.” The comic is great by the way and you should read it if you’re in the mood for some good pulp eighties action movie style fiction. Below you can see a picture of my study on the monitor next to the actual comic page in digital form on an iPad.
I fell in love with Guillaume Singelin last year when I came across some of his space drawings and I immediately began following his tumblr. I’ve experimented with his coloring style (not very successfully), and I just purchased my first of his books–“Junky.” It’s an amazing sketch journal packed with a lot of good insights into Singelin’s process. I would highly recommend it if you’re in the market for some stylized visual inspiration.
As I’ve been reading “Junky” I’ve been soaking in Singelin’s style with my own sketches of his work:
As I mentioned in my previous post, part of the cool thing about doing Inktober this year was getting exposed to some amazing artist. Artur Sadlos‘ Inktober work blew me away for a number of reasons: 1) his sense of composition and design; 2) his creation of a sci-fi/fantasy world (which I’m always into); and 3) the simplicity of his quick sketches which had me believing I could actually try out his technique. His entire 2015 Inktober collection has been posted here on Artstation.
I’m definitely in the copying phase of learning right now. I’m trying to really build up my visual drawing vocabulary through live sketching and copying the work of others. Of course, I do venture away from these practices from time to time, but it’s scary:) I’m comfortable with it and I’m learning a lot. I think this is the quickest way for me to improve right now. So…I decided to try my hand at copying Sadlos’ Inktober work. Over the past few days I’ve done some sketches in my sketchbook and they’ve been hella fun–the kind of thing that keeps you going back to the sketchbook. I hope you enjoy checking them out as much as I enjoyed doing them and hopefully they can introduce you to this great artist.
Colonist #87 Ponders the “New Earth”
My first day on the planet,
I want to dig my naked toes
down into its soil,
no longer Earth, but still
the skin of a new world.
I wonder what roots grow here,
what burrowers and tunnellers
create this friable surface.
I want to get it under my fingernails,
let its microbes schmooze with my cells,
introduce my body to whatever pathogens
it may have to overcome.
Let’s face it – it has always been my way
to get dirty,
to be one with whatever land I walk.
I am here, I will say.
Taste me.
–Andrea Gerig
Huge shout out to my friend Andrea Gerig for providing another poem for our intrepid Colonist 87… we didn’t know we were collaborating until we realized that we were both creating the same thing.
Note: If you want the full effect of this piece while staring at it and reading Andrea’s poem you should consider playing some Glitch Mob in the background:)
My confidence in Photoshop is increasing as far as the coloring goes, and this piece required more digital painting than any other one yet as I decided to play with more painted textures than before. In the past I’ve provided a texture layer in the background, but all the texture in this one is entirely painted which gives it a crisper feel in my opinion. I feel that this is my first “real” digital media piece.
Colonist #87
I have left the Earth behind.
Pale blue dot, fading into darkness:
Home, all that I know, my Native Shore…
You still mean everything to me,
But I turn my back
And face the stars
While the vision of your sphere
Still fills the window.
________________
You will remain large in my memory,
And I will not watch you fade
Into insignificance
With tears on my face.
__________________
No, I go forth willingly,
Boldly taking these first steps
As a child of Earth,
Ready for a brave new world.
–Andrea Gerig
I’m really enjoying this Photoshop business. I did another quick sketch today. It was, again, an attempt to mimic the style of Guillaume Singelin who does some amazing space illustrations (like this one):
http://blackyjunkgallery.tumblr.com/page/7
I’m learning more and more about this digital medium everyday. I even ordered the 12×9 Monoprice drawing tablet today so I can begin attempting to learn (on a cheaper tablet) how to do some digital painting (link to the tablet is below).
http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=108&cp_id=10841&cs_id=1084101&p_id=6815&seq=1&format=2
Photoshop has always been one of my glaring weaknesses as an artist. Sure, I took the “intro” class on the Adobe Suite in college, but for the most part I’ve focused on traditional media.
So, today, I decided to take a low resolution cell phone picture of a quick sketch I had done a couple months back while hanging out in a coffee shop. I threw it in Photoshop, and with the help of a lot of Youtube videos and online tutorials, I attempted to color my line drawing in the style of Guillaume Singelin. You can see his coloring work I was mimicking–as well as the line drawing I used, below. I put some mysterious text on it just so I could post it as “sequential art”:).
