Sargent Study

Here's another study I did using Art Rage (really love that program) and Photoshop.  This one turned out to be much more difficult than other master studies I've done.  Sargent makes it look so easy.  His portraits have this naturalness quality that you simply can't achieve unless you really slow down and look very carefully.  Besides the fact that I liked the painting as soon as I saw it, I picked this one because, one - it looked like a simple, fairly monochromatic straight-on portrait, and two - it had a lot of thin areas that I was eager to try and tackle.  Art Rage does the thick, impasto paint pretty well, but the thin areas are hard to mimic.  But boy was I wrong about this being an easy study.

Here is a rather rough progression and a detail.  I started with Art Rage and worked back and forth with Photoshop to get the canvas wash satisfactory.  In hindsight, I should have done the initial sketch and block-in with the darks (stages 1 and 3) more carefully instead of rushing in with the heavy paint thinking I could just fix it all later.  I had to do a lot more correcting of the drawing in the later stages because of that.  Overall this was a humbling experience.  You can see the image I was working from here:  http://muddycolors.blogspot.com/2012/01/art-might-online-art-museum.html

And here are some figure drawings from  a week ago.  1 mins, 10mins, and 20 min I think.

LifeDrawings from yesterday + Sketchbook Dump

And here are some life drawings from my sketchbooks - some old, some not so old.  Yes, the first model was nude except for the giraffe hat (complete with spotted pattern). 

sum mo (not Sumo)

In Progress Character Design

I've got a number of personal character concepts in the works right now which I hopefully will be posting soon.  This is one I just recently came back to after putting him aside for a while.  I've noticed that I do better work when I have a chance to take a break from the image for a while (preferably overnight or longer) and then come back to it with fresh eyes.  I don't want to say too much about who he is right now as this is still in the early stages.  You can read his character on the right.  I'm still trying to "dial in" the features until I'm happy with it.

Sculpts!

Thought I'd post some old sculpts.  Some personal, some commercial.  Sculpting has always been my first love in the arts.  I haven't had much time for it in the last 3 years though.  Hopefully 2012 will be different.

A Thin Model

   Had a good week at the Life Drawing session.  I do miss the professional lighting setup we used to have at Art Center in Pasadena though.  It is definitely much harder to render form in a diffused lighting situation with multiple light sources.  The strong direct light source also casts hard shadows and makes clearly distinguishable shapes.  And your drawings have a greater sense of drama.  But I guess it'll make me a better artist in the long run because I'll have to learn to organize my lights and darks more carefully and to make those decisions about what to emphasize and what to leave out with a more discerning eye.

   Another thing that helped back then was that we often had the model standing in front of a solid colored backdrop rather than looking at the model in front of a distracting smorgasbord of fellow artists, windows and furniture.  But then again I suppose I could be thankful for the opportunity to to rise to the challenge and come up with a creative way to interpret the model's surroundings.  I know, I know, it's all for practice anyway, quit whining, shut up and draw.

Draw Life

Selected drawings from recent life drawing sessions.  First three are my favorite.  Tried to fix the reclining female in Photoshop, but it still looks over-worked, and something is off.  I've been trying to do a better job with proportions and measurement lately, but I have to slow down to get it right.