Blackbook {Theraphy For the Soul}

     Over the years I've been drawing steadily, it has come to my attention that art is muscle memory. Practice practice practice. Like breathing. Draw until you no longer have to think about it, like the way your body knows to make your heart beat.
     I also observed my best doodles always found a home on my math tests and vocabulary papers. Why? Because the doodles I created on my school assignments were drawn in class when I wasn't pressured to do my best, I wasn't worried about messing up because it was just a doodle. I figured this mean of art was a good way to keep up with my muscle memory, as well as allow me to branch out and draw different things.
     So, I purchased a 24 pack of Sharpies and pulled an old dusty sketchbook off of my shelf and proceeded to draw whatever came to mind. I promised myself to not be a perfectionist about the lines that would soon find a home in this book, I promised myself these were just like the doodles on my homework assignments. I also made a point to start drawing things I normally wouldn't, pictures with more meaning. Thus, Blackbook #1 was born...

The Content 

Blackbook #1 (Just a cheep journal I got for free at some ski event) 

      Those are just a few of the doodles I've done, the book is almost filled up, almost time for Blackbook #2. Though just like any other drawing I do try to make each piece look nice, but if it's not perfect, it's alright. This book holds my thoughts and ideas, struggles and triumphs. It's a picture diary. From this I've learned to let go a bit, not focus so much on the outcome of the drawing but more on what art does for me. It's therapy for the soul.

Curious Smile {Speedpaint}

A speedpaint is a sped up video of a process, in this case a digital painting. A special program records everything happening on the computer screen, then it's converted into a video and sped up to get this result:

(For the best effect, enlarge the video to full screen)

Finished piece-

Rose's Doctor (Digital Painting Process)

     Digital art is probably the most workable medium around, (next to acrylic painting in my opinion), though speaking with experience it's not as easy as it may sound.

     For anyone who doesn't know how the process of digital art works, here's a little brief-over:

You plug this fancy little thing into your computer, it's just a tablet (this is the one I have, it's called a Wacom Bamboo Capture)

     The tablet responds to the pen's touch just like a normal pencil on paper would; the harder you push, the thicker the line. I use a drawing program called Painttool SAI, which starts you with a blank canvas and from there you have a color palette and a bunch of customizeable 'brushes', and as shown on the right side there are layers (think of layers as transparent sheets of paper stacked on top of each other. If you only want to work on one layer without affecting the work on the other layers, you simply select the layer to work in.)

     From there, magic happens and you can get really amazing, smooth, clean results. Here's an example of a digital piece I did a while back, it's more Doctor Who art :) 

Rose's Doctor

1) Sketch - Start with a loose sketch first to get the general idea and feel down, then refine the sketch a bit to start creating the base of the lineart. (FYI the watermark is a username from an art website, in case you're curious.)

 2) Lines - I created a new layer on top of the sketch layer (imagine putting a new transparency over the sketch and tracing over that sketch in Sharpie) and used a solid black brush to get a solid outline of the characters.

3) Basic Color - I created another layer, this time under the lineart layer (this way the black lines will be on top, and if I get color underneath them, it won't show up) I zoomed in and added basic colors.

4) Color Lineart - There's this fancy little tool you can use that allows you to change the lineart from black any other color. In this case, black looks to startling against Rose's blonde hair, or their pale skin. So, I took a slightly darker version of the base colors the lines are touching and colored over the lines. See? Looks more natural, easier on the eyes.

5) Shading - We'll get into shading techniques another time, but for now just take a slightly darker version of the base color and using a low opacity setting on the brush (opacity refers to how transparent a color is. If the opacity is low, you will have to use several strokes of the brush to get the same saturated color as a single stroke on a high opacity.) When I shaded this, there wasn't really a specific light source since they're kind of floating in space, so I just shaded the wrinkles in the clothing and other places light doesn't easily reach. Just by simply shading the piece looks more alive.

6) Background - Your characters don't usually float in white space (then again, they don't usually float in space space either... but this IS Doctor Who.) For the background on this particular piece I used a bunch of different brushes and opacity levels and colors until I got the desired effects (it takes a lot of messing with, there's no real trick to it) then I zoomed in and added tiny white dots for stars. I did a few other technical things to touch it up, like color editing and adding that light blue line around the characters so they would pop out. When you think it's done, take a step back and examine the details.

Digital art definitely takes some practice, it takes a little getting used to for sure, most artists aren't used to looking forward at the computer screen instead of looking at their hand while drawing. Once you get the hang of it, it's super fun to mess around in some drawing programs, you can do so much that traditional art doesn't offer, like overlays and effects and oh, the lasso tool! But we'll get into that another time...

Anyway, thanks for reading, hope you like the finished piece! Don't hesitate to comment or ask questions. 

Painting Space (Acrylic Process)

A while back a friend introduced me to this glorious thing called Doctor Who, a whimsical British television series resurrected from the 60's and reintroduced in 2005. Though, as far as my knowledge stretched at the time, the main character's name was 'Doctor Who', and it was some crazy show about this alien man who traveled around space in a telephone box... didn't make much sense to me honestly, and it didn't sound very appealing.

However, I somehow found myself watching it.... and slowly enjoying it.

Turns out, it IS a crazy show, but the good kind of crazy (kind of like Pop Rocks, they're pretty crazy, right?) The deep characters and the enticing plot line actually drew me in, so I figured I owed my friend a little favor, kind of 'thank you for introducing me into this awesomeness' gift. What better to paint than the most iconic object from the show; the T.A.R.D.I.S. (Time And Relative Dimensions In Space)? So I grabbed my brushes, a canvas, and some paint and got started.

The actual T.A.R.D.I.S., just so you can base my painting off of something. The Process of Painting Time and Space 1) Space - I started off with a dark blue canvas, and used a sponge to blotch in black, then blotted in some gold glitter. From there I used a toothbrush and dipped it in white acrylic paint and ran my finger along the bristles towards me. The further away from the canvas the brush is, the larger the patch of stars will be. The closer, the more controlled and condensed the stars will be. 2) Stencil - I already had cut out a TARDIS stencil, so I went ahead and carefully held it down and painted over it. (I used a brush, but a sponge or a mini roller work well too) 3) Stencil (cont.) - I continued to paint around the stencil with a brush leaving purposeful streaks. 4) Details and Text - With the same white brush, I simply added more paint and pulled the streaks out and swirled them a little bit to look like an aura of light. I then took a metallic silver sharpie and followed the swirled streaks to define them a bit more. I used a fine brush with black to (painstakingly) paint in the letters, and then used a permanent thin Sharpie to add the words around the edges. 5) Final Touches - From there I added a few more details, touched up places I missed, and added gold marker to accompany the silver swirls (also added gold dots around the big star patches). I also (at the last minute) decided to mix red and black paint and sponge a tiny bit of the tinted black randomly to help make the nebulas. That's it! - Seriously, it's finished now. :)

    I gifted it off, and I think he really liked it! Either way I had fun making it. The lines aren't completely uniform and accurate on the perspective end giving it a stylish distortion.

    I have to say, I generally don't paint 'fan art' unless it's of something I really enjoy almost as much as art, so Doctor Who definitely has to be up there with my favorite shows. Honestly, some people might think the first few episodes to be a bit strange, but ultimately stick through it and you won't be disappointed (that is, unless you dislike British men flying around in blue boxes while changed the fate of the universe itself).

    Doctor Who really is fantastic if you ask me, so I say GERONIMO, just go watch it! So, allons-y everyone, come along gather around the TV here, and remember - don't blink. You don't want to miss a thing.