Saturday, February 27, 2010

Some Progress

Just been working this one up for the last few days...

CarryWIP10_72dpiNQ

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

More Thumbnails and Sketches

Here's a few more thumbnails and sketches from the last week or so. I'm definitely seeing the value of these in terms of evaluating whether or not a composition is going to work. I've always enjoyed experimenting with these, but now I think it's getting to be a must-do stage of my process.

CarrionSketch72dpiNQ

experiment with the comp...

CarrionSketch272dpiNQ

Here's one from pencil thumb through a more worked up stage...

baggageThumbnail_72dpiNQ

BaggageSketch_72dpiNQ

CarrWIP03_72dpiNQ

Here I've printed out the photoshop sketched lines and cleaned them up in pencil on heavy watercolour paper, then scanned and added them back in. With the value blocked in, I'm better able to see how the drawing needs to be, rather than going to far too early and needing to change it midway through the colour stage. The pencil and paper texture is subtle, especially at this size, but I think it adds a certain something.

CarryWIP04_72dpiNQ

And another.. this one will stay in greyscale for the final. This has been worked up from a previous thumb... you might be able to see that I've comped in a 3d model of the motorcycle to help with the structure. It'll get all tweaked and painted over for the final... just need a little help with all that complex machinery and perspective.

CapitalCitySketch05_72

Last but not least, a character sketch for a project, this has been pulled back from a version that I went too far with and overtightened... I'm slowly learning the value of staying loose... still have to force myself to do it.

DaewynSketch02_72

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Death

Here's one of the sketches from last post that I worked up. I tried to keep it loose overall and only tighten up a bit more in the focal areas.

TouchOfDeath_NigelQuarless_72dpi

Friday, February 5, 2010

Colour Thumbnails

This week I've been drawing loose thumbnails sketches and then doing quick colour and/or value passes on them in Photoshop. It's a good, fast way to see if compositions or ideas are going to work before I go ahead with them. If the thumbnail doesn't read or look good, it's likely a bigger version won't either.