ArtCtrl

I have been changing a few brush settings in GIMP to get different effects. Most notable I enabled opacity pressure sensitive. In the past I’ve always had this pressure sensitive set to just size - so the harder I press the larger the line. Turning both on really execrates the effect - the smaller line seems further away since the opacity is lower etc…

I have also started using full screen mode in GIMP which removes the top bar - the result - the painting taking over my whole screen  Great.

Anyway, I had to ink this work 3 times - my first three attempts resulted in my video file being over 2 gigs. I use CamStudio which has a bug in so that if a file hits over 2gig the file corrupts. I’m normally really excellent at not letting files hit this 2gig mark - but this morning it went wrong twice. CamStudio has a option to auto stop after a certain amount of time - I’ve got this set to 1700 - but it didn’t stop for me!

On to the painting:

The reference is a combo of 3 drawings in total. The first is a drawing I did in Palmerston North sitting in the square. This is one of the rare perspective drawings I have done - the road fades off into the distance. I mashed this up with another two drawings of the Levin Skate Park. This is technically one drawing spread over two pages - but i scan them in separably. Opacity is dropped to 50% in order to seen drawings underneath.

Line done. Holley saw me do this inking and liked it. The opacity changes certainly helps the line feel more flow.  Tone added, Small detailed areas ignored and focused on large shapes. My favorite areas are the cars, Added vegetation to the foreground in order to help with the depth.  Color. I had lots of fun with this. Mixed colors on the palate - something I don’t normally do. Added a figure to the right - felt it needed something in the foreground. Certainty not my favorite work as I feel it’s still too fuzzy. What if I used the smudge tool?

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Reference used. In total this is three drawings. The top left is a view from Levin North School, below is the same image rotated 180 degrees. This is scaled down as well. I wanted to attempt a reflection look. On the right - a scene I drew in Wellington.  Line. It’s been a few days since I’ve painted something I’ve liked. At this moment. I like this.

Tone added. Again some detail is lost through the painting process  Certain areas blend into one another - especially the bush and sky. This can be fixed when color is added, My favorite area is the traffic light on the center right. Color. With color I was able to define certain areas that were getting mixed up with the gray scale tone. Blue for the sky, yellow for bush (and reflections) and red for objects (buildings/advertising box). This is very loose, I’d like it to be tighter. I’m not sure how I feel about these colors as well - I’m using mulitipy. I think I prefer the works that I paint over the gray scale normal with low opacity

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Digital painting fom the sketchbook reference. This was done a few weeks ago - I’m just catching up on the digital paintings I’ve missed uploading.

So here we go - taking two drawings I did into GIMP - line, gratscale, and finally color.

The left drawing is at the Levin Skate Park, the right is of the Levin Rose Gardens.

Line added. No detail has been lost - I always try to capture all my pencil lines with the line process.

Next up is gray scale tone. You can see along the top of the scene I’ve layered out all the colors and tone I’ll use in this painting. This helps me keep my colors minimal and keep unity between the series of works. Comparing the tone to the line I notice that I do lose details in areas but the image has a more complete, and fleshy feel.

I’m not sure how I feel about this. It feels empty, especially compard to the line verstion. Maybe there needs to be more happening in the background? Trees and objects scaling down into the distance. This is flat, but it’s how I’ve always liked to work. Getting some depth may help rid me of the empty feeling I get. Or maybe it’s fine as it is.

Here’s the video:

Spent the morning organizing files and posts. Working on getting a large Borderlands 2 painting post together - it’s been a fun side project.

For now though - here’s a Lily Allen figure and portrait I painted recently in GIMP. I’ve drawn this image several times before - it’s always interesting going back to these old reference photos and taking a new approach with the work.

Line work. Still keeping with the red. I kept this quick and loose - knowing I’d be covering it over with tone and color. I kept the color very minimal - keeping with just yellow for the dress and blue for the negative space. In other recent works I’ve used yellow on the skin and red for the clothes - this I decided to keep the clothes grayscale.

And the video of the painting process.

Have a great weekend.

I haven’t been happy with the latest digital paintings I’ve been doing. It’s been a struggle. Oh well. I got Dads scanner working on my laptop so I can go back to scanning my sketchbooks in.

I did one street pencil drawing today - but spent the evening working from photo reference in my sketchbook. I’ll get these images uploaded over the next few days. For now, a mash up of my drawings in a attempt to turn it into a scene..

This is the reference  I started with. I just imported the drawings into GIMP - scaled down - and decreased the opacity. The opacity is around 60%. In the background is a mid gray tone texture that I will use for the tone stage.. For now - line.

Line. Still sticking with the red. I prefer it over the black. It’s interesting mixing these drawings together - it’s allowing me to work with drawings that are lacking detail. I’m not sure where I will go from here - but I feel I’m progressing with creating more complex and interesting scenes.

Gray tone. I recorded the painting up to here but forgot to torn the screen recorder on for the color. I was frustrated with myself - normally I’m really good about recording all my digital painting.

Like I said earlier  I struggled with this painting. And this is the stage I had problems with - more so than the line stage. It feels empty and lacking depth. My favorite area is the clock tower in the center. There is something about the tones working together - other areas lack the detail. I thought taking it into color could help fix this emptiness I felt - it only made it worse at first - but towards the end I started to get somewhere.

Color. It certainly helps create a base. I still feel it’s lacking.

Watercolor below here

I didn’t do a concept art environmental work yesterday so wanted to make sure I did one today. I haven’t been getting out and drawing on the street. I have been drawing everyday, but it’s been at Mothers rather than public. I need to start getting back out in public and drawing again.

Anyway, here’s a painting I did today.

For the reference I opened a bunch of drawings up and used them as reference to create a new composition. I could mashed these works together into GIMP and traced over, but just decided to just use it as reference.

The drawings are various areas in Levin - including a Church that I went with family for a party. It’s very rare that you will find me in a Church - but when you do, I’ll likely be drawing.

Line work. Size 7 pixels works best for me. The default 20px seems too large. Again, no black - just a lovely red.

Tone added I worked over the trees several times with a range of textures as I was not happy with them. My favorite area is the letterbox - the range of tone works well. The image may need more detail on left, especially behind the figure.

Color. Keeping with the same palette of colors - though this time I decided to use multiply and overlay brushes (like the portrait I painted yesterday . I used the  I’ll keep working with the multiply and overlay settings as it gives the image a gutsy feel.

Finally, the video of the process:

Awake early this morning - 5am. Wanted to get straight into the digital painting. I first checked Reddit SketchDaily - Free Draw Friday. Fantastic - can just do a street scene.

I mashed together three drawings I did in Levin. This system of mashing drawings together is working out well - it’s allowing me to cover more ground and use the drawings that I may not have used otherwise.

The inking. I choose to use a brown over the black. It gives a more natural look over cartoonish. That’s what I want. Having the lines in the first place is wrong, but it’s been helpful for me to develop my work into more detail.  Gray-scale tone added. I used three brushes - two custom made flat brushes for the objects/sky and a vegetation texture brush for the vegetation (leafs). I should have added dark and texture to the sky.  And color added. Same colors as the previous works like this.Not much happening in the foreground - focused on the background further by using a dark red in the clock tower in order to push it back. My favorite areas are the left and the clock tower.

Check out this artists work

And finally, the video of this paintings process: