Step-by-step No. 3

Decided I wanted to do something with feathers, and a dramatic sky of some sort. Feathers are a real pain in the tucas, so I don't know why I keep returning to them. Maybe I'm a masochist :P Below you'll find my progress so far. It's not much.

General pose and colour-scheme. Palettes nabbed form
Navate.deviantart.com 

Some more work. Blocking in colours and such.

Changed my mind.

Changed it back again and tweaked some anatomical issues
 after feedback from a friend.

What I have so far.

Background! Needs more EXPLOSIONS!! And maybe some
skulls and other bodyparts.

Referenceless 2.0

I finally found the time to return to this painting and finish it. Sort of. Some paintings just never seem done. At least most of mine don´t. Or it could be that I´m never satisfied with my own work... le sigh :P

Started smoothing out the skin, and sketched up
a new idea for the head-piece.

More work on the head-piece. Tried to make it look
like the head of a bird.

Toned down the glowy bits as I felt they were stealing
attention from the rest of the painting.

Aaaaaaand done!

Referenceless!

So, as I mentioned in my previous post, I´ve decided to wean myself off of the reference-drug, and go completely cold-turkey. Below you´ll find my first attempt at painting anything without references. The only thing I´ve used is James Guerney´s Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter, which is an absolutely fantastic book. I´m starting out with a portrait of a man, possibly the Welsh trane-god Ceyr, because I really like painting portraits, and because I rarely paint men... Enough chit- chat!

A quick sketch where I establish the basic idea, light source and palette.

Solidifying the shadows, defining shapes and such. 

Look, ma! No training wheels!

Eye!

Another eye! Also added extra light sources to break up
the massive shadowed area, and give an impression of a cage.

Defining the area around the eyes and mouth, and also
worked on the beams of light.

To be continued...

 - Tattersail out!

Reference-orama!

I think I´ve mentioned before that reference is key, or king, and both is true. References are a great way to get the details right, like light, colour, anatomy, texture and a hundred other things. But sometimes references can be a crutch, something I´ve discovered the hard way. I realized I had been relying on reference pictures too much, which made me doubt my own skill as a painter. Am I good at this, or am I just good at copying references? Well, not copying-copying... I´d never do that. Anywho, less talking, more showing of examples!

Below are three pictures you´ll find in one of my many (MANY) ref. pic folders:

Kevin Durand

Tom Hardy -  from The Men of Warrior by Tim Palen

Bettie Page

And here are the three paintings I painted using these pictures as references:

Icarium from Steven Erikson´s Malazan Book of the Fallen

Mok, the Seguleh Third, from Steven Erikson´s Malazan Book of the Fallen

Tattersail, from Steven Erikson´s Malazan Book of the Fallen

As you can see, they don´t deviate much from their respective references. This is a prime example of going too far in your use of references, at least that´s what I think.

I didn´t like where I was headed, and I didn´t like the feeling of being only as good as my references, so  I decided to draw stuff completely from my own imagination, and do a painting with as few references as possible. I´m hoping it will be good. In fact, I´m hoping it will be better than my previous stuff.

If you want to see for yourself, stay tuned!

 - Tattersail, signing off.

Lost No. 4

Sometimes I just lose interest, or forget what the hell I was thinking when I started the painting.

This is one of them. To be honest, I have no idea what's going on here. Stuffs, is my guess. I was never any good at playing around with shapes and such anyway.

 - tattersail, signing off.

Lost No. 3

So, this is a personal painting I've been working on for the better part of a year, but I can never seem to finish it. I open it up once in a while, work a little on it, get bored/distracted and then I go do something else and forget about it for a couple of months. And I don't understand why. I believe it could be a very good, if not great, painting, a painting that might redefine my style...

Inspiration for this one is the art of Lauren K. Cannon and Thien Bao, who are more or less polar opposites when it comes to colours and techniques, but what they share is a love of the weird, birds and the female form.

With this painting I am trying to push my colours and develop my storytelling-techniques. I have no idea if I'm succeeding :P

Firstly, I'll show you my inspirations and references, which I haven't done so far, I think. It's kinda weird, seeing as references are very important to my process...oh, well. I shall strive to do better!

Broken Flame by Thien Bao.

Mek by Thien Bao.

Bloodstone by Lauren K. Cannon. See what I mean by polar opposites?

Mhegoriah by Lauren K. Cannon

Rhumii by Lauren K. Cannon.

And, now for my painting which I've titled Bird Lady or some such. Hooray for imaginative titles!

Preliminary sketch to establish pose and light source. I decided on two,
the blue being the primary and the the yellow the secondary.

The idea is slowly taking shape...I see beewb!

Bird skulls are awesome!...alright, all skulls are awesome! Unless
they're printed on a hipster T-shirt :P

Changed the eyes.

Colours!

The head dress and secondary skulls have gotten more definition,
and I've added more colours.

Trying to blend the colours and add texture to form a background.
The secondary light source has finally come into play. Pushed the shadows further,
and started on the bird. Also, nipple! As if you didn't notice...

Aaaand this is where I left off. Don't really know where to go from here and the damn feathers keep killing my motivation. I love feathers, but they're a effin pain in my posterior to paint! Hood's hairy balls, I really want to finish this thing!

 - Tattersail, out...

Step-by-step no. 2

Time for another Malazan painting. Hooray! This is a scene from Toll the Hounds, a sort of stand-off between the Son of Darkness, and a swordsman without equal named Traveller. I chose to depict the moment right before everything hits the proverbial fan, because I think the "moment before" is always so much more powerful, especially when you know what happens next. This is the moment when you inhale, and hold.

As per usual, my painting starts off quite simple. Just one guy
What's the worst that could happen?

Things are starting to take shape and I've begun laying down
some basic colours. Quite a muted palette, but I doubt the Son  of Darkness would look
good in pink.

Hands! And new hairdo. And yes, the sword is supposed to be
THAT big.

Cape! Also, my light source has been sorted out.

Had to expand the canvas
to make room for more CAPE!

New hairdo again. And changed his stance after someone commented
that it looked like he was crapping himself. That just won't do.
Also, constructive criticism is great!
It might sting a little at first, but that's just your ego being bruised.
No pain, no gain...

Oh fuck, shit just got real!

Moving stuff around. Important to keep the cape in the frame.
It's a really nice cape, it really ties the painting together.

Moar stuff? Are you insane?!!

Traveller's got clothes on now. And say hello to Pallid and Lock,
two Hounds of Light. They mean srs bisniss.

Aaaaand done! Nothing to it :P

Some details for you.

Dragnipur is the name of this badass sword.
It's what all the hoopla is about.

Rake, the Son of Darkness. This is his happy face.
No, really.