Friday, August 10, 2012

Fond memories

I did a quick colored sketch of a brightly redheaded girl, with blown out features. I did not, on me, have the right shades of red to show off the beautiful unnatural tones of her hair, but I did what I could. After which I scanned it in with at a handy massive office copier and realized that it had been blown out even more. So I tried to color correct it in Photoshop some (the image on the left), and thought it still didn't capture what I loved about the original piece. That being said I took a photo of it using the camera on my phone and you get the image on the right. Neither of which do the piece justice, but it's what I got.


I feel as if she is remembering a happy moment in her life, so that's why I named the post the way I did. That was not, I believe, the intention of the original photograph, but I obviously like mine better. I still feel as if subtleties of the original piece are missing. The soft tones of the watercolors contrasting with the brights of the marker in the hair aren't readily apparent in either case. But maybe I'm just in love with my own piece, and well, someone has to be. That's ok, though. As long as I don't start believing that I can't improve. As long as I continue to aspire to add new skill sets to my work. There will always be new techniques, new materials, new ideas and images to design. As long as I never loose the will to keep striving, I'll be OK. Don't you think?
Either way hope you enjoy.
PS If you want to see the original photograph click here

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Detail: Twisted Sister

Here is the close-up version of the Twisted Sister. Here you can see the hands and torso. I hope you get why I say that the head on the other page is better. Just gotta keep going!

Twisted Sister

I saw a drawing, possibly painting of a slightly deformed but cute girl with a crown and I was smitten. But as always I wanted to make it my own. I twisted her more, made her screaming (hopefully) more visceral. Added a touch of color to spots. Is it perfect? No. But I feel my hands are getting better, and the grotesque aspects of the drawing, position, image are much more present. I did not want this to be cute. The scream and the neck I feel are better in the lower left hand side of the image, but the body and torso are better in the colored side. Maybe another try in a couple of days, based off these sketches and not the original, can make this even better.