Baumkuchen

 

Digital art is like Baumkuchen. It has many layers.

Started out as a quick black and white practice, but got carried away and spent somewhat more time than i should. 

Happy Year of Rabbit!

Happy Chinese New Year to all the folks celebrating it ^^

Panda looks so at home with those ears...

Nothing much to write about lately except that I've been constantly slacking off assignments and doing quite a bit of my own works xD. I keep telling myself that I will do some work today but end up always not doing it. TONIGHT FOR SURE I'M GONNA DO SOME!!!! PROMISE ;A;

Anyways, haven't been posting step-by-steps lately, so here's some.

Draft, don't plan to use outlines for this.


Straight on to the color thumb.


Using a single layer to paint the character. Slowly refining the pic.


Done refining the character.


Fixed up the panda and put in a simple background.

That's all folks. I have something else exciting to write about but can only do so around end of February. Have a great year ahead!

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Cuelloween! i want to be the lollipop (*´Д`) =3 -3 =3

Happy Halloween peepz.

Nothing much to be happy about though. We don't celebrate it much here hmm? definitely coz its origins are western so yeah. The Celtic equivalent of version of Hungry Ghost Festival or something.

Still, i have always enjoyed myself for this Festive and still will for some time to go. I think i mentioned this before so i'll spare you the details.

Anyways, enjoy my annual 'pumpkin' carving session.

1. Select a fresh pumpkin in a shape that pleases me.

2. Mark the necessaries in preparation of carving.


3. Cut off the top and start scooping the stuff outta the pumpkin.


4. Follow the pattern made earlier as i cut my way through the pumpkin.


5. Remove the cut outs and do further refining to the pumpkin.


6. Place the lighting inside the pumpkin to create an eerie glow.

Adios while i show off my newly carved pumpkin.
You can carve your own pumpkins too!

IT IS SO HARD!

...to start anything at all.

FFFFFFFFFFF...i'm practically forcing myself to do a lot of things. Forcing myself to work on assignments, to update this blog and to finish off the work about to be featured below.

Ugh?

Could it be i have finally mastered trying to take things easy? i know i should be worried about being so slack but i ain't! My fears and stress of not doing any work has just evaporated into thin air. The logical part of my brains are sensing impending doom so it's actually helping and forcing me along in survival. If not for it i guess i wouldn't have done anything at all.

Anyways, enough of that. I just hope it's a phase i'm experiencing after taking a short break. So yea i'm busy joining competitions again and trying to at least make it into one of em to mark this as a successful year. No loss tho if i don't make it coz it's really pushing me to keep producing.

Here's the latest piece i did to try to end up representing Malaysia in OTACOOL
Step-by-step:

drafted the rough in my warped-by-water sketchbook


scanned it and fixed up some parts


the outline stage


a rough color rendition of what i would want for the end results


i always work on the character first


watdefisherman'sfriend?
what just happened between the previous step and this?
i totally scrapped the shitty background i came out with in the rough. Have no idea how i thought it looked ok at that time.


Final touches to the character and background before cropping up the pic for a tighter composition.

Damn...i'm so not used to coloring in light tones anymore. Coloring dark pictures have screwed up my sense of depth quite a bit. For example, the pic below, which was the first entry for the same competition.


i hope to be able to work on a 3rd piece. Futile it might be but hey, i can't give up on a competition that demands for original characters can i? my own stuff especially...never felt happier joining.

BREAK!!!!

HELL YEA!!!! I HAVE NEVER LOOKED FORWARD TO A BREAK SO BADLY AS THIS ROUND. I'M GONNA RECUPERATE AS MUCH AS I CAN BEFORE THE NEXT ONSLAUGHT.

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i'm learning to take things easy this round. Won't be handling commissions. Take my time doing some personal works. Daily sketching and self exploration. Gaming non stop and catching up on lost time on movies, animes & mangas. i lost my internet connection for roughly a couple of days and found that time passed by so slowly that i had ample time to do the things i liked. It's good to feel the slow pace of things again once in a while. i just totally dumped the whole workaholic mentally for the extent of this break.

i noticed now that i have urges to do more traditional works lately. Watercolor in particular. After all the enthusiasm of going purely digital now i find myself reverting to getting dirty on pencil and paper. Human nature again to long to do something that you don't have the privilege of doing anymore. It's funny how we always contradict ourselves.

Speaking of contradictions, i'm a walking contradiction myself. Like i mentioned before, way back when i was still in my teens i used to be prejudice towards stuff like gothic lolita and now i'm finding myself gaga over it. i also used to hate the color green but thanx to a certain vocaloid, i have learnt to find beauty in that color as well. It's hard to name my favorite color now if you ask me about it.

i think my strongest point in art lies in colors. Ever since it started from a hobby, i was very particular about the colors i used. So now with no particular special preference for a certain color, i find myself having a lot of fun and freedom exploring with color combinations that bring out a certain mood or impact to a picture. i'm far from perfection though, even if i perceive it to be my forte. Regardless, i just want to have fun while doing what i love best.

*ahem*
i strayed from what i really wanted to say. Anyways, back to contradictions. i think what is important is that we learn to figure out which is the side of contradictions that would help elevate us into another level. Sometimes we remain rigid about it being our 'personality' or 'habit' which defines us. Maybe due to our ego or just part of us that wishes to not change, we sometimes end up shutting ourselves up in the bad end of it. And so we stop our own growth in that aspect.

i self-reflect whenever i can and found that i have changed quite a bit over the years. i try to correct some quirks within myself to some success, while picking up other idiosyncrasies along the way. It's almost an endless loop, but that's what makes us a little bit better each time we try to confront it.

i have this feeling that i might have just turned more eccentric and twisted within my own world. But that's just me. You be the judge.

i'll end off with some step-by-steps of what i've been up to.

rough sketch

color thumb

initial base and touchup

further refinement

preliminary textures

more texture spam and final result

Based off this video and song. i endlessly looped it while working on it to get into the mood. i enjoy drawing something of this genre but i can't do it all the time as it creeps me out while i'm on it. The creepier i make it the more scared i make myself. Yes i am afraid of ghosts and horrors ._.

Fantasy Earth Zero Contest

Joined another contest on deviantart. Supposed to do a rendition of our own version of either warrior, mage or scout. I chose scout at 1st but gave up and went for warrior instead. So here's some progress of what i did to the final product.

Did some rough sketches and silhouette study to find a suitable one for me to work on. i wanted an interesting silhouette that will bring out a character more, so i chose the bottom right one. Eventually i combined other stuff together from all that mess to the base i chose. I can already hear ringing words from my lecturer that i need to do more but time is not on my side and i am loaded with college assignments as well. This is the best i could do for now.


Next comes the weapon. I researched a bit on the skill list tree of the warrior class for the game. Then i came up with a weapon that could use ALL skills. We have the single handed weapon and shield skills followed by smashing skills for double handed wielders. As usual my preference of weapons usually end up with hammers. So keeping the hammer in mind, i created a gauntlet/shield that acts as defence and offence at the same time should the warrior wanted to do hand to hand. Think God of War gauntlets of Zeus. Then a hammer would still need a long haft, so a spear it is. And one that could combine with the shield gauntlet thingy to make it a hammer. There you go, best of both worlds for the skill tree.


The initial rough stage...the theme for my armor is 'Hawk'. The hammer looked weird at this point but i couldn't be bothered to fix it at that time. Assignments first.


Later i whipped up a more solid looking hammer head and tested it on the arm that was to wear it as well.


Confirmed the outline at this point and worked on the basic color feel i would want for the overall.


The very initial color base without the shine works yet. The armor still needs some polishing for that extra glow.


The red skirt-cloak was feeling a bit too monotone and making it seem lacking in contrast and boring. So i tweaked a dark blue tone to it instead and found it more satisfactory. Polished the armor a bit to have that oooo-so-shiny effect.

Fun facts
- After completion, i notice that the colors are very Ragnarok Online-ish. I might have been subconsciously doing a color scheme close to theirs. Coz that was the very 1st mmorpg that i loved very much.

- As if the color scheme wasn't a blow enough, many pointed out that this looked something like the paladin class of Ragnarok Online. Ok...must be the blue i made myself change to. Wait does that mean it would be a Lord Knight class if i left it red instead? ARGGGH FAIL IS ME!

- So yea because i wanted to do hawkish stuff, i ended up with a chocobo head for the hammer head. I totally did not intend for it to be chocobo related and reffed off a real hawk's features. To tell the truth i kinda despise FF.

-The earlier hammer head ended up looking like it came out of Card Captor Sakura xD not intended as well. But rofl, really looks like that wand Sakura carries about capturing cards.

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Fat chance of winning for this, but just gain more experience joining these competitions. ;_; i wished that i could draw more for the contest. But i'm so time tied this sem that i wanna go jump off some building.

March Comes Marching Down

If ever any cute girl comes along to me dressed like this with the same pose, i can die a cutesy death on the spot without a care...

When the blog gets neglected, save it with step-by-steps or tutorials. Yeaaaaaa.
Not very different from the usual step-by-steps i post here, except this one contains some of the quick and dirty techniques i put to use all the time 8D

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I'm already feeling the holiday mood and starting to neglect TOA work....I'm so sick of the simplified figures assignment these days that i barely want to do them at all. So i just aim for some C to C+ gradings with my lousiest effort ever. Sorry SS i don't feel motivated to do them anymore.

I don't feel productive lately too. I'm trying to take a short break from drawing and spend some leisure time gaming and watching anime, which i haven't done in ages. This be doing me some good as it boosts my moods recently. I'm no longer so time-tied and workaholic for the meantime. Good or bad thing i won't know, but i live life for the moment and worry later.

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i noticed that after entering art school, the effects of the fundamentals that i were taught during my foundation year is seriously starting to show up now. The way i was taught to perceive everything as lines, simple forms and shapes has granted me now the power of sharinga- *ahem*, the power to perceive almost all objects around me into it's most basic form and structure with my eyes. I coin the term "Artnigan" for the ability my eyes possess now, aside from my inherent ability to see everything else in the most perverted way possible (eroningan).

Putting aside all the eroningan-shenanigan-vegan stuff, this new found ability that is triggered subconsciously when i plan to draw or visualize an object, is seriously a big help. There were complex things i never managed to put on paper before but has now become more manageable thanx to 'Artnigan'.

Since it has only just activated in its preliminary stage, i'm still not utilizing it to its full potential yet. I'll make sure to master this skill to level up and have my irises turned into atom-shaped patterns. Maybe as i go further along down this ninj-... art path of no return, i'll start picking up more useful abilities such as being able to plagiarize techniques by observation, heack maybe i'll even learn to see through clothing.

signing off now,
adios

The 2010 Tigress

Haven't been showing step-by-steps lately. So yea...

I started off with wanting some anatomy practice, so i looked through my sketch book and hey, let's use this. Not much of an angle or dynamic-ism, but heack i thought if i were to study anatomy i can screw all that.

lalala did this rough when i was artjaming with some nutty friends beginning of this year. Initially i was lazy and thought of just going with this and touching up the features a bit. Then i thought "Hey why not try doing semi-realistic for once. It might be interesting". Turned out to be quite fruitful and fulfilling since i haven't really done this before. Besides i could hand this in for simplified figures...I WISH! i will get killed by SS if i do orzlll


Continuing where i left off, i used the above rough as a base, sketched the supposedly more realistic curves, and changed the pose a bit to make her more menacing than pouty. Did some initial shades for the body. I tried working differently this time by going from dark tone to light, just like acrylics. Turns out i'm pretty bad working this way so i need more practice.


Added in stuff i forgot like the tail and some of the waist length hair. Rendered some more to bring out the basic 3d form of the clothes, hair, etc.


It was pretty done when i reached this stage, all was left was to clean up the rough outline and touch up more places. IMHO i could have stopped here but i felt that the outline was giving the pic less than semi-realistic result. Still very manga-ish which defeats my purpose. So i pushed on.


Somehow when the outlines weren't so obvious it made her look a bit broad. As in really plump and well-covered. Realistically it would be the body most women would have in real life. But i wasn't satisfied at stopping here and soon realized after a while that she did seem plump to me.



So time to put in my own touches and made her slimmer and gave her more ideal, sexy proportions which our lects can't seem to stop emphasizing. I suppose it did add a bit of aesthetics to it after i did so. I decided to stop now cause my main focus was not to spend too much time on this piece. I wanted it as learning material so i considered it done. Took roughly 4-5 hours, done between short breaks of work i have piled up.

What i have gained (slightly):
- how to draw a less manga-ish pretty face.
- a more realistic sexy body.
- insight of the beauty of real tigers (i was fascinated by the stock photo references i have)

What i could have done better:
- spend more time polishing the body and working on the arms. Still not too familiar with doing nicely shaped semi-realistic arms.
- worked on a better background to really bring out the character.

Gothic Lolita again

Like i was saying previously, i'm on a streak for gothic lolis. Pity sem break ending soon or i would have loved to do more.

Going for the 'Sweet' Gothic lolita style this time.
Man i suck at drawing flowers.

Another step by step on how i work.

i'll go straight to the outline this time.


Filling in of basest colors. Each diff color on diff layer.


Beefed out some of the defining light and shadow areas.


Touched up the shadow areas again and filled in the base colors for the flowers.


Defined the shades and highlights for the flowers until i'm satisfied that it looks at least like a plant.


Added in more corny graphical elements into the background and touched up the gal.

Hmmmm, cavities yet anyone? Sorry for the dental bill it's gonna incur for you. ;D

What have i become?

i am turning creepy and crazy 8D

youtubezzz
warning: do not watch when alone and in the dark

art based on the vid:

normal sketch


reverted it into negative


final product made in wallpaper size, if you're mad enough to use it. i know i am and is currently pimping it as my desktop wallpaper.

Trying out diff stuff. Looks unfinished but i wanted the untidy strokes to give it a creepy feel, just like the vid. Added some texture to it so it doesn't look too flat. Spammed the song non stop while working on it 8D

i'm losing some marbles...