Many may wonder if there is a secret brush or technique to achieve greatness. And I can finally say that:
the secret to my secret magic ingredient is ...
No pea soup.
No brain soup
No effort sweat
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[Art-Fu]: distilled knowledge and philosophy to become one with Art.
Dinosaurs and mankind have often had a maligned past. Often portrayed as the tyranical lizard that rampages a little village or city block, or typecast in numerous horror B flicks, which brings us to this lovely issue of IFX gone dino mad on the brain. Featuring living legend, artist and creator James Gurney of dinotopia fame, and other strong dino contributions from cover artist D Mandryk and tutorials from G broadmore, this 29th issue has in addition sprinkles of art caveats, scattered (like a string of pearls) throughout to power your art-fu to a broader level.
The Art-Fu stuff
1/ Research and reference: established artists and proffesionals spend a good portion of the time gathering the right reference material for any illustration or project. Besides the internet, any opportunity to speak to a specialist, see a specimen live at an exhibit or study an enviroment in its natural state all add to the basic DNA of art knowledge.
It is this key fundamental that can really build a strong anchor of knowledge and databae when you paint and draw, especially when describing the forms and shapes of non existant images eg. Dinosaurs roaming in palaces. Artists who seem able to draw forms at will from imagination are often admired and at oft times, it is natural to be in awe or even feel a twinge of "I am not good enough, they are so young and good, to will I ever get better" angst.
However, do stop and think for a moment. These artists demonstrate that in their respective field - be it character, creature, transport, enviroment or abstract art that their fundamental grasp of describing form is strong. And yours can be as strong with that simple step, of gathering reference, studying it and then applying it in your daily practise.
2/ Texturing: How many ways do you skin a sabretooth?
School of texture, can be summarised as thus:
Photo/image overlay
Custom texture brush (painted in)
Custome texture image/brush (erased out)
Filter method
It appears in this issue, the frequent question of how to texture painting XYZ is broached, with each artist presenting their own personal faviourite spin on how to skin and overlay this cat (or lizard skin...). There is no wrong or right way, there are optimal ways and there are ways that suit different purposes for differnet occasions. Whichever school of texturing one decides to employ, here is ArtFu's take on texturing
ArtFu says: "Texture make picture look betta, but sometimes texture make painting look like hash and scrambled eggs."
Translation: When used judiciously, textures can enhance the realism or effect of a painting, but often its poor (over) use tends to look cheap, nasty, very digital and obviously textured with a phtoo overlay. A good texture effect, blends in seamlessly and is unnoticable within a digital/matte painting. A nice way to check this is to stick the levels onto high, and any poorly added photo overlays will appear with its edges unrefined, or showing through.
3/ Tricks of the Trade:
Henning says: Wrinkles grow fasta with bevel and emboss used judiciously
4/ IFX29 Select Shots
5/ Next Issue: IFX 30
NB: In this month's issue, I have decided to take a different approach towards the review of IFX via the production of sifting through the magazine and distilling the good bits for the artists, who desire to incorporate the wisdom, philosophy, decisions, troubleshooting and appraoch of the legends and pros into their daily work practise via the incorporation of ArtFu. I hope this is more valuable as a review, and lighthearted as we take the yoda like confucious-yoda like appraoch to painting and life.
These are my musings. Partake of it as you will. In your own
discoveries, perhaps the thoughts may be similar or no. I am not
providing advice but perhaps relating what I feel a perfect artist
needs to achieve that state of oneness.
The Philosophy of Art
Metaphorically, you are young (and thus
seen to have unlimited energy and enthusiasm. keep this with you for
all your life, and Art will be life, not a job, not a hobby but a
lifelong passionate affair and part of your fibre) and thus, are in the
most perfect place to become exceptional.
Everyone can paint and draw. The technical aspect can be learnt at any
age. The young adapt faster. Once you adapt, and learn the basics....to
become a great master at art, it is applying that simple basics into
perfect basics.
From what i understand, a pro has mastered his basics. Every square
inch and pixel. It is there, perfect in the mind, poise and ready to
leap out, onto the hand that draws and paints it into life.
Another analogy, is like a warrior who aspires to be a perfect
swordsman. When first learning the way of the sword, 70% of the stroke
comes from honing your repetition of 100 strokes, and 30% derived from
the focus of the mind.
In his mid to advanced stage, perhaps there is a balance of 50% power and mind
As a master, 90% of that killing perfect stroke is purely mental. And
only the barest and most economical of effort, the 10% is derived from
years of muscle memory, and training of the body as a superb fighting
machine.
This pure single minded drive, is NO great secret. people may not like
to hear it but really, its pure hardwork, and daily devotion to the
task you have in hand....and applying yourself.
Hard and Soft
To reach this state of oneness...and this apply to any field, a artist is in a state of looseness and detail.
A piece of cloth is soft, and thus it is flexible and supple. A brick
is hard, and when i throw it at someone it hits hard, but lacks finesse.
A wet cloth, is as strong as steel, and retains its suppleness.
I try to achieve this state of being between supple and firm.
Translated into art, one strives to have a painting that is loose
(energy and the right strokes provide for the mind, immense pleasure at
every subtle nuance) and yet sufficiently detailed (tight/hard at just
the right amount, in the right spot) due to experience of lighting,
composition, exceptional colour handling and knowledge.
For the beginner, you must learn from yourself.
Take no one's advice as knowledge, take no training as the truth.
This is not contrary to taking a formal education in art, but just keep
in mind the rules, the theory..are simple that. They broaden your
horizons, but the ultimate truth of how to paint, is ENTIRELY
yours..and the art you produce uniquely your own.
The Practical Stuff
So, you want to start somewhere.
Lets formalise a small exercise. Lots o
f them.
1. Draw at least 10 images a day
2. Try to produce some loose quick images
3. Try to produce a single good illustration a week.
Explanation
1. Repetition -
teaches muscle memory. Like the swordsman, your first 10 strokes may
feel heavy. They maybe take a lot of brute force even. You must
question why. Perhaps, when you're tired...and can draw the same tenth
sphere...it will look better and better. I guarantee you now. If you
apply yourself, honestly. your tenth character drawing will be better
than your first...and your twentieth better than your tenth, and so
on...
2. The quick strokes are called gestures.
These capture the essence of a person, a creature, the air, the wind,
the smell, the ambience of something. It can help teach you fluidity
and looseness. It is what makes an artist's loose almost lazy
stroke...great art to see and behold. With one stroke, you paint a
mountain, with one dab, a multitude of stars appear, with a tiniest
scrape, a single focal point of light is made. This teaches efficiency
and greatness in one simple stroke
3. In this illustration, you must take it as a personal challenge
to produce your best understanding of all you understand and have
practised to make that single painting - a perfect painting of your
skill. It is almost akin to life and death. There is no victor or
loser, and at the end of it all, it marks your progress and growth.
All these, may be hard to read, digest or understand. But hopefully the
gist of, may aid some. Feel free to partake of these thoughts, I
believe these can make anyone an exceptional artist. The rest is up to
your own unique genius. Because anyone can paint...but not everyone
should.
Create greatness in your own living image.
----------------------------------------
Summary
Hurricane's treatise:
"every study and batch of sketches/work gives you a letter in your
alphabet, and eventually you'll have em all, now you need to start to
make words, then talk and finally sing"
Simplified even further: "Work hard, Play Hard, Reach for your Dreams"
And even simpler...."One stroke, one draw"
The pure economy of light, composition, colour and structure in a single stroke....
---------------------------------------- Put into practise:
Sketchling says:
Yeah.. thats a cool way of putting it. I have been thinkin some very
similar thoughts with regards the hard-soft thing. I see that
underlying so much of drawing, especially people. Just an example would
be the soft gesture of muscles next to the hard forms of bones.
When first introduced to digital paintings,
I was fascinated by the beautiful imagery produced by seasoned pros at Sijun and conceptart forums.
A speed paint could be as simple as the outline of a form with scant colour.
Speedpaint by HPX-1
A speedpaint could be polished with refined lightness and style as epitomised by this painting by Craig Mullins
A speedpaint could have the simplified but grand sense of scale and colour as shown by sparth and David levy's multiple speed paints. Eg. Prince of persia concept by sparth below
Inevitably, I joined in the fray feeling it would help me improve my
process. The more I painted, the more I felt at some point of not
reaching the desired level and frustration grew.
That can be due to me not basically understanding ANY of the basics of
painting. I did not know the terms composition, perspective, colour,
light , form which I seem to brandish about now. A friend suggested
that a speedpaint might be something else than just a loose drawing.
Indeed, these days when one looks at a speedpaint thread,
there is a dilution of artistry and range of skill. You have the seasoned pro, the middle grade and the beginner.
Now, I'm not quite hinting that a speedpaint should not be for all to enjoy, and yet, what is a speedpaint?
Spurning the challenge of speedpaint
Turning my back on speedpaint,
I started to work on basics for a year.
Perspective - helped me understand how to draw transports better.
Composition - helped to unravel the importance of what makes a good cutscene/image
Colour and light ....colour and painting with lightness eluded me
I had not participated in speed paints for over a year, as I felt I had
not reached a sufficient level of proficiency to truly paint what I
understand as a speedpaint.
Speedpaint as I understand it
In one sense, a speedpaint is a rapid painting of values, colours and composition all rolled into one.
In that sense, a speedpaint is the embodiment of all the full skills of a digital painter, the economy of stroke and technique
(which may imply the usage of layers, filters, methods as long as they
get to the end result in the most economical step) within a relatively
short duration of time.
It is akin to reaching a kensai status (sword saint) in the way of the
sword. The minimalist economy and grace of form and poise, to strike
and strike only when absolutely necessary, and when done so, it will
have the ultimate desired outcome. The vanquishing of your opponent.
So, therein lies the challenge of a speedpaint.
Once mastered,
you can harness the rapidity of composition, design, and looseness of
the painting to visualise a statement. And ultimately, incorporated
into your workflow.
But make no mistake, a speedpaint can sometimes go horribly horribly
wrong if you seek to finalise it into a finished illustration for a
client. This is only so, when the underlying form, the underlying
basics and clean lines that may be required are not fundamentally
understood
Enjoy speedpainting!!
For it means to paint with light, and lightness in your paintbrush
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