AmberDust's Portfolio

Aerith Evanesce

AmberDust — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 11:46:25 GMT

Aerith Evanesce

More fanart, nevermind eh?
This was mainly an exercise for attempting more realistic lighting and getting a more '3D' face. The art shows Aeris/Aerith from FFVII as she dies, I doubt this is much of a spoiler anymore. <.< >.>

I started painting in black and white and liked the look of it, so I only adjusted colours slightly at the end to keep the monochrome look. Overall, pretty happy with this one, but any c&c is welcome and appreciated, I promise I'll get some more original concepts up here soon!

Enjoy! :)

Tools: Photoshop and Wacom
Time Consumed: Ten hours approx. over several days
Aeris/Aerith is © Square and Tetsuya Nomura
Art ©AmberDust 2007

Forbidden Pool

AmberDust — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 18:19:33 GMT

Forbidden Pool

The mischievous pixie NiaTa knelt beside the forbidden pool; she had abandoned her duty to trick intruders away from the woods, (or, if she was so inclined, to their deaths) and her incorrigible curiosity had led her to the glittering water.
Her wings fluttered with excitement as she reached out to touch her reflection. The other spirits of the woods whispered among themselves at the disturbance.
Ripples formed and NiaTa withdrew her hand, horrified at what she'd done...

I've been creating some characters recently for painting inspiration, and I thought I'd draw this pixie character to use for my new site's banner.
I wanted to achieve a very speedy and painterly effect (which contrary to how it sounds, is pretty tricky and time consuming if you go into all the details) and though some of the trees seem off to me, I'm pretty happy with it.

Full view please! Enjoy. :)

Details: [link]
Tools: Photoshop and Wacom
Time Consumed: Lost track. Definitely over ten hours... over about two weeks.
Reference: Gorgeous picture of a transparent butterfly I found on the 'net (for the wings of course): [link]
Art ©AmberDust 2007

Woman Who Does Not Bleed

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 11:34:49 GMT

Woman Who Does Not Bleed

Painting of Rei Ayanami from Neon Genesis Evangelion, done for my best friend's birthday (Rei is his favourite anime character). I hope he likes it. XD

I drew the lineart traditionally on A3 paper, scanned it and coloured it roughly in Painter IX.5 before taking it into Photoshop for touching up, details and colour adjustments.

Comments appreciated, enjoy!

Tools: Photoshop, Corel Painter IX.5 and Wacom
Time Consumed: Well over ten hours, I stopped counting.
Rey Ayanami is ©Gainax, ©Hideaki Anno and whoever else.
Art ©AmberDust 2007.

Rei's Poem...

"Mountain, heavy are the mountains. But that changes, with the passage of time. Sky, blue sky, what your eyes can't see; What your eyes can see. The sun, one, only one. Water; it is agreeable. Commander Ikari. Flowers, so many the same, so many without purpose. Sky, sky of red, red the color, the color I hate. Liquid flows, it drips, ripples, and pours. Blood, scent of blood, woman who does not bleed. From the red soil the humans come. Humans made by man and woman. City, a human creation. Eva, a human creation as well. What are humans? Are they creations of God? Humans, that which is created by humans. This is that which is mine. My life, my heart. I am a vessel for my thoughts. The entry plug, the throne of the soul.

Who is this? This is me. Who am I? What am I? What am I? What am I?

I am I. This object that is, is myself. That which forms me. This is the self that can be seen, and yet this is not like that which is myself. A strange feeling. My body feels as if it is melting. I can no longer see myself... my form, my shape fades from view. Awareness dawns of someone who is not me. Who is here? There? Beyond me, here. Shinji. This person I know. Major Katsuragi. Dr. Akagi. People, my classmates. The pilot of Unit Two. Commander Ikari. Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?"

.:Josh Holloway:.

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 11:16:04 GMT

.:Josh Holloway:.

Had to be done, he's too hot to not paint.

Digital painting of Josh Holloway, AKA Sawyer from Lost, painted secretly in the early hours for *Deepsies' birthday on the 16th.

Details found here!: [link]

Used lots of reference, mostly this image: [link] though I tried to change as much as possible. It is completely hand-painted though.

Comments appreciated, enjoy! :)

Original size: 4000x3200 pixels
Tools: Photoshop CS, Wacom GFX Tablet
Time consumed: About 20 hours

Art © AmberDust 2007

Vincent: A Divided Soul

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 11:12:14 GMT

Vincent: A Divided Soul

This is one of my favourite characters from one of my all time favourite games, so it was really enjoyable and challenging to paint. I'm pretty pleased with the background, considering I hardly ever do them, perspective, and also the Galian Beast reflection (yay for the impossible!).

Comments welcome and appreciated, enjoy! :)

Time consumed: About ten hours
Tools: Photoshop and Wacom
References: Official Vince artwork and screenshots of the Galian Beast limit
The lovely Vincent Valentine from FFVII is ©Square and Tetsuya Nomura.
Art ©AmberDust 2007

Conflict In The Skies

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 11:06:39 GMT

Conflict In The Skies

It was only a matter of time before I painted a dragon. Heh heh.

This was a little test to loosen up a bit and see what I could achieve in as short a time as possible. Like a speed painting. All of this took about 3 and a half hours, which is quite a difference as I typically take 10-20 hours on similar drawings.

I had lots of fun doing this, using different colours and painting a dragon for the first time.
The guy leaping in the air was interesting to draw as well. It's great to do something a little different. ^^

Anywho, ejoy! :)

Tools: Photoshop and Wacom
Time Consumed: 3 hours, 30 minutes
Art ©AmberDust 2007

Princess of the Wolves

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 11:03:03 GMT

Princess of the Wolves

Anyway, this started as a little doodle for a new pose, something a bit different, what I came up with reminded me of San from Princes Mononoké, so it became some fan art.
Princess Mononoké being my favourite anime of all time.

It tooks ages to draw, mostly because of tricky proportions and I tried to be as accurate as possible costume-wise. Hope you like it!

Tools: Adobe Photoshop CS and Wacom graphics tablet.
Time Consumed: Maybe 10+ hours over a week or two, far longer than it should have anyway. <.<
San from Princess Mononoké ©Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki.
Art ©AmberDust 2007.

Rezephua: Arklith

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 10:59:02 GMT

Rezephua: Arklith

The last concept for my friend's third Rezephua character.
Arklith is quite a different character compared to Lekina and Damien so I tried to create some contrast with the colour scheme, attitude and angle; it was quite a challenge, I lost count how many times the head and body was redrawn. XD
Enjoy! :)

Rezephua RP Forum: [link]
Original character ©Spire.
Art and concept ©AmberDust 2007.

Rezephua: Damien

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 10:56:40 GMT

Rezephua: Damien

The second Rezephua character request: Damien Theremhoff. The suit is rather large and powered by a magical gemstone with Damien inside controlling it. The weapons are also retractable.

This is a first for me to paint a huge suit of armour and those reflections were quite a challenge, but I'm quite pleased with it overall.

Enjoy! :)

Rezephua RP: [link]
Art and concept ©AmberDust 2007
Original character ©Spire

Rezephua: Lekina

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 10:52:26 GMT

Rezephua: Lekina

Character concept request done for a friend's Rezephua character. Enjoy!

Textures are from ImagineFX's free resources.

Rezephua RP Forum: [link]

Original character ©Spire.
Art and concept ©AmberDust 2007.

Keep Your Heart Broken

AmberDust — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 10:44:16 GMT

Keep Your Heart Broken

Well this is something I've been working on and off for the past week or so. I've had a lot on my mind, so it was nice to grab a nice big brush in Photoshop and just paint whatever I wanted. I was going to upload this yesterday, but I was away at a friend's for the whole day, so I couldn't finish it. Besides, I didn't want to make everyone feel miserable on Valentine's.

I did some experimenting with perspective and custom brushes here, so comments are appreciated. :)

Title inspired by 'Keep Your Heart Broken' by The Rasmus.

"My love will grow black if your heart gets stolen
Just promise to keep your heart
One day I'll come back if the door's still open
Just promise to keep your heart broken
Forever and after my love
Just promise to keep your heart broken"

Time Consumed: About ten hours, maybe a little less.
Tools: Photoshop and Wacom.

Art ©AmberDust 2007

The Tunnel

AmberDust — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 12:07:27 GMT

The Tunnel

Anywho, this started off as a demonstration of the Wacom's pen pressure. I thought the doodle I made looked so much like a spooky tunnel, that I finished the sketch, coloured it and finished it off.

It's also an experiment, seeing as I do so few landscapes/scenery, it was good to get some practice in. I also concentrated on composition and drawing as many details as possible to give depth while working with very desaturated colours. And I threw in a butterfly for fun. ^^

My aim was to give this a spooky feel; does the end of the tunnel lead to freedom, or will the darkness swallow you up before you reach it? Perhaps the butterfly hints that you're better off in the tunnel after all? Feel free to decide. :)

So, this is more of an experiment than anything else, I promise I'll paint something more impressive next time. ^^;;

Oh, and before I go, a few interesting shapes emmerged from the rock of the tunnel as I painted it, can you find the creepy mouth and eyes?

Please comment! ^^

Time Consumed: Wasn't counting, but probably roughly ten hours over about a week.
Tools: APhotoshop CS and Wacom Tablet.
Reference Used: None, except for a butterfly photo or two.

Art ©AmberDust 2007

Howl's Secret Garden

AmberDust — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 12:04:19 GMT

Howl's Secret Garden

My first artwork for 2007! :D

I really wanted to do some fanart to one of my favourite anime films, (my favourite is Princess Mononoké but this one comes second) so after about a week's work and far too many late nights here it is.

I really learnt a lot during this process, about texturing, colours, realistic clouds and making things look '3D'. Also the difference between a feminine and masculine Howl. XD
(Thanks to my family for pointing that out and the comments and advice of a friend! ^^)
This is also a first for digital grass for me and to be honest I think it came out really well.

I'm iffy about some of it though, such as Howl's arms, shirt and hands, (one of those love/hate things ya know?) but there has to be a point where you say stop! before you spend half your life on a project.
This is that point.

I went through half of my DeviantArt favourites checking out inspiration and references, used my bedroom mirror to reference my own hand, pinched one of my Dad's shirts, checked out tutorials and took screenshots of the movie and flipped through my little four-part graphic novel of the movie, picking up details, costume design and something to base the faces on.

You can tell I wanted to get this right can't you? XD
I really think I'm progressing now, and I hope to do so throughout the year with more experiments and challenges!

Anywho, despite all the resources I had, the was mostly going off the movie and my own judgement. So yeah, I'm pleased with it, particularly the clouds and grass and Howl and Sophie's faces. And maybe Sophie's dress. though it could've been better.

I also had a mishap about halfway through, where I realised Sophie's anatomy was screwed up and didn;t look right next to Howl, so I had to cut Sophie into several pieces and merge them back together, which was a dangerous operation! It made me learn something very important though: make sure the original idea and/or sketch is just the way you want it before you start shading, texturing and detailing! <-- Wise words! XD

So anyway, I'm rambling now, so I'll wrap things up. Please comment!

Check out Details?: [link]
Check out WIP?: [link]

Size: Roughly 25% of original canvas which was 3697x5000
Tools: The usual Photoshop and Wacom.
Time Spent: Please don't ask. I spent way too much time on this, and hope never to know how much exactly. <.<
'Howl's Moving Castle' 'Sophie' and 'Howl' are ©Diana Wynne Jones, ©Hayao Miyazaki and ©Studio Ghibli.
Art ©AmberDust 2007

Nobody's Child

AmberDust — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 23:59:18 GMT

Nobody's Child

I was actually in the middle of starting another painting when I thought of this. I was listening to 'Nobody's Child' by Electric Light Orchestra, and several of the verses starts with 'painted lady' so I suddenly got this idea. I wasn't going to paint the same lady described in the song however, I wanted to do my own interpretation.

At first she was going to be a woman covered in black tatoos leaning against a rusty wall, but for some reason I sketched the first idea in white over a black background and then painted some brown tones on her skin and whoosh, the painting changed completely and I created this.

The symbols on her skin don't mean anything at all, I didn't look up any reference at all, so every marking is made up.
I think this worked out very well, I managed to paint her rather quickly without excluding detail, and the background is merely suggested, so I didn't spend forever doing that.

Enjoy, comments are welcome and appreciated as always! ^^

Time spent: 4-5 hours
Details: [link]
Tools: Adobe Photoshop and my Wacom Intuos3 Graphics Tablet
Art ©AmberDust 2006

My Inspiration.

Painted lady, stop that closin' in on me
Painted lady, you're supposed to be a dream
Painted lady, you better stay away from me
Painted lady, why you loosinin' my tie
Painted lady, what's that twinkle in your eye
Painted lady, you better stay away from me
Painted lady, with your jewels and your beads
Painted lady, don't you do these dirty deeds
Painted lady, you better stay here with me
Nobody's child 'til I saw the light of your smile
Painted lady, nobody's child
You have set me free

Nobody's child, you came in and stayed for a while
Painted lady, nobody's child
You have set me free

Nobody's Child ©ELO (Electric Light Orchestra)

The Little Mermaid

AmberDust — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 23:56:01 GMT

The Little Mermaid

Yay for fanart! :D

This is a digital artwork of Ariel from the Little Mermaid, I used screenshots from the film to help with the style and colours, and based it on the scene when Ariel is pulling the petals from an underwater flower, just before Sebastian sings "Under the Sea".
I worked hard to keep the original style of Ariel, but hopefully also with an added a bit of realism. I also kept to the original colour scheme, and design. It was very fun to colour and I didn't have too much trouble, except for the pink leaves on the rock which were a right pain. XD
And surprise, surprise, there's actually a background! It took a long time to do, so I hope it came out right. I also spent a lot of time on Ariel's face, it was surprisingly hard to get a balance between it looking like she does in the movie, while also making it "3D" and painting it in what I hope is my own style. XD
TLM is one of my favourite Disney movies, so I just had to paint her! ^^

I think I went a little overboard with details, which is why it took so long, but hopefully it was worth it.
At least I learnt quite a lot during this, so it wasn't a waste of time!
Don't forget to look at the details!: [link]

Comments appreciated! ^^

Size: Roughly a quarter of the original.
Details: [link]
WIP: [link]
Original Sketch: [link]
Time spent: Roughly 30 hours over two weeks.
Tools: Adobe Photoshop CS and my trusty Wacom Tablet. ^^
Ariel "The Little Mermaid" is ©Disney.
Art ©AmberDust 2006.

Raia - Elven Summoner

AmberDust — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 23:47:54 GMT

Raia - Elven Summoner

This here is my first Digital Art piece.

I started with a fairly simple sketch which I scanned in, and opened in Adobe Photoshop CS.
I then worked on the colouring, I've done digital colouring before, but it was with lineart, so this is my first digital artwork without the use of lines, working with light, shadow and variations of colour. And also a simple background, which I've rarely done before.
I decided to keep it monochrome, although looking back, it might have appeared more 3D if I had used a different colour for the background, but I'll keep that in mind next time.
I've had a few comments already, apparently the neck and chest are too long and the cloak is not quite 'flowing' enough, so yes, I admit, something strange happened with the neck and it's pretty much unfixable now, but seeing as she's an elf, perhaps I can get away with it. ;)
The cloak I whipped up pretty quickly, as I didn't think I needed to pay as much attention to it because it was more of a background object, so it ended up looking a little rough and stiff.

The hardest part of this piece was her face, hands down, I spent ages getting it to look the way I wanted it, and the result isn't quite right yet.
The easiest, I think was her hand and the lower half of her dress. I modelled my own hand for her own, so I could get the shape right and it immediately started working. And the dress became easier as I went along, the lower part just fell into place for me, it was really surprising but also rewarding.

I think I spent about 20 hours on this, perhaps a little less, so it's not too bad for a first time. XD

Anyway, I did this a few months ago now, I finished it two weeks into September 2006. And although that was only a short while, I feel that this piece is already really old and I could do a much better job now, but I don't like editing old art, so I shall keep it and all it's imperfections as it is. :)