3 Co-workers

Did a caracature of three co workers averaged about 4-5 hours per portrait. That was great for me. The Brian painting probably took the longest, when I did his initial sketch I could settle on a distorted face shape that I liked. I sketched about 9 variations. Finished the Carrie first, then Brian and Steve's I did this past Saturday. Kept getting side-tracked playing a video game called Dragon Age (been consumed by that game.) Stumbled across a sale on Amazon Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Awakening and Dragon Age II for $10 (download only.) Also had two weeks of Jury Duty, got called as a potential once but never picked.

I didn't want to post any until I had at least three portraits done, got a few other co-workers to do, will post them as I get them done. Going to try and get a couple done this weekend (another extended weekend for me as I've got Friday off, using the rest of my vacation days before I the end of the year and I loose them.

Initial sketch done in Autodesk's Sketchbook Pro, painting done in Adobe Photoshop, using a Wacom Cintiq 12W.

Barry Manilow

Going to see Barry Manilow in concert, thought I'd try and get another entry into my "Celebrity Book". Didn't really plan on it but my boss has season passes or something for the concert hall and word got to her that I'm a Barry Manilow fanatic (not really, I like his music but I'm not an über-fan the way word gets around that I am, but I just go with it.)

The hair was tough on this one, I still don't like it but I can live with it. This one was done as a grayscale value painting first then color added to it when it was done.

The plan is to print it out the size of the book and add it to one of the pages, print another one and frame it (to give as a gift.) Then take both with a small vase of flowers, deliver them to the venue with a note telling him to keep the framed one and sign the one in the book and have someone take the book to the coat check room so I may retrieve it after the show. (Basically the same thing I did when I got Jay Leno's autograph. I would just send him the framed one and the other one not in the book but I it helps when they can see that I've got other celebrity autographs.

Sketchbook Pro, Photoshop and Cintiq 12W

Retro Awesomeness

Feeling kinda nostalgic, had Jim Kelly on my mind. Loved him in Enter The Dragon "Ghettos are the same all over the world… they Stink!", Tattoo Connection, Hot Potato, Black Belt Jones. Hardest Part was the afro, can't just draw a circle gotta get the shape right. Wanted to give it a kind of retro background, did the one with his name in purple first then thought if this was done back in the day they would definitely work into it the African flag colors. I like the first one better, keeps the background in the background, flag colors are a bit too strong for my taste.

Sketchbook Pro, Photoshop, on Cintiq 12W

Fastest one yet

Started this one Saturday (2-4-12) about 8pm while watching COPS and continued til about 1:30 am then finished it the next morning. Total time, about 8 hours. Traced the faced for the line art portion (always feel like I'm cheating when I do that, but I'm confident in my drawing skills, wanted to focus on painting technique.

Used a method that is close to the way I did portraits with Prismacolor pencils. Read a tutorial were the author was all about using a brush (regular round, solid brush) and the eyedropper tool (when blending) instead of "Smudging" or "Blurring". I set my brushes "flow" to 100 select my base color or value and create the shape of the face and neck, then turn the flow down to 1 and start adding shades. Sampling from what you've already colored (instead of snagging another color from the swatch) helps to make the blends smoother.

I did the last portrait "EmmaPeel_Redo" this way. Gotta say I'm diggin it, but with the two of these I did straight color, I didn't do a value painting first then add color... probably should have. Not 100% happy with the hair, that's something I need to just keep practicing on.

Thu