Cintiq!

 Thanks to the generosity of my parents, I am now the proud owner of the 22HD Cintiq.  For a long time I had been using a tablet pc (the HP tm2t, which was pretty good) as my main digital drawing tool.  Tablet pc's are nice because they are full on laptops, and therefore portable and convenient, and I thought more than good enough for doing art.  I figured that using a cintiq couldn't be that different from using my laptop for drawing and painting, but I was totally wrong.  The Cintiq is so sensitive, way more so than the tablet pc.  It has so many functions as well, including the sixteen buttons and two touchstrips on the back.

When I opened the box, I realized why these things are so expensive (they are overpriced, even though they're totally awesome); it's the highest end professional tool an artist can buy.  The intuos tablets would probably be, since it's the same technology, but the Cintiq is simply on a different level from that. The one thing I can definitely say about it, is that it makes the process much faster.  Coloring takes a lot less time than it would with any other tablet, and it's easier to make it look better.  Because the screen is so big, I can zoom in more without having to constantly reposition the picture or move around a ton.  I also have a ton of hotkeys, not to mention the two buttons on the pen and the eraser.  And, unlike my laptop, I can have a keyboard available at anytime, so I can use any hotkey that I don't have programmed.
It is a fantastic piece of technology... and I don't think anyone would regret buying it, though it is such a huge investment.

And here is some samples of what I've done with it.  Most of them are just coloring, but there's a couple drawings as well :)

Coloring Practice

So at the end of this past fall semester, I was having an existential coloring crisis, partly because I was told that my colors looked like a fruit by the foot.  I decided to try coloring some linework by other people, just to save a little bit of time really, and I ended up really enjoying what I was doing.  It turns out that I might end up enjoying being a colorist, which is something that I never expected of myself.  I have always had a hard time coloring and making color choices. I will include links to all the original artists where I can.

  http://danielleister.deviantart.com/





 http://spacefriend-krunk.deviantart.com/

 http://cameron-stewart.tumblr.com/

 http://spacefriend-krunk.deviantart.com/

 http://jonathanglapion.deviantart.com/

 http://williamdresden.deviantart.com/
















http://spacefriend-krunk.deviantart.com/
http://geddlee.deviantart.com/

Select Head Paintings

This semester I took painting the human head with Don Seegmiller, and he is a fantastic teacher.  It's been one of the best classes I've ever had, and I got soooo much better.  I didn't really think that I'd like painting with oils, but by the end, I understand why they are so prevalent among traditional artists.  They're smooth, they flow, and they do what you want, as long as you've put in the time to learn how they work. 

Concept Design

It's been a while.. but I have something to post for now, which is a part of why I hadn't been.  I love drawing comics, but one of the problems is that if you don't have everything done, you can't really post it unless you can regularly update, which I can't.  Anyway, I'm in "concept design 1" this semester, and at first it sounded like fun, but then it got really stressful.  I did make some pieces that I'm proud of for it, but it was a somewhat frustrating and often unrefined experience, but we're all learning, including the teacher.

The assignment was to design as if we were on a real production team and we were working within a current franchise, which happened to be Resident Evil.  I had to design a car, which was... difficult, but I put in the time, and I think it turned out.  I also designed a possible co-op character, even though it wasn't assigned. I think that it just took some time for things to get set up in the class

Summer work

 I've been working hard this summer, and, though I don't have too much to show for it, since most of it is currently unfinished and can't be posted.  I do have three finished colored pages, although they have no lettering, and page three isn't included here.

I am a terrible blogger

I am so bad at remembering to update things... I know that this site would probably be like... the most valuable blog that I could have, but it's so much easier to update facebook or tumblr or something than blogspot.  Anyway... I have not spent this summer doing nothing. Right now I am starting to ink page 40 of my personal comic project, as well as having mostly finished a painting for my fiancee's birthday on the tenth of July.  I was quite pleased with how this turned out, but it's very clear how much more finished the face is than everything else.  I need to put in more polish to the clothes and hand in particular. 

I have also been working on my idea for my BFA project, although when I looked at the requirements for the proposal, it totally freaked me out.  I would like to just jump right into it now, but that would be a terrible idea. 
Anyway, the idea is a post-apocalyptic comic that would explore the ideas of... well... exploration.  Whenever I see movies or play games in that genre, I always find it fascinating to think of what happened to the people that lived in the abandoned infrastructure.  I love the look of decaying buildings and things like that.  But I also feel like the genre of post-apocalypse is way too focused on killing people and now "why is everyone gone and what were they like", but instead "how did everyone die?" So, in essence, my original idea was to have this young, somewhat childish character exploring the ruins of someone's apartment with her father.  I have some of the story drafted out, and I plan on working out the thumbnails more, but I need to talk to the people in charge to get a better handle on what I need to be doing with this project.

Summer?

Well, it's been a while... I am currently taking a figure drawing class for the first half of the summer, so it's pretty intensive.  It's been a huge relief to have much less school, and to actually have some time to myself.  I've spent a lot of that time playing Metal Gear Solid 2 and 3, and then quite a bit of time drawing some stuff for myself... Though a lot of it is redrawing, really, because I have been looking back at my old work, and every time I look back, I realize that there are times when I cut corners, and that NEVER pays off.  Especially when I don't have any time constraints... why cut corners?



So, I have some comparisons of the backgrounds that I've redrawn recently, and will be splicing in with other panels and the characters.