The Bane of My Life:

For the past 24 hours this has been the bane of my life. I don't know if I should put the stages up for this as well... hmmm.... might as well.Yeah so I would seriously appreciate any kind of crit on this, because i need to do 3 more. It was such a ridiculous learning process that I'd love it if anyone could recommend any different process. I'm not sure.

Plug:

Also, you should all totally start following my twin sisters' blog.

Practice Makes Perfect:

I really, really need to get on it with photoshop. Really need the practice. And also to ACTUALLY FINISH THINGS. I just went through loads of my folders and have about 10 things that would be so good for a portfolio IF THEY WERE FINISHED. Man. So that's added onto the plan.

Because of this, I am posting up these sequence images of a painting a started doing a couple of months ago and (surprise, surprise) never finished. But if it's up where people can see it, it might give me more of an incentive to finish it. Hopefully.

So since I started this I have learnt that starting with the lines was not really the best idea, but I'm trying to work them out, and in a few newer pieces I've started with the shading. I'm pretty sure that if I spent a good day or two on this I could make it look alright, I just get dragged into the details.

Relevent Artists:

For reference I thought I'd make a list of relevent artists I could like at for the different tasks I need to complete. That way, I'd have different styles to look into and see what suits the work best. Most of these will probably just be personal favourites:

Character Design:

I had so many links open for this section, but I think I've narrowed it down to two that get my point across very well. I think being able to work for either of these companies means that you are a genius with character design:

Massive Black: Their work ranges from realism to extreme stylised, and the concept art makes me need to change my pants. It's relevent for all sections I think, but the originality in some of the characters is good for reference. They also use a variety of media, classic and modern which shows that pen and pencil or watercolour are not dead yet.

Imaginism: Perhaps the complete opposite in style to Massive Black, these artists use of lighting and detail really captured me when. I think they have more recently done the concept art for Tim Burtons 'Alice in Wonderland', which makes me love them even more.

Costume:

Dustsplat: I found this guys work a while ago on Deviantart. The precision just blew me away. I really love the originality in the costume design in all of his characters, so I think this would be more revent for looking into interesting costume design, but also good for character design. The layout of his work is simple and easy to read as well, no frills.

Creatures:

Aaron St. Goddard: I would say that the work on his website is relevent for reference in all areas I am looking into, but I found his creature design particularly interesting. He creates improbable characters and creatures that still make sense in their own right. It is possible to see thier skeletal structure and to imagine how they grew and developed. I find that quite an impressive quality to get into ones work.

Environments:

While I would have included many of the above for my favourite environment artists, I have a new favourite to include as well:

Oliver NePaul Wilson: The use of vibrant colours and quick strokes get movement into the landscape, and there is an fantastic use of colour to indicate emotion and theme in his work. A recent discovery, but a golden one, nonetheless.

Tech and Vehicles:

Doug Chiang: I actually have a book of 'Robota' Illustrated by Chiang, that I didn't realise was the same artist. Good one, Hannah. Anyway, his work is impressive when it comes to tech because it is possible to imagine or even see how each of the creatons would work, just through a sketch. The delicate and precise lines show the quality of technical drawings or blue prints for technology that actually could be created, but is far more imaginative and vibrant than anything that already exists, or probably ever could.

Thanks for sticking with me, That should be enough writing for a little while, don't you think?

I'll got some more art up in the next couple of days.

CHEERS PALS!

A Matter of Principle:

Now, this is more for me than anyone else. So if this is amazingly boring, please do forgive me. I need to document everything I need to do, and put it somewhere I won't lose it. 'The internet!' I thought, 'Nothing ever gets lost there! Not even stuff on Facebook!' (Which is scary if you ask me.) Anyway. Here is my to do list;


Portfolio:

• Characters – Show personality and story through the character, pose, colour, costume etc.
  
• Costumes – Shows characters personality and history.
• Creatures – Use the research of animal and human anatomy to create realistic creatures that make sense anatomically but that are still interesting.
  
• Environments – Perspective, architecture, design, geographic and historic influences, fantasy and sci-fi. Interior and Exterior, Natural and Manmade.
  
• Tech – Be able to show how things are put together.
• Vehicles – Important -
• WORK IN DIFFERENT STYLES: Realism, Cartoon, Stylised, Painterly, Sketch, etc.

FIND ARTISTS and websites that are similar, work to references and save them.

• Dissertation: (4000 words)
• The Video Game Theory Reader
• Persuasive Games - The Expressive Power of Video Games
  
• ‘Win together, lose together, play together, stay together.’ An examination of literature related to the differences between player and character relationship in customizable and non-customizable games.
  
  Branch out into:
• How players customise thier characters
• Why non-customisable characters are made the way they are for their audiences.
• DO MORE READING.
  
  Life Drawing:
• Take photos of pieces and create booklet.

Okay I'm pretty sure that's all I need for now. I think if I think of more I'll come back and add it on.

Wow that's quite a bit. That's okay. I think I'll focus on creatures, tech and environments. They're what interest me the most. It's just a matter of getting a good amount done in the next two months.

CALENDER:
Week 1 (8th March): Animals - Finish sketches.
Week 2 (15th March): Environments - Pencil and Photoshop paintings. Natural and Manmade.
Week 3(22nd March): Environments - 2 main paintings adapted to fantasy and schi-fi.
Week 4 (29th March): Tech/Vehicles - Experiment with sketches and how things are put together.
Week 5 (5th April): Finalise some sketches of weaponary, etc.
Week 6 (12th April): Dissertation/Life drawing.
Week 7 (19th April): Dissertation/Life drawing.
Week 8 (26th April): Finish off all unfinished work, make website.
Week 9 (3rd May): Hand-in Week.

I will probably swap all of these around in real life, but hopefully this should... be okay. Time to get a wriggle on and get stuck in.

Thanks for the ramble, guys.

Yours sincerely,

Hannah.

Zoodles:

Does what it says on the title. My favourite bit of the zoo was the penguins and the fossa. And lunch. Lunch was really good.
I could have laid this out better really, but I just wanted to get all of the little sketches together.
I will have some more detailed drawings tomorrow.
I need to make a plan of everything I need to do as well. I'll do that in a sec.

And yes that is one of my hairs on some of the scans. I am so classy.

Life Drawing 3:

Okay, so I did actually post this but apparently I didn't. I did though. Imagine that this is between 'Life Drawing 2' and 'Life Drawing 4'. Yeah.

Getting Through The Block:

I think I probably need to stop drawing random people now and actually do some real work.
Thing to do next: Faces and bodies from interesting positions/poses - Including both people and different types of animals.

Life Drawing 4:

Megan Andrews, Rita McCarthy and Peter McCarthy.
I thought I would try and draw me and my twin sister to see if I can get the differences between us in the drawings, but I haven't drawn me yet. I will at some point. And I drew my grandparents for my mum.