Septembre 1.2000
I put up a new Title, which is (surprisingly) not videogame-related.
Maybe next time I'll have Dusk as Ulala. ;)
This Title, like the pic of the week, is pen and ink and watercolour.
I felt like drawing Niru again since I hadn't drawn him in what seemed
like forever. The previous CG of him was the last time I'd drawn him! So,
here, from a top-down perspective, he looks rather pathetic and a bit too
young and short. I threw the background in last, without any plan whatsoever;
it's Atéo, not that it matters. This is 50% of its working size.
September 8.2000
This week's CG has a pleasant pink background and is 70% of its working
size. This picture was slightly more difficult than last week's since I
have 2 characters in it. It's in my recent style but just a bit more refined.
I looked at Rachel's last picture and boy, that was terrible...This one's
not that much improved but I can at least claim some incremental advances...
Ein and Rachel were drawn on separate canvases, then merged into the
same pic. Of course, Rachel ought to be angled more towards the camera
but I failed in that endeavour.
The BG is pink just because I didn't want another white BG... ^_^;
September 15.2000
I have attempted to draw in a different style, namely a more realistic
one. I don't know how well I succeeded. It's Kim as I've never drawn her
before. I have also returned to pencils and watercolour, rather than pens.
This is 100% of its working size.
September 22.2000
Hmm. The more I look at last week's, the less I like it. ~_~
This week, we have Rhyme's second picture. For some reason, I always,
always draw her exceptionally poorly. This is actually one of my better
attempts but still, not so pleasing to the eye. I'm still working with
pencil/watercolour. Still trying to figure out just how much of her bust
you're supposed to be able to see from that angle and the hand? Oh, yikes.
I was getting depressed this week because there are so many excellent
CG artists out there who can create images with a simplistic style but
they still look marvellous. On the other hand, my style lacks definition
and doesn't look any better as a result. :\ Anyway, 75% size. It's a little
better than last week's mainly because I spent a lot more time on it.
September 29.2000
Well, here we go again. Rachel never quite looks girly enough when
I draw her, which irritates me to no end. It's a conscious decision to
give her loose clothing and all but I cannot manage to convince the viewer
that the subject in question is in fact, a girl. Well...
2B pencil and watercolour. I tried really, really hard to use coloured
pencils but they completely annihilated my lines, even with very light
colours, so that was a no-go. 100% scaling. As for angles, I tried really
hard to get her left leg to work but it doesn't. The over-lap of the sword
(foreground) took a great deal of effort because I can't sketch around
something like that and I didn't want to have to resketch (the whole thing's
a sketch, isn't it?) the sword.
I rather like her eyes. :}
October 6.2000
I had a rotten lousy week, so I decided a nice picture of Dawn and
Atéo would help. And it didn't really. But it's a nice, friendly
picture. This week, we pulled out Poser 4 and posed the whole picture...feet
on the floor, fingers in position (even Atéo's!) and as little impossible
posing as possible. After that, I traced the image in Painter Classic,
then traced that one and touched it up to give me linework (2B pencil).
After that, I greyscaled and posterized my reference pic down to 1 level
and used that as a colouring guide. It's kind of odd but I have more realistical
shadows this time around. Not surprisingly, this picture was very simple
to draw once it was posed. However, I have lost some of the perspective.
That's why her hands look huge. Since the picture is mostly traced, it
shouldn't be very surprising.
October 13.2000
I spent an unusually long time sitting around trying to come up with
a picture idea. I didn't find one, so I just drew Crys. This is far better
than my last attempt at her (8/11/00). The picture appears at 70% of its
working size. My major complaint is that because I started the picture
as a very very sketchy one and then cleaned it way up, I failed to clean
up everything. The seam on her jeans is just plain wrong. I also
have little idea how one's hands look like in one's pockets. I think that's
close...
I tried to make her a little more mature and started by elongating the
picture. Fortunately, I stopped working on the picture for a while, cleared
my mind, and when I came back, I saw she was just horribly, horribly stretched.
I think I'd better take a break between conception and execution every
time, in order to get a better perspective. As it is, the really zoomed
out pictures often lead me to find size and proportion mistakes I don't
quite notice when I'm working on the picture at 100%+ magnification. Looking
at the thumbnail, something seems amiss but I can't quite place it.
But...she looks like a girl, right? Yes? That's what I was aiming for.
(No one else has this problem, do they? ~_~ )
October 20.2000
This is the fastest I've done a CG, so of course, it's not gonna look
all that great. It was mostly an excuse to have lots of varied colours
on the canvas, rather than to actually portray a realistic sunset...I simply
haven't that much skill. After sketching for maybe all of 10 minutes, it
got coloured and then I convinced myself I ought to have given her a much
shorter neck. Oops. It looked okay at the time.
October 27.2000
Today, I have used a new technique called "backdating." Although it
is actually Sunday, I'm pretending it's not since this is the10/27/00 picture.
I really started it on 10/27 and did a lot of work on 10/28. It took a
bit longer than I imagined, since I worked at a much higher resolution
than normal. This picture is 33% of its working size. I know some CG artists
work at much higher resolutions than that but this took long enough as
it is. I think the end result is much better, though, since I also worked
much slower. I could have rushed it out on 10/27 as I sometimes do but
this time, I took my time and kept checking and rechecking the size and
proportions on zoomed views. But at a point, I realized I could be working
on this indefinitely...So, I stopped. I just couldn't adjust Jason properly
to fit into the background and his "shadow" has been completely screwed
up as a result. It was merely scrunched while I kept shifting his legs,
so that's why it is completely impossible. (I hadn't noticed, even while
colouring?!) Or maybe it's not so hopelessly wrong...I keep changing my
opinion. Anyway...Jason is pretty non-dynamic, isn't he? I spent a lot
of time working on Aeyar, trying not to make her so hulking while tending
towards a taller, more feminine look. That shows in the choice of pose,
doesn't it? ^_^; I tried a new light source, too. So, now it's entirely
top down. Not that I really know how lights work. ~_~ But it looks nice
overall, doesn't it? Nicer than usual, anyway. Colouring was sketchy to
match with the sketchy linework. One of these days, I'll figure out how
to control the sytlus for nice clean lines, I hope...
November 3.2000
Once again, it's actually the 6th! O_O I should be asleep! Picture
was created 11/4 and 11/5. I finished shortly before midnight...
The picture here is 25% of its working size. Because of that,
I spent an extraordinary amount of time on it. I think colouring it was
2 hours alone! I apologize that the file is so large but since this is
¼ size, just imagine...My .RIFFs are 7.62MB for the lines and 24.5MB
for the coloured version! This is the largest file I've ever created in
Painter. The previous one was that really big, unlined Kain picture. For
reference, last week's was only 6.12MB, coloured.
I had lots of problems with Kim's pose. Since she's squatting a little,
all of the angles are weird. I didn't spend quite so much time on shading
this week. If you'll notice, I actually put Kim's shirt-sleeves on in a
more realistic fashion. As for the angles of her torso and shoulder, I
kept fiddling with them until I finally just said "DO IT!" and it turned
out...okay.
Zach's leather jacket is based off Ryo from Shenmue's jacket.
I just looked at the wallpapers they have available to download and approximated.
As a result, I gave him a purple shirt instead of a white one. (Since Ryo's
is white, Zach's had to be coloured.) Why purple? If you notice, all the
other primary and secondary colours are represented...Also, Zach doesn't
really have a CD. I merely drew a generic guy with a slight grin.
The poses are very stiff 'cause I'm really not used to such giant resolutions.
I had to keep zooming out to check size and proportions. I also horizontally
flipped the picture quite a lot in order to check my lines. While the end
result is not perfect, it's still a LOT better than the original conception
(now lost forever. Heh heh heh...).
Background? Are you kidding me?
November 10.2000
Dawn fought against someone and he slashed her left arm so badly that
she dropped her sword. If you didn't know, Dawn is right-handed.
This picture was done rather quickly and is presented here at 100%
size for no very good reason. 2B pencil and Felt Marker.
November 17.2000
This picture was just for fun. Jäne has no idea what Thanksgiving
is and is completely lost. :} A little picture, this is 100% working size.
November 24.2000
A gag picture, this was done in perhaps as much as half an hour. It's
shown 50% of its working size.
