So, this Christmas was pretty much like most previous Christmases. I got practically nothing productive done besides taking care of my holiday shopping and making sure that my house was clean enough to pass my dad's inspections. It's become sort of a tradition now that I make something small for each of the relatives I visit on Christmas... nothing fancy, just a small sketch or painting - in this case, it was small watercolor paintings of poinsettias.



Again, nothing too fancy, but I was fairly pleased with how most of them turned out, and the rellies seemed to enjoy them, so I will consider my endeavor a success!
Now, if only I could find work >_<

I used the Graffiti feature for the first time tonight. I figured, what better way to get back into painting via tablet than to practice with a medium that doesn't allow me to get nit-picky.
I think it came out rather well.. I really wanted to do more with it - especially with adding a few more darker tones and fixing the background, but I started having problems with my stylus, and eventually gave into frustration. I am also confused as to why on earth the final image looks as it should, but when I replay the video, a line appears out of nowhere!
Ah well, that's what you get for using a facebook app I suppose :)

Tree Spirit

So, it's been a while since I posted much of anything here. It isn't because I haven't done anything recently, just that I haven't done anything worth sharing in a while. I'm going to start tackling a new 3d project next week - an environment - so we'll see how that goes. Then I may take a stab at Dave G's first 129 project, although, I've never been particularly fond of self-portraits. Or perhaps I'll make a portrait of someone else... tho, portraits of recognizable people are quite difficult to do well. I'm still working out concepts for a possible character to model in the future. So I'd like to present yet another stab at the "tree spirit" character. I like this concept, but may abandon it for an option that would provide more variety in textures - although I would love to try creating a realistic tree texture- which is why I've gone in this direction :)
The background to this image is a result of some Mucha inspired color studies I did earlier this week- since I feel like my color sense could use some improvement. The color in this image isn't particularly amazing, but I'm still working it out and this isn't really at a finished level yet.
Anyways, without further ado...

Any and all comments are appreciated!

random sketchness

So, it's been a while since I posted anything up here.. and to be honest, it's been a while since I've done anything worth posting.
But, I figured it's about time to start up again. I'm playing with an idea for my next modeling project. I started doing some sketches the other day of a sort of wood-nymph type character - a tree spirit of sorts. I haven't really gotten very far with this yet, but I figured I could post up one of my quick sketches just because.
Now, this is nowhere near being a complete drawing/painting. It's really still in the ideation stage, and I'm thinking now that I might go more into a bonsai sort of shape and feel- since they offer a lot in terms of interesting shape and form. For now, I give you my earliest sketch - again, not a masterpiece, just an idea.

I wasn't happy with this sketch at all.. I felt that I was being too stereotypical and, in a very me way, making it too pretty and perfect-looking, so I did a quick painting over it. Nothin fancy, after all, this probably isn't even close to the design I'll actually end up with in the end. Anyways, on with the show!

and just for kicks, a sketch of a real tree! This was the day I realized that painting on one's computer outdoors is not the greatest... the colors definitely looked different outside o_O oh well.

It's been way too long since I painted with you, Photoshop! I need more practice. Hopefully I'll be getting into more of these sketches soon.

I submit here for your approval, all of the work I've been doing for the past two months! I was participating in the "massive art challenge online" known as Dominance War
For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, I essentially had 2 months to design, model, and texture a character based on the assigned story and criteria. I won't go into all the boring details, but rather show you the product of all my labors :)

My character is called Zyphire. Her design is inspired by a wasp (a small creature that has always terrified me). Like a wasp, her size isn't intimidating, nor is her spindly stature, but her Glaive can deliver quite a "sting" (how horrible was that??)
But yes! Without further ado, here is my work, as submitted to the competition!

Hey all,
I'm posting again, isn't it amazing?
So, I've been working lately on my concept for Dominance War IV.
Her name (tentatively) is Zyphire, and she is an amazonian Wasp, Stalker class. I'm still working out the details, but her weapon will somewhat resemble the stinger of a wasp (which is in fact barbed on the ends and quite scary-looking) and will be either a hand-held gauntlet style weapon or a long-range glaive (because I have a weird love for glaives). The weapon will basically have the added affect of, very much like a wasps sting, spreading a numbing poison throughout an enemy's system, slowing and weakening them (unfortunately ineffective against the machine race).
While I have the generalities nailed down, I'm still working out her silhouette and coloring. Thus, I have thumbnails to show!
any suggestions or comments would be awesomely helpful :)

this first piece is the initial idea sketch I came up with...
not the final, just the starting point


that's all for now, but there's more to come!
these are my recent ideations/silhouettes... any thoughts as to which ones are working?