Tag: Brush

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Fixing mistakes as I go along! Mermaid Painting Process

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Okay, this was a really enjoyable commission I did at the end of last year.  I know it’s not always possible, but it’s great when a client gives you free range to do what you want.  Even more so when you can trust they aren’t going to ask you to change the final thing!

The client was after a painting somewhat along the lines of this Alphonse Mucha style Lucy the Octopus strip…
2015-06-03-150… but it needed to be an A2 size picture in watercolour and ink rather than ink and then Photoshop colour of the Lucy strip.

I didn’t have too long to get the painting done, due to other commitments, so just dived in with some quick ideas in my sketchbook…
Mermaid-Blog-01-Idea Mermaid-Blog-02-Rough-PlanNext I was on to the pencils…Mermaid-Blog-03-Pencils Mermaid-Blog-04-Pencils Mermaid-Blog-05-Pencils Mermaid-Blog-06-PencilsThen inking with a brush…Mermaid-Blog-08-Inks Mermaid-Blog-09-Inks Mermaid-Blog-10-Inks Mermaid-Blog-11-InksThen I got out the old sharpie and marked out frame borders on my drawing board. Easy as… OH €£@*!  I’VE DRAWN A LINE RIGHT THROUGH THE MERMAID’S HAIR!!!!
This is a DISASTER!  I can’t click undo like on Photoshop, and I can’t tippex over it as that will mess up the watercolour when I lay that down!  AAARRRRGGGGHHH!Mermaid-Blog-12-mistakeFortunately, I’ve done the painting on nice thick watercolour paper, which means with a stanley knife I can scrape off the top layer of paper … Mermaid-Blog-13-mistake… and get rid of the black line!
It certainly leaves a dent but hopefully, by the time I add watercolour no one will notice!
Mermaid-Blog-14-mistake Mermaid-Blog-15-InksSo back to the inking, mainly with a brush but also with a bit of drawing pen…Mermaid-Blog-16-Inks Mermaid-Blog-17-Inks Mermaid-Blog-18-Inks Mermaid-Blog-19-Inks Mermaid-Blog-20-Inks Mermaid-Blog-21-Inks Mermaid-Blog-22-InksTime to erase the pencils… Mermaid-Blog-23-eraseAdd a quick plaster to my finger which has a blister from so much inking… Mermaid-Blog-24-blisterA few final details with a fine pen…Mermaid-Blog-25-Finished-InksThen I lay down the watercolours…Mermaid-Blog-26-watercolourI’m using some new liquid watercolours, and everything’s going fine.  Right?Mermaid-Blog-27-watercolourAll going swimmingly (no pun intended)… Yep.  No problems here!Mermaid-Blog-28-a-watercolourOH €£@*!  Who am I kidding?  I’ve done the blue borders way too dark! 
It’s a general rule of thumb with watercolour to build up the lighter tones first, then work up in layers to the stronger richer tones, BUT I’VE LEFT MYSELF WITH NOWHERE TO GO!
Mermaid-Blog-28-things-go-wrongDrastic action is required!
I take an army of wet Q-tips and try to remove the blue…Mermaid-Blog-29-things-go-wrongIt barely makes a difference… Mermaid-Blog-30-things-go-wrongI carry on adding other colours in denial.Mermaid-Blog-31-things-go-wrong Mermaid-Blog-32-things-go-wrong Mermaid-Blog-33-things-go-wrongBut in the end, I get out the gouache paint!  Unlike the translucent watercolours, gouache is opaque so I can go over the blue frames with a paler greyer blue tone.
It takes a couple of hours but worth it to save the painting!  The eye is now drawn away from the frame to the more important stuff in the picture!
HOORAY!  JOB DONE!  Mermaid-Blog-34-things-go-wrong Mermaid-Blog-35-things-go-wrong Mermaid-Blog-36-watercolour Mermaid-Blog-37-watercolour Mermaid-Blog-38-watercolourNow I try a new trick!  Using masking tape I make little star shapes to mask the next layer of watercolour.Mermaid-Blog-39-masking-tape-trickAfter it’s dry, I carefully peel off the tape to reveal lovely little stars below.  It works pretty well…Mermaid-Blog-40-masking-tape-trickBut OH €£@*!  The tape has ripped some of the painting.  PROBLEM NUMBER THREE! Mermaid-Blog-41-masking-tape-trickBut a quick touch up with drawing pen and watercolour and all is well! Mermaid-Blog-42-masking-tape-trickAll done, and the client will never know all the issues I had attempting to bring this thing to life (unless I write them all out in a blog).Mermaid-Blog-44-Finish

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Evolution of an Anthology Cover: Tempo Lush Tales Cover Process with Darker Chi Lynch

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So designing the cover for an anthology’s a tricky thing.  Do you focus on an image representing one of the stories inside, or make reference to all of them?  What was I going to put on the front of Tempo Lush Tales that would encompass what the book’s about and make people want to pick it up?

After researching other anthologies (both comics and regular ol’ wordy books) I settled on trying to get an overall vibe of the collection across in a single image.  There’s a variety of styles in the book from dark satire to softer sweetness so I hoped to come up with something that would bridge common ground of all the ideas in the book without focusing on any specific story or character.

I wanted something that showed something of this Earth but with a fantastical twist – something like a flying whale!  This was the perfect image but far from original – a quick google of the term brings all sorts up, plus I was already a fan of the whale sequence from Disney’s wonderful Fantasia 2000, so didn’t want to ape that.

I considered all sorts of flying objects and animals – very hard to find something that hadn’t already been done.  I eventually tried playing with the concept of giant flying pineapples.  See my early messing around with the idea on Photoshop below…

tlt-cover-blog-01Even as a very rough depiction of the idea, it wasn’t quite gelling for me.  I had plenty of other work to be getting on with so I put the cover aside for a few weeks.

As the deadline for the release of the book was closing in, I turned to artist and designer, Darker Chi Lynch, to see if she could do better than my own attempts.

She was smart and tried quickly getting down on paper loads of possible directions the cover could take, based on talking through my concept for the collection with me…
tlt-cover-blog-02We both kind of liked the cubes and the big eye thing.  Darker tried playing with the cubes…tlt-cover-blog-03…but didn’t feel it was quite right for the project.  It was a little mathematical and we needed something more organic. tlt-cover-blog-04The eye definitely seemed the way to go.  We talked about the concept of having the eye in the knots or the rings of a tree trunk…tlt-cover-blog-05Suddenly things were clicking.

When you cut a tree down you can count the rings of the trunk and tell how many years it had lived for.  We liked the idea of the eye being a spirit from within the tree, able to tell not only how old the tree was but many more stories.
It also made sense that cutting the tree down releases those stories, as paper from the tree would is turned into pages delivering stories to a reader.

Darker did a mock-up on Photoshop of a potential cover, which was pretty close to the final result – it just needed polishing.tlt-cover-blog-06It was helpful to see the colours she envisioned at this stage.

A tree happened to have been cut down in front of a neighbour’s drive.  I sent photos to Darker for inspiration.tlt-cover-blog-07She got out her brushes and ink and went to work on the trunk image for the cover as well as the stars hung up with string.tlt-cover-blog-08 She had a few stabs at the title text and the central eye…
tlt-cover-blog-09She did multiple eyes after we discussed using them as part of the interior design of the book too.  We hadn’t decided what would go where yet or which eye would make it on to the cover.tlt-cover-blog-10Darker combined the new art with the colours and textures of her earlier Photoshop rough.  She tweaked the title lettering a little, making it white with a shadow to really make it stand out.tlt-cover-blog-11And there you have it.  Thanks very much to Darker Chi Lynch – hope I can work with her again!

You can get hold of a copy of Tempo Lush Tales here!

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The Making of my Big 75 Animals Pic

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As I’m just sorting out a print of my Big 75 animals pic (available to buy here), I thought I’d show my process of it.  I wanted to do a landscape full of animals and after stirring my brain with a spoon for a while I decided to sort the animals according to where they might be found.

  • Sky
  • Mountains
  • Trees
  • Land
  • Underground
  • Water

The basic idea in mind, I began doing a whole of preparatory sketches of the various animals I would like to use.  Some didn’t seem to work and therefore didn’t make the final image (sorry meerkats).

Generally I redrew each animal from my sketches for the final piece, but in the case of the sea otter below, I was happy with my sketch so I actually traced it on to the final work.

Liberties with scale and geography were taken in favour of composition!

After a rough plan I worked on the final piece in pencil on A2 paper.

Click image to view at larger size

Then on to Inking, using 3 & 4 Pro Arte Prolene brushes, a dip pen and Daler Rowney FW Black ink…

After a while I noticed my brushes were a little worn.  The inking around the gorilla and yak are a bit muddy.
So I went out and bought some nice new brushes to complete the job.

I decided to add a cricket on the far right tree.  Just felt like it needed this to balance the composition.

I messed up the lion’s toes a bit.

Click image to view at larger size

On to colouring. I planned to work in watercolour (my really old set of watercolours to be precise) and limit my colour palette.  I chose my colours by using the hi-tech method of painting little rectangles of the potentials on a sketch book page then covering up ones with little bits of paper until I’m left with a pleasing combination.

I also marked the colours in my watercolour set with little bits of post-its, coz I’m more than likely to forget which ones to use otherwise.

The ink I used was waterproof so it doesn’t run when adding the paint.

Down goes the first layer of watercolours.

Building up the colours.  Somehow I managed to spill a couple of drops of blank ink on the larger turtle.

At some point I had to tone down the colour of the underground tunnels by removing some of the brown with wet cotton buds.  There’s no Undo with watercolours.

After scanning the complete work into Photoshop, I touched up the spilled ink on the turtle and the lion’s feet goof up… and we’re done!

Click image to view at larger size

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Portrait & Life Part 1: Ink Portraits

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After I unveiled my David Lynch themed comic, a couple of friends were surprised at the art-style.  Not my usual more cartoony work.  Please note I do not use “cartoony” as a negative adjective as some people do.

I’m definitely being influenced by taking some Portrait & Life classes over the last half a year or so.  First time I’ve done Life drawing since Art College, where frankly I never really appreciated it.

It’s great to sit, observe and just draw or paint, not worrying about story, character or context.  The techniques learnt have crept into my comic and illustration work.

Ink wash Portrait 16.1.12

Hmmm… maybe the eyes on the face below do look cartoony, but as I say, that’s not a negative in itself so I don’t care!

Ink wash Portrait Face 16.1.12

Ink wash Portrait 13.12.11

I’ll post some more pics from my Portrait & Life sessions soon!