DSG: 1439

Latest Daily Sketch Group topic: Seasonal/Lovecraftian • CTHULHU STANDS IN FOR SANTA CLAUS. I must admit I'm not really a big fan of the whole Santa thing, but Cthulhu is another matter so this topic was fun. Go Tentacles!

Colour Choices

One of a few speedpaints I did to try and pin the background composition and colour for the cover of my ongoing .pdf Dragonlance project. My usual love for muted browns are there but I played around a little and added touches of cool purple and warmer, slightly more saturated pinks. A subtle change, but one that marks the begining of my growing fondness of exploring complimentary (but very subtle) colours that absolutely do not appear in the reference photo.

I intend to add a figure on the crevice to the left fighting off an airborne creature to the right before I start refining, but looking at the speedie now, I have distinctly different feelings about the image than I had when I started. Even subtle colour changes seem to be exasperatingly devastating (in a positive way) to my initial subconcious reactions to the picture. Hmm...

Tentacles

Great character... shame about the film.

Shiny Things

Having a go at painting shiny surfaces on my DS. I was really drawn to the orange on this bike.

Growth Rate

An afternoon walk provided me with a visual update on the state of a spot of land currently being reclaimed by mother nature. The rate at which moss and weeds take advantage of cracks and crevices on reclaimed land is very pleasing. It inspired me to have a little fun with a photo of a street in Kobe City, Japan.

The cool thing about many Japanese residential streets is how the citizens seem to love putting plant containers on every available surface, so you already get a feeling of how things would be given time.

FFVII: MP

I booted up Final Fantasy VII (again) last week as I was feeling rather ill, and needed a familiar comfort zone to take my mind off the amorphous mass of thick, heavy snot that seemed to be in a constant state of mutation inside my head. It's rather amusing to look back on the times in my life when I thaught I had the flu. Now that I have actually had a good solid dose of the real mccoy (including the inability to walk properly for a few days) I see the error in my judgement. The distinction between a bad cold and a case of flu couldn't be clearer.

Cold = poor mans influenza

Anyway, playing FFVII again gave me the incentive to do a spot of fan art - complete with bad shoulderpad placement to throw the anatomy way off. Hey, I was ill damnit!

Doorway

Desert

Gotta love desert texture and colours.

Project Sketches

At the moment I am working on a little fan project for the Dragonlance community which I hope to release as a 32 page .pdf document sometime in the new year. Many Dragonlance fans like to contribute new D&D gaming rules for monsters, spells, characters etc... I myself am not a gamer but I did enjoy reading all the old campaign sourcebooks when I was younger, so I figured I'd have a go at writing some fluff and expanding an area of the world which was only briefly touched upon in the official releases.

Obviously I don't want to be posting finished paintings for the project (at least not until the .pdf is released), but I figured the odd sketchbook page wouldn't hurt...

Rock Formation

Another quick DS study.

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Girl In Hat

Quick DS speedpaint before snooze.

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...And Again!

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Bleh... Again!

More lunchtime nonsense.

A Stiff Westerly Breeze!

Autumn is most certainly here and, although many people openly comment on (may even genuinly enjoy) the gorgeous red and gold hues that are on show, I have rarely come across someone who enjoys a good old dose of chill wind 'givin' it stacks' about the place. Many women (from my personal observations) seem to view wind (even a mild breeze) as something almost daemonic. Anything that messes with the hair is inherently evil. Maybe that's why they seem to be so easily offended by the humble fart.

It is a well known fact that every man is born with an intuitive appreciation of the fart - from the most serious executive 'suit' down to the average schoolboy renegade. The study of male chromosome structures within DNA have confirmed what we all knew was true from the first time a fart was 'delt' during a gathering of peoples - probably in a confined space like a cave. Let's face it, farts are good... and chill winds that blast the smell of rotten leaves into your face (no puns here) are almost as good!

All this has little to do with the above sketchbook page (as you already know if you were bored enough to read the sketch-scrawl) so I'll stop right here.

Dragons... Again!

Another DS speedie during lunch. And another dragon.

Forklift

The forklift driver did a runner while I was paining this so I ended up having to finish it from memory.

DS_043

Back on the DS tonight. I'm still in love with this little gem of a handheld. :)
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'To Do' Lists

My recent spate of Dragonlance sketches turned out to be a great way to motivate me (now that I have more free time) into going down my 'to do' list and getting things done and ticked off. I finally got off my arse and finished an illustration I posted as a speedpaint many months ago, and have been trying to convince myself that the finished painting is an improvement. I'm not doing a very good job of it.

Anyway, no time to dwell as I still have 3 more to finish.

Sketch-dump

More characters from the book I'm reading. I did want to do a sketch of every character or creature mentioned, but at the moment the dragon count is around 20 so I think I'll just stick to the main ones.

Dragons

Dragons of good and evil.

Ogres

Two quick Ogre character sketches.

Dragon Shapes

I recently baught a batch of old Dragonlance novels and started reading them last night. I thaught it would be fun to do some sketches of characters and scenes as I read, but for now here's some quick dragon shapes I did during lunch to get me in the mood.

Lunchtime Doodles

Bleh...

DS Dump

A dump of Nintendo DS Colors! speedpaints... Bleh!

DSG_1407

Latest Daily Sketch Group topic: Sci-fi • Insect-Like Robot Has Both Mechanical + Organic Looking Components.

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Sleepyhead

As well as doing sketches as a warm up exercise to engage the brain, I sometimes (oddly enough) also sketch to wind down at night when I don't feel tired enough to go to sleep. This probably works becouse I find drawing to be very calming... most of the time. Maybe it has something to do with focusing brain activity or something?

Whatever the reason, I didn't feel sufficiently sleepy tonight so I hit the pencils again. Hence the double post.

Edit: Oops. I forgot it's Friday already. ;-)

1930's Construction Workers

109

I'm digging out my graphics tablet tonight and doing some painting. I did this sketch as a warm up. Let's just leave it at that and say no more.

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Oddities

Beggar

I was looking through a collection of travel photos from India and came across a rather interesting picture of a deformed begger. What drew my attention the most was his use of a flipflop to aid in movement. He also had the most amazing hair. I played with the reference a little and added more fantastical elements - particularly his stomach.

SP_018_Lemnos

A speedpaint from a photo of ruins on the Greek island of Lemnos.

I'm not sure about the purpose of the ruins, but Hephaestus seems to have been "givin' it large" on the island at some point in history, so maybe it is part of a temple in his honour. Whatever the subject, I was drawn to the photo becouse of the beautiful rusty colours and the dark brooding sky on the horizon. There's something magical about the rocky earth and gnarly windswept costal colours of the Greek Isles that I just go dizzy over.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I live in England where - despite most residents seeming to think this "green and pleasant land" is nothing more than a whimsical, nostalgic view of our country - there still seems to be vast tracts of quaint fields, hedgerows, tiny winding lanes and beautiful little villages built from local stone (Google Earth flyover anyone?). Okay, the "pleasant" bit might be pushing the boat out (so to speak) when it comes to numerous areas, but there still seems to be a preference for overtly lush greenery in many parts. I think that is why I love the look of more hardy, arid landscapes - and probably why I love the local heathers and gorse bushes the most.

DSG_1393

Another Daily Sketch Group (DSG) theme: Sci-Fi Sleek White Paramedic Hover-Bot. Partial fail due to the back end and not really putting across the idea that it is there to help... looks kinda nasty.

DSG_1391

Current topic for a daily sketch group: Creature • Hunched, Barrel-chested, Extra-limbed, Teeth-gnashing Abomination.

Telecom I

A quick speedie I managed to squeeze in. God, I can't wait for my holiday and some serious down time.

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Bladerunner: The Inevitable Post!

Lack of recent posts has been due to my horrible ability of attracting mountainous workloads by simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time... with the wrong sort of mentality! Never the less, I found myself waking up this morning with the destinct feeling that the day was all mine - to fritter away as I pleased - with a stiff two finger salute to anyone (even loved ones) who may try to incur on my self-indulgence! I spent my day, wisely I might add, watching Ridley Scott's Bladerunner (again) and finished off the afternoon with a few speedpaints and a long soak in the bath.

Anyway, here's a few speedies from my latest Bladerunner session. 'Twas inevitable that I turn to this film at some point in this sketch-blog.