Character Design: Sergio

Here is a sketch I did with a Japanese Brush Pen and colored in Corel Painter. I just love the painterly quality and hand painted feel you can only achieve in Painter -- or by painting the thing traditionally.

New Sketches for a New Year

Happy 2016! 

I thought I'd start off the New Year with some new sketches. These were all done in pursuit of a permanent style for my upcoming Wandering Koala web comic. I've made a couple attempts at it with a couple of different blogs, but neither of them excited me like I wanted them to, so here's hoping third time is the charm.

The sketch above was actually done on New Year's Day. I drew it with a Japanese Brush Pen and then colored it in both Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter. I've tried a lot of different programs, but nothing gives you a truly painterly feel like Corel Painter. Adobe keeps trying, but it still looks and feels so digital, which isn't a bad thing, it's just not what I'm going for.

 These next two sketches were drawn in what I call my "combo brush". Basically I ink the figure with a Zebra disposable brush pen and then go over it with my Japanese Brush Pen to give it texture and grit. The background was also inked with the brush pen. I used a pattern effect in Photoshop to tone the image. I know it's retro, but there is something I just love about those thin mechanically-produced hatching lines. The color version was colored in Adobe Photoshop. I'm thinking of running it thru Corel Painter like the illustration above to make it look more painterly. While I approached both illustrations with the same basic technique, there is something so much more "painterly" about the above illustration.

As always, let me know what you think!

Art Philosophy - Thoughts on Style

It's amazing what a difference style makes to a work. One can use the same drawing technique and basic design approach and yet come up with three completely different looks that almost appear to be from three different people all because of a change in style.

Style has a huge influence on a work. It it the first thing that the viewer notices. It's a close tie between style and subject for the major reason someone is drawn into a work. A unique enough style can even cover up a multitude of artistic blunders and weaknesses, at least for a short time.

And yet style also puts a work into a pigeon hole which both creates and limits the audience and potential uses for a work. Ironic.

The three illustrations above were all drawn with different tools and colored with different programs in different styles. My overall drawing style still pulls them together as being done by me because it is pretty strong and distinct, and yet there is some nice variety and experimentation going on.

Which do you like best?

Color Theory: How many colors should one use?

It doesn't take an eagle eye to spot the differences between the two illustrations above. One is colored with blue and the other is full color. So, which one is better? Which one is right? That's not an easy question to answer.

Color has been a part of art since the first work of art was created. Throughout history, its use has largely been dictated by the technology. Oil painters were limited to whatever colors they could make and mix with the materials they could find. Printers were limited to whatever colors their presses could produce, first just black and then slowly adding more and more colors until full color was feasible.

Today artists have more options available than ever. With that blessing comes a curse--too many colors to choose from. It's caused many artists to become lazy. During times when color is limited, one has to think and design much more carefully about how to render the work. This extra thought and effort shows thru and is one reason why old illustrations hold up so well. But when every color under the rainbow is available, some people are like kids in a candy shop and make themselves sick eating too much (and the viewer as well).

The advantage of the first illustration with a monochromatic scheme (blue plus black and white so technically there are three colors) is its simplicity. It's easier to read and communicates more clearly, because there are fewer colors to distract the viewer. Also, black and white art has the advantage of being visual text in that people can more easily read it like they read black and white text. That's one reason the black and white daily comic strips in newspapers are so effective, they clearly communicate the concept. The disadvantage is it isn't as pretty and therefore not as eye catching. It requires more effort from the viewer to notice and appreciate. Of course, that usually leads to a higher caliber of viewer.

The advantage of the second is it is prettier and attracts more attention. The disadvantage is there is so much going on that the message isn't as clear. Sometimes that isn't a problem when the message is a feeling or emotion conveyed largely thru the colors.

To decide which color scheme you should use, you need to first determine the purpose of the art work and who you want to see it. (You should probably consider how the final product will be delivered as technology will dictate your options, but you should consider that at the beginning when initially conceptualizing the work.)

Before & After - A Great Kick

 

 On the left the original hand drawn artwork inked with a Japanese Brush Pen for the ongoing eSerial at WanderingKoalaTales.blogspot.com.

On the right the finished illustration colored in Corel Painter.

I think they both turned out spectacularly well. What do you think?

World Building

 

One of the great things about fiction is the ability to create imaginary worlds. (And if you saw the last State of the Union address, you'll note imaginary worlds aren't limited to fiction.) Fiction gives both the author and the reader the opportunity to explore worlds that don't exist but wouldn't it be wonderful if they did? One can travel thru time, space, and cross any dimension and explore the many 'what ifs' that one could come up with.

German Expressionist films of the 1920s were especially groundbreaking in this regard (as were the films of George Melies). Most early films (and most films today) are set in the normal world and involve normal, everyday tasks. German Expressionist films were some of the earliest to create a world made out of expression and emotion. It was this genre from which I drew inspiration for this latest tale.

German Expressionism is known for its odd angles and distorted perspective as for its arbitrary use of color. And they tend to lean towards the horror and macabre. I thinks you can see a little of each in the above illustration.

I'm still really liking the style, but I wonder if the digital inks are too cold and lack humanity. Part of me really digs them, but part of me misses the warmth and craft of the traditional. I'll have to do some more sketching.

Art Philosophy: The Right Color

 

 Mark Twain once said something to the effect that the difference between the right word and almost the right word is a big one. I believe the same is true for color.

I've created numerous sketches and works of art in black and white with one color, and some have been very successful while others fell flat on their face. A large part of the success/failure was the color I chose. Some colors really do have the ability to stand on their own and make a work feel complete, while others just don't. I'm still not sure what the difference is, but I've noticed colors that are mid to mid-dark and have high intensity seem to do better than light or dark colors and muted tones. I've also noticed the primaries seem to work better than the secondaries or some intermediate mix. (Before you say anything, green is a primary for light.)

When I started Wandering Koala Digest 3, I was pretty sure I wanted to to be green to complete the primaries (the first one was red and the second blue). I wasn't sure of the green, but I thought something in the ectoplasmic family would be good, and it was. The page above really looks like it's colored, even though there are only 4 colors (5 if you count the white paper). It's amazing how the addition of just one color turns a black & white comic into what could be considered full color.

I hope you like my latest efforts. Let me know!

Sneak Peek: Mistakes

 

This story has taken me a while to finish, because I really wanted to try something different. I've been looking over the past Wandering Koala Tales (and boy has the catalog been growing!) trying to decide what I liked, what I didn't like, and what direction I want to go. I've tried a lot of different genres--novels, comics, graphic novels, short stories, novellas, and anthologies, and a lot of different media and styles exploring the world of the Silent Wanderer.

One important element of the Wandering Koala when I created him and his world was the flexibility to literally do anything I wanted. And while I've had fun doing that, it's probably been kind of schizophrenic for the reader to follow the story told in so many different formats and style and not even in order. And the publishing schedule has been erratic.

With the launch of the first Wandering Koala Digest, I've finally figured out the format that works for the stories I want to tell that both provides the flexibility for the character and the wide range of tales I want to tell but is still easy enough for the reader to follow so he doesn't get lost. And a bimonthly schedule gives me the time to craft quality tales while still providing a regular dose of Wandering Koala action at predictable times.

With the third Digest I think I've finally figured out the art style that I'll stick with for most, if not all, of the tales. I'll admit it isn't the most polished art I've ever created, but polish isn't what I'm looking for. Wandering Koala was inspired by Boys Adventure stories like Hardy Boys, Pulp Fiction like Doc Savage, and adventure comics like The Phantom that were pumped out at a frantic pace by people who had energy and excitement oozing out their pencils and typewriters. The tales were fast and furious and spoke to something visceral inside the reader instead of merely stimulating the intellect (although they certainly did that with the wide range of topics and knowledge the authors possessed and displayed). This art style is a lot more raw and rough and expressionistic. It's supposed to illustrated the mood as much as the scene (and maybe even a little more).

I'm in love with this first page, and I'm excited to release the whole story in February 2014 so you can enjoy it as well. Be sure to leave me a comment and tell me what you think!

Character Sketch: Martial Arts Student with a Bow

I'm currently working on the third volume of Wandering Koala Digest, and I'm playing around with different techniques and approaches. I really want to try another all-digital story. I haven't done one since Wandering Koala meets the Beast who came for Christmas, and I wasn't all that thrilled with how it turned out. The Phantom Coach looked cool all digital, but the Beast just didn't. That's one reason I went back to such traditional media as dipping a brush in ink.

So while I finish up the story, I've been doing a lot of sketching in various programs including Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, and Manga Studio 5 trying out all the different ways one can make a digital line. Some have turned out well, and some will never be seen in public.

The figure above was created in Corel Painter. The background was rendered in Adobe Photoshop. I really like the look, style, line quality, and colors. I may just have found my next story's style.

What do you think?

Merry Christmas in 2013!

 

My annual Christmas Card, 2013 Edition.

The Joy of G.I. Joe

 

The 80s had the best toys and the best cartoons. And more often than not, the two were connected. A few meddling people saw these cartoons as nothing more than 30-minute commercials. As a youngster I asked myself what we wrong with that? I still don't see the problem. Ironically many of those same people champion and applaud certain shows that are nothing more than 30-minute or 60-minute commercials for their political and subversive propagandas, but that's a subject for another post.

One of my favorites was G.I. Joe. I've never been a fan of military anything (unless it's World War I) so it's funny I liked G.I. Joe so much. Rewatching those shows now as an adult, I realize they weren't military at all but science fiction. Cobra always had some outlandish base in an exotic corner of the world and used some science fiction McGuffen to blackmail the world, and G.I. Joe would use their scientifically advanced vehicles and weapons to stop them. This was good science fiction filled with interesting characters and exotic locals. I love shows that travel to exotic locations.

The 80s were also the era of the ninja, and G.I. Joe had their ninja, Storm Shadow. Most of the time he worked for the bad guys, but from time to time his honor would require him to assist G.I. Joe. He was always left mysterious and in the shadows with little exploration of his background, and that just made him cooler. I know a lot of people want a full back story on all characters with "character development" (a term people use without really understanding what it means), but that really limits your story options and turns a tale into a factory churned out yawnfest.

I've been wanting to have Storm Shadow meet the Wandering Koala for a while and finally got around to it. The figures were drawn with a Staedlter pencil and then inked with my Japanese Brush Pen. I created the dojo in Adobe Photoshop and colored the characters in Corel Painter.

I'm really happy with how it turned out. What do you think? Leave me a comment and let me know.

Art Technique: Filters and Digital Painting

 

So I've wanted to get into digital painting for awhile. I've tried several times with several programs, but have yet to find a satisfying technique. Maybe I just wasn't meant to paint.

Today I tried to do a digital painting of Jak Phoenix, the star of two really fun and entertaining novels. And he's a blast to create fan work with. I created a painting completely in Corel Painter. I wasn't satisfied. So I brought the painting into Photoshop to see what I could do with it.

Needless to say after a few filters and a little simplification later and I was MUCH more satisfied. It worked because the structure was good, the design was strong, and the colors and values were almost working. I'm always amazed at how it only takes a few modifications to make a work go from almost working to working beautifully.

Here is the original. It's not bad, but it's not really good either. The background is from a public domain photo by Lynn Greyling.

But don't take my word for it. What do you think?

Archetypes in Art

 

Archetypes are recurrent motifs or images in art or literature. They include the Hero, the Wise Old Man, the Damsel in Distress, the irredeemable Villain, the Magic Animal, etc. Evidences of them can be found in all cultures and all times. Some speculate that they are part of our makeup and that's why we respond to them so readily and why they are not limited to any culture or time period. One of the most famous scholars to study archetypes is Joseph Campbell. His book was a major influence on George Lucas when he wrote Star Wars.

Above is my version of the archetype of the Thief. In this version, he is a masked highwayman on a motorcycle robbing from the good and the innocent. I drew it with a zebra brush pen and colored it in Corel Painter. I really like the greyscale with one color approach, and in this image it almost looks like full color. And it's very appropriate for Halloween.

Let me know what you think!

Stuffing a Square Peg into a Round Hole

 

If you've been in a bookstore lately (and if you're like most people you haven't), you would see the titles organized by genre. The purpose of this is to help a potential customer find something to buy. The idea behind it is good, but the execution doesn't always follow.

Some books could easily fit in more than one genre. I've always found the literature section an odd one, because all good books are literature. And a lot of horror books are also science fiction or fantasy. And fantasy just means something fantastic or imagined, but it's turned into castles, magic, and dragons. Which means other fantasy books that don't include magic, dragons, and castles have to go elsewhere. And what about supernatural books? Yes, they could be horror, but they could also be fantasy or suspense.

I get annoyed for two reasons. First as a consumer I've had trouble finding a specific book I went into the store to buy, because I wasn't sure of the genre. Second, as an author I'm not always sure how to classify my books. My most recent title, Wandering Koala Digest 1, contains a supernatural thriller, but also a science fiction novella. So do I put it in horror, because it's not really horror, but there is no supernatural category? To me that's like putting a square peg in a round hole--it just doesn't fit so well.

That's one of the joys and wonders of the digital bookshelf--a title can be listed in multiple places without having to place a physical copy in each one. You can also search for a specific title and get right to it. It's no wonder I've gravitated more and more to buying books online and as digital editions even though I love the feel and smell of a physical book, and I love browsing bookstores.

So what does any of this have to do with the above illustration? It could easily fit in several categories: science fiction for the weird monster, pulp fiction for the protagonist, horror or supernatural for the weird monster, graphic novels for the visual nature, young adult because that's usually the reading level I write, or even holiday/special occasion for Halloween because of the weird monster. Maybe we just need a Weird Monster genre?

Feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think.

To Color, or Not to Color -- THAT is the Real Question

In the late 19th Century thru the early 20th Century, printing technology was developing rapidly. In England, printing advanced more quickly than in the US which led to the rise of the Illustrated Children's Book with charming stories and magnificent illustrations. Color soon followed making the children's books even more wondrous. Maybe you've heard of Alice in Wonderland, Winnie the Pooh, Peter Rabbit, the Wind in the Willows, or the Wizard of Oz? All of these "classics" were made possible by printing technology and brilliant craftsman on the illustrator's part of make the most of the day's technology. The usual method was to draw the illustration with a black line, then carve that into a plate and add color shapes on a separate pass. Eventually the technology reached the point where the illustrator could create the entire image in color and then reproduce it.

Of course, this wasn't the beginning of creating an image with a black line and then coloring it in. Early Christian and Muslim illuminated texts from the first few centuries AD used this method. And before that, artists used this method to record their hunts on cave walls. Today the method is popular with cartoons, comics, graphic novels, and digital illustration. The term 'cartoon' actually referred to the outline created by Renaissance artists creating frescos who first sketched the image with a pencil before applying watercolors over it covering up the sketch. But they didn't invent the method, just coined a cool word from it.

I've always enjoyed black line work colored in. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because that's what I've grown up with. Maybe it's because a black line clearly defines an object. Maybe I just like abstraction. Who knows? But it's something I've never been able to get away from, even during my watering color days when I tried for a more photorealistic approach. There were times I'd take a 'finished' watercolor (as if any work of art is ever finished), and add black lines around the figures with a paintbrush.

The above illustration is a black and white line drawing that I've colored in Corel Painter. The line work is below. I really like the black & white version, but I'm also digging the colored version. You'll notice I added a lot more texture and lighting effects than usual to give it a more painterly feel and modern finish.

Which do you like better? Leave a comment and let me know.

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Art Philosophy: The Use of Color

Color is an interesting animal. It is one of the Elements of Art (which include Line, Shape, Form, Value, Space, Texture, Color, and Motion), and probably the most powerful element. Differences in color will override any other design elements or ideas and immediately draw the eye to it.

Because it's so powerful, it needs to be used judiciously to gain maximum impact. In the early days of printing, this was forced onto artists, because of the difficulty and limitations they had. Artists were forced to design with color and really consider and plan for its use.

In the current digital era, color is so easy to add and print, it too often is overdone with form and shading meticulously rendered on every last hair. Just pick up a comic book from 2005 and compare it to a comic from 1995 and one from 1985. You'll see the approach and use of colors is completely different. In 1985, colors were created from hand cut film with each plate (Cyan, Yellow, Magenta, and Black) being a value of the whole divisible by four (25%, 50%, 75%, 100%). This limited the number of colors, made multiple colors more difficult and expensive, and so forced good colorists to make the most of a few hues. The results were really amazing. The 1995 comic shows the beginning of computer coloring with every color under the sun thrown in as a gradation with chaotic patterns of lights and darks and photoshop filters thrown in just because you could. Comics from 2005 seem to forget there were multiple colors and use mostly browns and greys with every value of each to create a very bland and muddy look.

This is just one of thousands of examples how the ease of adding color has been both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because an artist can now use any color he so chooses. But that creates the temptation to use every color just because you can. There is no longer the technical restraints to force an artist to plan his color design--he has to rely on self discipline, something creative people tend to lack.

The two works I've posted are different color treatments of the same image. The first followed my current move in color to use black & white plus one color. The second is a more traditionally colored version with flat shadows added. I like both, but the first on just seems to look more like art while the second looks more like commercial pandering. Not that there's anything wrong with commercial pandering, but it is nice to have a break from it. After all, we're faced with it everyday nearly everywhere we look.

These were drawn with a Zebra disposable brush pen and colored in Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter. I'm still not sure which I like better, because each has things going for it, and each have places they could be improved.

What do you think?

It's Done!

And it is done! The first draft of the latest Wandering Koala tale (currently titled Modest Proposal) is finished!

It's an apocalypse virus story that I've been kicking around for a while (I even started writing a version a few years thinking it would be my third novel, but the story didn't go anywhere). I was inspired to write this when I started reading Contagion (a story arc in Batman comics) when I was a teenager. There was a TV movie with a similar theme soon after that solidified it.

The title Modest Proposal is an interesting one, because while I've read the famous Jonathan Swift essay, it didn't even cross my mind until I was almost finished with the first draft and looking for a title. The working title was Disease, but that just didn't sound compelling enough. I also thought about calling it The Third Horseman (or Fourth or Fifth) but that sounded too unoriginal. Then I thought of Final Solution since that sort of fits the plot, but World War II and Nazis have been so overdone that I try to avoid them. That's when A Modest Proposal popped into my head. The prologue definitely has some similarities and parallels, so I decided to go with it for now. (And anyone searching for the essay may 'accidentally' stumble onto my book, a bonus.)

Of course, now I have to revise, revise, revise, so the title could change. I doubt the story will, because it's already been thru so many drafts and versions that I'm pretty sure this is the one. It reads and feels like a Wandering Koala story. The last one, The Green Bull, didn't. That's why it didn't make it into paperback and why the site wasn't redesigned using artwork from that story.

And the image above has nothing to do with it other than they both feature everyone's favorite Silent Wanderer. The inking was a Zebra disposable brush pen and the background is a Google Sketch Up model that has been heavily painted over in Corel Painter.

Inspiration

The Universe wasn't created from nothing. God didn't point his figure at a void and boom! everything came into being. There was existing matter that God organized to create "worlds without number".

Art is no different; it doesn't come from a vacuum. Every work is inspired and informed by something else. When I was in Art School, one of my instructors after an Art Seminar pointed to a speaker and mentioned how it was patterned after the golden section the visiting artist had talked about, and how the golden ratio was based on proportions Jesus had used to create the Earth. Ultimately everything an artist "creates" is a reinterpretation of part or parts of the world around us.

And that doesn't apply to just visual art. How many times have you read a book, seen a TV show, or watched a movie that reminded you of another story? Probably quite often. There are only so many plots and characters out there.

The wall hanging to the left was inspired by Japanese and Chinese prints. I know what you're saying--it doesn't look very Japanese. And I agree. But the approach was very much inspired by oriental art, but with my western and personal interpretation. It's that unique interpretation which makes a work "creative" or "original" when everything in it came from an already existing world around us.

And in case you were curious, I drew the figures with a Zebra disposable brush pen and then colored them and designed the backgrounds in Corel Painter.

Let me know what you think!

Peoples is Peoples

People never cease to amaze me.

There is a certain group on DeviantArt (starts with Bad and rhymes with grass characters) that has requested, on five separate occasions, to add my works to their group's galleries. After the third time I figured I might as well join the group and save them the time of asking.

And they rejected me. They said they viewed my work and didn't feel I qualified. And yet they have sought me out to ask me to add my work to their group's galleries. In fact, since the rejection they have TWICE requested permission to add TWO different works of mine. That's five requests that THEY initiated. (The illustration at the left is the latest one. It was drawn with a Zig Calligraphy Pen and colored in Corel Painter.)

So here's my confusion. My work is good enough for them to seek it out and ask my permission to add it, but it's not good enough to join their group? Huh?

Peoples is peoples, and peoples is very confusing.

Third times the charm

Covers are a tricky thing for me. I know what I love in a cover, but when it comes to create one, I struggle. This is my third attempt at a cover to The Green Bull. I liked the first one I did, but it was radically different from other covers I'd done, and it didn't seem to get a much reaction. So I tried something else, but I wasn't very satisfied with it. So I tried one more time.

This time I finally got the kind of image I want for a Wandering Koala story. It's moody, it's pulpy, and it is a scene from the story that whets one's appetite for the rest.

The story is now available for all eReaders at Smashwords, and is available at most individual stores and will soon be available at all fine retailers.