Friday, December 19, 2008

Fixed up


Edited up the racing hounds one.
Meh.

Still like it.

...Sorta :3

Lion Rider


Boy I hope my uncle doesn't see this before Christmas.
It's his gift, in lieu of a tattoo design I don't forsee myself... you know... designing
I hope he finds it satisfactory, I did get an A- on it.
Turned out pretty snazzy, considering the time I had on it.

End of Semester

So we have come at last to the end of the semester.

I have to say, I quite enjoyed it. I found a stride I was quite comfortable with, and only felt burnt out once right around thanksgiving. Because I don't have Adobe Illustrator or Corel Painter at home I basically spent much of my time in the Mac Lab, occationally arriving at 9am and more than two dozen times leaving at 11:58pm when they started shutting the lights off.

But, with that schedule came a sort of relaxing peace. I knew exactly how much time I had, and didn't stay up pulling all nighters. When I came home, I slept, and returned the following morning.

My goodness, what a great opportunity I had in having Chuck's class. After midpoint review I felt really bummed out and hit a very low depth in self confidence. I thought I was better than the review suggested, and I felt I embarrassed myself, even though I put my best work out there. Talking with Chuck in person made me feel much better, but it wasn't until nearly the end of the semester did I really start aggressively seeking out photo references again. Before I sort of half assed used them when I really had no clue as to what I was drawing but now they are the first thing I look for when I have an idea and really there is no substitute to the level of subtlety you can miss when simply trying to draw from the mind. 

There are many very qualified instructors at the academy, but only a certain few of them can really provide you with that certain 'oomph' needed to put your best work forward to really try and show what you're made of. Chuck was one of them. I always wanted to impress him, show him I was worth something, that I was determined to make it. I don't want to be a lazy student. I don't want to slide through class. I want to LEARN while I'm still here and can look to them for advice.

One assignment we had was to take an in class drawing we completed and to put a background in perspective around it.
Chuck's reaction to all of our work was more or less "that we should wallow in our own shame for a week before trying again." He said he thought we were blowing him off. I worked hard on my assignment but I found out from Ed, and Chuck, that the main reason my perspective was wonky was my placement of my vanishing points. Big, instant improvement.

In short, I enjoyed it. I'll miss the class in the future, but I won't forget the lessons.

OH! Before I forget. I submitted work to the Society of Illustrators scholarship. Here's to hoping I at least am worthy of a mention, if not some money! Hey!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Superhero thoughts

All this is brought upon by the mention of an upcoming one shot book, which asserts that Nightcrawler, feeling made redundant by Pixie (read: Awful) leaves the X men.
X-Men quitting time

I think it's a lame excuse to put a character into Limbo. There are many more people on the net who agree with me, and who argue it better, so read up, folks. Needless to say I am severely vexed by this news.


Thursday, December 11, 2008

Racing Hounds

NOT FINISHED!

I wish I had enough time to go in and actually paint more backround dogs that actually follow the path of the track, and I really need to go in and redraw those jockeys, yeesh. It is really hard to draw a person riding a dog like jockeys ride horses. Seriously, they like squat up and tuck in their knees high up. Plus, Greyhounds are way more flexible than horses, so most of the dogs' spines would probably throw the riders after a stride or two. The best bet would probably be to hunch up as best you can over their shoulders.

Also I was originally going to color the painting, as in, not sepia color. Buuut...adding color after the value is still rough for me and I just ran out of time. Oh well. I still like it.

Either way, the image of tiny dog riding jockeys wouldn't leave me alone-- (Yes, they are supposed to be tiny jockeys, not horse sized dogs.) So I had to get it out of my system.

So.... Here you go.

Friday, October 24, 2008

Ninlil


Perhaps when I wrote this post originally I spoke too rashly; I felt feelings of lowered self esteem caused by a very rough and what I thought unfair judgement of my skills. I however felt no ill will or need to start drama with Chuck.

What I did do was schedule an appointment with him to discuss why my review was the way it was, and see if perhaps I was not interpreting the notes he had left correctly. I learned that I was incorrect, and through a very insightful talk with the director, got some very useful tips on how to proceed and improve my work.

I always appreciate constructive criticism, and thrive on the advice and opinions of others to try and improve myself. I am actually rather pleased with how the events unfolded. Perhaps if the review had been more average, I would not have sought Chuck's personal council.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

Absolution


I have signed up to do an event called 24 hour comics this saturday. It's from 10am on the 19th to 10am on the 20th. I have decided to illustrate a book on my super hero team I dubbed The Heralds. (Not to be confused with The Harolds!) One of the main characters is a silver knight named Absolution.

I painted him today in class in Corel Painter.

He turned out more evil than I was trying for.

Wish me luck this Saturday! Must... Need...Sleeeeeppp....

Aqrabuamelu


This was our most recent homework for Illustration 3
In keeping with my desire to merge homework with Caravan Tales as much as possible, I chose to do the Scorpion Guardian Aqrabuamelu. Gilgamesh confronted him after Enkidu's death, to demand to know why humans had to be mortal.

Saturday, October 11, 2008

What have you got there?


It cannot be overstated how much I love the X men, and am delighted that they moved their HQ to my current City of SF. Being a huge Nightcrawler junkie, emo-ized or swashbuckler, when I draw him, he tends to be using his acrobatic prowess to play pranks. 
As it is, Wolverine is rarely a good sport about it.

(as a disclaimer, Marvel owns these characters, I just borrow them for some fun. This particular image however, is miiiineeeeee >:3 )

Ninlil


Sorry for the fat copyright on it but I needed to get this up here somehow. This is my (nearly) finished composition for Caravan Tales, Depicting Ninlil, wind goddess... I am unsure how to proceed, aside from the simple coloring of the flowers and shading the couch...Should I color her, what color? Leave her blue? Make her transparent? Like she is made of crystal? Oy... Such Dilemmas and no time to work.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Rakshasa Family Portrait


For our final in Digital Imaging, we had to create a family portrait. They could be any type of family-- Barbarian, historical, sci fi, bog monsters, etc etc. I decided to do a portrait of a type of indian demon called Rakshasa. I admit I was influenced by Might and Magic: Tribes of the east, in that their Rakshasas are four armed with lion heads, but I ran with it. According to legend, Rakshasas are shape shifters, so it is possible they'd appear that way. :p can you guess who is related to who?

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

The A to Z dangers of space.



My final for Astronomy was a (not) children's book called the A to Z dangers of space book. I did get an A on it. It was a complete book with all of the letters drawn in B&W inked and shaded in Photoshop. This one was one of my favorites.

Fatal Ultimatum


This picture stems directly from a game I've been solo concepting. The pirate on the left is shielding a small boy (the protagonist) from his captain, a cruel money driven brigand.
Fun stuff.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Digital Painting


The media I am most familiar with, and comfortable with, is pencil and paper. (Reliable, and cheap!) Obviously, though since i've been in school, I've gotten to work with molds, plaster, clay (sculpture), charcoal, Pastels, and paints.

I'd have to say I'm fairly proficient with the dry media. I'll post some charcoal pictures later when I get around to taking photos of them, because they're 18x24 size papers.

But, the media I have the most fun with is digital. Ah'm talkin photoshoppe. Yeha!
This is a child for a story I came up with, about a nomadic tribe living in the desert. Since they have to travel at night to avoid the intense heat, some of the members of their tribes have a divine gift, where they absorb the light of the sun during the day, then they radiate light all through the night, giving them clairvoyance as well to navigate in the shifting landscape. This young boy is the newest one born with the gift, and as the sun goes down, it is when he begins to shine.

Finally made a blog...

Don't want to seem like I'm jumping on the blog bandwagon, but since my roomates and I are doing a compilation book, it seemed like a good idea to have a blog I can send people/clients to, so they can see what I've been up to.

I do have a deviantart: PsychoTiyal
and a Y!Gallery: Y! PsychoTiyal
(Word to the wise: Y!Gallery is an adult themed site. My work is not, but the site as a whole is NSFW, as an FYI)

So you can check them out, too.
Oh, and I suppose it's worth mentioning. All images posted here as mine are Copyrighted to me.