Wolverine

It's been quite a while since I've posted a new painting. I started this painting of Wolverine back in September but a run of illness had prevented me from sitting down to it properly until recently. So anyway, enough appealing for sympathy, lets get on with the art work :-)

Wolverine

Digital Print

I started this painting after watching "The Wolverine" at the cinema. It was one of those paintings that just meandered along, changing as it went. Initially I had intended to have one of the Chinese leads in the background, or perhaps Jean Grey but as I worked I just wasn't feeling it.

At first I wanted to do this painting landscape, giving plenty of room for Wolverines claws to be the center of attention. I sketched the idea out, added the rough values and an idea of the color scheme.
I really like working with two light sources of different colors, so I decided early on that I would use a blue "moon lit" light source and a orange flame light source.
As you can see from the first sketch, I kept to trend in that the proportions of most of it are very wrong. This wolverine is squat, his head is squished and I remember spending ages not knowing what to do with Wolverines legs.... no dirty jokes please!
Looking at this work in progress even I find it hard to believe that it is the same painting as the finished piece and I'm always struck, particularly when writing this blog, by how much of a transformation my paintings go through to get to the final stage. Often I think that I should spend more time developing my sketching so that my initial sketches reflect a far clearer image of the final painting. Many of my friends who work predominately in traditional media do this and create incredibly detailed work before ever putting pen, paint, or pastel to paper. But that just isn't how I work. When I think of the way I create a painting I'm often more reminded of sculptors or wood workers who are sometimes heard saying that they have an idea in their head but the wood or stone "tells" them the form it wants to take. It's the same with the way I work. I know roughly what I want to do and I will usually have a very clear image in my head or even as a sketch roughed out on paper, but in the end it doesn't matter what I planned to do, if the painting "wants" to so something different then I'm just along for the ride!
Right, enough introspection... On with the painting!!

In this second work in progress I've given up on the idea of a landscape painting and moved to portrait. I've also corrected many of the problems with proportion and spent more time that was possibly necessary painting Wolverines abs!
I still don't know what to do with Wolverines legs so I spent some time looking at reference photos (reading between the lines, I sat drooling over more shirtless photos of Hugh Jackman... but this time he had tight pants on too)
Now that I had the main figure pretty much up to scratch I needed to think about his placement, the lighting and background. I also needed to tackle one of my nemeses, Wolverines adamantium claws. While I'd been enjoying painting Wolverine I'd forgotten how much I hate painting metal!

This is the last work in progress and as you can see we're nearly there. A fluke of the blue light on Wolverines right side put me in mind of rain and as the orange light was going to be a fire light source I decided that Wolverine was going to be moving in from the cold rain to an roaring inferno. (Kind of fire and ice without the ice... I probably should not share the inner working of my brain) At this point I still haven't tackled those claws, and to be honest I was getting a little intimidated by them and so was putting it off. I was also worried about the colors feeling a little muddy.

I was almost there but lots of little tweaks would be needed before I was happy.

And here we are, back to the final painting. I finally got over my fear of Wolverine's claws and discovered that the worse part was not the large claws across the middle of the painting but the smaller claws on that are almost invisible on his other hand.

In addition to the obvious inclusion of the claws, I also spent some time tidying and refining, giving the edges and little more "edge", removing some of the mud from the colors and adding some sparks and a hint of fire for Wolverine to move towards... Oh and of course an X-Men belt buckle.... It wouldn't be complete without that.

You may have noticed that I've started to watermark my final images more noticeably. Sadly, a number of my artist friends have recently had work stolen or posted without credit. Artists put a heck of a lot of work into what they do, whether it's digital or traditional, and it's sad that there are people out there who feel it is OK to use others paintings without permission or in some awful cases use them commercially without paying for them or even claiming the work as their own. This is why I will now be adding watermarks to my images. Hopefully, some day soon the clever techy gods will come up with a way to prevent image theft without the need to scribble all over it.

New bronze cameo necklaces availablein my Etsy store

Following on from my previous post, I now have even more pendants on my Etsy store. This time in bronze / Antique Gold tones.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161800511/wolf-fashion-bronze-antique-gold-tone

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161790862/neytiri-avatar-fashion-bronze-antique

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161791690/geisha-fashion-bronze-antique-gold-tone?

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161793366/azazel-x-men-fashion-bronze-antique-gold?

I've fallen in love with the Azazel pendant just a little bit so I might have to make one for myself ;-)

New Silver Cameo Necklaces

I've been hard at work this afternoon (well I suppose that's a matter of opinion) making new silver tone cameo pendants from my artwork for my Etsy shop... and here they are, 3 lovely new necklaces. Snap them up before I decide I should keep them for myself ;-)

Geisha

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161467289/geisha-fashion-silver-tone-cameo?ref=listing-shop-header-2

 Neytiri

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161464008/neytiri-avatar-fashion-silver-tone-cameo?ref=listing-shop-header-1

Wolf

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161475533/wolf-fashion-silver-tone-cameo-necklace?ref=listing-shop-header-0

All 3 necklaces are made from nickle free settings with glass cabochons. The chains they sit on are also nickle free. £6 each plus p&p.

Geisha - Digital Portrait

 

Geisha
Digital Portrait

If you've been following my blog then you'll know that a while ago I spent a few months obsessed with painting and drawing Geisha. Since moving to digital art I haven't painted any Geisha, until now!

As with most of my paintings I started with a rough idea that I sketched out on the computer. I usually keep this very loose as my final painting rarely looks anything like the original sketch.

Once I've got the basic shape sorted out I usually start a more detailed black and white under painting,  however as the majority of my Geisha was to be black and white I decided not to bother this time... BIG mistake. Deciding to jump right into colour reminded me why I never usually do this. Most of the alterations and corrections that I do are worked out in the black and white stage as it's harder to make big alterations once you're working in colour. Had I taken the extra time this painting would have taken a fraction of the time that it did.
As it was I put down colour blocks as you can see on the right side of this work in progress shot and then stated to add in the detail as you can see in the eyes and the left of the work in progress.

At this point I was starting to go a little nuts and remembering exactly why I work in black and white first. The hair decorations just weren't going right, the eyes were slightly unbalanced and those flowers were awful. It took me a lot of fiddling around to fix this mess.

Finally the finished article. I removed the awful flowers and replaced them with more natural looking cherry blossoms instead of a representation of the common paper flowers modern Geisha wear in their hair. The hair ornaments have also been made to look more natural and have been given depth, the eyse ate no longer unbalanced and look a little more "real" and detail has been added to the fan and the background to give some depth to the painting.

I always learn something from every painting I do and I think the most obvious thing that I have learned from this painting is not to rush. The result I get from taking my time, working on the under painting and then adding colour is always less strained even if it does take more time. It's far easier to make alterations at the start than at the end.

I'm thinking about setting my computer up so that I can record a time lapse of my painting process. It probably won't be available for a while. I've already started a new painting of Wolverine that I hope to finish in the next week or so but the next painting after that I may give it a try. I'm not entirely sure if my style will lend itself to that sort of thing as I tend to paint in short bursts but I'll see how it goes and let you know.

Geisha is now available as a print on my Etsy store here https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/161340461/geisha-portrait-print-size-16x12?

Please also check out and like my Facebook page where I post lots of work in progress shots and random updates https://www.facebook.com/TessaLakeillustration

Azazel - Then and Now

Unsurprisingly I follow quite a few other artists on Facebook and just recently a lot of them have been doing "then and now" posts. The idea is that you take a painting that you did a couple of years ago and re-paint it in your current style to see how much your style has changed and your technique improved.

When I decided that attempt a then and now painting, I chose one of the first digital paintings I ever completed to re-work. The subject was Azazel, my favorite X-Men Villon.

This original painting (on the left) was done in grey scale using only a round brush. I remember that I sketched it out directly from a movie poster and even though it's very rough and not very detailed it has got the basic features just about right. In my current style I usually use something like this in the early staged of painting and then build a more detailed painting over it. At the time I was quite happy with this painting and I think it still has a certain charm although it screams "UNFINISHED" at me which is another reason why I chose to repaint it.

The painting to the right is my revised painting. I purposely didn't spend a huge amount of time on it, just a couple of hours, about the same as I spent on the original. Once I found a few source photos I decided that I wanted to make the painting a head and shoulders shot like the previous painting, but unlike my first painting it wouldn't be a straight copy of a photo as I try not to just copy photos anymore if I can help it. To work out a pose I decided would take inspiration from my favorite moment featuring Azazel, in this scene he has just killed the entire crew of a Russian ship and for no reason other than his own perverse joy he grabs the captains hat and pops it on his head before heading off to steer the ship at some very miffed American soldiers… Good clean evil fun!

So in my revised painting I decided to have Azazel wearing a captains hat and smiling just slightly, as if he's up to something. I also made the painting slightly sepia in tone like an old photo.

The difference in the two paintings are quite pronounced. My current work is a lot more detailed and has a bit more character to it. I'm getting much more skilled at capturing light, drawing hair and indicating texture… although I think I've probably got a way to go on that particular skill. For all that my style hasn't changed dramatically. The majority of my work is still done with one brush which has a pencil like texture to it, but is still basically a soft round brush. My paintings in their early stages usually look very much like my 2011 painting and are done using 3 shades of grey. The main difference in my technique now is that I build upon the original image, making it more detailed with every pass. In my finishing touches I do often use custom brushes now to give my paintings a little extra texture or detail, however I try to limit the use of custom brushes to the bare minimum, as despite their time saving qualities I find that when I finish a painting using a custom brush I often can't look at it without seeing the obvious signs of whatever brush I've used. Not good!

So, what do you think? I know that if someone had shown me my second painting when I painted the first and said "in 2 years you'll be able to paint this" I would have probably just responded "I wish!". On the other hand, looking at the painting I did recently I can't imagine being able to improve my skills much further. Perhaps I'll have to pick this up again 2015 to see if I really have got as good as I'm going to get, or if I've made another leap to something I never would have imagined myself capable of today! Here's hoping!

If you like my work please like my Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/TessaLakeillustration

Captain Malcolm Reynolds - Firefly

I completely forgot about posting this painting which I completed a few weeks ago. The subject is Captain Malcolm Reynolds from Firefly.

As usual I started with a rough black and white painting to get the general shapes and lights and shadows placed.

 

Once I was happy with the black and white painting, I added the first layer of colours and tweaked the composition again. I also put in the basic background so to make it easier to tie the subject and background together ay the end.

At this point I tweaked Malcolm's face a little, it looks a lot more like him now. I also added more colour and started putting a little more texture into the background to make it weathered.

...And here's the finished article. I had lots of trouble with the gun but got there in the end, and I had lots of fun creating the messy background.

I'm currently in the process of updating my website and finishing off a exciting commission so watch this space for up coming news. Alternatively if you would like to be kept up to date with work in progress and news please like my FaceBook page https://www.facebook.com/TessaLakeillustration

Naytiri

 Naytiri Portrait

So the past couple of days I've been entertaining myself with this little portrait from one of my favorite movies, Avatar. My goal with this painting was to try to capture the character without doing a straight copy of a photo or still. The painting took about 5 hours and was completed digitally on CS3. Without a doubt the thing that took the longest was working with the pink and blue light sources hitting blue skin... Not a combination you have to worry about very ofter!

Below, for your viewing pleasure are a few work in progress shots to show how I achieved the painting.

 Before doing anything else I roughed out a greyscale sketch to give me an idea of where the shadows would fall. I do this with most of my paintings as it helps to map things out and catch errors before I get too far into the painting. In this case I found it a bit of a mixed blessing as because of the secondary blue light source places where I thought shadow should be were actually florescent blue.

I also drew in one of the pink willow like trees in the background. I don't normally touch the background yet but I found it helped a lot later when I tried to work out the pinks on Nytiri's skin. I may make a mental note to work out the background first going forward.

 Once I had the greyscale image to work with I could start working on the skin tone and roughing in all the elements, lights and shadows in colour. At this point I realized that Nytiri's right eye wasn't quite right. I also noticed that her face was too rounded and her nose too thin, so I spent some time correcting the proportions by flipping the image to get a different perspective and "re-set my brain".

 At this pint I had corrected all of the obvious floors, Finished the right eye and added more definition to the rest of the face. I also painted in Nytiri's stripes and roughed in the light points under her skin so that I could get a feel for the finished painting.
When I first started painting digitally I would paint each element on it's own layer and then stitch it together with a blending layer, but while that made it easy to alter elements without needing to repaint the surrounding area I always found that the painting felt a little disjointed. Now I tend to create a new layer for every sitting. That way I can easily undo anything that I've altered recently but don't like, but I'm always working in the same way I would if I was working in traditional media (in other words, laying down colour, waiting for it to dry and then laying down another glaze on top of it) This works much better for me but I still use the odd additional layer for working on something complicated like hair or working out how something works within the painting like Nytiri's spots and stripes.

To get to the final painting I continued refining and adding detail, I tweaked Nytiri's nose and mouth a little more and drew in the lips. I spent some time adding more florescent blue to the shadows and doing my favorite part of any painting, working on the hair :-/ Finally I blended Nytiri's stripes and re-drew her spots.

Pet Portrait

My goodness it's been a while since I last posted anything new! But I've finally got myself sorted with a shiny new super quick computer so it's back to business as usual I hope!

While my computer has been out of action I've been working on this lovely little pencil commission. This little chap was quite a feat with his very impressive, but very fiddly ears. He was approved by his owner today so he will be winging his way to her this week. I must admit that despite that fact that I've done a few commissions now I'm always terrified when I send through proof photos. I think it's very similar to the feeling of sitting in a waiting room before going into an interview for a job you really want. Still, I'm sure the fear must serve to make me work harder!

The next commission I'm working on will be back to my beloved Photoshop to create a image for a unique cameo necklace but unfortunately I won't be able to share this one with you until the new year as it's a Christmas present.

If you would like more updates on what I'm getting up to please follow me on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/TessaLakeillustration

Make Way for the King – WIP 2

So I’ve started adding colour to this painting tonight and I’ve already discovered that I hate painting armour almost as much as I hate painting hair… Good thing I’m not working on a painting with lots of armour clad knights then isn’t it?!

So far I like the way this is going. I’ve slightly altered the frame and face of the king from my greyscale under-painting and tweaked a few things slightly. Once I’ve got all of the base colour down I’ll probably tweak it a lot more. I’m not sure whether to change the shadow on the kings face so that you can see his eyes… In the photo his eyes are completely in shadow and although I’m not sticking rigidly to the source material I do like the contrast but in my painting I’m not so sure. I guess I’ll see how it goes.

Make Way for the King WIP

Well, several weeks have passed since I went on a lovely holiday down in Devon and I have finally started drawing again. This painting which is in the shading phase was inspired by Tewkesbury Medieval Festival and is loosely based on a photo taken by my friend Jennie Anderson (visit her website at http://www.jennieanderson.co.uk/).

I’m reasonable happy with the king but I may tweak the soldiers in the background a little. Next stop, coloursville!

Larten Crepsley

Todays post is a little bit of fan art I’ve been working on.

For those of you who haven’t seen “The Vampires Assistant” Larten Crepsley is one of the main characters in the vampire world created by Darren Shan. He’s also my all time favourite vampire :-)

Cherry Blossom - Work In Progress

Yesterdays upload glitch has magically resolved itself so I can finally share with you my current work in progress (well, one of them anyway) It was only a matter of time before a geisha made her way into one of my burlesque paintings, this one started off as a speed doodle but has developed so well that I intend to turn her into a finished piece.

Originally I had no plans to add the cherry blossoms, they were a spur of the moment idea but now I love them so I will be re-drawing them in a little cleaner before finishing the sash and fan.

Don’t forget that I will be at the vintage fair at The Vic in Swindon tomorrow with fantastic artist Jennie Anderson and our Burly Boo stall. Pop along and say hello if you’re in the area.

Pendants

I’ve now completed my first 2 pendants for the vintage fair next month. They were a bit fiddly but I think I’ve got the hang of it now. They are made with glass Cabochons and nickel free vintage style backs.

Peacock – Finished

I’m calling this little lady finished.

Peacock is going to be another print that will be on sale at my local vintage fair in February, details of which can be found here www.thevicswindon.com/get/events.

Peacock - WIP 2

I may have got a little carried away with the feathers!!!

Peacock – WIP

I haven’t posted for a few days but I have been working hard on my next burlesque painting for the vintage fair next month. I tried a slightly different technique with this one, first creating the line drawing, then roughing it in grey scale and finally applying colour. It’s made it a lot easier to get the effect that I wanted.

I’m nearly happy with the body now and just need to spend some time working on her face and hair. I also need to do something slightly more exciting with the feathers in the background but I haven’t quite decided what yet.

Everything Stops For Tea

A very Happy New Year to everyone! (I’m only running 3 days late)

As you can see from the picture above I’ve been taking a break from my airship WIP to work on something completely different. “Everything Stops for Tea” is the first of several burlesque/vintage inspired painting that I hope to complete by February in time for a vintage fair (More about that at a latter date). As usual this was painted digitally.

WIP 9 – Complete (I think)

I’ve finally finished (for now) my current work in progress and I’m happy with the way it’s turned out.

I finished off the background and added a few extra shadows today. The arches in the background have become columns, but when I first rendered them they looked very flat and boring so as a solution I added some honeysuckle vines.
My first idea was to have something like a curtain of them hanging down behind the girl but on giving that a try I found that it created too many tangents drawing the eye off the top left corner so I removed most of them just leaving the two.

I’ve learned so many Photoshop tricks during this picture and I can’t wait to get started on another but first I have another commission for a colouring sheet for a local church.

WIP 8

Not much of an update for you today I’m afraid, just a little work on the paints and paintbrushes. The reason for the appalling lack of progress is two fold. Firstly I’m being a little pathetic and didn’t get anything done over the weekend because I have a cold. Secondly when I sat down to work tonight I was almost immediately interrupted when a firework shattered my living room window!
Luckily only the outer glass of my double glazing was broken but the whole room seemed to shake with the explosion, it felt like being fired on by a cannon! Peanut the rat slept though the whole thing…

WIP 5

Another couple of hours done on this one and it’s only the small fiddly bits and the background left to do. Today was spent working on jewellery and my little ratty friend who has come out looking very cute even if I do say so myself. I don’t think it will be long now before I’ve finished this one but I’ve got a couple of unproductive evenings coming up (in other words I’m off down the pub!) so I probably won’t get the last bits polished off before the weekend.


Technical difficulties – I’m currently having technical difficulties with my blog. It would seem that I can post to it, but not respond to comments or view it myself! I’m hoping to get this resolved shortly and will reply to all comments as soon as I can.