Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Building a Cathedral to show a ruin

This past few days I've been relearning how to draw.

Not paint, but draw.

Most digital painting is really just drawing. Sure, you have color, tones, you can 'mix' colors and apply 'wet paint' etc, but in the end you are drawing. There are some guys out there who realize this, like Justin Gerard here, and begin a piece of work by painting the undertones and then digitizing the rest. And you know what, it still looks like a painting!

This past few days... yeah, I told you already. I'm loopy. I'm drawing EVERY. SINGLE. DETAIL. for me to later obliterate it for that 'naturalistic painting' effect. Eventually I'll get to that second step without the first step, but it's important to note that even Picasso had to draw photorealistically before he could know which corners to cut. I'm re-learning where the corners are this week.

Oak trees and chrome plating were invented to punish illustrators, I'm almost sure of it. No amount of photoshop brushes and layer effects will effectively fake a realistic oak trunk. Leaves, maybe. But not the trunk and branches. Same goes for chrome; try as you like, there is no function key for effective reflective surfaces. And I have both in my latest painting.

Anyhow, I'm loopy from the radiation coming out of my monitors, and all the staring. There WILL be a resolution, I assure you. The hard part is over, now is time for details, which is the bestest most funnest part of any painting, and I speak for the entirety of painterdom when I say that. Excepting the words that don't exist.

Sigh... Can you imagine all this WITH linseed oil and turpentine?

No comments:

Post a Comment