When making illustrations with the mediums we've used so far I think I'd rather mix them. I'd much prefer drawing something to redo digitally, making line art to color with watercolor or in Photoshop or even using whatever type of paint or even pen is needed to better sharpen or define a rougher medium. I'd rather work with color but with the ability for well defined lines and shadows that watercolor doesn't easily allow.
I'd rather not use watercolor alone, ever. The medium has always been my least favorite. I love colors, I love painting, but I've never understood watercolor. I can never master any techniques and fall back on the same methods I use with any other painting, where I paint in a rough shape of color only to mold it into what I want. I even treat pencil sketches that way and always prefer doing those before making any lines in pen. But when the process of painting is about adding layer upon layer from light to dark, without being able to lighten up an area later, then anything I make feels sloppy. I'd rather that sort of painting in a digital form, where I could just as easily lighten with a low opacity eraser or brush. Despite all this I have no trouble working with the Gouache subtraction. It's just watercolor that I feel I can't ever do right.
I also think I enjoy having more instruction given when it comes to large pieces or many little ones. When I have to make something big I hesitate more in deciding the subject matter, and when I have ten small and unimportant images to make and a completely open instruction on their subject, then I have a hard to knowing where to even start looking for inspiration because I'd rather it be something I want to do in that case, and I never know what I want to do. When piece is small enough to not take as many resources if I need to restart it but I only need to do that one, then I have no trouble figuring out what in my infinite range of options, I want to make, and if I don't like it I can more easily start over.
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Midterm portfolo 0.7 - Open Category: Missouri Watercolor
Fitting that when posting this right now the image I have is blurry and out of focus (hopefully I'll have edited in a better photo by the time you see this). I decided to paint the Momo, short for the Missouri Monster, this state's own personal variation of bigfoot. Really it's just like a normal bigfoot except he disrupts picnics, attacks dogs, and has enough hair to play every part in a death metal band.
I didn't have my illustration board at the time I started it so I ended up painting it on foam board instead, which was weird. The surface was too smooth and I should have just painted on a completely level surface so I could take advantage of that instead of having it be a problem. I feel like no amount of detail I add or changes I make can make it look how I want. The brushstrokes just naturally decided to all look like the same sloppy thing all over no matter what I did to it. If I ever use this sort of paint on this sort of surface again it will only be with very specific type of images as a darker sort of thing like this just doesn't want to play nice.
It really is a horrible photo. You can't even see his glowing red eyes! Photoshop refused to show them if I did anything at all to improve the contrast and lighting. I also had to actually warp the image to make up for what was sadly the best angle my webcam mounted on top of my laptop would allow for a picture leaning against the wall, but mostly because that foam board actually warps itself! I'm going to flatten this thing under something until I can barrow a camera and I'll also paint the red eyes with more contrast. Maybe some yellow even.
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Monday, October 8, 2012
The Addition of An Artificial Subtraction
Worked from an image. Traced the basic shapes and shadows just to get everything sized right, but after just painted by eye with the reference image in another window. Done by taking a dark color in a layer above a white layer and using a low opacity eraser to imitate the gauche subtraction technique.
Maybe when I call later to find out why I still haven't gotten the Matte Medium I ordered over a week ago still hasn't gotten here, or if anyone can lend me some again, then I could do this with real paint. First digital picture for Wednesday.
I guess I'll just make a new post when I finish the second one.
filler
Filler post, want to put one thing before another but that one thing isn't scanned yet. I'll have it up in a few hours.
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