I tripped on a pebble

I very rarely post anything here that does not include one of my works but since coming across this quote I feel that it is only fair to post this.

A very important quote from Pablo Picasso:

"From the moment that art ceases to be food that feeds the best minds, the artist can use his talents to perform all the tricks of the intellectual charlatan. Most people can today no longer expect to receive consolation and exaltation from art. The 'refined,' the rich, the professional 'do-nothings', the distillers of quintessence desire only the peculiar, the sensational, the eccentric, the scandalous in today's art. I myself, since the advent of Cubism, have fed these fellows what they wanted and satisfied these critics with all the ridiculous ideas that have passed through my mind. The less they understood them, the more they admired me. Through amusing myself with all these absurd farces, I became celebrated, and very rapidly. For a painter, celebrity means sales and consequent affluence. Today, as you know, I am celebrated, I am rich. But when I am alone, I do not have the effrontery to consider myself an artist at all, not in the grand old meaning of the word: Giotto, Titian, Rembrandt, Goya were great painters. I am only a public clown--a mountebank. I have understood my time and have exploited the imbecility, the vanity, the greed of my contemporaries. It is a bitter confession, this confession of mine, more painful than it may seem. But at least and at last it does have the merit of being honest."

I think that I am definitely not your ordinary guy. This damn quote moves me to tears. :(

I think that I will never again lambast modern art.

Or atleast I'll try not to. :P

Speed Paints

These are two speedpaints I did for a friend. I certainly hope he can use them. They look like shit. lolz.

Concepts were made by my friend and I just tried to flesh them out as much as my meager skills can allow. I didn't go into details since this is going to be shrunk to fit into a word document.

The first one is supposed to be a knight travelling or entering a dark catacomb.



The second image is that of a necromancer casting a spell on enemy spear men while his undead approaches from the forest. It's hard to understand I guess. lolz.

If I could have 1/20th of Craig Mullin's sketching ability I'd be an impressionist master. lolz. For now though, this will have to do.

Little Red Ribbon

Well there she is. Weird hair, little ribbon and earless. lolz.

What was supposed to be no more than an excercise in painting a face and getting construction right turned into a whole portrait.

I have yet to work on the ears and I might give her earings too. Maybe a few more refinements here and there to make her look more alive and to fix some of the flaws.

I'm still somewhat ashamed of posting my works on cgtalk though that doesn't really stop me. So many great artists there who are always ready to offer advice and help.

This is a face study that should go into a painting in the future. It is of a greek woman. I like ancient greek clothing. It's so simple but I find it so attractive on a lady.

This padawan has much to learn and re-learn and the year is closing on me fast. I have to make more time for my painting and get a lot of practice in before next year. Hopefully plans come into fruition.

The uninspired

I've been feeling quite a bit drained these past few days. I've been feeling like my creativity is chained to the wall... along with the rest of me. Anyhow the above two are just quick sketches... i did them in tada!!! 5 minutes. :P Yeah yeah they look like shit. I know. Kinda like my emotional state right now. The bottom pic is an impression of a memory I have from a visit to zamboanga. I remember walking around at the shore during 1 a.m. in the morning as I was having trouble getting some sleep. The fishermen were out at sea and they looked like fireflies in the horizon. There were hoards of them lining the water. I felt like sitting and staring for hours ... until I realized I was alone... on a beach that had absolutely no lights. lolz.

Did some work on the portrait. Mostly just minor touches. I'm kinda happy with how adding the lashes and making them stronger breathed new life into her. I made a lot of mistakes with this one and my shadows were incorrect. I'm too far along to fix it now though so I'll go ahead with this and save the lessons learned for the next project. I have to remember not to give into my smudgeaholic urges as it results in some colors dissappearing. lolz. In this one my midtone became a casualty. I kinda lost the transperency too... she orgininally had that angellic glow present in most pale skinned women. Now it's gone gone gone. All because I go crazy with blending. :D

Rainy Days and Mondays

So I was left at home, feeling sick and nothing to do. After staring at Mr. Bouguereu's insane paintings I had an epiphany with the colors(which is very likely to be wrong.lolz.). Anyway I thought I'd try it and this was the result... well as far as I had gone anyway.

So I'm applying some of the stuff I've learned from observing Mr. Bouguereu's works, Mr. Loomis' tutorials and one other Portrait Artist who's name I can't recall now... it's a hodge podge of lessons. lolz. At any rate I figure the coloring probably has these elements: midtone, cool shadows(i just call them that. i don't know if the term is right), warm shadows(or stronger shadows), warming color, lighter tones and then highlights which were used sparingly. There's lots to do with this one coz the face still looks flat... I'm kinda struggling with the lip color as it looks like lipstick... I was gunning for something more natural.

I learned something precious yesterday... I remembered how Linda keeps saying flip your work from time to time to get a fresh look and so I tried to do it. To my horror the portrait I've been painting for nearly 8 hours (ahem... I wasn't feeling well and kept dozing off from time to time. lolz.) was crooked as the road to Baguio. lolz. Well I fixed that one and ended up with an almost symetrical face... which might not be a good thing. :P

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update: May 18, 2006

I have never done a face in color until today. I have to say that this is all so very difficult for me. Not only do I have to think about the mathematics of color but I also have to know exactly the kinds of planes present on the face in order to shade it properly. She's looking kinda strange right now. Anyway here's the to do list:

• The right side of the face is too wide... need to chop off some excess there.
• The eyes look weird, pasted and highly unrealistic.
• Haven't completed painting the lashes.
• Make the lips look more natural.
• Make the eyebrows appear more natural?
• Complete rendering of the nose.
  

I'm hoping I can finish it this weekend. I also figure I should do more speedpaints so as to buff up my efficiency. Right now I work too long to get only few results.

Loomis

Here's something I did for practice. It was supposed to be a quick sketch but I ended up doing it for 3-4 hours. In between eating, reading and the gilmore girls. lolz.

I love her hair. I did that in less than a minute. lolz. I like this kind of carefree look in hair. :D

I still have a long way to go to perfect the construction. These practice sketches are pretty useful. I get to learn quite a bit everytime I do them. Hopefully It'll help me improve in my problem areas.

I only used the reference I had for the rendering and for correction when I felt like I was "lost".

Know Yourself

So I've been trying to do someone's portrait over the weekend but I guess it was one of those days where the Artsy Bug decided to take a break and fly off somewhere. I just couldn't draw or paint decently even if my life depended on it. :(

Anyway I figured the best way to aproach that situation was to fall back, regroup and try again. I bought another mini-book(I'm turning into a bookworm), a sort of trouble shooter for painting. I found some stuff that would be useful and I think I'll try again either tonight or tomorrow night.

The recent fiasco left me pondering upon my own skills and I came upon the following conclusions:

• My drawing skills suck.
• I am too shy around color. Must be my penchant for less saturated colors...
• I have not done a whole piece and so I'm not so good with making the subject "blend into the background".
• I need to work on hands, feet and faces.
• I take too long to finish.
• I need to do more perspective and foreshortening.
• Composition is my weakest spot.
• I don't think I have a problem with concept art... I just have a problem with transfering my concepts to canvas. Must be my lacking skills...

So I'm going to work on each of these weak spots over the next few months. Practice practice practice... I think I will have very little time for anything else. Art truly is a cruel mistress. lolz.

I've been looking at works by Craig Mullins and some impressionst works... I think I'm starting to like them and I see their values specially when creating quick sketches and snippet arts. I'm not denigrating them(I obviously see the skill required to do a full size impressionist work), it's just this is how I view it because I would rather develop those into fully detailed paintings. :D heck! I'm a realist, what do you expect?

Julie Julie Julie

Here's the progress on that portrait so far. It just needs a little more tidying up. I think I'll leave it as is... for now. A guy has to realize when something is beyond repairing. lolz. I'll do another one of julie again soon. She's my fave. ;) Like you can't tell. lolz.

I recently started work on an original composition. I hope it turns out okay. I'll post when the sketch is done... I figure I'll have to stop in the middle anyways since I have to do someone's portrait real soon. :D