1 picture every weekday

[astrapho]

I've started attempting some traditional painting with acrylics after so many years being purely digital when it comes to painting. As a poor digital artist I go through 3 stages when painting traditionally:

1. How can I use as little paint as possible?
2. -Actual painting using terrible cheap brushes-
3. Finding excuses to use up all the remaining paint




(I squeezed way too much green)

There is no way I will ever be a traditional painter but I've found even shitty practice with them really helps x'D

[djizomdjinn]

Well, look on the bright side. If you dilute your paint so you get as much out of it as possible, they're basically watercolors, and those work fine with terrible, cheap brushes.

Both of the landscapes look good, but either there's a perspective error with the church or some change in orientation isn't very clear.

[astrapho]

@djinn: Good eye yes there is a perspective arror, I made a massive mistake in the beginning, the roof of the church began to slant instead of following the horizontal i set for the rest of the pic. That was the part where I was trying to use up all my paint though so I didn't correct it, I'm definitely going to be more careful in the future :9

The terrible brushes though are really affecting my ability to put down the shapes correctly, they're so imprecise :/ don't skimp on brushes... I'm going to see if I can find better ones.

I like making my protagonists look like the evil people somehow.

[johnway]

I do like flawed heroes. They make for more interesting characters and more human in a sense. Those of pure virtual are frankly boring.

And to counter that, i suppose the best villians are the ones that society makes. You know, heroes who no fault of their own but society makes them evil. Sort of fallen heroes because of social injustices. Like a hero knight who leads a band of other knights to defend a town against overwhelming odds from a rampaging horde of invaders. he succeeds at a high cost, losing most of his company, his closest friends, the love of his life. In most circumstances, he would be hailed a hero.

The nobles/kings have other ideas. They make him take the fall guy when infact it was the nobles ineptitude and scheming that nearly brought the town and the country to ruin. The hero knight, rather than being honored during the debrief, is accused of gross misconduct and blamed the entire event at best a phyricc victory and at worst military blunder that shouldn't have happened. Shamed by society and despite giving everything for the good of others, his reward was to be ruined by the very people he set out to save. It breaks him and rather then seeking revenge, he sets out to change the country for the better through genocide. People who were once his enemies become his most powerful allies to set the plan in motion. He alienates old friends and loved ones with his ruthless ambition to see the world a better place. he slowly becomes the monster/evil person that society had painted of him.

When it comes to painting, one of the main reasons i started off in digital was that i knew i would suck at traditional mediums and it can get very, very expensive. Plus my passion was IT so it made sense to me to use digital mediums. especially when the results were pretty decent.

Plus theres the undo button. thank god for the undo button.

[astrapho]

@john: Enjoyed reading that mini fallen hero story you did there It's pretty good. You ever considered writing some kind of webcomic or stories?

They were doing something quite heroic here, in this scenario, the story in my head was that they were actually repelling invaders from their village, and had successfully baited them into a position where they could crush them with a cavalry ambush. Normally I suppose this would be played quite heroically, but I thought at this point, the heroes were just as frightening as the invaders were, and they were out for blood, so they're also every bit the ruthless killers they were fighting.

I enjoy those grey characters very much, like your fallen hero character... I think there's really just no such thing as a totally bad or totally good person, and I love to explore that in my characters. Here's another picture I did of the commander of that cavalry on the same horse, this time picking berries with her boyfriend:



@traditional painting: It can get expensive if you want to get the best results, but I would still recommend doing traditional painting in some form at some point, it's massively beneficial even for digital technique, because traditionally there's no way to tinker around to accidentally stumble upon something nice. You have to really know your stuff, and it will rapidly teach you what's really important. ;9 Like getting things right on target the first go... >-<

[Grieverjoe]

Really digging your paintings, as always, and even your lineart sketches are always so full of life and energy.
Like John, I haven't dabbled much in traditional, since digital makes everything very convenient. I mean, I HAVE worked traditionally before, just not as much. It's very much a science that I haven't mastered.
John, that was a very nice description you painted there. I second Ast's notion of doing something with it.

[johnway]

Hi Guys i might try and cook something up but you know me, i don't do things in half measures and my ambitions easily outstrip my skill.

I do have some ideas on parts of the story and such. i'll spoil the ending now; The fallen knight doesn't succeed. After all the violence and bloodshed, his ultimate plan to bring the country to its knees fails.

But on the other hand the irony is that the fallen knight is the real victor. Although he becomes the monster his noble plans eventually gave way to all out revenge, he does enough to change the country for the better. Most of the (corrupt) leadership is dead, the entire population united as one and past social prejudices disappear. The heroes of the war on both sides become the new leadership paves the way for reform that will encourage prosperity and peace. The knight will go down in history as a monster, but the ideals he once believed and fought for will be his greatest legacy, even if the people don't realize it.

[astrapho]

It's a good ending Keep working at it, your skill will catch up.
Having too much fun in school xD Sorry for the tinyness. I'll get a bigger one :9

[johnway]

gosh that horse archer is nice. I'm actually looking forward to the larger version now!

[astrapho]

Thanks john! Now with a background and mood lighting ;D



edit: watch in HD here!

[johnway]

Now that is awesome astrapho. As always.

[Grieverjoe]

dat lighting tho

[astrapho]

Glad you guys like it

[astrapho]

Felt like giving all my characters a realistic treatment today I feel like it helps me feel out their personalities better even if I'm going to stylize it later.

click for larger

[astrapho]

About an hour's study

[djizomdjinn]

Man these look great. Hard in just the right places, while soft and blended everywhere else.

[astrapho]

Thanks djinn!

I'm on a castle roll right now. Haven't decided what style I should paint them in but I'm having a lot of fun learning about castles. I feel like an evil villain designing one. They're such monstrous death traps. It's still a fantasy castle but heavily french inspired.





quick sketch of the lighting i'm gonna use :9

[astrapho]

Studying skin :9

[astrapho]

Been super busy nowadays but here's an animation experiment :9 I was curious to take a look at what made these kinds of action scenes tick.

[Grieverjoe]

i want more of them kungfu-vikings-with-magic thing. I'll have 12, please.