New art update

I'm still working on my second Bouguereau copy as well as my grandfather's portrait. I've been slacking for a while but I'm back in the game and really motivated. I want to finish a couple things before March ends to have ready to show at the Illustration Master Class in June. Here's the Boug copy of "The Abduction of Psyche" as well as a 3 hour portrait I did in class tuesday night. The Boug copy is just the first layer of paint. I'm trying to keep the skin tones bright and higher chromatically so that when I go and place the grayer skin tones on top the vibrant undertones show thru in some areas, like Bouguereau himself worked. I actually am doing this painting with the color palette of Bouguereau, at least according to his students, courtesy of the ARC website. The three hour portrait was just too much fun to do. It was a two week project, but I missed last week's class and so had to play catch up with the rest of the class. I exceeded my own expectations and received the biggest compliment of all when the lovely Joan, our model, told me as we walked to our cars that she really liked my portrait of her. A+ Julian, A+. Feel free to rip me to shreds though haha.

Bouguereau copy

This is the copy I mentioned before that I was working on. I spent about 10 hours on it. I posted the half way finished version a couple days ago, its here again for further comparison. Looking my finish next to the actual piece, which I downloaded from artrenewal.org, I still see a lot of mistakes. HOWEVER... there are quite a few landmark milestones as far as my painting application and technique is concerned. I'm incredibly happy with how the values turned out. They're subtle and similar to the way Bouguereau handled modeling form. The skin tone is not the same as the original, but I'm not bothered by it. The value structure is still there, off by a smidge, but there. I'm going to do two more Bouguereau studies and time myself at 10 hours each. I'll even keep a time chart to make sure I don't over do it. I could have continued on this, obviously, but I felt that the 10 hours is good training to build speed and accuracy. I have the last of a bunch of favor pieces to do in Feb, but I'll time manage myself to allow 10 hours for these copies so I can do one per week. After the last one is done, I'll do a portrait or self-portrait with Bouguereau inspired palette and technique. It'll definitely be an intensive painting month. I look forward to seeing my own progress. All comments welcome.

Randomness

Fun fact: Stick your oil palette in the freezer. THe paint stays fresh longer, doesn't skin over, and is ready to use the next day and can stay wet for a loong time. How did I figure this out? Well I read Terese Nielson's blog, she mentioned keeping it in the freezer as a way to keep it fresh. I, for some time, had been keeping my palette for my intermediate painting class in my car all week. It hasn't been out of my car for about 3 weeks. Every time I've gone into class, my puddles of paint are pretty good, ready to use. Even the fast drying earth colors only had a very mild skin on them. So reading Terese's blog informed my unexpected experimentation. So since that I've been jamming my palette into my mini fridge in my studio. Works like a charm! I should try the clove oil she mentioned as well...

I've been working on a Bouguereau copy. One of his studies of a head for a painting. Its almost done. I'll most likely have pictures up soon, I'm quite proud of it.

BREAKING NEWS! My brother just saw a ghost in our basement. We were watching the G3 concert Dvd downstairs before, taking a break from painting (me) and homework (him). My mom asked me to go cook spaghettis, so I paused the dvd and andy turned off the lights and the tv, and all that. So whatever. Literally about 5 minutes before I began typing this he calls me, I go and i hear the music playing, so I'm like meh, I don't feel like going downstairs. he comes up, and he tells me he just saw a ghost. I stare at him with a face saying "you're full of shit" but he says he went downstairs, he thought i was watching the DVD because it was. Now remember, I heard the DVD playing loud when I went to see why he called me. He then said he went to get his airsoft gun (he felt safer with it, so let him be) and as he rounded the corner to see if I was there, he saw a figure turn and vanish. Creepy! Especially since my studio is RIGHT THERE and I'm a night person. I'm going to be pooping in me pants tonight :)

"Dragonflower"

Hello hello hello! So 2 posts ago I introduced some sketches and a sketchbook finish render for an idea of a girl coming out of a flower. Here is the final drawing as well as the painting after 2 hours last night (stage 2) and then how it looks now after painting for about 6 hours on and off today (stage 3). I even got a name for it, and I might be inspired enough to write a short story or poem to go with the finish. We'll see how that pans out. But this is a big thing for me because this is the first time in a long time that I have used acrylics. I'm not using it to finish the painting, but more for a really worked out underpainting for when I start going over it in oils. I'm leaving the flower and the girl for strictly oils, since that level of detail and subtlety I only know how to do in oils. But being able to paint that much of the landscape background in one day... I must say I'm quite intrigued. So here it is, without further ado.

Save the date!!!

March 8, 2009 at the Montclair Art Museum, the kind folks who gave me a job, are having a momentous and utterly extraordinary opening. The Wyeths: Three Generations will have over 60 paintings, drawings, etc from N.C., Andrew, and James. Its bound to be a spectacular event and I'm hoping that any illustrator who lives anywhere within driving distance of the MAM will be able to make it out. Here's the website for the museum with a bit more information:
http://montclairartmuseum.org/wyeth/
I'll post any news I find out from work on here for everyone to read. Just wanted to share in the awesomeness.

New idea

The initial sketch evolved in my sketchbook a couple months ago, inspired by a stock photo from deviantart. It sat in my sketchbook, just waiting for me to use it. So finally, I dug it out, redrew it in my other sketchbook and fine tuned it, making it pretty. Then I thought, gee... what on earth can I possibly do with this drawing to take it from the page to a painting? So I spent a few days pondering. AHA! The serpentine coils around her initially was just fabric, but I started thinking of it as a vine, with thorns. So she'll be coming out in bloom from the flower that I drew, composited from a couple flower photos I found. The question at hand is what will be in the background? I want the horizon line to be low. She's high up in the air coming out of this thing, we're looking at her and down at whatever. Mountains perhaps? Those sound good since I want to try using muted colors and a limited palette, reserving accent tones for her and the flower only. Maybe a galaxy? Or a planet being slowly eaten up by a black hole? I'm still doing sketches for that, but here are the 3 initial stages of this personal project. Enjoy!

News

No art posting today. The Conan painting from the last post is going to be scrapped and started anew. I'll finish this one more for practice to get skin tones and fire and background, etc. After the fantabulous criticisms of Donato Giancola and Todd Lockwood, two phenomenal illustrators of the fantasy/sci-fi genre, I've decided to start the subject from scratch and make it 100 times better than this current incarnation. So stay tuned for surprises. Also, this month is dedicated to my relearning of anatomy and to better grasp certain areas that give me a hard time to render (namely hands and feet) and also to strengthen my visual memory so when I embellish my photo reference, it doesn't look forced or lame. Another bit of news... I want to create a portfolio of portraits so I can begin advertising myself as a portrait artist as well as an illustrator. So thats all for now. I don't know how much I'll be posting this month except for a few portraits and a finished painting that hasn't seen the light of day for a loooong time.

Conan progress

Here is Conan in its current, about 65% done phase. I just need to finish his arms, his head, the severed head and some armor detail that'll be added in, as well as the middle ground. I need to figure out that middle ground. His head and helmet won't take very long since its already blocked in pretty nicely. I'm adding a gauntlet to his arms because it looks better than a plain arm. His scars haven't been painted in yet, nor has his necklace, so all in due time. The middleground is what bugs me... rabble rabble rabble

Criticism

I'm open to criticism from anyone even if you hate my work, I honestly don't care what you say as long as there is merit and knowledge behind your dislike. Just don't be an ignorant idiot like this anonymous moron named "The Hand of God" and leave me comments as unenlightening as this critique:

"WOW THIS SHIT BLOWZ ASSSSS, like holy damn son.



...damn this shit sux.


p.s. holy shit this painting blows major aSS"

I wanna insult him/her, but its not worth it :) So bash me all you want so long as you know what you're talking about, otherwise comments like this will just be deleted

teaser

The good part of a painting I'm doing for Primordial Traditions :)