XP Pen Reconstructed Masterpiece Napoleon Bonaparte

This is my second entry for the “XP Pen Reconstructed Masterpiece” contest. While looking for famous masterpieces I had seen the Napoleon painting before I had decided to paint the Van Gogh painting I made prior. I know I wanted to do something with this recreation, but I didn’t have an idea until this past weekend. I started with the motorcycle first which took the longest since I was mashing different motorcycles together until I arrived at this design. Next came Napoleon which went faster than I thought. I debated whether to have his face uncovered or at least his eyes, but decided to go with a closed helmet in the end. When I finally finished the background I was about to call it done but felt it needed something more when I was looking at the soldiers in the background. After some thought I decided to add a jet which fit perfectly in the blank space and to top it off, also merged well with Napoleon’s hand gesture.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Kodachi Kuno Swimsuit

For the background I once again used some of the new oil brushes for the background. These are made by Martina Palazzese (used brush 04). They add some really cool textures, but sadly they don’t blend. I’m really missing Corel Painter in that sense. Of course I went with an 80s painting style and added two layers of shadows and one of lighting on Kodachi. I was debating on whether the background should be during the day or a sunset. I ended up going with daytime lighting but it does give me an excuse to do another Kodachi painting.

Hasta la proxima,

-Nube

Yamato

This is the painted version of the line art I drew before. It can be seen here:

I quite like her multicolored hair. I wasn’t too sure about the background so I made a simple swirling cloud patterns.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Ten Shin Han Meditation COPIC

This is the colored version of the Ten Shin Han line art I posted here:
https://darkcloudxero.com/2021/05/10/ten-shin-han-meditation-line-art/

It’s been quite a while since I last used Copic markers. There is also a metallic gold pen that I had never tried. In this piece I was contemplating between painting this as either a more realistic style or a stylized one that emulated Buddhist paintings.

Sadly, scanning the finished painting I couldn’t get the color of the gold to pop out correctly. It came out really dark. So I had to edit those golden lines digitally. Which took quite a while… One other problem I ran into was dried up markers. I pushed them to the limit but they did leave streaks on the paper. I decided to leave it as such just to see what kind of effect it would have. Doing large areas is definitely better suited for watercolors.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Rin Shima Next destination COLOR

This is the colored version of the ink drawing I made of Rin Shima which can be seen here.

I decided to do something a bit different in that I wanted to see if I could just modify some reference pictures. I wanted to convey the feeling of accomplishing the goal of reaching a destination and embarking to the next one. As I was painting the raindrops, I decided to add a drop on Shima’s finger which I felt really fit. Because I decided to follow the reference picture a bit too closely, but I guess it was a happy mistake.

References used –

Rin Shima:

pose:

background:

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Rin Shima Next destination Line Art

I had been reading the manga for a while now, but was surprised to learn just how big Yuru Camp is in Japan. That makes me rather happy. I actually went camping last summer. I couldn’t help but remember Yuru Camp. For my first artwork of this series, I picked Rin Shima. I quite like how dependable and independent she is.

pose reference:

Rin Shima:

https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/96378

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Goku Dodging Jump

This is a double feature of sorts. I will be doing two types of painting on this drawing of Goku which has been drawn with ink. I first used watercolors to paint Goku and then I painted him again digitally using Corel Painter 2020. The time between each was very noticeable. The traditional painting took and the digital painting took me only . I really have to think about how I advance after every movement. Meanwhile with digital painting, I seem to have more experience and I can make as many mistakes as I want since I can undo right away. But I guess that doesn’t completely transfer over to traditional. Although I can go as detailed as I want, it might be better if I develop a simpler style like Little Thunders which can be so versatile but not overworked.

This painting has made it clear that I should practice more with watercolors. One other thing I remembered, don’t ink your drawing if you will be using watercolors on it (this is only if the inks aren’t waterproof). Otherwise they will smudge when painting. Instead, go over the lines by pressing hard on them using a pencil (I mean I know this, I don’t know why I didn’t remember). Then erase everything. If done correctly, the lines will be visible even when painting over them. One you are done painting, the line art process can finally be done. This can be done with ink, color pencils or more watercolors.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Airi Jacket

We are actually still getting snow where I live, so that inspired me to finally give this painting a try before the weather finally changes to a warmer one. I really love the colors of Airi in this cold weather and wanted to give it a try for a while now. It’s also been a while since I did a realistic painting so I opted to go for that. There are so many more photos I want to try painting so we’ll see when I get another chance.

This painting is based on Airi’s digital photobook vol. 92. I only used the real tapered wet flat brush for the whole piece. I like the brush but it can be hard to use because when I try to use the same paint color, I can’t quite get it back using the eyedrop tool since each bristle stroke is different and mixes together. I already have a number of paintings lined up where I kept trying out this brush and a new one that I believe is my new main brush, to be used with the oily bristle and tapered oils brush.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Momochi Sunset Study

I recently saw an artist that worked with light colors and used that as an aesthetic advantage. Usually when I paint, almost every time it looks really light so I worried whether it would look well to others or not. So this time I have decided to just paint like usual and try to not overwork the painting too much. What I did want to try though is a version where I just painted and let the colors separate the whole piece as a whole. In the second version I added some lighting to the hair, darkened the lips and added some linework. Personally I prefer the original version more although I do like the the linework version as well. I went for a semi realistic/anime style. This mainly entails that one keeps the detail on the face as flat as possible and making the eyes bigger. Of course one can play with the style and how far to push the details which will give different effects. I chose to add a good number of facial details but using very light tonal changes that are noticeable but that are not very abrupt and still keep the coloring style a bit flat. As for the eyes I decided to keep the main shape and colors intact but made them bigger and enlarged the eyelashes a bit.

This study was done using a photo from Momoko Tsugunaga’s last photobook. Happy Birthday Momochi, thank you for everything you have done. Even now your work still makes everyone happy. And this of course includes me. Now that more media is becoming available to us overseas fans and that I can understand a bit more Japanese, I have so much media that I can now enjoy for the first time. It’s a shame my skills were not good enough back when you were still active. Although I love that not only did you have a goal in life (as a teacher), but you accomplished it on top of all your idol activities. The motivation you emanate is absolutely stunning. I truly hope that you are doing well and enjoying life. I can only hope that my art reaches you and makes you even just a fraction of the happiness you have given me.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Corel Painter 2021 Illustration

I named it “Panzadores” because I combined pan (bread) and cazadores (hunters). What if there was a world where a witch put a curse on sweet bread and they came alive. The more delicious the bread, the stronger and more dangerous they are. Thus hunters have to be hired in order to defeat and have a chance to actually taste them?

This is a contest entry for the illustration category of the 2021 Corel Painter Contest. I made it just in time, the deadline is on Feb 19.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Pan Mexicano

This will eventually be a part of a contest entry I want to enter to the Corel Painter contest. But for now I will upload the current background.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

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