Momochi ice cream float 1st Surface Pro 5 Painting/ Review

Every once in a while I check out the Goodwill auctions and was surprised when I found a Surface Pro 5 being sold. From the pictures shown it seemed to be in pristine condition and had the keyboard cover included. So I decided to take a chance and bid on it. And to my surprise I won. It took a while to get to me which sucked but in the mean time I ordered the accesories that were missing (these being the charger and the surface pen). Luckily I managed to find a genuine used charger and the pen was on sale for that week I was searching for it. When I finally received it I was surprised that it came with the original packaging. The actual surface pro was a bit dirty but looked almost new after I cleaned it. It has me thinking just who bought it and why they decided to donate it. I got the i5 with 8gb or ram which worried me since Corel Painter works better with stronger specs.

You know it’s funny, I was a bit stressed since I had to remind the Goodwill to send it. Which made the wait time longer than it should have been. But by the time it arrived, it was pretty much already October… meaning Inktober. It wasn’t till just the end of last week that I had a chance to finally test it out.

And the first model to be painted using my new Microsoft Surface Pro 5 is Momoko Tsugunaga. This time I used some screenshots I took from her last Photobook where she was inside an ice cream parlor. There were many amazing scenes to choose from, but I decided on this when where Momochi was looking out the window pensively as she was reflected off a picture frame. I painted the background first, then to Momochi and finished with Momochi’s reflection. I think she came out super cute.

So, how did the Surface Pro handle Corel Painter? To my surprise it was quite smooth. Although some things were a bit slow to react (such as making successive brush strokes or changing the brush size using the bracket keys), it wasn’t really by that much. All in all, as long as I have it in high performance during painting sessions it works without any problems. I’m actually quite amazed. Now, I haven’t really been keeping track but painting nonstop with High performance enabled gave the battery about 3-4 hours of life before I had to recharge it. Recharging is also quite amazing, it takes about 30-45 minutes to fully charge it. After a full days worth of painting the Surface Pro did get warm but it wasn’t uncomfortably hot at all which again was also very surprising considering just how thin it is. I already made a second painting so this quick first impressions is taking into account both experiences. What’s great is that it works as a tablet with the power of a computer at all other times. I was worried that I may have had to upgrade to a new stronger version but this works amazingly well.

I recommend.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

First XP Pen Artist Pro 16 Painting

This painting is somewhat bittersweet. On the one hand, it is the first painting done with my new drawing tablet but that is because my old Xp pen was no longer working properly after the latest Windows update. (I’ll probably talk about it more later at some point). I recently got a third job so time for painting has decreased by a good bit so I will probably be posting less than before. Maybe that’s a good thing though, it will give me some time to step away from a painting and look at them with fresh eyes.

Although I have only had my new tablet for a couple of days, I am enjoying it. The new monitor setup is a lot more comfortable as well. Man, it feels great being able to use Corel Painter again. I’m still a bit rusty with the oil brushes so this whole painting was mostly done using the sergeant brush. The model that will be the first painting is Momochi. I got the reference from a screenshot that I took from the making of “Hatachi Momochi”. Video Photobooks are great because I can get more references. Man, I’m glad I live in this amazing era. Thank you Momochi for making so many video appearances!

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

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

Guts Despair and Goodbyes V2

I drew this way back in May of this year as a tribute to Kentaro Miura. Looking at it again though, I wasn’t too happy with how thin Guts looked. So I fixed that digitally with Photoshop. I ten added some more hatching and some screentone.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Momoko resting on arms

I was wondering why my artwork was looking a bit blocky when I was resizing it to a smaller size so that I could post it online and just now remembered that I didn’t change my settings that I used for creating pixel art. Changing the resample option to automatic and that did the trick. I think I have about one or two weeks worth of artwork that have been resized using the wrong settings… What’s funny is that I already had a resized version up and ready to post, but I’m glad I forgot.

The line art for this painting is quite old now. Its from way back in June. I remember trying to paint it not long after drawing it but didn’t like what I was coming out with. I decided to go with a Copic/watercolor like style. Using Toko Suzuki’s brush is great since it has both texture and opacity control. I really like the amount of detail and control I can get with it. There’s many ways to paint this Momoko drawing but I have couple others that I can try that out with.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Momochi pink swimsuit

This is a painting of Momochi that I have been working on whenever I had some free time during the weekend. This time I used a couple of oil brushes from my collection. I will probably be making another version where I make it a bit more anime like. But first I wanted to go for a more realistic feel. The reference I used was a screenshot from “Off Momochi in Okinawa”. I think this will give me more options in terms of what I can study and paint as well as look closer at poses with movement. I’ve been wanting to also do some animations so this will really help.

Momochi looks freakin adorable as usual.

I have a couple of momochi ink drawings that I haven’t painted yet, I’ll have to think what coloring style I will use for them.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Asuka and Rei Commemoration Line Art

The new Evangelion movie has finally been released here in the States. But I have yet to see it… This drawing is to commemorate it’s release. Really looking forward to watching it when I get a chance.

Hasta la proxima,

-Nube

Lady Naoko Kawai Study

I’ve been itching to do another Naoko painting lately. While looking through my references I came upon what looks to be a poster that says “[Seikodo] Lady Naoko” (another poster did not have Seikodo on it) and some more text below tI’ve been itching to do another Naoko painting lately (I still am). While looking through my references I came upon what looks to be a poster that says “[Seikodo] Lady Naoko” (another poster did not have Seikodo on it) and some more text below that which I can’t quite read but I believe a part of it has Naoko’s full name. On the top right of the poster is some kanji that I translated as “girls bloom”. On the side is some small text that’s also hard to read (I think it has this text: “夕女は。悪いて大人になる” although the kanji is quite hard to make out since it’s so blurry)If anyone knows what this poster is for, do let me know. Just searching for Lady Naoko yields no results.

Reference used:

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Akane Jogging

This painting is influenced by the poster of “Maboroshi no mizuumi”, it reminded me of the first episode of Ranma where we were shown how diligent Akane was in her training. Looking at the plot of the movie though, it has a rather sad plot. That was a bummer. I wanted to do an 80s anime style where I try to replicate Ranma 1/2s look.

Poster used: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0226998/mediaviewer/rm112027904/

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Confident Futaki and Insecure Koharu

I’m quite enjoying these latest chapters of Watamote and the depth they are giving to the side characters. What was a greater surprise to me was that the attention was directed towards Futaki, aka Emoji mkII. I always liked when she would appear every once in a while so this better look at her character and how she takes gaming super seriously to the point of training is somehow super motivational. For those of us who have a passion we take seriously, this is very relatable. And of course, I’m glad that things are making Koharu Minami look deeper into her personality and her actions. Hopefully she will grow as a person and her relationships with people will truly be genuine.

I decided to paint a scene of them in the weight room since it’s both comical and also a special place for this odd pair-up.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

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